The Ascent of the Writer

By Benjamin Weilert

What does the evolution of a writer look like? Poems, articles, and short stories can all explore ideas that the writer uses later for larger projects. "The Ascent of the Writer" covers the last 20 years of Benjamin M. Weilert's writing. Many of his stories have already been published elsewhere, but this collection brings them all together for the first time to show how concepts he wrote about years ago eventually made it into his novels.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Benjamin Weilert
• Release date: Sep 8, 2020
• ISBN: 9781005780173

Benjamin Weilert

Benjamin M. Weilert . . . What does the 'M' stand for?Mountain Climber, Movie Connoisseur, Master of Science, and (of course) Multi-novel WriterBenjamin M. Weilert was born in Colorado in 1985.While he went to school for Mechanical Engineering (eventually earning a Master’s Degree), he has found science to be interesting enough to write fiction about it. He likes to classify his novels as “science fantasy,” wherein the science is real and (semi) accurate, but portrayed in a fantasy setting to make it accessible to non-scientific readers. If you want stories that are surreptitiously educational, he’s your man.

Book preview

The Ascent of the Writer

A collection of poems, articles, and stories by

Benjamin M. Weilert

Fiction by Benjamin M. Weilert:

The Ascent of the Writer

The Fluxion Trilogy

First Name Basis

Second to None

The Third Degree

also available . . .

The Fluxion Trilogy Omnibus (with Appendix)

Non-Fiction by Benjamin M. Weilert:

Cinema Connections: a never-ending 6 Degrees of Kevin Bacon

Fourteener Father: a memoir of life above 14,000 ft.

Connect with the author online!

www.benjamin-m-weilert.com

1st Edition

Copyright © 2020 Benjamin M. Weilert

All rights reserved.

ISBN: 1005780173

ISBN-13: 978-1005780173

Smashwords Edition, License Notes

This e-book is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This e-book may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each recipient. If you’re reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then please return to Smashwords.com (links located above) and purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author.

Dedication

To those who dedicate themselves to their craft.

Contents

Introduction

I – Poems

II – Articles

III – Flash Fiction

IV – Short Stories

V – Novelette

Acknowledgements

About the Author

Introduction

Back in 2012, I received a book from my brother as a groomsman gift for his wedding. It was a collection of novels and stories from Kurt Vonnegut from 1950 to 1962 (ISBN: 978-1-59853-150-3). Having already read most of Vonnegut’s best-known books—like Slaughterhouse-Five, Cat’s Cradle, and Breakfast of Champions—I was already used to Vonnegut’s polished satirical style. The stories contained in that collection, however, were some of his early work. I was fascinated to see how some concepts he explored in a short story would eventually grow into the famous novels he would write years later.

I’m no Kurt Vonnegut.

This year, I adopted the idiom of hindsight is 20/20 and took some time to look back on the writing I’ve accomplished over the last 20 years. Granted, 20 years ago, I was starting high school. My love of writing certainly began to bloom again after being squashed in the academics of elementary school. After being forced into the strict five-paragraph essay format or writing papers on a variety of scholastic topics, I started to find the fun in writing again.

In my basement, I have a horde of memories stashed away. I won’t go so far back to bore you with the dozens of books I made when I was in the first grade. They weren’t terrible, but they weren’t particularly good, either. Whatever happened between this prolific stage and the end of my high school education is a mystery to me—probably repressed, so I don’t recall how I hated to write.

All that changed when I entered college. I was able to write for fun in my spare time. I was able to write for me. I explored ideas that rattled around in my brain and, in so doing, develop my love for writing again. Little did I know at the time, but those ideas were the seeds of more significant projects.

After I graduated college with a Master’s Degree in Mechanical Engineering, I had even more free time at my disposal since I no longer had homework to do when I came home from my full-time job. I wrote my first novel in November of 2010. It was at this point where I started to take writing more seriously. A whole book is a huge undertaking, and I figured out how to do it through the help of National Novel Writing Month (NaNoWriMo). I haven’t looked back since and now have ten manuscripts written—some of which I’ve gone on to self-publish.

This book is a collection of poems, articles, flash fiction, and short stories (with a single novelette tacked on the end) that I believe shows my evolution as a writer. A fair number of these pieces have been published before in newspapers and anthologies. Others didn’t quite make the cut but explored scenarios or ideas that I either used in novels or plan to expand into larger stories in the future.

Evolution claims that single cells evolved into multicellular organisms, which in turn evolved into every living thing we know. I like to think that words evolve into poetry, which can become flash fiction or expound into short stories or novellas—or even a full novel or series of books.

This evolutionary growth is the structure I have applied to the following sections of this book: start small, then grow from there. Each piece in these sections are arranged in chronological order of their publication or first writing (if unpublished). This organization is to the best of my ability as it’s difficult to recall precisely when I wrote something when a lot has happened in the decades since.

It is a humbling experience to collect 20 years of material into a single work. If anything, it has made me excited to see where my writing takes me in the next two decades.

Benjamin M. Weilert (c. 2020)

I - Poems

Poeticus simplicita

While I find poems to be quite restricting, there is an elegance to choosing the exact right words to convey something in as concise a way as possible.

I only dabbled in poetry a little in high school as part of a class assignment, which is where the first four poems in this section originated. The next two poems were both published in a creative arts anthology late in my college career. The most recent poem I wrote was for my vows at my wedding.

First written February 15, 2001.

Time

Passing by at the speed of light, there’s no

stopping the continuous flight of hours

and minutes and seconds gone by.

Never to be seen again by any

eye. Each moment we

grow older, the

more we

see,

until our

heads are laid

to be; a sign of the

test of time it takes to

make a difference in the world

that aches, for a savior, the Christ,

the only one, who was God’s only son.

First written February 15, 2001.

Water and Fire

Flowing through our mind

Reflecting into soul

Clears away the past

Gives warmth to the cold

A light to those in the dark

Ever burning now

First written February 15, 2001.

Old Man Winter

Once there was a man who was cold

Go to Greenland, one day he was told

So he hopped on a plane

To be seen soon again

And griped there was way too much snow

First written February 15, 2001.

World Series of 2005

A pitch, a hit, and a run to first base.

There stands at the plate a beast of a man.

All fans know this one to be the team’s ace.

The last time he was up, outfielders ran

to catch the ball and get Mark McGwire out.

So this time the smart outfielders ran back.

With a full wind-up, a cheer, and a shout,

McGwire neatly bunted, not a loud crack.

There was a surprise for the team, no snap.

They scrambled to get the ball to a plate.

Catcher caught it and put it in Mark’s lap.

It was all over, the team was too late;

sadly, beaten, did no victory jive.

They had lost the World Series of 2005.

First published in The Oredigger Volume 87, Issue 11 – March 7, 2007.

Re-published in Colorado School of Mines Creative Journal: High Grade 2008.

Aria in White – 1st Movement

Piece by piece, the slate is wiped clean:

Nature’s blank canvas with a shimmering gleam.

Marching quietly toward the ground at night,

Skier’s domain comes back to life.

As the white blanket is unfurled,

The travelers’ bane constricts their world.

Unassembled artillery for many a war,

Changing the landscape near and far.

Melting clay in the craftsman’s hands,

Purity destroyed by the shifting sands.

First written April 7, 2008.

Published in Colorado School of Mines Creative Journal: High Grade 2009.

Genetics

He gave me all of my logical sensibility

but she gave me the random spark

To look at things in sequence

and to intuitively trust the shot in the dark.

Observing the wonders of the rational

while acknowledging the chaotic din

And the analysis that is always needed

to give the mundane a creative spin.

A father’s objectivity forever

countered by a mother’s subjectivity in full

While looking at all the parts,

recognizing the magnificence of the whole.

His gift of the left to my life

is complimented by the addition of her right.

Within me are two halves of a whole combined to make this shining light.

First published on my wedding day, March 14, 2015.

Vows

From the first day we met, my life has changed.

God placed you in plain sight for me to find.

A match more perfect could not be arranged.

You’re so beautiful, so thoughtful, so kind;

I need no map when I’m lost in your eyes.

When we’re together, nothing else distracts.

Our life might be tough, full of tear-stained sighs,

And disagreements: these I know as facts.

It still does not change me down to my core.

I want to be, for all eternity,

Your knight in shining armor, mi amoré.

Protecting your dear life for all to see.

We are wed; I desire for no one less

Than Laura: my love, my smile, my princess.

II – Articles

Journalis satirica

The same brother who gave me the Vonnegut book at his wedding is the one who piqued my interest in writing for the college newspaper for the Colorado School of Mines. While I wrote plenty of articles for The Oredigger covering various lectures and school events (of which I won’t bore you with here), there were two types of articles I enjoyed writing every week: satire and movie reviews.

I attended college from 2004 to 2009. During this time, The Onion was experiencing its heyday and was the premier source of satire on campus. It is then no surprise that The Oredigger also had its own satire section at the end of each issue titled Fool’s Gold. Even though I loved writing a satire of the everyday situations a student might experience at a university focused on science and engineering, I haven’t found an outlet for this type of writing since then. Sure, I write essays and articles for the quarterly magazine at my church…but that’s not satire.

As for the movie reviews, I eventually took them—most of which went under the Must See Movies column that I created—and evolved them into my Cinema Connections blog that ran from 2012 to 2019. In 2019, I collected the 400 blog posts and published a book of the same name. I have included one of the Must See Movies at the end of this section that didn’t make it into the Cinema Connections rotation. Additionally, I still write movie reviews and post them on my personal website (www.benjamin-m-weilert.com) every week.

First published in The Oredigger Volume 89, Issue 1 — September 1, 2008.

Shakespeare demands royalties

$2B or not $2B? That is the question

Benjamin M. Weilert

Shakes Spears for Fun

Although he’s been dead for almost 400 years, William Shakespeare arose from the dead this week to claim royalties for everything based off of his works. Julie Caplet was working the desk at the National Copyright office when the decomposing poet came strolling in asking for a check.

I don’t know who this guy thinks he is, with his frilly, soiled clothes and pale complexion, but I’m not giving any money to anyone who smells like rotting flesh, recalls Caplet.

The lady doth protest too much, methinks, replied the reanimated playwright.

When asked why he chose now to collect on his intellectual property, Shakespeare said, Some are born great, some achieve greatness, and some have greatness thrust upon them. However, one cannot cash in on that greatness until he’s been dead for a while.

The decaying Brit said that he refused to rob banks because of his invulnerability to bodily harm due to a strict moral standing. Picking his jaw up from the floor and reattaching it to his head, he said, For I can raise no money by vile means.

Unfortunately, that’s not how the entertainment industry sees it. We’re ruined. Completely and utterly ruined, was the response from filmmaker Hamlet Macbeth Othello VIII. There have been no original ideas in Hollywood for 75 years! We’ve just been using his material over and over again since it seems to sell tickets.

Royalties will be paid to Shakespeare for every film that’s based on any of his plays. This includes studio profits, DVD sales and syndication.

Films such as 10 Things I Hate About You, She’s the Man, West Side Story, and Shakespeare in Love will be among the affected movies. Speculation has arisen as to the timing of Shakespeare’s resurrection in regards to the recent opening of the movie Hamlet 2. After screening the film, Shakespeare’s reaction was good. That’s actually the exact plot I had in mind for the sequel to Hamlet.

With the rising of one of the great literary figures of all time, other industries are bracing for similar circumstances. Zondervan, one of the lead publishers of Bibles, dreads the second coming of Jesus Christ. If he comes back, he’ll want a hefty chunk of change. It’ll definitely be his red letter day, said Zondervan CEO, Gideon Zondervan.

Heaven refused to comment on the exact time of Christ’s second coming but did suggest that we shouldn’t be starting any long term projects any time soon

First published in The Oredigger Volume 89, Issue 2 — September 8, 2008.

Physics Department Arrested

Some laws were not meant to be broken

Benjamin M. Weilert

Physicist

S.W.A.T. teams broke into Meyer Hall last Wednesday because of some disturbing reports about the activities of the resident physicists. These reports described the strange behavior of the students and faculty of the Physics department. Improper facial grooming, lack of proper footwear, and levitation were among the items on the reports.

Unfortunately for the department, the levitation charge was the most serious as it broke one of the Universe’s most sacred laws. According to Universal penal code I1643-N, All things, regardless of sentience, must obey the law of gravity. Upon breaking said law, the perpetrator must be fastened to the ground with large metal spikes.

Sergeant Major Isaac Gottfried commented on the situation, It was the strangest thing I’d ever seen. All these hippies were floating around the room, throwing Frisbees and talking gibberish about spatial singularities within the frequency domain of time, or some such nonsense. However, the law is very firm in its wording. With a sick and twisted smile, he produced a large sledge hammer and some railroad spikes.

The department head refused to comment on the incident, but did mention that they would fight this through whatever means possible. A case this large could just overshadow the previous science related court case, Newton v. Leibniz, which was settled out of court, in a boxing ring.

Even though the entire department was arrested, they believe to have the upper hand in their case. Upon further investigation of the levitating physicists, one could see very fine strings holding them up off the ground. According to a statement released on Thursday, the Physics department had this to say, We’re not breaking the law of gravity, because of the simple fact that we’re relying on string theory to levitate. Most people don’t understand string theory, so it’s only natural to brand it as witchcraft.

Newton v. Leibniz. This groundbreaking case was settled out of court and in the ring.

First published in The Oredigger Volume 89, Issue 3 — September 15, 2008.

Truth behind Genius Juice

Student secretions revealed as the secret

Benjamin M. Weilert

Sweatpants Enthusiast

With its appearance a few years ago, Genius Juice has been a healthy alternative to soft drinks offered at free food functions. Many assume that the bottled water is produced the same way that all other bottled waters are: a garden hose in some guy’s backyard. Unfortunately, the truth about Genius Juice is much more disturbing.

Each week, Mines students of various disciplines and backgrounds take strenuous exams to test their knowledge of the subject matter at hand. Understandable byproducts of these exams are the sweat and tears of the students. Collected and bottled, this is the basis on which Genius Juice is made.

Most students don’t realize that every room on campus slants toward one corner, says Genius Juice creator, Brian Frieze. During every test, the students’ secretions make their way to a drain in the corner of the room. All of these drippings are then collected and processed into Genius Juice. In order to hide the salty origins of the drink, the collected fluids must be processed through many stages including desalinization, homogenization, ionization, and purification. The resulting concoction is the concentrated anguish and frustration of Mines students.

Tenured student, I.B. Faylen commented on the mysterious properties of the drink, After every test I’ve taken, I feel as though I’ve lost some of my intelligence. However, when I drink Genius Juice before an exam, I don’t feel as though I’ve lost as much of my brain. This observation led to testing.

Using laboratory mice, the side effects of Genius Juice were examined. Compared to the control, the mice who drank the Genius Juice exhibited symptoms that are all too familiar to Mines students. The most astonishing result were the mice that drank Genius Juice and raised the IQ of the test subjects by an average of 23 points, making the mice as smart as Alaskan salmon. These same mice, unfortunately, acquired side-effects including acne, alcoholism, sensitivity to ultraviolet light, fear of the opposite sex, and the uncontrollable urge to curl into a fetal position in the darkest corner of the cage.

The lead scientist of the investigation commented, These are amazing results, but what I find most interesting are the statistics on the decomposition of the fluid. Certain exams will provide more stress for students, and thus make for a larger percentage of the collected secretions. Chemistry is the lead producer at 28%, followed closely by Physics at 23% and Physical Activity at 20%. The least amount of product came from the Liberal Arts department, with a total combined contribution of 9%.

Little has been said about marketing Genius Juice as a temporary intelligence booster, but the idea has been explored. Plans are underway to install vending machines with Genius Juice at both the University of Colorado at Boulder and Colorado State University campuses. CU and CSU refused to comment on whether they would accept the machines.

Genius Juice. Not an adequate source of good English skills.

First published in The Oredigger Volume 89, Issue 4 — September 22, 2008.

Mines Improv Theater is scripted

Not off the cuff as originally thought

Benjamin M. Weilert

Founding Member

Every other Tuesday night at 8 p.m. in Berthoud Hall, room 241, one of Mines’ lesser-known groups meets. Mines Improv Theater (MIT), a spin-off group from Mines Little Theater, gets together and has a great time doing improvisational games. However, most of the material used is pre-determined.

One of the games, called Whose Line Is It Anyway? requires audience members to write down phrases that are then used in a scene when the actors run out of ideas for dialogue. Many other games also require pre-planned characters and scenes in order to keep the actors in line. MIT is also infamous for reusing material from previous meetings, which was at its worst during the writer’s strike of 2007. I swear, I’ve been Michael J. Fox at SeaWorld at least 7 times, says longtime member B. Weilert, who has asked that his first name be withheld.

Satire is usually the name of the game, and no subject or person is taboo. Some of the famous figures that have been portrayed at MIT meetings are Michael Jackson, Barack Obama, George W. Bush, and Leonard Nimoy. I’m Jesus! proclaimed member, P. Johnson as he threw rose petals from a strainer.

Despite many of the jokes being pre-planned, occasionally some good one-liners are produced. Such quotes include, …and then she started talking about geosynchronous orbit and I’m like: ‘Take off your pants,’ and Your pelvis is moving so much the camera won’t focus! When all sources of material are depleted, members of the group resort to what is referred to as Plan B.

Audience members at MIT meetings are encouraged to participate, but it is not required. However, the first three rules of MIT are:

1. There is no talking about MIT.

2. THERE IS NO TALKING ABOUT MIT!!

3. New people must participate.

One of the qualms with the MIT audience is that some of them are planted who will laugh at anything. When questioned about this accusation, one of the female members, K. Reinking, giggled so hard she collapsed on the floor and convulsed in laughter for many minutes. Paramedics, who arrived later, pronounced her dead on the scene due to oxygen deprivation.

Mines Improv Theater is always looking for new victims…ahem…I mean, participants, and welcomes anyone who wants to relax after a test and watch people with no dignity make fools of themselves and any investigative reporters present. Their meeting schedule has a meeting this Tuesday, September 23rd, with the next meeting being on October 7th.

This article was a paid advertisement for Mines Improv Theater. All names used in this article have certain omissions in order to protect the identities of its members. Despite appearing in Fool's Gold, this article is 95% true.

First published in The Oredigger Volume 89, Issue 5 — September 29, 2008.

Homecoming Cancelled!

Benjamin M. Weilert

Stick-arounder

An announcement was made by the Mines Activity Council during last Thursday’s movie that the 2008 Homecoming for the Colorado School of Mines will be cancelled. Turns out, no one leaves.

Jessica Bowser, MAC president, had this to say, It’s sad really, but we can’t have a Homecoming if no one ever leaves. This decision was brought on by the results of a recent survey by CSM.

The survey of the student body revealed that no one ever leaves this school. I graduated last spring with a bunch of my friends, but now that I’m back at grad school, I see they also decided to stay, remarked grad student, S. Martin Pantz. Of the undergraduate students who participated in the spring commencement, 100% of them returned to further their studies toward Masters Degrees. The Masters students continued on to Doctorate work, and the PhDs became professors. Professors obtain tenure and/or die of old age or freak chalk/chalkboard accidents.

There was also an interesting anomaly discovered in the study with regards to students who have obtained the