All Comments on 'Christmas Lost'

Despite the need for some more polishing and editing, this is a terrific first chapter to a deeply emotional story. It is clear the "hero" of this story is a self-centered, despicable heart surgeon who has so many arrogant, hateful qualities that it is difficult to be sympathetic towards him -- his wife, Jan, pegged him properly. Yet I am sympathetic towards him, and I think that was Joesephus' intent. I suspect the next chapter would involve some sort of redemption. Maybe his personality would change for the better as with a frontal lobotomy (used in the old days for certain, violent psychotics). Maybe as the patient he will finally "get it" and realize the importance of having a heart (one would think a heart surgeon would have one, but the stereotype is that many don't). We never really learn why Dr. Nelson fell out of love with his wife, and it is never clear why he is such a shit of a person. It is unclear why his wife and he fell apart in terms of their love and their marriage, but I suspect part of it is the poor communication between them, apparently more the fault of Dr. Nelson than his lawyer wife. I do think it is possible (I've read of such things) for a brain tumor to cause weird behavior where the person believes it is really behavior he/she chose to pursue, yet it was truly the tumor that caused awful personality traits. Maybe a second chapter could focus on that, even if a "frontal lobotomy" turns out not to be necessary. I'm not sure I could write as well as Joesephus, especially with the religious overtones his stories often included, but given time, it would be very interesting to write an ending. Possibly DG_Hear or another writer with good story-telling skills would be interested in tackling this.

Dr. Strange (Marvel Comics) story where the surgeon is an arrogant bastard who had to lose everything in order to get back his humanity. Perhaps DGHear or curious2C could finish this story as a tribute to the creativity and talent of Joesephus. There are a lot of possibilities for this story. It would a shame for it to end like this.

Josephus could have made our world so much interesting.

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Vulcan's comment reminded me of Coaster2's tale of the house wife who decided to make money taking off her clothes for no obvious reason. This was then blamed on a brain tumour. Many people questioned this solution, possibly because they wanted a more detailed and interesting explanation. I felt at that time the fact that she died indicated that the author felt she was guilty of something....

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JR82 is correct Josephus would love you guys to try to finish the story for him.

I miss his stories,this has the beginings to one of the better stories in this catagory!!!

The English language developed, I believe, as an effort to pin the fly on the exact place on the map where it was meant to be, and if the word used to place the fly there was unfamiliar to the reader, then whether he/she dropped out of school in the second grade of elementary school or had two doctorates behind her/his name the dictionary was developed for one's education, so go use it. Thanks to jonnyrebel82 and Eric Thread for letting Joe bend our minds once more and sending us on the way to find the most reasonable continuation of the story, even if it is not the "happiest".

As someone who considered him a friend and mentor (a strange thing to say about a kid half my age), I want to thank you for submitting this. It's wonderful to get to read something else of his I didn't know existed. Joesephus was a great guy and more than willing to bend over backwards to help someone in need. His death was tragic, senseless and leaves a hole in the fraternity of serious writers on Lit.

"If you were my son I'd operate. If you were my father I wouldn't. " What wonderful insight. Do everything you can regardless of reality with your children but accept reality when it comes to your elders. I am not condeming, I am cheering. I would try anything for my wife and my son but........sorry I am getting morose. I know you are in a better place but thank you for all your stories. Jim in AB

"O" so little we learn, But only the wise Know, that at the end of the game both the King and the pawn, go into the same bag...

I think J's command of the English language was far superior than some writers where English is their mother tongue.

J was an excellent writer. Wish there were more of him....

Magnificent. I am especially impressed as English was not his native language. Wonderful story and I am heartbroken that he never got to finish it.

Joesephus loved giving us mini morality plays as short stories. This is a classic case study of how to create powerful characters: pathos with the girls, a god complex in the protagonist, a love interest and stable parent with the wife and mother, and ample doses of regret, remorse, repentance, and reflection all leading up to an extended resolution through restitution.

This could have gone many different directions. I have my ideas, but I am a hopeless romantic, and more of a reader than a writer.

Thank you for posting this, and I am glad the text was left as is. We have all seen the disasters foisted on the public by editors, family members, and literary "geniuses" who take it upon themselves to provide us with their version of an otherwise unpublished manuscript. Sometimes the material left behind was there because the author did not deem it worthy of publication. Hemingway and the fiascos published by his sons come to mind.

I am sure MR J would have no objections, TK U MLJ LV NV

Would be interesting to see some one complete this unfinished story. ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐

Someone could finish this as a Chapter 2. It needs resolution.

All hail the great Joesephus!!!!

He is greatly missed!!!

And now we'll never know how Josephus would have finished it.

What's great pity.

What a lost talent.

if he is monitoring THIS story and he has contact with the estate of Josephus, perhaps he can view some scribble, crib notes, or personal chats & correspondence with other peers he was friends with, I believe great artists have tendencies to leave a conglomerate of work and unfinished unpublished writings,,,Good luck, TK U MLJ LV NV

RIP, thanks for the stories. May God bless you.

Josephus was quite a remarkable talent, indeed.

RIP

I just found this author over the last 3 days. I had not known he past in October 2007. I never look at the dates of published stories.

Over these past three days I have written a couple of comments that slammed his stories and loved his stories. Then I came to this one with the note from jonnyrebel82 telling of his passing with the month and year. I want to say thank to jonnyrebel82 for publishing this one. It is a beautiful story with a story-line that if you have ever lived around the world other than just in the US you seen the stories and tales of parent taking their children to keep them from their spouses. Just most do not have resources to do it in this manner.

But this story was a good tribute to a good writer and well worth the read.

Thanks for the stories

RIP Joesephus

JH4Fun

Man. This is what I call having a legacy. Having people comment about your work, so long after you had passed, simply awesome.

Personally, I've liked what I had read of his works. Something for the other authors in here to aspire to.

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Gripping story. Some minor things cropped up but was posthumously posted first draft right before the author's unfortunate passing. Suspect that the brain tumor at least influenced his flight with the girls. That was irrational. The cheating for anal with a nurse was probably (mostly) the god complex that afflicts most surgeons.

A wonderful insight into a young man who took the at of learning seriously.

Maybe his characters were over-achievers, but maybe that was a reflection on him.

There is more power in expanding one's grip on language than most understand... especially in today's world, where education is not really geared to enabling a student to understand philosophy and history and this their very own nature, but instead, making them productive cogs in the corporate machine... not daring to think for themselves but to produce for their masters; increasing the grip of organised structure and improving the bottom line.

It's been proven that the expansion of your vocabulary and the learning of more language actually allows you to think to a higher level.

If this was what Josephus was doing, then having his life cut short is not only an injustice to him, but a loss for the rest of us.

Thank you for posting this story in his honour.

"Man is a spiritual creation, and until you find something bigger than yourself you'll never fill that hole in your soul..." How many people live 3x as long as Joesephus and never figure that out.

Tumor like that could explain a lot of behavioral changes. Not sure where Josephus planned to take the story. Great writer. He is missed. RIP Josephus.

How to create a metaphor that encompassed the hubris of mankind through a personal narrative that is parallel to the 'tower of Babel'. The ending feels similar to mankind on the brink of mass extinction by global climate change. ("To be or not is be, that I is the question?")