All Comments on 'Dreaming?'

I am assuming this must be a part one because this feels completely unfinished.

There is a deadpan, almost laissez-faire tone that makes this feel like a reminiscence. The actions are poignant and painful in the present tense, but in the context of looking back dispassionately through an entire life of experience, take on an entirely different meaning. Subtle, but powerful. Thanks. *****

Marital fidelity is the elusive butterfly being chased here. mgm gives us a thumbnail snapshot of narrator with good intentions who alternates between being irked and bemused as the females characters clamber onto his cloud . This is a ecent albeit not immortal read if one tempers their expectations. I thank magmaman for sharing.

reveals the truth,,,,even though it is painful. TK U MLJ LV NV

Well, I didn't like the story.

I expect few reader did or will.

The reason I write a comment,

is what the writer wrote in the start

about making stuff up.

We, who are at least relatively

grown up, know regrets.

Something in the past we could

have done better, or at least different.

Many of us would love to go back

and change the things we did.

But we can't.

Magmaman you can!

Don't let the truth spoil a good story.

Take Brenda's virginity and then

fuck her bridemaides!

We would love to read that story :).

Just don't cheat, at least not knowingly.

(You didn't know Brenda was about

to be married)

We'd love to read about what you

should have done ;).

Please stop writing... poor grammar, poor spelling, poor story line.... lowest rating....

way too short

I just have a question: Wasn't Brenda married to Doug? In six months did she get a divorce from cheating Doug and was marrying again with another man? And then fucks her friend just days before the wedding? Not a good sign for her new marriage...I think all that was told before that was just an introduction to the final part...3*

On the surface its a little confusing, there are slightly deeper meanings and stories but it might have gotten lost on some.

Well, I guess, in the end, all writing is a "literary" experiment. But this story is just a glimpse of what happened, with almost no understanding or exploring of the emotions and attitudes involved. Similar to most JPB stories. He comes back from the war, learns his wife has become the village bike, and divorces her. OK, so what? The interlude with Brenda, so she can scratch that lingering itch, is irrelevant to the marriage breakup.

So we have this vignette of a very typical marriage failure related to military service. Apparently happens all the time. What have you or this story added to that sad fact?

Thanks for the effort, I just don't see what you were trying to accomplish. Good writing, but pointless, so no score. Maybe if you finish this I can tell you what I think if it. Until then.

in encouragement for going down a path OTHER than your well worn massage/sex therapy plots of late.

Nothing wrong with those, or THIS, really. But looking at other aspects of cheating? Yes, exploring that needs to be something you do. It saddens me to admit that this is more like a 3 star effort, in that the flash format is best to explore the dissolution of marriage plot. But I firmly wanted the system to know that I gave 5 stars for getting back to other story concepts outside of the world of massage. Keep going, don't stop. Writing is very important to you, AND YOUR writing is important to the rest of us, whether anon can admit it or not.

Thanks!

In fact pretty awful 1*

Damn......downright shabby.....this one should have never made it past a rough draft.

This reminds me of lost opportunities which could have been been disastrous or wonderful. Now I can see who was hot to trot, who was hot for me and who was trying to trap me. The fact is that I would not have been able to distinguish between the types of opportunities.

Doth not a good story make. No drama, no emotion, and no action

Your summation of Vietnam War was spot on , and also your opion of how & when girls lose their virginity. Entertaining as always!

EVER write any stories with truth. Truth can be boring, I suppose. This short is truth, and as a result not a hell of a lot there to satisfy any fantasies. This of course was the 60's, those of you too young to remember just can not be made to understand.

A world of "flower" children, free love, protests in the street, and an attitude towards sex that in some ways makes the promiscuity of today seem.. tame.

Sex was a nice way of saying hello, and I like you.

I was far more conservative back then, WAY behind the world and the way attitudes were going.

Some suggest I should have beaten up Doug, but to be fair there was perhaps a dozen others also and I was still recovering from damn near dying. Maybe hire it done, if I had any money which I didn't.

There was no point.

Just a moment in life, how I belatedly discovered a cheating wife.. by.. cheating, that was what it was I suppose although that really was a very drunken union.

Brenda? She had a fantasy, about she and I making love in that park. That is all that was. A moment like that can stick with a person for a lifetime. Brenda divorced Doug, after that day in the park nearly 50 years ago, I never saw her again.

To those smart enough to understand how life was so long ago, perhaps enjoy my poor efforts, thanks. To the rest, there are other tales, go see if you can find YOUR thing.

I write about mine.

MGM

If you had skill or talent, you could write about truth.

Bullcrap! This is some powerful stuff. Very subtly impactful. Ever read the skewering reader reviews of Michael Chabon or Thomas Styron? Talk about pearls before swine!

An old art prof of mine said once that critics are like eunuchs. They stand by the bedroom door and listen to what's going on, and try to talk about it, but in the end will never have any idea what's really going on in there.

Please don't dumb down your best stuff for the simple minded.

Can only speak for myself but when I got home I fucked every women that couldn't out run me. Had several relationships during those early times and always drank myself to oblivion. When I woke up alone in the dark at a party I would go door to door until I found my date in some one's bed. Wasn't married just involved with some particular women and we had decided our relationship was mutually inclusive. Never felt too bad about the guys...we were all single tho I was the only one with military experience. Hard to come down off an adrenalin rush. Had to use my training and experience to abuse the offending dude sometimes but usually the guys didn't want to tangle...I understood that and how guys are tho it does stick in my craw when the dudes with deferments were fukkin our girls while we were busy elsewhere.

For the woman tho that was a different story...they could choose to be single while we were gone and I might add under almost unbearable stress. So many cheats and sluts in this world who decided to be pin cushions while hubby or fiancé was away eating cold C-rats in a hole during a monsoon or whatever It was always too hot or too wet or, believe it or not cold. While the women partied oblivions to our plight...that somehow was being done for their benefit...as well as all those deferred or 4-F boys there is no way to explain or understand, we didn't ourselves, the adrenalin in our bodies and brains. Many good men are dead or behind bars cuz the betrayal became exquisitely painful and manifested itself in a way that we were familiar with. and dealt with. Eliminate the enemy, the women. Never again trust the side kick or any other woman. Had I not served I think it would be fair to say that I would be chasing and bedding the women just like the college or 4-F guy. They really didn't have a clue how deep our anger was and the women didn't seem to care.

Never hit a woman...apparently the mantra of today. Never hit a woman...such a privileged thought. Sure wasn't the case over there. Woman could and did kill some of us sometimes using their feminine charms as bait for the unsuspecting. Women are as capable (and colder) of killing us but somehow even that was cleaner than coming home and finding your wife or fiancé in bed with another man, or men. The red rage is often uncontrollable. The woman says things like "it's not what it looks like or "I can explain" ect. They do not have my respect.

4 marriages and 50 some years later I still don't trust them and have found they have changed little from 50 yrs ago. For me, its love 'em and leave 'em. That's the way it is. In the words of Catullas "The words of a woman spoken in love ought to be written on the wind or on the swirling waters"

So that's where it left me...supposedly for ye. Who do I get to thank? I guess I can't resist it....Thanks Obama! (I really think he did a great job over all.)

Brenda at the time of the party was married to dough but 6 months later when she screws the protagonist she says she is getting married..when did she get divorced?

It brings out the worst in all humans. My mother told me of females spitting on 4F males who the military rejected for being cowards Meanwhile itchy wives, unlike their husbands and boyfriends, did not go without. Meanwhile on the ship or in camp someone who got off and we're exposed got a blanket party. A piss hard in the bathroom get you killed

Choppy. Vague. Without real direction or plot.

Idiotic and pathetic!!!

Wait until you have written a story before you post. This is a "slice of life" bit that does not quite cut the mustard. 3*

Not a well constructed tale. It doesn't really qualify as a complete story, more like a vignette of an incident.

War and deployment are not friends of lovers. The stress and worry has destroyed innumerable relationships.

Your story was a great example of just telling the truth. Too bad the mental midgets could not see beyond their masturbation fantasies and understand what you wrote.

Moving on down the road!!!

didn't end well

least we don't live in the same town :)

I have a lot of dreams too , but these days they don't end that well.

Two years later, I ran into Brenda again. We chatted, and I asked her how her marriage was going. She said she was divorced. Seems her husband kept his girlfriend after he married Brenda.

She asked me if I was still interested. I suggested dinner. Three years later, we're still an item. But there's no way in hell I'm marrying her.

She blew that up when she cheated with me on her fiance. FWB, not a problem. But no nupuals. Not now. Not ever.