It was an ideal day, that day. The temperature hovered around the mid seventies throughout with a mild breeze approaching from the southwest. It had stormed the night before, so the oft rutted dirt roads approaching the then-capitol splashed as horses and carriages moved into the city for the final debate. Of those who had…
When your mind is filled with information, worry, and emotion, it’s easy to get to the end of the day and feel the time just evaporated behind you. As you get older you begin to feel the same way about weeks, months and years. I remember as if it were yesterday, the time I stood…
Scared, as we all would be, you joked with your brothers, ate a meal and prayed your enemy wouldn’t take the time to aim true. You fell in a trench, in the rain, in mud so deep your last thought was that you hoped you wouldn’t drown in it. You could hear nothing over the…
So it will be 20 days tomorrow. When I woke up on the morning of May 6th, I couldn’t stand, my chest was tight, my head was spinning and nausea rolled over me, wave after wave. The Urgent Care center thought it might be a stroke so I spent the night in the hospital. After…
I thought it was a stroke. Hell, even the ER doc thought it might be a stroke, thus checking me into progressive care overnight. I was the youngest person on the floor other than the nurses and doctors–I was definitely the youngest patient. With my eyes unable to fix on anything for more than a…
Around the age of 31, I started a new ritual; waking up and announcing my gratitude aloud. It seemed silly and I didn’t even say it aloud at first, worried my bedroom furniture would judge me as some new-age, hippy-dippy, crystal worshiping doofus. The improvement was immediate though not significant. I in fact, didn’t realize…
I’m breaking up with you, GOP. It’s not you… It’s me. No. Screw that. It’s totally you. Last Week, Congressman Devin Nunes, Chairman of the House Intelligence Committee “received” information showing FISA court authorized surveillance on Russian Intelligence Officials. That classified information revealed intercepted communications between Russia and Trump, Trump aides and surrogates. As Chairman…
Just as I did with the Crime Novel “Hedged”, I’m making the first raw chapter of Splinter Self available to Mail List subscribers. Don’t worry, If you’re already a subscriber, a message will arrive shortly with the Subscriber page link if you’ve misplaced it. If you haven’t signed up for my mail list yet, just…
So, it’s been a year since my dad died and I wrote my own sharp edged memorial to him. I can’t say I’ve done a whole lot of work in resolving anything with him. It’s been a little quiet from his side, and I’ve been fairly busy myself since my beautiful wife (who was ill…
I was bored, and I’ve been working really hard to stay on my narrow Paleo path since Gretel left for Germany two weeks ago. For the most part I’ve been successful. Anyway, I did a live broadcast because I’d never done one before. It was a bit anticlimactic, but the food was good and I…
Cold against my thigh, I feel you in my pocket reminding me that I want to smoke. Your weight is comforting to me. Unlike your plastic imitators, you have substance, bulk, a heaviness that hints at your great worth. Ahhhh, my Zippo. My first was stamped with the Army Engineer logo. That made Zippo a life icon,…
So on the eve of Gretel’s departure for Germany, before I even got her out the door, I got trolled by an alt right racist on one of my old posts(Technology Fail: Racist Bullets). It’s not the first time I’ve been trolled by the alt-right (It’s not even the first time this week). ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ But…
Originally posted on One Roof Publishing Magazine:
Q. In one sentence, who is S.L. Shelton as a writer? A. S.L. Shelton is a soldier, wrapped in a tech, inside a writer; there is no fiction, only exaggerations. Q. You are a prolific writer and active blogger. How do you schedule time for both? A. It’s…
3:30 a.m. on Sunday, April 17th—Falling Water, West Virginia WOLF sat at the workbench with a soldering gun hovering motionless above the circuit board. He closed his eyes and willed mental resources to Scott’s dream prison, hoping to prevent him from piercing anymore memories of the beach two months earlier. Once his thoughts had calmed,…
Every day is the anniversary of something. Not all of them have a pointed, clear memory pushing to the surface, reminding you why it’s an anniversary. But each year you age, the calendar becomes more and more a mine field of special anniversarys. December 6th is a special one for me…it’s the anniversary of the…
The year 2016, if it’s not my last, will hopefully be remembered as the worst year of my life. Believe me, I know things can get much worse, but despite the repeated kicks to the crotch this year, I hold out hope that it was a fluke–a confluence of events like a perfect storm that…
There’s a lot in life we can look back at and be proud of (and ashamed of). We all have our talents, gifts, lucky moments. My life has been filled with excitement and an almost constant hunt for new experiences, so I have a fairly large mental photo album of interesting images, and film clips…
Yeah, I’m a rebel. TODAY! The first three books in the Scott Wolfe Series will be FREE for two days, Thursday November 17th and Friday November 18th. ALL MARKETS. TinyUrl.com/WolfeSeries Why? Haven’t we had enough bad shit happen the past few weeks? Aren’t you sick of the bad guys winning? Don’t you want a story…
He looks like me. He wears my clothes and sounds like me when he speaks, rarely as that might be. The troll at my writing desk is my distorted doppelganger. He comes into existence slowly over a period of days. Sometimes just a shadow, at first. But as my manuscript or editing become more involved,…
I was never the soft one. I had the harsh edges and the strong opinions. A bit on the Asperger’s scale, what’s in front of my face is the most important thing in the world at the moment, and sometimes it’s hard for people like me to think about consequences. It’s haunted me my entire…
Originally posted on Author Don Massenzio:
Today we sit down for a 20 Questions session with author S.L. Shelton. He is going to tell us about his interesting background, his inspiration and share some of his work with us. Please enjoy this edition of 20 Questions: ? Q1) When did you first realize you wanted…
You thank me for sitting with you. You apologize for waking me when you don’t feel well. You worry I’m bearing too much of the load. You say you’re sorry for not getting to something before I do. Wonderful, silly girl. I hear you crying in your quiet space and you wipe your tears as…
The man who recruited me into the army in the mid 80’s, SGT Bill Steel (yes that was his real name) oddly ended up being my platoon sergeant a few years later. He once told me the difference between a fairy tale and a war story is that a fairy tale starts with “Once upon…
