MIRACLE OF MIRACLES By Jeff Tanner, Guest Blogger

Thunkin Theodore - photo finish

Miracle of miracles, I was scheduled to teach a two-day workshop in San Antonio when I learned my horse, Thunkin Theodore, was running in the 4^th race at Retama Park in Selma, Texas, just outside San Antonio. What a great opportunity! I invited the entire workshop to come out for the race – and a photo in the winner’s circle if we won.

We decided to name him for our oldest son, Ted, and honor Ted’s namesake, my baseball-playing uncle. Hence the name “Thumping Theodore,” also Ted Williams’ nickname. My uncle wasn’t the caliber of Ted Williams, only rising to A ball in the minors. But the Jockey Club couldn’t read my writing on the application so Theo’s official name was Thunkin Theodore.

When he was born, we didn’t know what kind of horse we had. Was he hard-working or lazy? Smart or dumb? Our hearts soared with hope when he raced other foals and yearlings in the pasture, always running through to the end even when he wasn’t first. The road from a race around the fence line to the winner’s circle at the track, though, is long and arduous.

We still weren’t sure about him after his first two races. We first tried him on turf—his sister won twice on the grass. But our big strapping bay tiptoed all the way around the track. That’s not how you win. So this time, we were trying him on the dirt. And this time, the competition was steeper than any he’d faced.

Still, despite the fluttering in my stomach, I’d only promised the workshop’s participants a night’s entertainment, not a victory. The odds-makers agreed, with Theo not among the favorites.

About eight of the participants took me up on my offer, clustering around me, the trainer, and the jockey in the paddock before the race. Tommy Morgan, my trainer, was a laconic West Texan, not prone to talking. The jockey, however, enjoyed chatting up the young blonde in our group.

When the horses broke from the gate, Theo was right there, in fourth a little off the pace, just as Tommy instructed. That way, there’d be juice in the tank at the end.

The horses turned for home with Theo in second. At the 8^th pole, a furlong before the end of the race, he was in first, with a horse coming up on his left and another to his right. Each of the other horses surged forward, both on the inside--between Theo and the rail. Theo responded, running even harder.

He was determined.

You can’t train that into a horse. It’s part of who they are. That’s what separates the winners from trail ponies and yard art.

Theo was so determined that he sprained a ligament just after he crossed the finish line, though we didn’t know it at the time. Our little group posed in the winner’s circle with a triumphant Theo and his smiling jockey. Even Tommy had a small grin, apparently entertained as he watched the jockey talk more with the blonde.

As Tommy said, “It helps when the jockey has a little extra motivation.”

Later, I took the group back to the stables. Theo was enjoying an after-race snack of fresh grass alongside the fence. Another horse was being led by.

Theo saw him, raised up, and trumpeted loudly. “I won! I am the King!”

The other horse lowered his head and slunk past.

Theo’s ligament healed up nicely and he came back to race--and win--again. Over his career, Theo ran in twelve races, posting two wins and two second places. When his racing days were over, he became a jumper, continuing to compete, continuing to give it his all. But that first win – that was special.

Miracle of miracles. 

BEST WRITING ADVICE (PART FOUR) : MURDER YOUR DARLINGS by Penny Hutson

“Murder your darlings,” is a term coined by Sir Arthur Quiller-Couch in the early 1900s. In 2020 Roy Peter Clark titled his book, Murder Your Darlings: And Other Gentle Writing Advice from Aristotle to Zinsser. Others have used the phrase or some version of it in the years between.

In short, it means to cut out any unnecessary writing. In practice it’s revision on steroids.

The concept skyrockets beyond deleting filler words, unnecessary adjectives, and unclear lines. To “murder your darlings” means to mercilessly slash those gorgeously written passages and clever lines you love when they don’t support the main idea, further the story, add to a character’s development, or aid the readers’ understanding. In other words, if it's not serving a specific purpose, cut it out. 

When you do that, something magical happens. A shiny pebble emerges from the rubble, like an ancient gold coin beneath the archaeologist’s brush. Eventually, an entire chest of doubloons is unearthed; hidden until all the dirt and rocks are removed. Like an archaeologist, a writer must eliminate everything that isn’t a necessary part of the main message or story.

When you cut away the excess, your message becomes clearer, focused, and powerful because it’s not mixed in a cloud of extraneous stuff that doesn’t support the overall message or story. Every detail, explanation, dialogue, or description will add to or detract from your piece. There’s nothing in-between - no neutral words, so to speak. If you want to show a character’s cheerful but naïve personality, for example, don’t crowd the page with actions or speech that doesn’t explicitly demonstrate that or appears to contradict it.

All this talk of cutting may leave one with the misunderstanding that shorter is always better or that the goal is to be brief. Nothing could be further from the truth. In one of the most used and iconic books on writing, The Elements of Style, Strunk and White tell us that it is not necessary to “make all sentences short or avoid all detail . . .” but it requires “that every word tell.” That’s the key. Every word must count, and the book’s slim 85 pages illustrate that point.

Thomas Jefferson took this concept a step further to say, “The most valuable of all talents is that of never using two words when one will do.” He’s referring to the gluttony of speech, while demonstrating the economy of words within his own quote.

Often, however, less is truly more. In his book, On Writing, Stephen King shows the reader a passage from one of his novels in which he describes a restaurant/bar using only four details, but it’s enough. He admits he had tons of other details he excluded, writing that, “It will not behoove me (or you) to wander off into thickets of descriptions just because it would be easy to do.” In his opinion, “. . .it’s not about the setting, anyway – it’s about the story.” A perfect example of someone murdering their darlings in service of the story.

But let’s be honest, it’s hard to delete something you’ve spent hours agonizing over – especially when it’s good. I have many perfect comebacks, dazzling descriptions, and clever lines that didn’t further the plot or add to my story. The best and hardest thing I’ve done is to cut them out during the revision process. Truthfully, the more I do it, the easier it becomes; though it’s never easy. I promise it will take your writing to the next level.

So, pick up the sword of revision with gusto and determination to slay the writing that impedes your work as Luke Skywalker clutched his light saber to destroy the dark forces in his world. Good luck, my friends; and may the force be with you.

If you liked “Part Four” in my “Best Writing Advice” series, you may want to read or reread Parts One, Two, or Three. See the links below.

__________________

The Almighty B-I-T-CH https://sandinourshorts.blogspot.com/2025/08/best-writing-advice-part-three-almighty.html

Don’t Look Back! https://sandinourshorts.blogspot.com/2025/06/best-writing-advice-part-two-dont-look.html

The Three Rs – Read, Read, Read https://sandinourshorts.blogspot.com/2025/04/best-writing-advice-part-one-remember.html

Penny Hutson also has a short story in a new anthology Costal Crimes 2 : Death Takes A Vacation available at https://wildsidepress.com/coastal-crimes-2-death-takes-a-holiday-paper/  from Wildside Press

ROBERT W. SERVICE: THE MAN WHO DIDN'T FIT IN by Michael Rigg

Robert W. Service (1874 - 1958)

“Gold!” One of the few words to spark bouts of mass hysteria—group insanity some might argue. And so it was just before the turn of the twentieth century. Discovery of gold near the Klondike River in Canada’s Yukon Territory in August 1896 unleashed a three-year epidemic known as the Yukon Gold Rush.

In total, “gold fever” infected over 100,000 people. They came from every corner of the continent, intent on reaching Dawson City, epicenter of the mining effort, where they hoped to find their personal end-of-the-rainbow. Of those starting the journey, only thirty or forty percent (approximately 30,000 to 40,000) made it to Dawson City, turned away along the route by a combination of expense, hardship, and death. Only about half of those who made it to the gold fields became prospectors. Only a few hundred became rich.

But this mass hysteria produced some unplanned riches—a bonanza of novels and verse describing the rush, the challenges, the victories, and the defeats. Among the authors tapping into this rich vein of success and heartache were Jack London (The Call of the Wild and White Fang), Tappan Adney (The Klondike Stampede), and my favorite, Robert W. Service.

Born on January 14, 1874 in Lancashire, England, Service spent his formative years in Scotland. He grew up reading the works of Rudyard Kipling and Robert Louis Stevenson and briefly studied literature at the University of Glasgow. In 1894, Service went to western Canada, where he worked in a variety of jobs, including as a cowboy and later as a bank teller, first in Whitehorse, Yukon Territory and in 1908—well after the Klondike Gold Rush had run its course—in Dawson City.

While the fever was gone, the memories remained. And Service drilled into the reminiscences of former miners and others, extracting material that formed the basis for the works earning him a reputation as “Bard of the Yukon.”

Service published numerous collections of poetry during his lifetime, including Songs of a Sourdough or Spell of the Yukon and Other Verses (1907), Ballad of a Cheechako (1909), and Ballads of a Bohemian (1921), as well as two autobiographies and six novels. He was a correspondent for the Toronto Star during the Balkan Wars of 1912-13, and served in World War I as an ambulance driver in France. After the war, he married Germaine Bougeoin and they resided mainly in the south of France until his death on September 11, 1958. Several of his novels were made into films, and he also appeared as an actor in The Spoilers, a 1942 film with Marlene Dietrich.

Were I to ask you to name some of his poems, you’d likely respond with “The Shooting of Dan McGrew,” “The Spell of the Yukon,” or “The Cremation of Sam McGee.” All excellent tales, indeed.

But my favorite is “The Men That Don’t Fit In.” It highlights a group of men (and women) captured by wanderlust and the need for adventure. And it serves as a reminder that, often, “It’s the steady, quiet, plodding ones” who survive life's struggles:

The Men That Don't Fit In

There's a race of men that don't fit in,

A race that can't stay still;

So they break the hearts of kith and kin,

And they roam the world at will.

They range the field and they rove the flood,

And they climb the mountain's crest;

Theirs is the curse of the gypsy blood,

And they don't know how to rest.

 

If they just went straight, they might go far;

They are strong and brave and true;

But they're always tired of the things that are,

And they want the strange and new.

They say: "Could I find my proper groove,

What a deep mark I would make!"

So they chop and change, and each fresh move

Is only a fresh mistake.

 

And each forgets, as he strips and runs

With a brilliant, fitful pace,

It's the steady, quiet, plodding ones

Who win in the lifelong race.

And each forgets that his youth has fled,

Forgets that his prime is past,

Till he stands one day, with a hope that's dead,

In the glare of the truth at last.

 

He has failed, he has failed; he has missed his chance;

He has just done things by half.

Life's been a jolly good joke on him,

And now is the time to laugh.

Ha, ha! He is one of the Legion Lost;

He was never meant to win;

He's a rolling stone, and it's bred in the bone;

He's a man who won't fit in.

Haunting, don’t you think? 

To learn more about Robert Service and the Klondike Gold Rush, check out: Robert W. Service | The Poetry Foundation and What Was the Klondike Gold Rush? - Klondike Gold Rush National Historical Park (U.S. National Park Service).