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Who You Are on the Inside

February 4th, 2012 | Posted by pftq in Stories | #
Two friends have known each other since childhood.  One has always been a bit weaker and slightly ill with an unknown virus.  The other friend makes the promise to one day find a cure to the other's condition and studies to become a doctor.

Twenty years later, the doctor gets close to understanding the nature of the illness and finding a cure.  Both are excited at the prospect, but as the cure is applied, the friend seems to gradually get weaker.  The doctor scrambles to figure out what went wrong, but each day that passes, the friend seems to slowly lose grasp on the world.  Eventually the friend becomes bedbound and the doctor caring daily for the friend.

Over time, the doctor notices that, although the friend is losing mental capacity, the friend seems physically fine.  In fact, as the friend becomes healthier, the friend becomes less mentally stable, as if gradually fading away.

The doctor...[More]
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Imperfect Genesis

November 13th, 2011 | Posted by pftq in Stories | #
In the beginning, the world was but a blank canvas, a fresh landscape for gods to shape as they saw fit.  After they added life and other final touches to their work, they decided to strip themselves of their power, join their creation as mortals, so that their emotions and imperfections do not allow them to destroy what they so cherished, perhaps as they once did in another time.  What they did not realize, however, was that the capacity for their destructive nature came not from their omnipotence but from their ability to reason.  Thus even without their power, the destruction they feared for their creation came to be nonetheless, only this time they would not remember it.
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Void

May 10th, 2011 | Posted by pftq in Essays | #
     I fear boredom.  I don't know why.  It's just the way it is.  I should be happy that my two hardest classes are now over, but I instead feel empty.  I should look forward to a fun trip I've been planning this month, but I realize that once it passes (or even in the midst of it), there will be nothing but a void.

     I can't help feeling similar to Jonathan Shields in "The Bad and the Beautiful" (1952).  It has haunted me ever since I watched it two years ago for a film class.  Of course, I will never betray anyone for any means, but like Shields, once a project or goal is finished, I don't feel satisfied at all.  Instead, I feel anguish and longing - like I have just lost purpose and have suddenly been reduced to nothing.  I can be anything and do anything, but once I stop, I sink away into the shadows.

     It is not as if I pursue a goal or task because I enjoy it either.  It...[More]
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Passing of Dreams

May 29th, 2010 | Posted by pftq in Stories | #
A young influential doctor is called in to assist in the operation of an elderly high-profile patient.  The patient has been left in a paralyzed state by unknown causes but continues to have thought processes and dreams; the paralysis is believed to have a mental rather than physical basis.  New technology by an experimenter is being used that would allow the doctor to enter the patient's dreams in an attempt to free him from his condition.  The doctor was chosen because the technology is not entirely understood, and it is hoped the doctor would be able to figure the situation out quickly once inside the patient's mind.

The doctor is placed into a deep sleep next to the patient, his head in a device connected to the head of the patient's.  The scene pans across the patient's brown eyes to the blue eyes of the doctor, the irises of which are blue.  The doctor awakens in a bed that is not his own and quickly realizes he is in the mind of the patient....[More]
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Immortality

December 11th, 2009 | Posted by pftq in Stories | #

  You often see movies or books about people who can never die, but usually they also heal super fast from any wound or injury.  Just a thought on my end, but what if you can never die, but you heal at a normal rate?

  The scary part about this is that the normal person can relate since no fast healing is involved.  The person in the character is essentially still conscious no matter what happens.  What’s to say this doesn’t occur in real life? Obviously you can’t heal from everything or live forever, but what’s to say your consciousness doesn’t continue drift along out there?

  It probably wouldn’t work that well as a film because you can’t show the inside of someone’s mind (supposing you take a first person perspective).  From an outside observer though, that might work.  Ideally, a book would work better so you can see the main character’s thoughts.

  The story…[More]

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Undo

November 6th, 2009 | Posted by pftq in Stories | #
This is an idea that came to me for possibly a short video ad of some sort.  Promotes safer driving I guess, but really.. change the ending and it could promote a lot of things.

  Scroll through a series of scenes showing every day life.  Closer shots show they are actually running backwards.  Over time, we see that these are all mistakes that people make (spilling coffee, breaking tables, etc) that are fixed by going backwards in time.

  Eventually we come to the scene of a car accident with a car pinning a helpless victim to a tree.  The scene running backwards, however, does not solve the issue.  The car pulls away and the victim slides to the ground.  The car is intact - in fact, it's brand new - but the person is still dead.
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Friend in the Shadows

September 30th, 2009 | Posted by pftq in Stories | #
     A man is traveling with his family and gets stranded in a dark cave.  He is alone and trapped in a large pit within the cave.  Fortunately, there is a stream of sunlight reaching down towards one end of the pit and plants are growing there.  From these few crops he is able to survive.  Later he also climbs down rocks deeper into the cave where it's darker and discovers a river where he can catch fish.

     The whole time he is alone until he one day notices someone standing in the shadows on the other side of the river.  The person can't really be seen and is just a dark figure.  The man calls and waves out.  The person doesn't say anything, but the man assumes it's because they're too far apart to hear each other.  However, the person seems to motion or signal back before fading back into the shadows.

     The man doesn't see this person again until one day he injures himself along...[More]
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Three Years Past

June 12th, 2009 | Posted by pftq in Stories | #
     A freshman boy walks down the school hallway eating a cup of ice cream he got from across the street.  While walking, he suddenly looks up from his ice cream to realize his surroundings look different.  It's the same location with some things altered, perhaps looking older or worn out.  He eventually realizes he has ended up 3 years into the future.
     His friends tell him he's crazy.  When the boy tries to use his ice cream as proof, they tell him he just got it from across the street.  Defeated, the boy just accepts his situation for the time being.
     His learning is accelerated and he quickly adapts to his new life.  He seems to learn things instantaneously sometimes (such as math) even though he doesn't remember having been good at it before.  One day his friends bug him about the ice cream again and the boy gets irritated.  The boy suddenly shouts, "How could I have gotten the ice cream...[More]
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Left Behind

March 23rd, 2009 | Posted by pftq in Stories | #
Scene 1:
-- Cut to door outside hallway. --
» Boy opens it and walks in with Friend1 and Friend2 (back to us).
-- Cut to front of group, angled to show only Boy's face. --
» Group walks toward camera down hallway, talking and laughing.  Boy talking and laughing with them.
» Boy drops...[More]
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Juggling Dreams

March 10th, 2009 | Posted by pftq in Essays | #

  Sometimes you feel unstoppable, great, as if the world is only beginning, and you are at the center of it all.  You get ideas, schemes that you never dared consider before, and now that you have, you feel obligated to pursue them, to drive them as far as you possibly can.  At first you're not sure if you're up to the task; the first step looks hard and difficult.  Then you toss in the first challenge, the first dream, and then the second, and then the third.

  Pretty soon, you're not only tossing and catching all three, you are actually juggling.  You can juggle two at a time, worry about the third later.  Or you can juggle all three at once, perhaps without even breaking a sweat.  Over time, you get better; you've gone far beyond anything you ever hoped to do, juggling three when at first you dared not even juggle one.  You're ready for more; you want a challenge.

  And so you throw in the…[More]

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Why Not to Concentrate

February 6th, 2009 | Posted by pftq in Essays | #
   I was walking home from school one day.  It was a bright and sunny afternoon.  The birds were chirping; the air smelled crisp and clean.  And then I stubbed my toe.  It was a painful stub.  The agony of my tiny toe scrubbing against the abrasive concrete, the concentration of all that pain in such a tiny insignificant stub on my foot, was more than I could bear.  I never wore sandals again.

   Yet that moment sparked a curious interest in me.  It made me realize that concentration, such as the concentration of all that pain in my toe, was not a good thing.  When one is trapped in a cell, concentrated in a small space, he is not happy.  When one is told how and what to think, to concentrate and narrow his mind, he is not happy.  Even in politics, concentration is not a good thing; Americans don’t like concentration of power.  Concentration means communism, dictatorship - all the things we fought to eliminate in past wars.  Just...[More]
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Doing What Counts

January 18th, 2009 | Posted by pftq in Stories | #
  Pete wiped his forehead and stepped back.  He had just finished helping an elderly woman pack luggage into her car.

  "Thank you so much," the woman said, standing back in amazement.  "You kids are doing so much these days."

  "It's no big deal," Pete chuckled, pulling out a sheet of paper from his pocket.  "Really, I should be thanking you instead."

  "What's...[More]
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Open Doors

December 29th, 2008 | Posted by pftq in Essays | #
   They say one doesn’t realize what he has until it’s gone.  When I broke my wrist two years ago, I not only realized that I had almost lost my hand completely, I realized how little I’d done, how much more I wanted to do, how close I came to losing the opportunity altogether.  As I spent the following summer bound to my chair with the injury, I taught myself web design and learned to program in six different languages.  The following year, as my friends and I began making videos but could find no outlet for our new hobby, we founded our own club, within months finishing three movies, hosting monthly Theater Days, and starting a VHS-DVD conversion service.  When I later reflected upon the events, after having made twelve websites for schools and organizations, after having had classmates join my club and become paid to teach our video editing to an afterschool class, I realized that opportunities are not sought but created, that it is not the opportunity that is...[More]
362 unique view(s)

Ambitious Perfection

October 9th, 2008 | Posted by pftq in Essays | #
     People say I am ambitious. I seek objectives; I hunger for accomplishment. But to simply call me ambitious is an understatement. I am not hungry; I am starved, ravenous. I do not seek objectives; I make them. I cannot remain satisfied without a goal, a purpose, cannot remain satisfied even if I did have a goal or purpose. I must always have results, excitement, change. I must see the world blaze about me, hear the thunder of progress roar past me. I must smell achievement at every corner. I must taste the power of drive and anxiety.

     I am also a perfectionist. I attain to every niche and detail of all that I do. If it holds but a single flaw, it must be fixed, redone, or scrapped from existence. My tolerance for the world is high, just not for myself. Everything I do must meet my expectations. No. Everything I do must exceed my expectations, must breathe and echo success.
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Life is Like a Mountain Climb

April 22nd, 2008 | Posted by pftq in Essays | #
     Life is like a mountain climb, a quest to reach the mountain peak.  Each stopping point represents the goal one sets for himself while each climb represents the journey to achieve it.  In the beginning, life may be long and difficult, but with each successful climb comes a fulfilling rest, the satisfaction of achievement, and of course, the grand view of the world below.  Aim too high and one may be in for a hectic climb, but aim too low and one may never reach the summit, the ultimate achievement which can only be as fruitful as the quest to attain it.

     In my climb towards the summit, my goals have often centered about fields of which I am familiar, with my satisfaction being the chance to prove myself and fully exercise my potential.  By focusing my goals and opportunities, I build on what I do best, expanding my base of skills and allowing each consecutive goal to lead to the success of the next.  While I may not always reach the...[More]
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The World At Hand

February 18th, 2008 | Posted by pftq in Essays | #
  Day after day, millions of Americans worry over the most miniscule of problems.  From children to fully-grown adults, the average citizen just fails to concern themselves with significant tasks, fails to put more time where time is needed, fails to see the meaning of life.  As toddlers, they worry over troubling matters such as loss of candy or the horrors of having to share with fellow peers.  As children, they fight over the ownership of poorly-crafted plastics and cheat each other over debts of up to a quarter.  As teenagers, they stress for days over the look of their hair, cause the biggest fuss over the color of their shirt, debate with all their might over the quality of their socks, which they promptly toss aside after a day's wear.

  Upon reaching adulthood, these same individuals only double their attitudes; their issues remain more or less of the same importance.  Ownership can no longer be resolved in small quarrels;...[More]
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Passing of Times

February 17th, 2008 | Posted by pftq in Essays | #
  I remember ever so sharply the more distant moments of my past.  I can remember far back to my first years of consciousness, perhaps 3 or 4 years old.  I could not comprehend even what age was at the time, but I could remember the finest details of our somewhat old and rundown, yet ever so familiar home.  I could recall the dreamlike sharpness of the silver faucet in our kitchen sink, the brownish tinge of the soft carpet beneath my feet, and the flare of the bleeding-blue sky outside my window.  There was the greatest satisfaction in the simplest of things, from the mere planting of a cornstalk to the feeding of ducks and fishes.  I cared less for the future and more for the moment.  Each day held a new surprise.  Baby birds would occasionally fall from the tree in the front lawn.  Frogs and crickets could be found in the backyard if one searched hard enough.  The world was unbounded.  One day I found myself finally able to ride...[More]
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A Day's Lost

January 9th, 2008 | Posted by pftq in Stories | #
  "Son! You need to get your grades up!" my mother exclaimed loudly.  She paced across the room and glanced repeatedly back at me, anxious to see my reaction but disappointed at my blank stare.  "You will become a failure! Nobody will give you a job!"

  I did not understand; I had almost straight As - perhaps one B.  I opened my mouth to protest, but immediately she thrust her finger into my right eye.

  "Son! Why do you have a scar on your cheek? Wash it off!"

  I stared...[More]
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Five Fingers

December 31st, 2007 | Posted by pftq in Essays | #
  "How many fingers am I holding?" he asked peevishly. He waved his hand madly in the air as if doing so would make his hand more visible.

  In broad daylight, it was easy to see that he held up all five fingers; whether he held them intentionally or he simply waved his entire hand carelessly, it was not clear. It did not matter what answer was given or if any was given to him at all. If I suggested five, he would merely insist the thumb was not a finger; if I suggested four, he would say otherwise. If I did not answer or I answered wrong, I'd just be blind.

  Sometimes people forget that I was once able to see just as well as any of them. When much younger and not ruined by misadvice and overwork, not being able to see was unheard of; it was inconceivable. Warned as we were, told to be on the watch for any signs of blur or fatigue, none of us could imagine the seemingly distant notion actually becoming reality. Seeing was a divine right, an...[More]
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Pining Over Apples

December 19th, 2007 | Posted by pftq in Essays | #
   Fearless it was.  Covered on all ends with a stubbly patched but thorn-riddled coat, intricately yet thickly woven, it was protected, shielded, nothing could harm it.  Its smooth, lumpy coat, designed with elaborate earthly brown patches and forest-green rings, provided its camouflage to hide it amidst the wilderness.  Scattered about its coat, finely embroidered, leaf-like blades stood dangerously perked, ready to defend and retaliate.  Tall and proud it stood, towering over the fellow fruits, a frizzy batch of foliage attached sleazily about its top to further boost its height.  How strong it must have felt, ready to face the harshest of treatment, the worst of cruelty.

   How wrong it was.  With a heavy thud, it crashed and rolled about the tabletop, helpless on its side, rolling hopelessly without an end.  With a simple plunge of the knife, blade delving deep, the coat was split.  Restrained by nothing more than my bare hands, the leafy blades...[More]
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