Pivot Points

Pivot points occur when circumstances change the course of a life. The direction changes arise in all forms, like an individual getting back on track, discovering a new love, or finding the strength to overcome a challenge. They sometimes show us a depth in ourselves we were unaware of; some insight that allows us to move in a direction we had not thought possible or to avoid significant pitfalls. These pivots turn on people we love or lost, people who presented a situation in a light we had not seen before, people who are kind, loyal models for life. These pivots can also have an unseemly side; the friend or relative who will not go straight, presenting us with a test of remaining loyal and risking a similar end for ourselves or breaking from that threat.
Every writer writes from experiences, one cannot make up the stuff we read in short stories and novels today. Some part of every fictitious story is true. If the writer did not “see” the pivot they are reporting, they may have been a part of it.
In Pivot Points I know these people; the characteristics, behaviors, and language are familiar. I’ve been to the places these events occur, even though I may have changed the name of the corner store.
Most of the people I write about are strivers; individuals striving to get to a pivot point; striving to make a change in their life: the widow unable to let go, the woman seeking a way to break from the criminal she lives with, the young reporter discovers a stunning love, or the grandsons who try to invent a different narrative for their dying grandfather. When a homeless girl with frozen fingers begs for coins from a rich New York lawyer his life is transformed, and when an orphan on a beach in Recife, Brazil meets four other boys in a similar fix, a criminal empire is born.
Great pain causes great hope; hope that the pain can be overcome. Some of these characters overcome their pain, others do not. As a writer I rejoice with those characters that move forward and I take no pleasure in the failure of others. We see life every day; we live in this life every day. The characters in Pivot Points are us.