I’ve talked previously about the inspirations for my vampire novel series, The Matriarch Vampires. The central West Virginia locations, Glenville State College, and the character nods. After shelving the original first drafts of the book two decades earlier, why did I feel it was time to dust them off and finally finish the story?
My wife and I enjoy walking through old cemeteries and taking local ghost tours. There are many haunted places around the U.S., often in old cities like Birmingham, Alabama, Savannah, Georgia, and St. Augustine, Florida. Back in 2010, we traveled to New Orleans and took such a tour, and our guide to the city at night was none other than Jonathan. He looked the way I imagine a time traveler might, combining a classic appearance with a modern sensibility, a person whom has long since reconciled the old and new ways with a natural ease, elegance, and an eagerness to share his experience.
Not having given much serious thought about fiction writing for twenty odd years, Mr. Weiss captured my attention and filled my imagination with stories and embellishments as we toured the French Quarter and Bourbon Street, recounting local legends with intriguing details and playing to the crowd… and yes, much was said about vampires. He and other occupants felt like a necessary part of the city, a piece of its soul that would be lost forever if abruptly cut out.
I didn’t create Cedarcrest Sanctum — another Vampire did that.
On the surface, it’s easy to assume, “Oh, she just wanted a stable of living donors to drink from whenever she wanted.” There’s some truth to that — a Vampire has to survive — but it was more. Louisa wasn’t only interested in her own survival; she wanted others to share in it and take a benefit for themselves. Our blood is sustaining to the living — what is best described as ghouling — meaning our residents live virtually pain and symptom free from any ailment at any age. It’s not a cure, only a suspension… but it must be maintained.
But that isn’t all that Cedarcrest is. The term “sanctum” is significant and intentional, no matter how archaic the word might sound. Sanctum has two definitions:
a sacred place, especially a shrine within a temple or church.
a private place from which most people are excluded.
I think she combined these ideas for Cedarcrest. While she certainly ruled the roost, I don’t think she saw herself as the high priest or queen of the damned; it was a place of refuge and safety — a sanctuary. Even under the guise of an elder care home, she actively sought her residents, scouring public records for the homeless and those in dire situations. Her days were long past acting the part of den mother to a sorority… something she actually did for a time after she was turned.
Our best evidence is her legacy: she wanted another Vampire, one she could trust, to carry on in her place. While she was done with the world, she didn’t consign her charges to a similar fate; there’s something noble in that.
Louisa’s long-term investments were transferred over to Cedarcrest as a trust and portfolio long before she left us; our continued charities and research branches are well-funded and self-reinvesting, but we can’t help everyone we want to. We operate without any outside funding but must maintain in-state oversight — it is a retirement home, after all. In spite of everything we do, this is still considered low-profile. Sometimes to help those in need, we have to do it under-the-table, anonymously, or even out-of-pocket.
We can really only maintain sixty residents, forty staff, and one immortal… by design. For people who don’t know about The Program (a clever nondescript name for our mutual mortal-immortal arrangement), we’re often asked why we draw no state or federal funding yet still provide no-cost boarding to our residents. Timothy told me the truth of it: even before Cedarcrest’s creation, Louisa was an outspoken advocate in caring for homeless elderly and funded other facilities to offset costs from her own personal fortune before forming the Cedarcrest Foundation of Appalachia (CFA).
Those who benefited didn’t feed her; she only ever met a handful of the ones she supported. It wasn’t about guilt or obligation; she did it because it was the right thing to do.
Paraphrasing: “But it’s your money, Louisa — why spend so much of it on them? You don’t even know them.” Is that really a question?
How do you explain to people it’s important to care about other people?
I almost made this mistake. I guess it must be something all new Vampires have to struggle with, wanting to continue old relationships and family ties but afraid you’ll hurt those you care about; it takes time, but it’s not impossible. Take care of your elders and spend time with them: parents, grandparent, and great grandparents. Listen to their stories and help them stay current.
You’ll miss them when they’re gone and regret if you failed to connect… and that’s forever when you’re an immortal.
Take your power seriously. Keep each other safe.
~ Janiss
It’s been a tough year, lost some good people along the way, but now we turn toward a new cycle. Hope you enjoyed your favorite drink last night and got some well-deserved rest afterward. Happy New Year, everyone.
Take your power seriously. Keep each other safe.
~ Janiss
Ever feel like you’re the star of your own television show? Not a good one or the most watched one, but a show on the bubble, always teetering on cancellation?
You wake up, think about things, then go about your life. There are recurring supporting characters, the occasional guest star, and those who are written out because their contract’s up.
If you were the outside observer — a mere viewer tuning in for a bit of escapism — how many stars would you give your own program?
There’s a movie called The Truman Show about a man (Jim Carrey) whose life being broadcast live 24/7, only he’s blissfully unaware that his existence is scripted — entertainment for the masses. All of his successes and failures are orchestrated under the control of a director and a writer’s room.
I don’t know about you, but I feel like that from time to time.
I’ve updated all of my social media profiles now to include the description “fictional character.” I’ve done this for a couple of reasons — one of which was covering my backside after being warned a few of my private posts were bleeding over into public viewing — but the best excuse is that it seems correct. After some of the most horrible things I’ve endured or seen, I still ask myself too often, “Did that really happen?”
So my question is, how about you? With online media and cameras everywhere, every word recorded and every image archived, doesn’t it feel nowadays like we’re all on television? On display for the entire world to judge or sympathize with? The only control feels like whatever you put into your profile, a sentence or two to sum up your full existence into an easily digestible bite for any potential audience.
On half of my profiles, there wasn’t enough room to squeeze even one additional word in, so I changed them all to match the smallest allowed description (turns out that’s Google+ with 140 words or less) and I like the consistency.
But I would be remiss if I didn’t confess a few folks I’ve spoken to don’t believe what I’ve been through in my short thirty years on this earth. I’m obviously disillusioned, a liar, and/or starving for attention… blah blah blah and yada yada yada. So for them and for me, there it is: fictional character — a made-up or imaginary person… because we all present the image of ourselves we want others to accept.
Maybe I should have someone mock-up a few fake book covers and slap my face on them. Timothy?
“Don’t be stupid,” was something I used to hear Eric tell his younger brother Daniel all the time. I didn’t say anything then… but I should have.
I HATE that expression. It felt dismissive, implying a person is willfully ignoring what the average person just should innately know.
I much prefer the phrase, “I know you’re smarter than this.” It can be a skill vs. will issue (thanks, performance evaluation terminology) because either you don’t have the capacity to rationally think through an idea or you’re too lazy to apply yourself. Then again, we don’t always know WHAT we don’t know when we’re growing up (or even after that).
Here’s a scary little fact: Vampires don’t just become faster and stronger; they get smarter, as in actually able to process data faster. They don’t just notice a few things; they notice everything, and they can put observations and facts together quickly… the very definition of intelligence. Couple that with a photographic memory and you should get the idea it’s hard to one-up the undead. There’s a downside, of course — two, actually: distractibility and paranoia — but if you don’t use what you know and choose to ignore it, that knowledge is useless.
And then there’s personal pride: “What I believe is just as important as your facts.”
I think there exists a point when a person decides to believe a thing, and once chosen, no amount of evidence can shake their position on that belief. It can be argued that religion is such a belief; we all know it can be dangerous if it motivates you to extreme action against anyone who doesn’t believe as you do. That said, it can also motivate you into inaction: “We’re doomed, so we can all stop trying now.”
I can’t abide a closed mind, and I know I felt this way before being turned. You only fail when you give up.
And I mean about everything. Climate change, women’s rights, civil conflicts, minimum wage, helping your neighbor…
Ugh.
Okay, fine, make fun. Ha, ha… look at the silly Vampire giving two shits about anything other than her next infusion. Why should she care about things that won’t directly affect her? It’s not like the suffering of others or seeing the world around her failing should bother her. It’s certainly not because we share this planet, affecting every other being directly or indirectly with every decision we make and with no options for relocation.
Where are we all going again? And how did we end up in this handbasket?
I was twelve years old on September 11th, 2001 — not yet an immortal. Daniel was my age, but his older brother Eric was a sophomore in high school and understood what was happening more than us. We all felt it: shock, helplessness, confusion, anger… everything. But how does someone who has been around forever come to terms with this kind of event?
Here is what three other immortals told me.
The Humanitarian Viewpoint:
“I came from a time when if you wanted to travel, you walked; if you wanted to eat, you hunted. Most strangers you met outside of your clan were travelers instead of tourists and you traded instead of purchased. Having seen the world evolve from thatched homes to high-rise skyscrapers seemed too sudden, and three centuries of experience made me wonder what held them up — or how easily they might come down again. I passed the World Trade Center once on the streets of New York City, but I didn’t have the courage to go in; it’s a sad thing for me to admit.
“The towers intimidated me, and while I imagined they would one day be replaced as everything is, I didn’t suspect how little time they had left. It was a shared terror when I, like most people in America, saw everything on television. There wasn’t time to process it because we worried what else was about to happen, each staring unblinking at the screens as we prayed it wouldn’t get any worse. It wasn’t about why it happened; we just hoped we would find a moment to catch our breath.”
The Conspiracy Counterpoint:
“We were arrogant, and what we watched was a much-needed slap in the face. The United States wasn’t immune anymore, and we couldn’t ignore what the rest of the world took for granted. I remember being impressed with the first responders, seeing the self-sacrifice and personal risks to save anyone they could, but in the days that followed, it felt like Pearl Harbor all over again.
“I hate to suggest it, but Americans were more gullible in 1941; they never concerned themselves with the possibility that the Japanese might have been allowed their attack to prime the great war machine. The conspiracy theorists were more prevalent on 9/11, and the fuel for their worries was telling: how could our government not know this was about to happen? Why didn’t they stop it? Either it was allowed to happen or our elected officials were incompetent.”
The Washington Insider:
“In October of 1957, the Russians had beaten us into space. Forget about Hitler’s V-2 rockets raining down onto the British Isles; if the Commies then could launch something into orbit, who could say they couldn’t drop a nuclear warhead into the middle of America? That was what the Space Race and the Cold War was all about: fear — a positive emotion if you want to keep a society alive.
“Nine-Eleven is a reminder of what dedicated patriots have always known: eternal vigilance is the price of liberty. We became complacent and let our guard down. It was no one’s fault and everyone’s fault. What followed a single morning of horror was a reminder that we can all come together to help support one another. A little fear is always healthy because it creates a common cause, but it’s a pity it too often takes a disaster to remind us of that.”
I’m still seeing swoons online over becoming immortal. “Please turn me.” “I want to be one of you!” “Vampires are SO cool — be my maker!” “I want to BE somebody!” And the one that floors me: “You’re so lucky that happened to you!”
All I hear is, “I wish I were handicapped so I could get better parking.”
Seriously: it’s the same damn thing — and you’re ASKING for it.
So here it is: my magnum opus. All further inquiries into being turned, remade, transformed, or whatever wonders you’ve imagined will now and in the future be referred to this post/document — I’ve been stewing over it for seven years and it’s time I unloaded. Feel free to skip all of this if you want to keep deluding yourself about becoming a creature of darkness and putting yourself in harm’s way that can’t be undone.
“Getting Lucky”: My Big Mistake
I turned left. That’s it — doomed in an instant. As I’ve done dozens of times before and a hundred times since, I crossed the Butchers Road bridge over the Little Kanawha River before turning onto Route 5. A right turn would take me in the direction of my Gramma’s old farmhouse; a left turn would head toward Glenville. I remember being a little hungry and a bit impatient, figuring I could nab a quick six-inch turkey sub in town and scarf it down it on the way back.
The laziest bloodsucking bastard imaginable was already eying my little red Kia Soul from inside his stolen black Cadillac Escalade. If I’d have gone home to Gramma’s, I would have known he was following me. Once you leave the main road, only locals bother with the backwater twists and turns you have to take get anywhere — and we all have guns (welcome to West Virginia) since our nearest neighbors may be five miles away, never mind any possibility of the sheriff’s patrol getting there faster than a pizza delivery. To coin a phrase: city folks just don’t get it.
I turned left and the bastard followed. I often park farthest away from where I’m going because I like to walk, and he’d cleverly positioned himself between where I stopped and my favorite local sandwich shop. I left the safety of my vehicle, assumed the (admittedly) handsome man in the pretty SUV was lost and in need of directions — and I awoke naked in a shallow grave covered in dirt. One glance and a few words — that’s all — and I was his toy. No seduction, no sweeping me off my feet, no promises of a better life; he stole me away and took everything from me.
Okay, here’s where Joss Whedon suggests I should lighten the dire mood: How does a lady Vampire flirt? She bats her eyes. Funny, right? Yes? No. Moving along…
Myth #1: It Can’t Be As Bad As All That
Vampirism changes you physically. A thimbleful of your once-favorite beverage or a lick off of a medium-rare steak fillet are yours to enjoy without incurring ill effects, but none of that compares to your craving for the sweet taste and aroma of warm, living blood — and you’ll want more than you need. “That’s okay, I’ll just go to a local blood bank and make a withdraw.” Nope, nope, and nope. You can’t freeze it or store it, and anything drawn that’s over an hour old is repellent.
You need warm living bodies to feed yourself (read: HUMAN only… no rats for you, Louis) and you need them readily. If you don’t satisfy that need, you’ll feel and look the part of a monster as your body betrays you and your mind devolves; you won’t be able to stop yourself if you slip too far away until that need is fully met. You’re going to want to connect with your old life — relatives, friends, co-workers — and they’ll be the first people you’ll want to sample. Oh, and children? Witches may hate them but Vampires LOVE them; that’s the blood you’ll want the most.
What would you get if your doctor became a Vampire? More blood tests than ever. Never trust “Dr. Acula.”
Myth #2: I’ll Still Be Me, Only Better
Sure, you get everything a supernatural predator needs: blackened eyes to see in low-light conditions, fangs and talons for ripping through flesh, strength and speed to catch and subdue your prey. If your victims can see and hear you, their minds become yours for as long as you like — but if you drink from them too heavily, their minds and memories stay with you… forever. A good rule of thumb is if you drain enough to kill them (whether you do or not) you risk a piece of their souls embedding itself within yours, starting with your maker (you can’t opt out of that one).
They judge and distract you, and your mind’s eye sees them in anything reflective: mirrors, chrome, even still water. If those sound like things you’ve heard Vampires avoid, now you know why. If you give into their taunts and interact with them — we call it daydreaming — it leaves you vulnerable; it makes it difficult to distinguish memory from reality, especially if you’re in dangerous territory. Remember how Vampires on “Buffy” lost their souls after they turned? It can feel a little like that, and sometimes you’re not sure where you end and they begin… a bit like going mad.
Here’s another riddle. What’s it like to be kissed by a Vampire? It’s a pain in the neck.
Myth #3: No Honor Among the Un-Dead
Oh, and then there’s every other Vampire on the planet instinctively wanting to destroy you. None of this “nesting” thing like rats or bats; if you lock two Vampires in a box for an evening, only one is coming back out. It isn’t as easy as the movies and television show to make a Vampire, either, so it isn’t done on a whim and you’re technically creating a competitor and/or possibly your own self-destruction.
We can even sense when we’re pushing up against another immortal’s territory, but not enough to pinpoint where they are exactly or how many there are. We believe it’s meant to warn us away from each other, but many take it as a sign of “getting ready to rumble.” Sure, you can keep human friends, but will they want to keep you? Maintaining a so-called masquerade is nothing short of exhausting — especially knowing you can kill pretty much anyone and be done with it.
Who does Dracula get emails from? His fang club.
Myth #4: Nothing Can Stop You
The good news: you don’t have to sleep in a coffin. The bad news: you don’t sleep at all… or dream ever again, for that matter. You’re always conscious and always aware — unless you’re daydreaming, which is just as distracting as it sounds. It isn’t unusual for Vampires to be seen talking to themselves, because they’re actually not (see Myth #2). But when the sun is up between dawn and dusk and its light can touch the earth, within the earth is the only place a Vampire can hide. Being up, active, and not below ground in at least a shallow grave feels like becoming the walking dead. Your heart stops, your breath ceases, and everything feels horribly wrong… but when you’re down in the dirt, it’s all comfortably numb. If you don’t plan for this at the end of every night, it won’t go well for you.
At night, our physical bodies simulate life, retaining youth (unless we choose otherwise) and are hard to ignore. To quote a recent mockumentary: “We are the bait — but we’re also the trap.” People around us feel a fascination toward us, almost celebrity-like, an attraction they won’t understand, even to the point of empathizing our heightened emotion (read: if I’m sad, you’re sad). It’s difficult trusting anyone around us because we can’t always tell sincerity from influence. A Vampire becomes the center of attention but they can feel more alone than ever — never mind all the ways you can be subdued or destroyed (which I won’t go into details about here, mortal).
How do Vampires get around on Halloween night? Using blood vessels.
Maybe It’s Already Too Late
So, to recap: living human blood only; multiple personality syndrome; other Vampires want to destroy you; no sleeping or dreaming and you feel truly alone. Glamorous, right? Everything you wanted and more? Better than the way you have it now? Offing yourself is easy — just throw yourself at another Vampire and let paranoia take its course.
Having said all this, if you have been turned against your will or have found yourself unable to endure eternity, reach out to me; ask me anything. Modern technology and social media have created the perfect venue for immortals to interact in the human world like never before, all in a virtual place where we don’t need to fear one another.
Oh, and you can thank Timothy for telling me this one: Where do Vampires learn to suck blood? Law school.
Addendum:
As if asking to be turned, bitten, or unmade wasn’t enough, now I’m seeing folks tell others to ignore my warnings because I’m not talking about “real” vampires. Identify all you wish, but when I say “Vampires” (capital-V) I’m talking about the dangerous supernatural kind who’ll kill you when starved, not the misunderstood hemoglobin-deficient very-much-alive guys, a few of which who’ve decided at some point that “vampire” or “vampyre” meant them exclusively and that all other uses — including the origin of the word — are insults directed at them. Quite the contrary; I WISH the supernatural kind only existed in books and movies, but I can assure you no one talking about truly dangerous (read: Un-Dead) Vampires are referring to you: the kind I prefer.
Take your power seriously. Keep each other safe. Be indomitable. ~ Janiss
Dr. Karl and I chatted briefly over Twitter about this last night.
The word of the day is “Pupillometry.” Vampires can sprout fangs and talons, of course, but our pupils dilate far wider than the color of our irises, giving our eyes a black or dark red appearance when seen “vamped out” since the observed sclera (whites of the eye) almost disappear. As a supernatural predator, it’s one of the hardest things to conceal about ourselves in the wild since sudden widening is an involuntary response to danger and desire… even in mortal humans.
From Wikipedia: “Pupillometry is the measurement of pupil diameter in psychology. The method examines humans (including infants) and animals. Pupillary responses occur from birth and are involuntary. Pupil dilation of 0.5 mm can occur when elicited by psychological stimuli.” Like other parts of a lie detector test, the pupil diameter can provide an involuntary physical clue akin to a change in breathing or galvanic skin response.
Cool, huh? Fine: I’m a science nerd. Anyway…
The size of the human eye is slightly smaller than a full-size gumball, just 24 millimeters wide. The color iris portion is a about the width of an M&M (red ones were my favorite), averaging 12-15 millimeters wide. Like the aperture of a camera, the pupil in the center can expand to a maximum of 6-7 millimeters in diameter, so some color is always visible…if you’re human.
Fun fact: Vampires, have incredible visual acuity. On the standard 20/20 human scale, an eagle might have 20/4 vision while a hawk has 20/2 vision; they can spot crawling ants during a fly-over. Incredible, sure, but if the doctors at Cedarcrest Sanctum are correct, Vampires have a 20/1 visual acuity or better. Let me put that in perspective for you: I can’t just see a fingerprint on a mirror from across a 20-foot room; I can tell you who it belongs to if I’ve seen it before… and which fingertip.
Okay, end tangent; back to pupils. When light decreases, your iris opens the pupil to take in more light and improve your vision, just like a camera, and contracts again when more light is available. The problem is that this also happens involuntarily when something attracts your attention, whether aroused or fearful. Humans have a maximum aperture opening of 7mm… good but not great.
Vampires are essentially nocturnal predators; our irises open far wider — a stunning 16-18 millimeters or about 70% of an eyeball’s width — and are unfortunately more readily noticeable to the observant.
“My… what big eyes you have!” Uh oh: busted.
The good news is we can control this mostly involuntary response the same way you can: being aware of it and guarding our thoughts, which isn’t always easy (for us) when there’s fresh blood around. It’s when we’re lost in thought (read: daydreaming) and are being observed by sneaky humans that we have the greatest chance of getting caught.
We can always make you forget what you saw, of course, but that’s not entirely fair, is it? Hey… I never asked to be a walking lie detector with built-in reprogramming capability.
A thousand-year old Viking vampire-werewolf-zombie-angel-sorcerer trained as a samurai-ninja-hacker-curator-Navy S.E.A.L. walks into a bar and says, “I have crossed oceans of time to take you to heaven in a flying DeLorean.”
Wow. Stacking the deck much? Some dude — I’m sure he’s got a twelve pack and a man-bun — who’s just EVERYTHING finds the perfect mate: a surrogate for the reader. When did these paranormal romance books get so extreme? How in the devil can anyone take any of this seriously?
I used to read my mom’s old paperback romance books: Danielle Steel novels. What’s wrong with falling for a renowned heart-transplant surgeon these days? Maybe what I remember are the heroines: “a glamorous, well-to-do young writer,” or “a beautiful young journalist.” Yes, there’s a pattern here — only the young get to fall in love ’cause those are the rules — but when you don’t have to worry about money, you can concentrate on everything else you want out of life without consequence (insert sarcastic laugh here).
Maybe I should pitch my story to her. “An eternal twenty-two year old, tethered to a rest home by an insatiable thirst, tasked to protect those who keep her alive and forever forbidden to walk in the sun. Suddenly (because you have to overuse words like that on back cover blurbs), a tall, dark and handsome immortal from wherever offers to take her someplace-or-another and give her whatever he thinks she actually wants but blah, blah, blah…”
Sorry, Danielle (may I call you that?) I don’t think I’m cut out for your amazing brand of one-woman survivor story with so many paranormal elements in my personal afterlife. That said, I’d probably laugh at a thousand-year old Viking vampire-werewolf-zombie-angel-sorcerer trained as a samurai-ninja-hacker-curator-Navy S.E.A.L., not that I’d be hanging out in a bar to begin with. Oh, and he can teleport and move things with his mind, too… did I mention that?
My wife and I enjoy walking through old cemeteries and taking local ghost tours. There are many haunted places around the U.S., often in old cities like Birmingham, Alabama, Savannah, Georgia, and St. Augustine, Florida. Back in 2010, we traveled to New Orleans and took such a tour, and our guide to the city at night was none other than Jonathan. He looked the way I imagine a time traveler might, combining a classic appearance with a modern sensibility, a person whom has long since reconciled the old and new ways with a natural ease, elegance, and an eagerness to share his experience.
I think she combined these ideas for Cedarcrest. While she certainly ruled the roost, I don’t think she saw herself as the high priest or queen of the damned; it was a place of refuge and safety — a sanctuary. Even under the guise of an elder care home, she actively sought her residents, scouring public records for the homeless and those in dire situations. Her days were long past acting the part of den mother to a sorority… something she actually did for a time after she was turned.
We can really only maintain sixty residents, forty staff, and one immortal… by design. For people who don’t know about 
There’s a movie called The Truman Show about a man (Jim Carrey) whose life being broadcast live 24/7, only he’s blissfully unaware that his existence is scripted — entertainment for the masses. All of his successes and failures are orchestrated under the control of a director and a writer’s room.
Here’s mine:
Here’s a scary little fact: Vampires don’t just become faster and stronger; they get smarter, as in actually able to process data faster. They don’t just notice a few things; they notice everything, and they can put observations and facts together quickly… the very definition of intelligence. Couple that with a photographic memory and you should get the idea it’s hard to one-up the undead. There’s a downside, of course — two, actually: distractibility and paranoia — but if you don’t use what you know and choose to ignore it, that knowledge is useless.
I used to read my mom’s old paperback romance books: Danielle Steel novels. What’s wrong with falling for a renowned heart-transplant surgeon these days? Maybe what I remember are the heroines: “a glamorous, well-to-do young writer,” or “a beautiful young journalist.” Yes, there’s a pattern here — only the young get to fall in love ’cause those are the rules — but when you don’t have to worry about money, you can concentrate on everything else you want out of life without consequence (insert sarcastic laugh here).
Cedarcrest Sanctum 