Dear Readers,

Sorry to be absent for a while. I have been working on other writing tasks when not focused on the in-between times of life’s ups and downs.

As to the writing tasks, I find, as a writer, and with much of life, that resting from one role tends to bring growth in many areas. When I am not writing, I’m earning my bread and the animals kibbles and bits, or going somewhere fun with my wife.

And I attend church regularly; that is the best fuel I have and the best road-map for life I have when not consulting the Almighty on my own or with my spouse or with a close friend.

So the writing tasks are myriad, and when I’m not into one, I can usually find contentment in one of the others; this keeps me from running to close to boredom, temptation and conflict.

The book related tasks I do include:

• Writing
• Editing
• Reading
• Publishing
• Blogging
• Social Media
• Book Design
• Drawing
• Narrating
• Reviewing
• Watching movies
• Living life

Here is an excerpt of the book I am doing final edits on for your enjoyment:

The Trainee

The Trainee 

Brendan Shea

Mercury Press

The Trainee

©2024, 2025, by Brendan Shea

Mercury Press

All rights reserved

No part of this book may be reproduced, recorded or transmitted in any form by any means, without the express written permission of the author, with the exception of a few brief sentences for review purposes.

After work

I came home at 7:30pm on a hot Saturday in September that was fast cooling down. The eastern humidity was thankfully over.

I’d been painting houses for some time, and my boss, Craig, always took the crew out to a buffet after our jobs were done. I pulled up to my family row home in Lancaster, wedged my old Saab beside the curb, shut off the engine, and yanked up the emergency brake.

I sighed in relief. 

The job had finished a few hours ago, but the meal afterwards was neverending. The guys and I piled our plates high with egg rolls and fried rice, dumplings and fried fish, and went back for more; more chicken wings, more mu shu with pancakes, more chow mein, and gallons of iced tea, and I was feeling a little bloated, notwithstanding the painting work had built strong appetites for us all.

I stuffed my car’s litter of crumpled burger wrappers, empty soda cans, bottle caps, old balled up receipts and oily napkins, all the paraphernalia of my vehicle’s operation for the past week, into a Turkey Hill plastic bag, and locked up the sedan. My car smelled like a McDonald’s french fry greaser, but it was reasonably tidy. I liked “tidy”.

On my way to the stoop, I dumped the bag in the trash, being careful to shut the metal lid tight. I didn’t want the raccoons to raid our garbage overnight. They might upset the whole thing, and drag messes across the walk. But most of the time they didn’t go that far if the lid was securely sealed.

My mom Karen was nowhere to be found. She was probably hidden away watching TV in her room. She liked to watch her programs after she got off work, and on her nights off, she escaped to her cozy woman-cave for solace and distraction. Tonight was not a work night for her; she got to watch all her shows.

My dad had decided to run out on us a few years ago when a brain aneurysm popped out of his head on the job, sending his body to the crematorium and his spirit to its eternal destination. What that was, I didn’t know; the purview of the Almighty was not often in my thoughts.

I was dragging my tool bag in my free hand with a purpose in mind. One time I’d left my tools in the Saab, and someone had jacked them by popping the trunk with a crowbar. Now I kept the back closed with a padlock and a screwed-on hasp. I didn’t want to tempt any more robbers, so after the first theft, I never left anything of value in the Swedish beast overnight. But I secretly wondered who was watching and from where, to know what I did and didn’t leave in the trunk. It was a creepy thought. 

I dumped my bag in the hallway and tried to forget about it. We’d never had anyone try to break into the house itself, thank God. 

Walking across the brown-painted hardwood floors, I reminded myself it was time to get that buffer machine so we could enjoy the nice finish below the crudely coated surface. Who painted a hardwood floor brown anyway?

I refocused my attention to the task at hand. At that point in the day I wanted zero food; not then, nor in the foreseeable future; otherwise, I would probably burst. But I was always ravenously thirsty, and stopped in the kitchen for some homemade iced tea. It was my poor man’s version, prepared by dropping a few tea bags into a gallon jug. I’d fill it with water, add a few packets of sweetener and chill. Delicious to me but my mom hated the stuff.

I trudged up the stairs to the third floor, armed with a quart drink cup, and saw Mom’s light was on at the second floor, so I popped in to say goodnight. 

But she was already asleep, dozing peacefully with an old Cagney & Lacey episode on one of the cable channels. The volume was up loud, and she was only half-covered with her duvet. It was now in the fifties outside, so after I lowered the TV volume, I gently covered her with the quilt and turned out the light, leaving Tyne Daly and Sharon Gless to keep her company in the shadows. 

I quietly reclosed her bedroom door, and crept up another flight to my attic bedroom, after stopping at the restroom to quickly relieve myself.

Putting on my pajamas, I flipped on my boombox, played some soft rock and kept the volume low. Turning out the light, I was ready to let go of the day. 

Finally. 

A long work week was over, and the next day I’d be free to think and do next to nothing. But even then, my job didn’t require me to punch a clock, answer much to a boss or wear special clothing. 

I drifted off to sleep, riddled with the cares of the day, financial woes and relational emptiness, but good old sleep won out and my worries peeled away. I didn’t even have any bad dreams.