♪♪ “K-E-DoubLe-oh...Double-good...Kellogg’s-best-to-you!” ♪♪

Boy, howdy! I may not be no “double-naught” spy, nor do I have the movie-star looks of any Dash Riprock, but sure as shootin’, I got me one fine mess of a story to tell.

As an adult, the letter ‘K’ only represents one word, “karma.” When I was a kid, it stood for my absolute favorite breakfast cereal, Kellogg’s Corn Flakes (of Battle Creek, naturally), the official sponsor of THE BEVERLY HILLBILLIES, my most favorite TV show on the planet. Now, it’s hard for me to look at any part of my adult life without connecting it to my childhood family (the Clampetts). It’s all about our life’s lessons, where we come from and making sense of the two combined. I’ve never been no good at math, but I’ll do my best to add them two together. Just like Jethro, let me do myself some cypherin’...

1+1=2. 2+2=4. 4+4=...4+4=, 4+4 is...well, don’t you pay me no nevermind. Math never amounted to no hill o’ beans anyways. It all adds up to where you are now and how many friends you’ve got…online, I reckon…Facebook, MySpace, Twitter and then some…not to mention how many you can fit in your cement pond.

Seriously, I write this blog now for one reason (my first post as a former-writer): it’s all about storytelling, whether it be in the present or via retrospect. I sincerely believe that if we didn’t have a means to story-tell, to “get it ALL out,” we’d all be goners by now. Y’all agree? Well, that’s how I see it. That’s why I started STORIES ABOUT FACING FEAR, a student-led, after-school teen-storytelling program (here in the U.K.). Young-ins here, just like anywhere’s else, got somethin’ to say. Otherwise, if they didn’t, would all end up stone squirrely, just like the rest of us.

Their brains, sometimes, is like one big kettle o’ catfish set on high heat just waitin’ to boil over and explode. Instead of expecting to clean up the mess, I say, “Let’s talk.” If only Granny Clampett could have set herself down and chatted with Mrs. Drysdale, rather than takin’ the hickr’y switch to her, they could have been downright neighborly to one other. Don’t ‘cha think?

Just like Granny and Margaret Drysdale, under any and all circumstances, communication’s the key. Even if it’s rather one-sided, I aim the get teens to tell their stories, to give them their turn…so they don’t end up taking the switch to nobody, especially themselves.

My STORIES ABOUT FACING FEAR test project begins (at two London secondary schools) in a matter of weeks now. I have high hopes. I aim to pass the possum at the fancy eatin’ table in peace.

I’ll make sure to write again, lettin’ you know how it turned out. Please login once more…

Y’all come back now, ya hear?

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This is syndicated from CLINT ADAMS BOOKS blog.

To learn more about Clint's recently-released occult crime novel for adults, THE SEVENTH RITUAL, his upcoming non-fiction book, STORIES ABOUT FACING FEAR: THE (TEEN) INTERVIEWS and his series of teen novels, please visit his website: Stories About Facing Fear.