Life Begins

Life Begins

By

Jack Gunthridge

Life Begins

© 2013. Jack Gunthridge

Smashwords edition

ISBN:
9781301105489

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Inc.

Author’s Note

Life
has
gone through various revisions throughout its publication. The
version you are currently reading has over 25,000 words added to it
from the version. This was done to make the story eligible for some
writing contests. This took
Life
from a novella to an actual novel. This matters
to some people, even if the author cares very little for such
distinctions.

The new section gives a greater insight into
Christine, her character, and how she sees her relationship with
Jack. Hopefully this will appease readers whose only complaint was
that the book was not longer. (Contrary to popular opinion, the new
section was not added because the author is a male and grew tired
of female readers saying how disappointed they were at the size. “I
really liked it. I just wish it had been longer.”)

As for the author’s preference
between the two versions, he does slightly prefer the original
version. If you would like to read this version, please skip over
the section titled
Restricted
Access
and proceed directly to
Chapter Eight: Back to the
Future
. This will give you the novella
effect as it was originally published.

I will not go into detail here about the new
section that was added. The author wrote it to fit into this work
and does feel that it adds to the characters, story, etc. It just
makes the work a little bit different type of work.

I would also like to take this
moment to clarify some confusion about this book. The author has
always envisioned
Life
as the first part of a two part series, whether it was as a
film or in book form. The author has always debated on where to
divide the two parts of the story when they are really part of the
same story. The newly added section helps to get the reader ready
for what will come in the second part. The problem with the two
parts is that while they are part of the same story, they are
mirror opposites of each other and were designed to be this way.
This is the reason that they were broken up. Although they are part
of the same story, their tone and feeling is completely
different.

The book you are about to read is not an
autobiography. It is just written in the style of an autobiography.
It is based on a screenplay that the author started to write when
he was in the seventh grade. It has always been his intention that
Jack Gynapsy grows up to be Jack Gunthridge. This was done so that
the author could identify himself with his work. The introduction
you are about to read is part of the narrative. It is Jack Gynapsy
when he is older and known to the world as Jack
Gunthridge.

After this note, everything else in this book
is part of the official narrative as conceived by the
author.

Yours truly,

The real
Jack Gunthridge
, author

This was the original introduction
to the finalized version of
Life
I released in 2010. Since that time, the book has
been read by thousands of people around the world. It has received
its fair share of fans and haters. I have had people write me to
ask for advice because they were in the same sort of situation with
a girl. I’ve had people telling me how important the book was to
them. And I have had other people tell me how awful the book
was.

As I have been busying preparing
the sequel I have always planned for this book, I have had my own
issues to deal with. I was formally diagnosed as having a high
functioning form of autism known as Asperger’s Syndrome.

As a writer, there has always been
something missing from the story, a little piece that didn’t quite
make the sequel work for me. It seems that puzzle piece was my
autism.

I spent the first 33 years of my
life thinking I was normal. I knew I was a little different. I was
creative, but I never considered myself autistic. With the recent
discovery, it has caused me to reflect on my own life and things I
have done.

The history of
Life
stems from my own childhood and
teenage years. I started writing the script for it when I was in
the 7th grade. As I learned more about girls, I revised parts of
it. My autistic traits are hidden throughout the story, whether it
is in Jack’s reactions or his philosophies.

Since the story was written in an
autobiographical style, people have always thought it was real.
Even though I tried to tell people it was a work of fiction, I
could never dispel the idea that it was a work of non-fiction. I
was so adamant about the work being fiction that I wasn’t even
comfortable when people would call it creative non-fiction, which
is really a term where authors are allowed to embellish the truth
in a way that it is mostly true, but the truth has been given the
freedom to be exaggerated for dramatic effect, character
development, and other literary tricks to keep the audience
interested.

The problem is that it even when I
denied the work being true, answering questions about specific
parts of it made it extremely awkward for me. The truth for the
answers to the questions that people want to know is complicated. I
found myself not able to deny something or confirm it. Both would
be a lie, whether it was a little white lie or a giant whopper. I
have always wanted to tell the truth, but I couldn’t really with
this book.

You must understand that one of
the common features of people with Asperger’s is that they create
alternate universes where they can control things and make a world
in which they can achieve their desires and wishes. They will
create alter egos that accomplish the great things the autistic
person knows is inside of them, but that the autistic traits and
social difficulties prevent them from doing. This usually happens
as the person is entering puberty and going through the teenage
years.

This is the exact time period of
my life in which
Life
was written. I cannot say that the book is entirely a work of
fiction or a piece of non-fiction. Lies and truths have been
blended so completely with wishes, desires, missed opportunities,
regrets, what could have been, and what was that separating them
and explaining them to somebody would be like pulling a single
strand from a tapestry and trying to explain how it was significant
to the whole.

I guess the best way to describe
the book is as a type of parallel universe where there are
similarities to my own life, but there is a lot that is
different.

Even as a teenager, I knew that
this was the work I wanted to be associated with. I had the main
character grow up to be Jack Gunthridge. Back then, I didn’t know
exactly why the story was taking the shape it did, but I knew it
was important.

Looking at the book now, after my
autism diagnosis, I feel that it is necessary to add to it once
again. Instead of adding length to make it a novel instead of a
novella, I feel that I should be adding an explanation of the grown
up Jack Gunthridge that has received the knowledge that he is on
the autism spectrum and looking back at this period of his
life.

Instead of uploading an updated
version of
Life
to the various digital readers and producing a new paperback,
I think it is better to let the semi-original version that has
already been read and reviewed to exist in the form it is in. I do
not wish to destroy history.

Explanatory notes, however, should
be added to the text to help readers to understand that Jack is an
unsuspecting autistic. It is for this reason that I will be going
in and adding a new section at the end of each of the original Jack
chapters. And the book will receive a different title to separate
that it is different from the original version where Jack’s
behavior is that of a normal person.

I don’t know if the book has
gotten bad reviews because Jack’s behavior and his relationship
with Christine didn’t make sense to some readers because of my
autism. Hopefully adding an explanation will help people to
understand the behavior and the relationship between Jack and
Christine.

As with the original story, the
new additions will neither be true nor false. They will be the
creator and the work looking back through a lens where the author
and the hero examine the past with the knowledge that they are
autistic.

These changes are significant
enough to warrant a new title to separate it from the original. I’m
not just adding a chapter or revising a section. I’m making an
entire character autistic, which changes how everything is looked
at and understood.

Introduction

There has been a lot written about me lately.
I do not think I can fully explain all of my actions to the public.
I don’t think I can fully explain everything to myself. Christine
has that effect on me.

When I was a senior in high school, I was
asked to write my autobiography. The purpose of the assignment was
to see where I came from so that I would have an idea of where I
wanted to go in life. This assignment is what you are about to
read. This introduction that you are reading is just introducing
you to this concept. I’ve been told that is what introductions are
for.

Anyway, my publisher wants me to tell you that
when I wrote this assignment I went by another name. This was back
when Jack Gunthridge (yours truly. That is to say, me, the author,
the person who is writing the sentence that you are reading) went
by the name of Jack Gynapsy. I know some of you might have a hard
time believing that a celebrity would change the name that they
were born with to another name, but it is actually quite common. So
when you read this story, remember that Jack Gynapsy grows up to be
Jack Gunthridge. You don’t really need to know why I changed my
name. I mean, there are a lot of reasons, but that is another story
that I don’t have time for right now.

You see, this book wouldn’t be published right
now, except for the fact that my agent and publicist need to clear
up some stuff about me that is in the media. It seems that
everything the public believed about me was carefully crafted by a
publicity machine. You see, it’s not that I meant to mislead you
into thinking that I was somebody that I was not. It just happened
that after the events you are about to read about everything I knew
and depended on in life changed. So the publicity machine promoted
that person, which was me, except that it was a different
me.

I’m not trying to confuse you. I’m just trying
to say that what you are about to read is the historical document
that I wrote about myself when I was eighteen. I’m not going to
tell you what happened after this was written. That’s really a
different story. That’s the story of how Jack Gynapsy became the
Jack Gunthridge that you think you know. This is the story of Jack
and Christine, two American kids growing up in the heartland. It’s
just that for you to understand what Jack Gunthridge (me) is doing
now, you will have to understand what happened to Jack Gynapsy (me)
back then. When you put what you are about to read together with
what you can read about me in the gossip columns, everything will
make a lot more sense.

If you aren’t thoroughly confused now, just
wait until you get done reading what I wrote when I was a
teenager.

Jack Gunthridge

Author’s Note

This is the original note of the
text by the Jack Gunthridge character that Jack Gynapsy grows up to
be. In this scenario, which will be revealed in the sequel, Jack
Gynapsy grows up, changes his name to Jack Gunthridge, and becomes
famous. A scandal arises as Christine comes back into Jack’s life.
To explain why the rich and famous Jack Gunthridge would be
involved in a scandal with Christine, Jack released the text you
are about to read. Supposedly it was written as an assignment when
Jack was in high school. It was just being released after Jack was
famous to explain this other woman to the public. It’s a fictional
introduction that sets up the entire second part.