Vital Information

You know that feeling that you have when you're absolutely sure that there is vital information that you need to know if you have any chance of surviving and you're not sure what it is or how to get it but you're positive you don't have it? That feeling of doom that comes from the understanding that not having this knowledge is guaranteed to make you incapable of either performing the duties you're expected to perform or successfully navigating a tricky situation? That old metaphor of the lack of instruction manual when it comes to life?

Well that's the feeling I've had for the duration of my adult life.

When I was growing up, I lived with the assumption that someday, somehow, I would become an adult. There would be some transition wherein I would become a capable, independent, intelligent woman who was able to successfully navigate difficult life situations with wisdom and acceptance rather than stupidity and panic. I would learn, perhaps magically, to balance a checkbook, to hold my temper, to take charge of a chaotic situation, to respond calmly to people who were out of control, to do basic household maintenance by washing the dishes and doing the laundry and going grocery shopping on a timely, regular schedule.

This was what being an adult was to me. And I believed, whole heartedly, that it would happen. I didn't know how or why exactly, but I trusted that if I made responsible choices I would reap the rewards of an organized lifestyle.

Nearing the end of my twenties I can no longer make the excuse that perhaps I'm just in prolonged adolescence. The belief that I was just like everyone else because so many people nowadays do not accomplish basic adult milestones until later in life. The hope that I was simply a little late in gaining an understanding of the rules I need to play by. I don't think that anymore, it's just been too long.

Especially because, unlike a lot of other people from my generation, I didn't take time off from school to backpack around Europe or move to an exciting city to "discover myself" or take so many drugs that it took me a few years to emerge from the haze and start living. No, I was responsible. I went straight to college after high school and straight from college to grad school and straight from grad school to a job. I studied a skill, started my career- no pause, no break. I had one big trip- after grad school, and I did back pack around Europe. But my job was already set in stone with a return date before I left and that three weeks passed by far quicker than I could have realized it would.

Now, five years later with an educational background that firmly places me in the felid that I've been working in I feel more lost than ever before.

This is not the life I thought I was working towards. I hate my job on a level I thought was reserved to those who burned out after twenty years in the field. After only five years I have become so jaded that I no longer believe in my career path. I would happily go back to working in a boring office if it meant more money and less stress and the saddest thing is that despite 6 years of college and over $40K in student loans and five years of work experience I think that I could easily make more as an administrative assistant and have a fuck of a lot less stress.

And that naive belief that I had before that the money meant nothing in comparison to the knowledge that I was helping people? I don't have that anymore. I've become so cynical that I would happily say "Fuck off" to every client I've ever had if I could earn a decent living and go home at night without a billion worries on my mind.

And all those adult skills I thought I'd have learned by now? Balancing a checkbook, staying calm and rational in chaotic situations, handling drama with wisdom and composure, maintaining a household? I don't have any of them. Am I as bad as I used to be? Hell no. But am I nowhere near what I envisioned? Ions away from it, it seems.

And I don't think there are any other adult milestones that might suddenly bring that knowledge I seek. A career? We've already covered that disaster. A relationship? I'm with the man I'm going to stay with for the rest of my life. We just went to a wedding (not ours, obviously). People talked about the bride groom like they were "adults" now because they were considering another person's needs as importantly as their own. I couldn't help but wonder how long it would take for them to become as dysfunctional and miserable as most married couples. I certainly don't think they're any less stupid than I am, probably a lot more so because they actually believe it'll work out. And kids? If my belief system isn't jaded enough to convince me that bringing a child into the world would be the biggest mistake I could possibly make then I don't know what is. I'm messed up enough, I don't need to mess up anyone else. So there's no other milestones I'm expecting to magically transform me into a responsible adult.

And that thought- that I don't know something I really need to know in order to survive- it plagues me. I feel more naive now- with my years of experience and lessons learned- than I did before college.
Then again, maybe that's what's wisdom is. Knowing enough to know that you really don't know anything. That you're only as smart as the smart people you parrot. That you only have half a chance of any given situation ending well, despite how many times you've done it before. That no matter how hard you try to prepare and organize there will always be a billion factors beyond your control that can easily fuck things up irrevocably and all you can possibly do is try not to drown in the mess left over.

I don't know. I'd like to think not. I'd like to think that that wisdom, that composure, that ability to handle the things that come my way will grow over time. Maybe it's not an "adulthood" thing. Maybe it's a "mid life" thing or even a "senior" thing. I don't know. All I know is if I lay on my death bed many, many years from now and I still have that feeling that I didn't know vital information I really needed- I'm going to be pissed.

A Different Landscape

As I was driving home from work the other day I passed a park with a line of trees bordering the edge.  They were all decently big, relatively old-looking trees but they were all equally spaced along the road.  I realized that not too long ago (earth wise, not my lifetime wise) they were just little saplings newly planted.  They probably were no different than the little ones you'd get at Home Depot or something like that.  And yet here they were, undoubtedly a few decades old and growing.  I wish I could've counted the rings and known how fast that growth was.

I found my mind wandering in the way that it does when driving home from work and I wondered what that stretch of road might have looked liked back then.  Or even longer ago.  I doubt that a hundred years earlier there was a road there, there was probably a forest.  Miles of trees where that small line of them was.  And I found myself thinking what that whole chunk of land that was now a well established town looked like.

I've read a little bit about the earth's history.  I understand the basics of geology.  I can wrap my mind around the fact that deserts used to be oceans, mountains used to be shores and almost none of the plants, animals or other familiar sights I take for granted used to be around.  I get all that, on an intellectual level.  But I can't for the life of me begin to imagine what it all looked like.

No urban sprawl, no suburbia stretching out for a radius of fifty miles around any city, no farm land splitting up the vast landscape into multi-colored squares like pieces of construction paper, no grass spreading as far as the eye can see.

The idea that almost 90% of the plants and animals that dominate the landscape now are, basically, weeds that sucked up all the natural resources and outgrew all the original inhabitants is mind-boggling.  And yet, that's all I know.  It's all most people know.

It's amazing how much we take for granted that is so incredibly recent.

Loss of Perspective

What if you'd never seen a thunderstorm before?  The world suddenly darkening, the wind blasting you in the face, the sky rumbling over head as black, ominous clouds blocked out the sun... what would you think?  That the world was ending?

What about a sunset?  If you didn't know that light would come back?  If you watched it creep back towards the horizon and disappear leaving you in utter darkness.  Wouldn't you abandon all hope?

What if you didn't know there was a tomorrow?  If this day- today- was suddenly all you had?  And you spent it as you did- paying bills, working at a soul-sucking job, doing dishes, laundry, mowing the lawn, cleaning your bathroom... how cheated would you feel?

See, that's the problem with Carpé Diem.  It goes in direct contradiction to what we have to do in order to survive.  In direct contradiction to responsible (and often dull, stressful and completely un-enjoyable) living.  And yet, that's what we wish we could all do.

All I know is, if today were suddenly the last day of my life- I'd be pissed.

The Price of Becoming a Master Multitasker

I recently began a job as a program manger.  I quickly learned the meaning of being a manger: problem solving, fire extinguishing and never ending multitasking.  Given that I was thrown head first into a relatively sink or swim position I quickly adapted and although it's only been a short time I'd like to think that I've significantly improved my ability to multitask.  It's great in some ways.  I cover a lot of different tasks and switch back and forth based on what's going most wrong at the moment.  It helps with crisis management.

The drawback is the mental strain of doing such an activity all day long.  At the end of the day, sitting in my car and taking the long drive back home I find myself suffering from ADD.  Just the like the commercials: "It's like you're watching a broken t.v. that changes channels every five seconds."

What am I going to make for dinner?  Did they fix the stupid construction on this road?  Whatever happened to Tiffany, anyway?  Oh yeah, like you're going to get there any faster than I will, you douche.  That's the car from that Adam Sandler song- how did it go?  "Piece of shit car..."  Way to go, buddy- the muffler louder than a Harley really makes you cool.  Maybe I should make meatballs.  What do I have at home?  Oh, I gotta call Nicole in the morning and ask her how to fill out that form.  Shit, did I fax in that incident report?  God, I gotta get some sleep.

I can feel my head spinning and I can't grasp any one thing.  And it's odd because as exhausted and completely fried as I am I'm also horrifically keyed up and racing with ideas that might be really good if I could hold onto any one long enough to actually take action.  Like this entry, for example.  It sounded a heck of a lot cooler in my head.

The Beveled Edge is Back!

I know what you're thinking: It left?  I'm pretty sure there were only two people reading this thing before, and I'm pretty sure they were doing it out of obligation for a friend.  Not just because my crap wasn't all that impressive, but because I started writing less and less.  You could log on once a month and catch up on everything new within a minute.  So why re-vamp it?  For my own selfish reasons.  Maybe I feel like writing down the random stuff in my head instead of just thinking it.  Maybe I like the medium.  Maybe I'm just a glutton for punishment.  I don't know.  Whatever the reason, though, it's back.

So why did the last version fail?  Well, many reasons.  Number one: I modeled it after the blog of a friend of mine who, unlike me, is an extensively educated, exhaustively practiced and frighteningly skilled fiction writer.  I came to the conclusion very quickly that it would take me years of practice and far more innate talent than I have to be able to write like him, and yet I still tried.  It's never a good idea to try to copy someone else's art.

Number two:  I held myself to a posting frequency standard that just wasn't feasible for me.  Which is why this time around I'm not going to make any claims to posting frequency.  If it happens once a week, great.  Once a month?  OK.  A few in a row?  Awesome.  But if I'm fried at the end of the day (which I am more often than not) and can't come up with anything, fine.

Number three, and most relevant to the new set-up of the blog:  Fiction isn't my forte.  Would I like to get better at it?  Sure.  But can I realistically expect myself to come up with something new and actually worthwhile every time I write?  Not a chance in hell.  I like fiction, I do.  But I've noticed a pattern in myself.  I tend to get into an idea, a story, and live there for a while.  Get to know the characters: their traits, their quirks, their failings, etc.  Plot is a secondary interest.  This probably doesn't make for good storytelling, but I've given up my dreams of being published.  I've also given up my dreams of coming up with short, interesting, funny, or in other ways worthwhile stories on the spot.  Doesn't work for me, so I'm gonna stop trying.

So what am I gonna do?  What the subtitle says: "Random musings".  My thoughts, my impressions of various things, my opinion, just random stuff.  Maybe every now and again some fiction will find its way in there.  But I'm not gonna force it.  I'm gonna write whatever the hell I feel like writing which is, quite arguably, what I should've done in the first place.

Will it be interesting to read?  I haven't the foggiest.  And for the first time, I don't really care.  Although I have not done the research to back this up I'm pretty confident that there are a lot of blogs out there containing much stupider shit than this one will.  Will it be as good as many?  Not a chance!  Will it be as bad as some?  I don't think so.  It'll be whatever the hell it will be and I will, for the very first time since starting it, leave it the hell alone.

If you want read it, have at.  If you don't, keep clicking to the next blog.  If you like it, awesome.  If you don't, oh well.  Maybe it'll evolve into something worthwhile.  Maybe it'll deteriorate into something so stupid even I can't stomach it.  I'm not gonna predict either way.  I'm just going to write, and see where it goes.  It worked for NaNoWriMo.  When I forced myself to let go of the idea of what I thought my story should be it actually started coming out.  When I tried to fit it to some ideal in my head it stalled, every time.  So I let it go, and I'm sure that in the pages and pages of crap there is actually some worth while stuff.  Maybe in the many blogs that are to come they'll be something else worthwhile.  I hope so.

A Brutally Honest Viewpoint on the Stages of Loss and Greif

By now popular psychology has informed most people that there are five stages of loss and grief.  I studied them relatively in depth in college and have used them in my practice more times than I can count.   But I've never actually experienced them myself, certainly not so acutely that on any given day I can quickly pinpoint that "Ok, today appears anger.  Alright then."  But that's where I am- and this is what it looks like.

Shock

You listen to the doctor explaining what the test results are and which diagnosis is likely (because apparently your PCP will never give you a definitive diagnosis, you need a specialist for that) and you focus on what the next step is.  Which appointments do I have to schedule?  Can I get someone to cover for me at work?  When I can I see the endocrinologist?  How am I going to afford all these co-pays?
You get way more information than you can really process and you do everything you're supposed to with a smile on your face: learn how to use your new devices, get all your prescriptions filled, go shopping for all the healthy food.  You show people your cool new medical alert bracelet and talk about the lifestyle changes you're making.  You tell yourself that you'll use this forced change as a perfect excuse to get healthy, which you need to do anyway.  You believe people when they tell you that in no time you'll be so used to it you won't even have to think about it.  You feel strong, capable, like you'll be better because of it.

Anger

You realize that finding things to eat is a lot more difficult than you thought it would be.  You resent the nice co-worker that brought cookies to work and put them on the table to share with everyone.  You wonder why traffic, supermarkets, insurance companies and the rest of the world won't accommodate you since you're having such a tough time.  You find yourself mentally cursing your friends for wanting you to be happy.  You wish death on the world in general because it's another really bad day. 

Bargaining

You listen to the people who tell you that once you've controlled your diet, you'll feel better and won't have to do all this anymore.  You think about how once it's under control you can go back to living the way you did and not worry about it.  You tell yourself that you can have that cookie or donut and it won't really do any harm.  You fantasize about the next big meal you'll have once everything is back to normal. 

Depression

You suddenly remember how much your life in general sucks and get hopeless about it improving.  You feel sorry for yourself and resentful at the same time because you know that so many people have it so much worse.  You hate yourself for feeling this bad over something so trivial in the grand scheme of things.  You overreact to everything and lose all perspective.  You cry all the time, for no reason.  You get sick of seeing your pathetically sad face every time you look in the mirror.

Acceptance

You get better at remembering to pack your lunch and eat meals at around the same time.  You become skilled at administering your medication without hurting yourself.  You get accustomed to what you can and can't do and don't think it's so limiting anymore.  You remember that the rest of your life is far more important.  You go back to enjoying your time off, planing for the future, challenging yourself to do better.  And life, as they say, goes on.

At least that's the plan.  Right now I seem to be stuck ping-ponging between anger and depression.  One of the things I always hated about this theory is that there's no linear progression- you can cycle through a million times over, even hit acceptance one day then revert back again.  And there's no set time line of how long it's supposed to take.  Day by day I wonder if I'm done yet.  I think I am because I'll feel good when I wake up, optimistic that things are finally going back to normal.  Then my mood shifts and I'm back in one of the earlier stages.  I

I try to be patient, but it's hard.  I guess I'll see what it all looks like when I'm on the other side of all this.

NaNo No Go

In case you couldn't tell by the fact that I cowardly hid away from the blog over the past few days, I did not hit 80k on new year's eve.  Nor did I miraculously finish the novel in less than that.  No, it seems that I am no closer to being done now than I was a week ago.

I don't need to go into detail about the amount of mental effort required to keep that inner critic of mine quiet with so much fuel readily available for the fire.  Nor do I need to say how many times the word failure has floated through my mind only to be beaten back down by that optimistic champion of mine who endlessly defends me against the barrage of insults I usually hear on a loop in my head.  Because you all know me, so you can safely assume all that without me telling you.

No, what I need to say is that despite this set back, I'm not giving up.  That deadline was not actually a deadline because, let's face it: I'm not dead.  Nothing terrible happened.  I didn't delay the release of a paper or prevent myself from finishing the novel.  All I did was delay it.  As one of you simply asked when I reluctantly admitted my lack of forward momentum, "Will you finish it this month?"

My response?  I don't know.  I know there is still much more to be written and much more of the story to unfold.  More than i've even thought of yet, I suspect.  The more of this thing I write the more it seems to decide it's own path.  I started out with some pretty specific plot points and it hit those relatively easily and then went further, meandering down little side paths I didn't see at the start.  And now all I have is a vague idea of where I want to end up with no clear plan of exactly how i'm going to get there.  This will likely make the word count grow more than I planned, and I'm ok with that.

For a terribly brief time in high school (before I realized how much I absolutely despise running), I joined the cross country track team.  After a week on the team the regulars decided to initiate me by showing me the side paths through the park near the school.  The unpaved, publicly unused paths through the woods that they frequented.  I loved them.  The canopy of trees overhead, the quiet, the lack of people.  It was so much better than the main track on the school grounds we all had to do warm-up laps on.  I hated that track- the noise, the constant shouts to go faster, keep up, push it, whatever.  Give me hours on the trails in the park over that.

That seems to be what I'm going for here.  The finish line is there, somewhere in the distance.  I'm in no rush to get there.  I'm meandering, exploring, wandering around in the story and discovering lots of fun little facts along the way.  I will finish, someday. But for the first time since I started this thing, I'm in no rush.

I don't know if this is the right way to do things.  The threat of going off the path is that you might wander into quick sand, or trip over a log, or get bitten by something nasty and never reach your destination.  I'm sure there are pitfalls I could reach that could seriously injure me (metaphorically speaking) and possibly prevent me from finishing.  But I'm counting on being able to backtrack, re-write and move past those should I encounter them.  And I'm sure there's much to be learned from that.

So I'll keep writing.  Hopefully the story will move forward as it fleshes itself out.  Hopefully it'll stay at least vaguely readable.  Hopefully I won't want to kill my main character out of frustration.  And maybe, just maybe I'll end up with something worthwhile. 

And in the meantime, I'm way overdue to get back on track with the random little snippets of fiction that I originally started this blog to practice.  So stay tuned for those.

Status Update

I hoped to write 10k words yesterday.  I dreamed they would be funny, exciting, endearing, wonderfully descriptive words and they would push me so far forward in the plot that the end would practically write itself.  Shockingly, this did not happen.

However, I did manage to get out just under 4700 words which may be the second highest single-day word count i've had since beginning this madness in November.  (I can't be sure without the little graph from NaNoWriMo which I can no longer utilize as that part of the site is in hibernation until next November.)

I find it very doubtful that even half of those 4700 words were funny, exciting, endearing or any of the other characteristics I hoped for.  But they may have been at least vaguely interesting.  Our main character now has a pet chameleon (not the small animals people often keep as pets, no- in my crazy fantasy world they're sort-of like flightless dragons) because apparently it's not enough for him to learn magic, he has to do it while attempting to raise a baby chameleon which will soon be too big to fit in the house.  Interesting, yes?

And, becuase of this new unexpected story line with the chameloen I am no closer to pushing the plot towards the end.  In fact, it's probably going to be a lot longer now.  I try not to push away any ideas when they come, even when they require me to write much more than I wanted.  I wouldn't have gotten to this point if I did.

I wonder if these are the lessons i'm supposed to learn.  To meander through the plot until something pops up and takes me in another direction.  To just let new ideas incorporate themselves into the story line without picking and choosing which to keep and which to toss.  To progress slowly in fits and bursts.  I know it's not how you're supposed to write on a deadline.  But maybe without one?

To let the story grow without judgement, without rushing it forward, without trying to change it into something ti doesn't seem to want to be.   Not brilliant, not concise, not perfectly constructed.  Just growing, like a mountain- layer by layer, spreading outwards as well as upwards.  It will, of course, be a mountain (and a nightmare) to edit.  But isn't that what editing's for?  You get this longwinded, crazy, spotty story and then have to pick and cut and poke at it until it forms something you want.  Like forming the giant slab of rock that you will later carve your masterpiece scultpture out of.

One way or another i'm writing, and that's gotta be good.  And hey!  Here's a shocker- I actually manged to come up with something not related to this novel and *gasp!* post it!  (See below.)  What a miracle that is, huh?

I don't know where all this is going to end.  I'm pretty sure it won't be tomorrow night, even if I do reach 80k.  And perhaps that will be disappointing.  To do NaNoFiMo and miss the Fi.  But maybe it will leave the door open for more.  I don't know yet.  But I'm going to keep writing until I find out.

Scene from some monster movie

Dual-disclaimer: 1) For those prone to nightmares from gory images, skip this one. (You know who you are.) 2) I find it hard to believe that I’m the first person to think up this particular scenario so if you’ve already seen in it some random horror movie, I apologize. No copyright infringement or any other theft is intended.


Mr. Fuzzles

Near dark interior of a typical bedroom, the only light we see comes from the clock on the nightstand next to a bed with a frilly comforter and bed skirt, casting a glow over the radius around the bed. From the corner of the room emerges what might be a snake, but is found to be a tentacle as it wriggles its way into the light. From the direction of the camera an old, gray cat enters the shot and crouches, clawing at the ground the way cats do right before they pounce. It leaps into the air landing on the tentacle and traps it in its mouth. A second later it is pulled violently into the darkness accompanied by a loud, panicked meow.

A hand emerges from the bed, reaching downward. It clearly belongs to an old woman with wrinkled skin, nails long and polished.

“Wha’s- what’s going on Mr. Fuzzles?” comes a groggy voice from the old woman. “Where are you?”

The cat’s head emerges from the dark corner, seemingly responding to its owner’s call. As it moves into the light we see it is actually impaled on the same tentacle which had snatched it away earlier, strands of muscle and gore hanging down where its neck should be. The tentacle pushes the head forward and the outreached hand pets it as a familiar pet owner would, gently stroking the head and ears.

“Oh, there you are,” she coos, “what happened to my little fuzzle-wuzzles? Did something scare you?”

She does not seem to see that her cat is no longer attached to the head she is petting. Perhaps she is not looking, perhaps she does not have her glasses on. For whatever reason, she does not respond with any alarm but goes on contentedly petting the head of her former cat.

We hear the sound of something moving across the carpet as the thing that the tentacle belongs to slowly enters the light. In the darkness we can see only part of it and it is unclear whether it is plant, alien or monster. It seems to have many black tentacles moving around it, pushing it forward on the carpet. As it nears the bed we can make out a pair of dark red eyes and a large, gaping hole with sharp teeth and thick saliva stretching across the widening gap of its mouth. Dangling from the mouth is the tale of the cat. It gapes towards the woman’s outstretched hand.

Miracle on Lawndale Ave?

Having received two observations about the lack of updates here from two of the blog's three followers, I decided it was about time to do one.  So here you go.

And just like that, the words escape me yet again.  So much to say, so little of it relevant or useful.  I could tell you about my holiday, all the baking and over-eating and family stress and cool presents.  I could tell you how much I enjoyed the quiet time after all the chaos ended.  I could tell you about how I'm feeling regarding the upcoming end of the calendar year.  I could make up something.  But none of that is where my mind is right now.

My mind is focusing on my complete and utter failure to produce a daily word count over the past couple of weeks.  It's focused on the lack of momentum in my story.  And, as always, it's allowing my inner critic to berate me with a loud, booming voice.  And I don't need to tell you how easy it would be to slip into a self-deprecating rant about how much I suck right now.  But that, too, is irrelevant.

At the start of this, before erasing and starting over, I started to say how (barring a miracle) I’d failed to hit 80k.  But then I remembered: I have four nights.  Can I actually produce 15k in four nights?  If I were a mathematician I’d say the statistical likelihood, given my averages this month, is incredibly low.  But then again, if I were a mathematician I’d know how to derive.  I don’t know how to perform that basic action nor the statistical likelihood of my success.

No, I’m a fantasy fan.  I know how to have grand, seemingly unobtainable dreams.  How to achieve those dreams?  Not so much.  But how to have them?  Definitely.  My grand, seemingly unobtainable dream is to hit 80k by midnight on December 31st.  I figure even if I fail, pushing myself for the next four days will be ten times more progress than I’ve had in the last two weeks, so it’s gotta be a good thing.  And who knows? Maybe, just maybe, I’ll give myself a miracle.

Wish me luck!

Back in the Saddle Again

So, last week was a very bad week for me, writing wise.  Out of the 7 days I only wrote for three of them and I wrote very little on those few days.  The usual unreasonable self-loathing and guilt ensued, pushing me to get back on track.

After two consecutive days of a more reasonable word count (around 1200 monday and 2000 yesterday) i'm starting to feel better.

Not that the writing has gotten any easier.  For most of this exercise, since November 2nd, the writing has been slow, difficult, uncomfortable and a variety of other unpleasant feelings.  While the plot's always been there the actual storytelling hasn't come any easier over time.

I had that one glorious day where I miraculously pounded out 5600 words (that historic day being November 22nd) and have not repeated it since.  I still have dreams of reliving that victory with a sudden massive word flow ending in an even higher single day word count, but that hasn't happened yet.

However, with the routine of writing everyday back on there is at least the chance of that happening again.

I knew this before, I certainly got it into my head last month, but I am relearning it now: nothing can replace writing everyday.  It's a lesson I've been taught many times before: in school by professors and in my personal life by my mentor.  And yet, here I am once again learning it.  I suppose it's just one of those things you just have to keep learning until it finally becomes ingrained or, gods forbid, habitual.

But hey, better to learn the same lesson twenty times over than never at all, right?

Still writing...

Why Christmas Decorations are a Good Thing

An unwanted pubic opinion:

Don't get me wrong, I hate the whole Christmas scam as much as the next person does.  I whole heartedly disagree with Christmas carols taking over my favorite radio stations for the later half of November and the entirety of the next month.  I hate the fact that stores start selling Christmas junk the week of Halloween and I certainly don't feel the need to rush out to the store to stand in line for ten hours at 3am the day after Thanksgiving (seriously- what's wrong with you people?)

No, I don't buy into any of that.  But there is one Christmas tradition that I'm ok with: lights.  Not that they should be displayed in stores in October or light up a house so brightly you have to shield your eyes to drive by it (circa National Lampoon's Christmas Vacation, an excellent movie).  And not that neighbors having contests over which idiot spent the most money to have the most ridiculously elaborate light display is a good thing.  But lights in and of themselves are great.

Why?  Because it's so fucking dark outside that if you don't have some lights in the landscape the suicide rate (which is already pretty high this time of year) would probably jump even higher.  I never signed on for this whole daylight savings thing and I personally wouldn't mind not losing an hour of sleep in the summer only to have it artificially given back in the fall.  And why is it, by the way, that if i'm getting an extra hour of sleep I lose an hour of my day?

Before the whole 'fall back' thing the sun started going down earlier and earlier, but at least I had a chance of seeing it set when I walked out of work at 5pm.  Now it seems the only time I get any sun is on the weekends.  My ten minute drive into work in the morning does not provide me with nearly enough sunlight and when I step out after 5pm now the sun is long gone.  Not because it's going down that much earlier but because 5pm is the old 4pm and the sun doesn't give a rat's ass about daylight savings time.

So, I guess, really the solution is to get rid of daylight savings time.  (The farmers can keep their own time system, if they want, just leave the rest of us alone.)  But, in lieu of that, Christmas lights.

In the trees, on the fence, in the windows, wherever.  Put up as many snowflakes on the light posts as you want.  Display as many Christmas trees as you have.  Throw in all the menorahs and Kwanzaa stars as you can get your hands on cause there's too much damned Christmas stuff in the display anyway.  Just make sure it's all well lit.

In the same simple-minded way that dragons like sparkly things I am a fan of lights.  They're pretty and they make the painfully black night a little more bearable.  So put 'em up as early as you want, and leave them up well into the new year.  Cause it's a long, dark winter and we need all the light we can get.

So, Apparently I AM that much of a masochist

So, as I said, I crossed the 50k finish line.  And I had a terribly brief moment of "Go Me!!!  This is the best thing ever!!!" and I downloaded my little winner's icon (<---Look over there!  Isn't it pretty?), and I reveled in looking at my nice purple bar, and I enjoyed a few days off from writing.

Then today I sat down to just take a look at my story and maybe add to it a bit and make my final word count that much greater than 50k.  And I again thought about how much more there is to write.

I originally started jotting down notes as a brief outline for where the story would go on the very first day (November 2nd, as you may recall) and the timeline started with little Factin and ended with him some years later.  Of the 15 or so outline points that I had originally jotted down only about half of them have actually come to pass in the story.

He's about to meet the wizard who will become his mentor, but I haven't actually written the scene yet.  And there's a lot of cool training scenes I have in my mind between the two of them.
The two other characters he's with are so far from fleshed out it's a little ridiculous, plus through chatting about them over the break I had several moments of "oh yeah, I totally forgot that about him/her!".  This is not to say that the characters in this novel will be at all true to what was originally imagined, but I'd like to transfer at least a couple of the details.
There were many more battles I had in my head in which Factin would (god forbid) kick a little ass (magically speaking) and maybe, just maybe, mature into something more than the self-loathing, distrustful, spineless and relatively annoying adolescent he is currently.  (That'd be nice!)

So, with that in mind, I have decided to attempt, and baring any serious time-consuming catastrophes, complete NaNoFiMo or, National Novel Finishing Month.  Their tag line?  "One writer. One unfinished novel. On December 1, the battle begins."  (Kind-of love the sound of that!)  Their idea?  Complete your novel from NaNoWriMo by adding an additional 30,000 words by the end of the month.  Why 30k?  Because according to the FAQ on the website 80,000 words "is on the low end of what's usually considered a real novel these days".

Now, this is a much less spiffy online community than what NaNoWriMo has become (although give it a few more years and someone who does web design and I bet that'll change) as it does not have a word count validator or home page with videos, interviews, tips and other cool stuff.  So that means no daily posting to the site, no seeing my bar graph grow (which will be a little heart breaking for me cause I really loved that), and none of the other stuff that made the NaNoWriMo experience what it was.

No, this is the simpler online community consisting of nothing more than discussion forums, moral support, and people posting about their successes and failures over the course of the month.  As much as NaNo is an honor system because no one actually reads the 50k words to make sure you haven't written "word" 50,000 times this is a serious honor system as there's no one to validate your word count but you!  (Well, me and Microsoft word because i've been going off of that word counter this whole month.)

Another change is that I am actually allowed to edit this time around but only in so much as I don't edit myself out of 80,000 words by the end of the month.  And since every word I get rid of is one less towards that 80k goal I'm thinking editing is going to be pretty slim until I've gotten a hefty bundle of words added on.  Besides, the point is to finish the story, not to edit it to a publishable point.  (There's NaNoEdMo for that!  At least I think there is...)

Now, part of me thinks that I must just be a hard-core masochist for signing up for this.  After all, that 50k was by no means easy- there were days where getting those words out was just about as comfortable as visiting the dentist.  (Ouch!)  Plus, it is Christmas time and lords knows there's more than enough to keep me occupied with that this month.

But the other part of me just keeps saying "But the story's not done!!!  You have to finish!!"  And it points out that, in addition to the tortuous days, there were the good days.  The days when I actually felt ever the tiniest bit like a real writer.  The days when I finally got that scene out and it was actually sort-of funny.  The days where I had that idea and it wasn't half bad.  And the days where I choked through that 1,000 words, hated it, and then felt proud of myself for sticking to it anyway.

Because that's the main thing that I've always failed to do: stick to it.  Back in school, no matter what class it was for, I couldn't choke out those words.  Granted at that point I was supposed to not only choke them out but also share them with the class which was undoubtedly why I failed so epically, but still.  Yes, I take solace in the fact that no one's going to be reading this 80k words until I let them and that will definitely help me leave them on the page in spite of hating them.  But even with that, just writing is a pretty big challenge for me.

So I'm challenging myself to hit 80,000 by the end of the year.  It will undoubtedly be difficult even though it's significantly less than what I had to hit this month.  And I'm sure I'll want to give up and trash the whole thing at least a half a dozen times.  And I'm sure that some days I'll be thinking that I could have just stopped at 50k and worried about actually finishing the thing some other time.  A time when I'm less stressed, more sane, and more able to just write.  But waiting for that time to come would be akin to planning to pay my bills by winning the lottery: it's just not a safe bet.

If you are following me in this I'm not going to make any grand promises about twitter updates (what'd I get this month?  Like, five?) or daily posts or anything like that.  (Although I may end up just posting my daily word count to keep myself accountable since I don't have another website on which to do it.)  And I'm not going to claim that there will be a story on here unrelated to this writing challenge since there wasn't for the whole month of November.  All I'm going to do is tell you that I am still writing, and still getting Factin into trouble.

One of my favorite motivational quotes comes from the Disney/Pixar movie Finding Nemo in which the fish Dori (voiced by Ellen DeGeneres, who I absolutely love) launches into a chorus of "Just keep swimming!  Just keep swimming!  Just keep swimming, swimming, swimming.." whenever the other character gets bitchy about how doomed they are (which he does a lot).  My new mantra for this month (shockingly) is:
"Just keep writing!  Just keep writing!  Just keep writing, writing, writing..."  And I will.

50k

Ladies and Gentleman, today a rather remarkable thing occurred.  I reached 50k words.  (Well, technically 50,169 words, but you know what i'm saying.)
Now, i'm sure that many of you, especially those who actually, you know, write- are thinking "So?"
Well to you I quote Billy Madison when I say "Well, it was hard for me so SHUT UP!!!"
Ah-hem, my point being that I have never done anything like this before and for me it is a big deal.
Now, the bad news is that Factin's story, while being over 50k words is no where near finished.  In some ways, this could be quite promising,  I could finish it, edit it and somehow, someway do something with it.  I haven't the foggiest idea what that something may be, but the possibility is there.
I could also just say "well, i've done 50k, opened up the door for more writing in the future because now i've proven to myself that I can do it so i'll just scrap this and move on."  I don't intend to do that.  Not because I have any grand delusions about becoming a best selling author- if this experience has taught me anything it's that I still have quite a lot to learn.  But because I still have a story to tell and if it can demand 50k words from me, then it can certainly demand to be finished.  Where it'll go, I have no idea.  Maybe nowhere, maybe just to more lessons which will have to be applied elsewhere.  But that's another story.
For now, i'm just going to take a minute to appreciate what I have accomplished.
To those who have supported me, thank you.  I owe you more than those small words, but for now that'll have to do.  Thank you.

Thanksgiving

At the risk of being overly sentimental, I do have to say that I am aware of how many things I have to be grateful for on this holiday that is designed for that recognition.
I am grateful for my friends who show me more love, appreciation, validation and warmth than I can really understand.  And on that note, I am grateful that one friend in particular is on the mend after serious health problems.  (And grateful to those who have used the pledgie to donate to this cause.)
I am grateful for my wonderful boyfriend who is capable of loving me on a level I only dreamed about, only better because it's not a stupid movie.
I am grateful for my family who, hindsight has shown me, did a pretty damned good job raising me and helping to shape me into the person I am.  And who still provide a safe, supportive home base whenever I need them.
I am grateful for my cat who is, regardless of what anyone says, the cutest cat in existence.  (And I dare anyone to scientifically disprove me. )
I am grateful for my car, as silly as that may sound, because it reliably gets me from place to place with little difficulty and this is the first time in my life i've really had that security.
I am grateful for my job, in spite of everything, because I am constantly reminded of how much worse off I could be.
I am grateful for those clients who give me the good days that I do still occasionally have at work because without them there's no way i'd still make it through the week.
I am grateful for NaNoWriMo for the enthusiasm, support, fun little graphs and other things which have motivated me to accomplish more writing in the past 26 days than i've done... ever, I think.
And i'm especially grateful to those who have supported me in thie endeavor.  It helps boost my spirit more than just about anything.
I'm grateful for my gym and for the people in it because without their support and enthusiasm there's no way I would have made it through that 29 hour test.  And I am, of course, grateful for my black belt because it's an accomplishment I never dreamed of achieving and it's spurred me onto greater things.
And I am grateful for all of the wonderful food that I was able to partake of today because not only did I get to contribute and share with people I love, but I got to have it in the first place and there's a lot of people who don't have that luxury.
To those who fall in the previous categories, you know who you are, thank you.
And Happy Thanksgiving.