Instrumental Obligations and Lacking Magic
This past Christmas, I received a guitar. To be clear, I mentioned wanting a guitar once, about seven or eight months before the holiday, as a throwaway thing that I never - never - expected to get. But I did. And I have to learn it.
Why? Because it was expensive and my parents were happy they were able to get me something I asked for, and I feel guilty ever day that passes without me learning it.
Back in tenth grade I started to learn as part of a music course I hadn't even passed the pre-req course to get into, and was only in because they had no other place for me that block, but in the end I lost what little I picked up and spent most of the time in the course fooling around. I was never a good student, but it was still one of my favourite classes. I used to have dreams of being able to plop down on the sidewalk uptown and play and be able to earn some quick cash, or being able to romance some musician guy through my sheer instrumental bad-assery.
Now I will settle for learning the chords to a couple of pop songs to placate my parents and make myself feel like this gift was not a total loss on me.
This isn't even the first time I've failed to learn an instrument - the one I'm honestly in love with, and always has been, is the piano - but I failed to learn to play keyboard in ninth grade, as well.
Okay, I didn't entirely fail - I learned a bit of Seven Devils, by Florence and the Machine, but it quickly fell apart and now I have no idea what I'm looking at when I sit down at a keyboard.
The thing is, I'm not sure I have the passion in me to develop another love like that. My love for things I used to enjoy - reading books, walking, partying, socializing, art (both digital and traditional) has all been slowly but steadily fading away over the past year, and it's been a struggle to get back into it.
I had a really bright (challenging, but bright) spot for a while, back when I was working and earning money and I felt productive, but my seasonal was coming to an end and they decided not to keep me on after it did, and after I stopped working I went into a downward spiral.
I'm hoping once I'm in school every day it will get better, and being out and getting things done everyday will be beneficial, but at the same time, I'm skeptical. I'm always skeptical when someone says something might offer some form of happiness of fulfillment these days. Because I know how it feels, have been through it time and time again, to start to feel yourself resemble a fully formed human being again only to have that happiness and stability and sense of identity start to slip away from you again.
But, at the same time, if I don't try, there's just the guilt. So I've been doing it, very, very slowly, with other things. I went for a walk a few evenings ago, even though it was snowing, because I knew I needed to get out or I would lose my mind. I've been working my way through a few books, trying to gain momentum in my reading life again. I recently finished The King's Games and Language Lessons, by Amanda Hocking and Jay Bell, respectively, and I actually fell in love with the Magicians, by Lev Grossman, although it may have made my depressive state a bit worse, if I'm being honest. It's a bleak book.
Soon I need to get back into language practice and try picking up this guitar for the first time.
I don't know, I suppose it feels like my life has stalled and nothing is happening, every day is the same, and I'm very isolated. A lot of old friendships simply dwindled into nothing once I left school, and it just feels like the magic has drained out of everything.
But at the same time, I know that it is up to me to seek out happiness. Nothing might change if I go for it, but if I don't there's not even that tiny chance.
So I'm trying to perk up. And in the meantime I'm trying to pick up on my workload and get more things out there. I've been looking at different marketing tactics and options to get my books out there, and, I don't know, it all seems really difficult and . . . well, ineffective.
Like, I had a LibraryThing Giveaway where I sent out twenty copies of Frenzy in exchange for reviews, and got zero reviews. I made the book free on Kindle for several days, and scours of people downloaded it, but it only got one new rating. It was a five-star rating, which was very nice, but it was still one rating, and no reviews. With Souls of Salt & Seawater, I figured things would be different - why? The book was born of reader demand. I had 200 followers on Tumblr, when I wrote a single one-off scene in response to a prompt on my dash, and almost overnight my blog grew to over 900 followers and I had dozens of people demanding I write a full story, or put a book out. And I love mermaids, so I did. And I sent out free copies, and ran a free promotion on Kindle, and again, easily over a hundred downloads, and zero ratings, zero reviews.
To be absolutely honest, I don't even need my books to sell well. I would be perfectly happy finding another source of income. But I do want my books to be read. I could care less about the money, as long as they foster discussion. As long as there's feedback.
All writers crave feedback. But there isn't any, and it's hard to gain any, because not only am I an indie author, I'm an unknown indie author. Not many people have taken a chance on my work, since they have no idea who I am, and nobody is going to take a chance on it until someone else does, so me and my work are both trapped in this eternal waiting phase.
To be honest, I'm trapped in waiting phases in most aspects/areas of my life, so I'm used to it, and I don't really expect anything else at this point, but it would be nice if things could start happening. 'Cause at this point, even if they were bad things, they would still be better than this insufferable monotony that's taken over my existence.
So, that's where I've been at, lately, and that's partially why I haven't been posting here - because there's really nothing to post about. And not a lot of people read this blog.
As soon as that changes, I will probably be posting a lot more than I do now, which is already quite a bit, considering that most of my posts get few to no views.
Why? Because it was expensive and my parents were happy they were able to get me something I asked for, and I feel guilty ever day that passes without me learning it.
Back in tenth grade I started to learn as part of a music course I hadn't even passed the pre-req course to get into, and was only in because they had no other place for me that block, but in the end I lost what little I picked up and spent most of the time in the course fooling around. I was never a good student, but it was still one of my favourite classes. I used to have dreams of being able to plop down on the sidewalk uptown and play and be able to earn some quick cash, or being able to romance some musician guy through my sheer instrumental bad-assery.
Now I will settle for learning the chords to a couple of pop songs to placate my parents and make myself feel like this gift was not a total loss on me.
This isn't even the first time I've failed to learn an instrument - the one I'm honestly in love with, and always has been, is the piano - but I failed to learn to play keyboard in ninth grade, as well.
Okay, I didn't entirely fail - I learned a bit of Seven Devils, by Florence and the Machine, but it quickly fell apart and now I have no idea what I'm looking at when I sit down at a keyboard.
The thing is, I'm not sure I have the passion in me to develop another love like that. My love for things I used to enjoy - reading books, walking, partying, socializing, art (both digital and traditional) has all been slowly but steadily fading away over the past year, and it's been a struggle to get back into it.
I had a really bright (challenging, but bright) spot for a while, back when I was working and earning money and I felt productive, but my seasonal was coming to an end and they decided not to keep me on after it did, and after I stopped working I went into a downward spiral.
I'm hoping once I'm in school every day it will get better, and being out and getting things done everyday will be beneficial, but at the same time, I'm skeptical. I'm always skeptical when someone says something might offer some form of happiness of fulfillment these days. Because I know how it feels, have been through it time and time again, to start to feel yourself resemble a fully formed human being again only to have that happiness and stability and sense of identity start to slip away from you again.
But, at the same time, if I don't try, there's just the guilt. So I've been doing it, very, very slowly, with other things. I went for a walk a few evenings ago, even though it was snowing, because I knew I needed to get out or I would lose my mind. I've been working my way through a few books, trying to gain momentum in my reading life again. I recently finished The King's Games and Language Lessons, by Amanda Hocking and Jay Bell, respectively, and I actually fell in love with the Magicians, by Lev Grossman, although it may have made my depressive state a bit worse, if I'm being honest. It's a bleak book.
Soon I need to get back into language practice and try picking up this guitar for the first time.
I don't know, I suppose it feels like my life has stalled and nothing is happening, every day is the same, and I'm very isolated. A lot of old friendships simply dwindled into nothing once I left school, and it just feels like the magic has drained out of everything.
But at the same time, I know that it is up to me to seek out happiness. Nothing might change if I go for it, but if I don't there's not even that tiny chance.
So I'm trying to perk up. And in the meantime I'm trying to pick up on my workload and get more things out there. I've been looking at different marketing tactics and options to get my books out there, and, I don't know, it all seems really difficult and . . . well, ineffective.
Like, I had a LibraryThing Giveaway where I sent out twenty copies of Frenzy in exchange for reviews, and got zero reviews. I made the book free on Kindle for several days, and scours of people downloaded it, but it only got one new rating. It was a five-star rating, which was very nice, but it was still one rating, and no reviews. With Souls of Salt & Seawater, I figured things would be different - why? The book was born of reader demand. I had 200 followers on Tumblr, when I wrote a single one-off scene in response to a prompt on my dash, and almost overnight my blog grew to over 900 followers and I had dozens of people demanding I write a full story, or put a book out. And I love mermaids, so I did. And I sent out free copies, and ran a free promotion on Kindle, and again, easily over a hundred downloads, and zero ratings, zero reviews.
To be absolutely honest, I don't even need my books to sell well. I would be perfectly happy finding another source of income. But I do want my books to be read. I could care less about the money, as long as they foster discussion. As long as there's feedback.
All writers crave feedback. But there isn't any, and it's hard to gain any, because not only am I an indie author, I'm an unknown indie author. Not many people have taken a chance on my work, since they have no idea who I am, and nobody is going to take a chance on it until someone else does, so me and my work are both trapped in this eternal waiting phase.
To be honest, I'm trapped in waiting phases in most aspects/areas of my life, so I'm used to it, and I don't really expect anything else at this point, but it would be nice if things could start happening. 'Cause at this point, even if they were bad things, they would still be better than this insufferable monotony that's taken over my existence.
So, that's where I've been at, lately, and that's partially why I haven't been posting here - because there's really nothing to post about. And not a lot of people read this blog.
As soon as that changes, I will probably be posting a lot more than I do now, which is already quite a bit, considering that most of my posts get few to no views.
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