Restless Summer Chronicles

 It's been a long, weird summer, and I almost forgot it was summer at all until the other day the realization came to me that I haven't been swimming at all. I don't think I went swimming last summer either. It used to be my favorite part of the season. And now fall is right around the corner. But life gets in the way of simple things sometimes. It's been a hell of a last few months.

The other day the YouTube algorithm spat this song at me: Crush by Ethel Cain. I think it might be one of the best things I've heard in my whole life. It's been on repeat for that reason alone, but the music video itself is also really good.

I just can't get it out of my head. Something's been feeling weird lately, there's just something about you baby, maybe I'll just be crazy, and piss him off 'till he hates me...

Writing has been sort of happening? But not as much or as often as I like. I began editing the first of two short stories in a series which I have drafted the other night and I'm going to finish editing it today. I want to publish both of those online for free. Eventually I'll probably throw them on Amazon or other distributers for 99 cents, but probably not for another few months. Unless things move faster than I'm anticipating, but some things are just out of my hands for annoying reasons. My general plan is to make a blog for these two stories, give them and their world its own little corner where you can read them on their site or just download ebooks/pdfs for free.

I have a dentist's appointment soon and they just sent me the email to confirm I'm still coming, which I am, and which is very scary and weird to me. Actually, I'm excited and scared. Chaotic combo.

The thing is Canada covers other forms of healthcare but not dentistry. Other medical stuff I need is subsidized heavily so I still have to pay for some bits and pieces, but the cost is heavily reduced so I pay small fees. Not dental stuff, though. So it could be hundreds of dollars for an exam/cleaning. But I'm HOPING they'll remove a tooth. They don't guarantee extractions so who knows, but it's half-chipped and rotting and it annoys me. Which reminds me, I have to message my cousin and ask which gum disease she was just diagnosed with, because it runs on the paternal side of the family and both our dads have messed up teeth, and the way mine are going, I think I take after them.

The last dentist's office I had was really rude and condescending and I think that's part of why I'm nervous. It was only one doctor and his assistant who were like that - everyone else was nice, but still. Lingering anxiety.

I have lingering anxiety about everything though, so that's normal. I hear cars drive around the area I live in right now and that gives me anxiety. Why? Hell if I know. A million reasons. But it all compounds and makes it hard to do anything.

Earlier I attempted to make noodles, but failed miserably. It hurt it a lot that I was out of milk and the recipe called for a cup of it. That said I'm still hungry as hell so I have to choose what to make soon and I've got no idea and no real preference. Everything seems equally gross. Except garlic rolls. But those would require some good sauce, which I also don't have. So here I am, frustrated, hungry, with a sore jaw and a chipped tooth, and no idea what to eat.

I don't wanna say it's a bad day, but it's certainly not a good one. I'm kind of over this summer. I wish it was fall already. Or winter. Winter is amazing.

~

Okay, new development: I found sauce. I cooked those garlic fingers. Then I saw the sauce had expired months ago. Then I ate the garlic fingers anyway. I ended up trying Greco's new hamburger pizza that night and...it was a hard no from me. Total pass. The hamburger was grey and kind of rubbery, and the pizza just wasn't good. I do love Greco's sauce and crust though; the parmesan crust is deadly.

I also ended up going to my dentist's appointment; it cost $350 bucks to extract that tooth. It took thirty minutes, two forms of painkiller, a drill, and it was a very scary, weird experience. It wasn't that bad though; the dentist and his assistant were very nice, polite, and professional here. It was a bit awkward because my small talk skills are non-existent, but I was so relieved.

The next morning I woke up and the first thing I felt was relief, and that's a new one for me. I knew the tooth was hurting me, and it was causing me stress, but I had underestimated just how much of my time and energy was spent either trying to take care of that gross rotting tooth to keep it from deteriorating further, or just worrying about the situation and my pain in general. Now all of that is gone at once, I feel like a weight is off of my shoulders.

I no longer have to worry about the rot or pain, but I also have less trouble eating, keeping my mouth clean, etc.

I grabbed a new pair of shoes while I was out (green converse) bought some new boxers, grabbed a couple of books - I got Crossed and Reached by Ally Condie. Matched is one of my favorite books but I never read the sequels. I also grabbed The Silver Gate by Kristin Bailey for like three bucks at Giant Tiger. God Bless. I should've grabbed more books while I was there but I wasn't aware my other favorite bookshop in the area was closed that day, so it was too late.

It was pretty hard avoiding solid food and smoking and coffee for like three days after my tooth was taken out, but by now it's healing (it's been two weeks since I wrote the first half of this blog) so I'm back on my bullshit. I had popcorn for the first time in that two weeks yesterday and it was amazing.

So yeah. My extraction went well and as usual none of my worst-case scenarios came true. It was a good day and it led to nothing but relief.

If you think that means I learned my lesson about imagining worst-case scenarios to stress over, though, you're delusional.

The next blog post will probably include an announcement or book release tidbit about CerbIm 1 & 2, so keep an eye out. ;D They're fun sci-fi shorts I've had sitting around since January begging me to edit them. So I am.

CerbIm 1: How To Save Your Cactus During A Futuristic Blackout

CerbIm 2: How To Fall In Love With Your Criminal Best Friend

Both of these stories are fun, cute, and flashy, and they'll both be out at around the same time. No more procrastinating for me.

Something I Once Said

Here's a passage I wrote on this blog way back in 2016 that I found again today and really needed to hear:

AT LEAST ONCE in your writing career, but probably way more times than that, you will find yourself sitting on the floor in your underwear, getting drunk and crying, wondering if you're throwing your life away. You may or may not try to ask your dead relatives for advice from beyond the grave. They won't give it to you, though, selfish villains that they are. This is normal. This is the stress of being a living, working artist. But you know why you got into this and you know what it means to you, so don't you fucking let your stress win. We've all felt like we were facing doomsday at one point or another, legacy or self-published, and those storms always pass. It doesn't matter if you're a first-time indie or the next Suzanne Collins with hype and a big six publisher and a movie deal at your back - you have undertaken a huge project, and you are allowed to have a human moment about it, okay?

Maybe you need to hear it today too, so here it is.

Confusion & Pizza

I thought today was Thursday, but it's still just Wednesday, which makes me sad. I thought Riverdale would be out, but now I have to wait another 24 hours, since in Canada it comes out on Netflix the day after it airs in America. In lieu of another episode of Riverdale I'll probably spend my morning writing. I finished a short last night, which ended up 2000 words longer than I thought it would be, so now I'm debating whether to draft another erotic short, draft the rest of Glimpse, or finish up my story I Kill Your Gods.

I'm supposed to have the house to myself today at least for a few hours, which sounds nice. People stress me out even when they're not doing anything, even when they're sleeping in another room making no sound, their presence unnerves me. Sometimes it's nice to have folks around, but mostly I find it very irritating, especially since the folks in question are my parents, and although I know they love me, I also know they judge me a lot and I don't live up to their expectations, so that's stressful. I mentioned to my mom yesterday that I wanted pizza (just an offhand comment about a craving) and when I woke up at ten last night, she'd ordered a giant pepperoni for me and a veggie pizza for her, so that was sweet of her. My dad, weirdly, does not like pizza.

My mom and I are usually more on the same page, and I look like her, but I have my dad's irritant personality and quick temper. He and I fight like cats and dogs, which is insanely stressful, but it's better than when I never stood up to him and just let him snap at or yell at me instead. At least I feel better about myself if I yell back, because then I have a backbone, right?

To be fair my dad works hard and is constantly tired, and he smokes too much and doesn't eat enough, so he probably feels like warmed over crap most of the time. But he quit for years and the new started again, so he only has himself to blame.

With that anti smoking PSA aside, I am going to listen to Grimes and get ready to write. Hopefully I have a cover reveal to share tomorrow! I do have finished works I can publish but I'm waiting until my backlist is longer; right now it's six titles total.

Blur

I haven't posted in a while because I've been trying to work on stuff (and mostly failing) when I'm not in bed bingeing Sense8. I'm super lazy.

They say depression makes you sleepy, that it gives you physical fatigue, and I understand that, but I also still kind of blame myself for it. I hate not getting things done or being able to focus on anything. I hate feeling like an invalid.

I've mostly been spending my time designing and formatting book covers because it's the easiest, funnest part of my job. At the same time, I want something to put out.

The other day I wrote the first bit of Beacon book two, finally. I think the Beacon trilogy probably will be my next release, if I don't hop over and finish something else first, which could always happen. I'm trying to finish book two by Saturday the thirteenth, which is scary considering how close it is, but I haven't been setting deadlines for myself recently and I'm determined to get back on track.

Tonight before I start work on that I'm going to free-write a bit to try and get myself back into the writing groove.

 

(This is the deadline face...)

I have no idea what the hell I'm going to write about. People think the hardest part of being a writer is the long hours or the pressure to write something great. For me, it's picking out which paranormal creature to make the hot dudes in my books.

I love stuff like the Trylle Trilogy or the Paper Gods Trilogy, books where the paranormal aspect is something newer and original. I like stuff you don't see often.

The market is flooded with werewolf books and I'm sure there's always a market for them, but as much as I love them I'm not sold on them. I don't know if vampires still have a market. My vampire book doesn't sell well, but I don't market it much and it is kind of a niche title. I still can't tell if it's urban fantasy or paranormal romance, really, and I wrote it. (I still love Blood of Midnight, I think it's a good book, it's just not an easy one to sell >.>)

Need by Carrie Jones has pixies, which is cool as fuck. I've written about those before, in a vastly different way, so I don't want to do that. I can't write about faeries because I'm not in the mood. Gargoyles? Not right for this project. Genies? I'm too white and Canadian to pull that off respectfully without a bunch of research first, which I really don't want to do with a 'just-for-fun' project.

See how hard this is?

What kind of paranormal beings can my hot gay heroes fall for? It's an eternal plight.

I'd love to write about the undead or zombies, but I have no clue how to make them hot and not gross and/or mildly horrifying. I have some ideas, but I'm not sold on 'em.

This is the struggle.

I'm gonna go brew too many coffees for one person, which is what I usually do when I'm stressed, and never helps, but does taste good. Maybe I'll find the answers I'm looking for in a human-sized vat of boiling coffee...

~

You can buy my books here or follow me on Twitter.

What Am I Doing?

What am I doing? It's four am and I've suddenly become interested in True Blood again (I rewatched the first two seasons and saw the third for the first time this summer) and now I'm finally sitting down to devour the fourth season BECAUSE IT'S A PROBLEM OKAY? I honestly couldn't stop now if I wanted to. And boy, do I want to - because this show is keeping me away from my damn homework.

I have six assignments to do today, so once my parents leave for work I'm going to be spending hours sitting here finishing those up and then be able to hand them in tomorrow. I have to go back to school this week, and I don't know which one I'll even be going to or what I'm gonna be taking, so naturally it's fucking me up and I'm trying not to think about it.

Which hasn't been working out well for me so far, clearly. I need to finish them, but I keep procrastinating because, you know, that's who I am.

I also want to get in a workout today, which is going to be fucking painful, I already know. I did a nice one the other day, but now I'm sore all over. Fun, right? I know people say it's good to exercise, but I kind of feel like I died a bit.

What I need is to be able to focus on writing and publishing and building a career for myself, but I also desperately need this diploma, and to be healthy, and to, you know, face life. Which has been hard, since I'm also trying to balance the whole mental illness thing, and I'm not taking medication anymore because of the side effects. The upside is that I'm not going to randomly have a stroke or develop type two diabetes - the downside is, hey, I have to deal with all of this shit on my own now!

I don't like to talk too much about my mental illness, because I feel like sometimes in the past I've overshared and it hasn't been productive or healthy for me, but the basics of it is I have anxiety and depression, and minor paranoia.

I'm managing it, to be clear, but it's hard. And sometimes I do fail. And I know that that will happen; illness isn't easy, and sometimes it wins. But I like to win. And I do not like to feel helpless, which is how I do.

Right now I'm taking it day by day, focusing on self-improvement and trying to be kind to myself, and to be fair I think it's gotten a lot easier as I grow stronger and learn to take care of myself, but there are still days when I can't fight off invasive thoughts or work my way around it, and I go into a depressive episode or a state of mania and things get bad.

The reason I'm even bringing it up now is because I haven't really blogged since the beginning of the month, which makes me feel bad, because I like to keep this page updated and I honestly love blogging. But I went into a depressive episode that lasted a few days, and at the end of it I just knew I had to make some serious life changes and extract myself from certain situations that weren't healthy for me at this point.

So I did that, and it's been getting better, and things are getting back on track. I'm letting myself unwind with True Blood right now, but later today things pick up again.

The best thing I can do is pick myself up and do my best. So. Homework. Exercise. Healthy eating habits. Those are things I'm going to embrace today. And be productive.

School is going to be hectic, but Souls of Salt and Seawater will be out by the end of February or the beginning of March. I turn twenty on March twenty-second, so I want to be well-into edits on Shadows by the that time.

Things That Need To Stop

A List:

1. Random racist people popping up in my Tumblr inbox to tell me they should get away with saying blatantly anti-Native stuff.
2. My brother coming home with little to no warning. (I like my brother: I like him better from a distance.)
3. My Mom cooking Chicken and then doing her best to convince me to eat it even though I told her before I took a nap this morning that I was going vegetarian.
4. My jaw randomly hurting every time I open or close my mouth.
5. Poverty.
6. Sobriety.
7. The world, maybe?

I don't know. As you can see, I'm agitated as hell tonight. I think I might punch somebody.

I feel a lot better than I did before sleeping, at least, but I'm still generally pissed at the world. That was my mental illness acting up. This is actual, rational emotion. So I don't know why the things that annoy me decided to collaborate and make this the day I go to the pen, but they did.

I'm going to focus on working on SOSAS and lock myself in my room so I don't have to deal with my family, since avoiding human interaction for the next few hours seems like my best bet.

I do have a few errands I might have to go into the city for tomorrow morning after everyone wakes up, though, and that troubles me. I mean, I can definitely handle going out and dealing with the real world. I don't really want to, but I can.

So that's where I'm at right now: annoyed and trying not to be a bitch and wishing things were different, even though that's pointless because I can't change them.

Rome Was Not Built in A Day

Things take time. I know that. It takes hard work and it takes patience. I'm not good at patience.

I keep having to remind myself, Rome wasn't built in a day, but it really doesn't help. I want these things to be done, I want Shadows and SOSAS to be done and out, and I want other projects I'm working on to be done and out. I want to be able to share these things and talk more about them because I can't because I'm not ready to release them yet or because they're in the early stages and everything is subject to change. . .

And it's mornings like this, when I've already been up all night working and I'm still not done and I still feel like I haven't done enough, when I'm on coffee number who-knows and my brain is fried and my fingers shake even when I hold my hands still, that I feel that the most.

I have this urge, this restless energy beneath my skin that turns me frantic and won't let me sleep. I have to resist the urge to keep going until I drop. I know that's not healthy and I know it's just another thing I have to work on, but it's an all-consuming sort of thing.

I don't know. I know these books are good. I also know they're not done. I know the editing process is a temperamental beast and I know that my schedule is packed full.

The funny thing is, the wait isn't even that long. I have things that I know will be ready to publish within a month or two, and I still don't want to wait and it still feels like forever.

No patience.

So I just have to wait and settle down and finish them, but, you know - mental illness. Caffeine overdose. Workaholic. Unhealthy coping methods.

The thing is, I have to take it one thing at a time. One choice at a time. One decision at a time. I'm still learning how to do that.

So that's where I'm at today: accomplishing things but still feeling like those things aren't enough. Being exhausted but unable to sleep. Feeling conflicted about what I want and how I want to get it. For now I think it's enough to let myself rest a little and remember that Rome. wasn't. built. in. a. day.

But it was built, eventually. So I'll do what the Romans did, and go stone by stone.

Bath & Body Works, Acoustic Guitar, and Misadventures in Exercise

So, my seasonal finally ended, and I'm back to being a full-time slug. At least, until the next semester of school starts. Of course, I'll still be working all day every day; I'll just be doing it at home, in my pajamas. I'm still editing SOSAS, and drafting The Indigo Horde (fun!) but I also have school work, and a new diet, and a new instrument and language to learn. So, yeah. I'm learning French at the moment, and I got an acoustic guitar for Christmas - which I asked for, and am over the moon to get - that I now have to learn.

As far as the new diet? I'm cutting out all junk food, all red meat, and adding thirty minutes of exercise a day. In the past I've only been exercising a couple times a week, and then I got my job and stopped altogether, because I figured that was exercise enough - and I was mostly right, since I lost like 8 pounds while working at that store. I started eating a lot as Christmas got closer, especially Chinese takeout and pizza, along with Christmas dinner and all the chocolate I got in my stocking. So, yeah. Not good. I also binged on soda while drinking (because as much as I love shots, I wasn't drinking an entire pint of vodka straight) along with vodka coolers and lemonades that I'm sure are calorie killers.

So, yeah, cutting alcohol out of the new diet, too. I'll probably drink again in the future, but most likely not until we're well into summer. I like to keep drinking a once-in-a-while kind of thing anyway, because I've had problems with self-medicating with it in the past. It's not a problem now, but I still try to stay mindful when it comes to casual drinking, as well.

So, yeah, that's what I have to look forward to over the next few weeks: a lot of work. I mean, it's fun work, but still.

Since my seasonal is over, I guess I can talk more openly about it now? I was working the Christmas rush at Bath and Body Works, and I honestly have no desire to ever step into a mall again. Shoppers are annoying. I'm sure I'm annoying to employees at stores too, though.

I basically went around un-boxing and shelving stuff, though I ended up working the floor and helping customers a lot, too, since I was out there so much. I don't really know what to say about it. It was fun. And exhausting. Really exhausting.

Half of that, was commute time, but the other half was just me. I'm not generally used to being around people all day, anymore, and it drained me. At the same time, the work was hard and I often didn't bring a lunch (I don't like carrying shit around, so that's on me) so I was constantly tired and hungry and in a mild state of anxiety. It only got really bad once, I think my second to last week - I had an anxiety attack and ended up leaving. I told my boss I had to go because I just didn't feel good, but I was honestly about to burst into tears. I have no idea why I freaked out like that, so I guess I was just overwhelmed that day. I think it was a valid learning experience, and I did gain some confidence just from being around people that often, but I'm glad it's over and I get a short break for a while.

Well, a break from going out every day. Not a break from working.

I've also done a lot of shopping lately. I bought myself one of those adult coloring books, and a few actual novels, along with a sketchbook. I grabbed a new hat and some candles. I think I'm going to buy some new incense the next time I go out, because those stick are cheap and I haven't had any in a while.

I also bought some video games. I got Saints Row 3 (we used to have it for xbox, and I missed it, so I grabbed one for the ps3 and I'm just as addicted as I was before) and Enslaved, Odyssey to the West. I would probably be playing those now, honestly, but my brother and his girlfriend are watching some mafia show on the big screen, and my cousin Amelia is passed out on my bed behind me (she had the bright idea to pull an all-nighter and then ditched me before it was even eleven o'clock!) and I really want to spend the next three hours just listening to 8tracks.

But I'm going to force myself to write more of the indigo horde while I do it, because priorities.

You've Got a Fire Inside But Your Heart's So Cold

Title from 'Haunting' by Halsey~

I feel like I should be happier than I am. I feel like I should probably be better at shoving out these empty spaces that keep trying to fill me up. And it's like I win, you know? I win the battle, and it convinces me I've won the war, so I stop being afraid to smile. And then as soon as things are good again, it all floods back in.

I don't really know where the person I actually am ends and the person my depression turned me into begins. In a lot of ways I think they're the same person. But I also think I had the capacity, once, to be happy, and naive, and innocent. I can remember being that way. I can not remember exactly when the chemicals in my brain starting turning against me and eating away at that person, but they did, they have, and they've been doing it for so long it's become my new normal.

And I worry, too - I worry that someday I won't beat it. Someday I won't be strong enough to swim against the black tide, but I will be strong enough to pick up a bottle of pills, or take that last step off a very high ledge. I wonder and I worry.

It feels like sometimes instead of being defined by what I actually am, I'm defined by what I'm not: like all these null and void spaces inside me I haven't filled up yet are spilling over, pooling on top of everything else like oozing blood until all I am is a long list of anti-accomplishments. Like I'm nothing.

It's funny how I win, too. Because sometimes it's as simple as drinking three cups of coffee and blasting some Katy Perry, circa 2011. And other times it's an entire November spent staring at the same blank ceiling and feeling nothing. Feeling like everything has spilled out a hole in the bottom of me and I'll never experience another emotion again. and when I do, it's fear.

But even when it's like that I always end up floating ashore one day or another.

I still worry though. It doesn't matter how many times you've been tossed overboard, how many times you've been unable to tell up from down or see sunlight through the surface - when the black tide swallows you up you panaic, even if these are the waters you were baptised in.

And the other ones? The anxiety? The paranoia? Those are a bit more problematic...

Depression is hot right now. It's sexy. It's hipster teens in black Adidos jackets, clutching cigarettes and torn sheets of loose leaf and turning blazed eyes into the cameras because they're gonna love this on Tumblr, it's gonna get five-thousand notes and every indie and pale blog in a hundred miles will have your face plastered on it! But it's the ugly mental illness indie blogs have never tried to make popular.

Because when I'm in the corner of my room at 3:43 in the morning with my shaking hands clutching a baseball bat to my chest like the last life raft in a stormy sea, that's not hot. Because there's not really someone trying to break into the house from outside, but hey, there could be. I don't fucking know: I'm crazy, in case you didn't get the memo.

When I run home from the bus stop so I'm panting and dry-heaving by the time I get to my lawn all because I think they're watching me from inside the trees, that's not hot. It's not hipster.

I can't help but think that if the lines I was broken along were smoother, more pleasing to the eye, that maybe I could cut myself some fucking slack.

But when it's 1am and I'm still shaking from that embarrassing thing I said today - why the fuck did I say that? - and cowering in the dark because my mind is convincing me that someone is after me, waiting in the woods and watching for the chance to catch me, it's harder to think kind things about myself.

But I still beat it, you know? I push away the pretty pills that pound my heart into oblivion because I want to be strong enough to swim on my own, without their help, without them keeping me up. But I remember how easy it was when I had them floating under my back, and sometimes I wonder...

I think there's a lot I could say about the ways people are broken in more malicious ways than I am, about the way they fall in love with their fault lines and try to paint them as pictures of love instead of working for recover. There's a lot I could say about how hard I am on myself.

But I still have it pretty good, and I feel like I should be happier than I am. So for now I'll just make some coffee and dig up some old pop music, and maybe I'll win another battle in this endless war with myself.