Category: Blogs!

On switching between stories and attempting to relax

I’ve never been one to talk about or worry about my blood pressure, but I know I live and work in a ‘high-stress’ environment. The stress from the day job is unavoidable; that’s what you get for agreeing to be a public servant on a federal level. The demands made on your body and spirit are way higher than what you’d expect. The lifestyle stress is my own damn fault: I like working on multiple projects simultaneously and keep thinking I’m in my early 20’s and capable of juggling 7 different tasks. (I can’t, now, and couldn’t back then, but we’re letting my past self feel arrogant at the moment)

But I was told that I needed to take it easy today. This was because I have been suffering through a heinous sinus infection for several days and have been pushing myself. Walking the mail route during a thunderstorm for several days did not help, either. But Sarah, and my daughter Hannah to my surprise, had all but yelled at me to not do chores and to rest.

I mean, really. What do you when your wife and your daughter tells you that you aren’t allowed to work at home?
(Note: my son showed similar sentiments, but he was distracted today by his trucks and potty-training. I believe that is valid.)

I took their advice (their stern, almost threatening advice, imagine getting a deathstare from a five year old) and took it easy for today. No physically-intensive chores and nothing to get my blood pressure up (I think), just relaxing and attempting to get my writing goals back.

Problem to that: it’s been so long since I’ve been through the daily grind of making my goal that I am staring at the screen and sweating over writer’s block. I did manage to get 800 words written down, but more than half of that was plot/outline while the rest was working on a first draft that I’m not confident in.

Thankfully, I can accept that my first draft will be shit. Every project takes work and I’m still learning. That, and I have several works-in-progress and can shift from one to the other when I’ve hit a snag. If I’m desperate to get my writing muscles working, I can always fall back to D&D writing and work out a few sessions’ worth of situations/dialogue/outcomes.

(Don’t tell Sarah or Hannah that I was working on multiple projects today. They’ll kick my ass and it’ll be easy with this sinus infection.)

I did manage to get some work done, though. Now my late-evening will be spent with my headphones on and lunch-prepping for the work week. Cooking is easy, at least. The struggle will be figuring out what goes with what produce is in the fridge. That asparagus needs using.

Happy writing, folks. See you soon.

Stuck in a storm, so might as well write.

I’ll usually be the first one to tell you that I don’t care if I get rained on, but if you’ve ever been around me during bad weather, you’d think I take this idea to some level of insanity. I never carry an umbrella unless the family is with me, and it’s for their sake, not mine. The moment I realize that a storm is imminent, I accept the fact that I’m going to look and feel like a drowned Louisianian rat and get on with the day.

That said, I’m also very aware of my mortality when a thunderstorm rolls over. This is due to an experience gained several years ago, on the job and in fact, on the very road I’m stuck on at the moment. I was parked by a utility pole during a thunderstorm and forgot the very basic of storm-survival knowledge: utility poles with transformers are prime targets when there’s lightning. A bolt struck the transformers and exploded, my world went white for a couple seconds, and I was picking myself up off the ground a few seconds after that.

Since then, I’ve made a policy that I can deliver the mail in any weather, but if the lightning is close by, I’m going to sit down and wait for about 10 minutes and let the worst pass me. Thus, we have today’s little shared moment with a mailman.

This isn’t really bad for Louisiana, but I’ll scamper for shelter when electricity is flying around.

So, while Zeus and Thor have their airborne spat, I’m sitting here going over my self-motivations to write, or rather berating myself for not doing as much writing as I’d like in several months. I think I’ve averaged about 200 words in a day, when it can happen at all. It’s understandable, really. The career is time and energy intensive, and my family has the ultimate priority in my mind. If given the choice between sitting at my tablet as soon as I get home and talking to the children, I’ll usually pick the latter. That the choice is presented to me when I sit down at my desk, in front of my tablet, is irrelevant and you can’t say otherwise.

I know what I need to do. I need to go back to my old disciplinary methods. Set up reminders to write when the kids go to bed. Have the coffee pot ready to brew when story-time is about to start. Stay away from the beer until I’ve made my goal for the day.

Alas, these things have been forgotten or ignored in the last three months. The mail volume increased, the kids discovered 8PM and decided it was a better time to go to bed, and I really like having a beer when I get home, for all I know it’s going to knock me out at 10 and I’ll wake up in my chair, Microsoft Word open and blank, and my knees hurting.

This is not a note of despairing my writing time, but rather my inner monologue getting an audience. Yes, I can do the things to get back into the swing of things. Also yes, I’m human and do have limits, even though I didn’t know them in my 20’s.

As the “heavy rain” shuffles off and thunder rolls away, I’m getting my satchel and heading out into the wet route. Just another few miles. Then I’ll get home, see to my evening chores, brew coffee, and write.

Just keep this in mind: ultimately we are the ones who will get our stories out, and it does take self-discipline to do so. Don’t slack off too much or you’ll be annoyed at yourself. More annoyed, anyway.

Y’all stay safe out there.

Godspeed, Buster.

As a mailman, I’ve met many, many dogs on my route, and my favorite route-dog died. Buster was a 15-year old bastard. He hated everyone. He hated me, his owners, his food bowl, a nearby leaf. If it existed within Buster’s line of sight, it was an object of his singular displeasure.

He growled at me every day for 8 years, and let me pet him only once. To be fair, he most likely didn’t know he was being petted, as he was staring off into space when I dropped off letters and scratched his ears for him. He did eventually look up at me and gave a threatening “get off my lawn” growl.

Goodspeed, Buster. You insufferable asshole. I’ll miss you.

On returning to a favorite genre for something old-fashioned

Science Fiction remains my all-time favorite story genre. I mostly blame that on being exposed to Star Wars at a very young age, and the choice of books in those years only confirms that.

Like any kid of the 90’s, I discovered Animorphs and became an obsessed reader. I had confirmed my weirdness in the fifth grade among my classmates for knowing these stories better than the St. Michael the Archangel prayer in Religion class (Catholic school for the win!).

Thank you, K.A. Applegate, for giving us all one hell of a story.

In that same year, I also discovered the Star Wars Expanded Universe, with a used and ratty copy of Darksaber.

I don’t care what the younger folks say, THIS is the Darksaber I know!

It was with this novel that I learned that the movies I knew and loved were being given new life, and also about how space battles were fought. I learned that I was intrigued by struggles in deep space, with giant crafts looming over each other and small fighter craft zooming around trying to get an advantage for their side. I learned that I loved the political aspect of opposing sides, and needed stories to give the POV of the antagonist. But mostly, it was giant ships hammering at each other that got my attention.

(Also, this particular story’s premise is hilarious when you think about it, and the climax makes you laugh more than get excited.)

Since then, I’ve always browsed the Science Fiction section of any bookstore I’d come across. When Fantasy was lumped into the same area as Science Fiction, I accepted it. I loved those stories too, so I saw it was an opportunity to stay in my favorite area of the store. I found Old Man’s War by John Scalzi, On Baslisk Station by David Weber, Battlestar Galactica by Glen A. Larson and Robert Thurston, and the grandfather of science fiction literature, Battlefield Earth by L. Ron Hubbard.

I went out looking for science fiction stories and read everything I could get my hands on, back in those days. It was a love, pure and simple, and it’s stayed with me over the years.

So, let’s step into more recent days. We’re on a family/work vacation in Florida, and my wife tells me that I need to have a couple hours to myself in the city. She knows I don’t like crowds and am a introverted nerd, so she tells me the thing that always excites me: “You can go into a bookstore and get whatever you want.”

Pure. Fucking. Heaven.

I did make a few purchases (been wanting to start building my manga collection) but I found out that I could not find the one thing I knew would satisfy my old addiction. I could not find a book series (starting book, at least) that was a good and old-fashioned science fiction. I wanted starship combat, I wanted explosions in the void of space, I wanted Captains and Admirals arguing strategy and having fights with their subordinates over it.

I was denied my fix and that made me twitchy.

Some days later, I was talking with my regular buddy about this situation. He’s pretty understanding about having a particular niche in preferred reading, so he’s a good shoulder to cry on when you can’t find what you want. However, he also knows I’m trying to be an author, so he hits me where it hurts.

“If you can’t find the story you want, why not write it yourself?”

I have to admit, I’m terrified of the concept. Yes, I’d love to see such a story back on the shelves, but I get that it’s not popular these days. But still, he had a point. What if the story idea still had attraction to readers? Could I make such a story worthwhile enough for them to pay for it?

I honestly do not know, but I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t excited enough to give it a try.

Short stories, novel progress, and notes for next project

It may just be an example of an ADD mind taking a creative twist, but I have been busying myself with short stories and writing notes on other novels instead of just writing the novel. Unfortunately, I had come across a major problem to the story and it forced me to remove a large chunk of the work.

Why, do you ask? Simply put, I had made a decision for the character that she would never make, and continued writing as if the decision were normal. It wasn’t until I had gone nearly two chapters ahead when I noticed that the story wasn’t progressing or fitting with the outline I had done for the book. After thinking about it, I went looking and sure enough, I had made a simple mistake that cost me 9,000 words and three weeks of work. Needless to say, I haven’t been terribly happy with this outcome.

(A polite way of saying I’ve been pissed off about it and trying to figure out how to use ANY of that work.)

While I’ve been going over those pages and comparing them to the outline, I’ve been trying my hand at different writings, if just to keep my brain working properly. On one end, I write with the clear intention of getting paid for my work. I do want to entertain but I also really want to keep putting food on my childrens’ plates. With that in mind, I’ve been coming up with short stories and submitting them. So far, I haven’t had any hits yet, but I’ve received a lot of good criticism on my submissions. Actual critiquing from the editors, not just being ignored or told ‘this doesn’t fit the market right now’.

(It might show my age when my complaint about submissions is being utterly ignored instead of being told ‘no’, but let’s move on)

Writing short stories is some hella-good writing exercise for me. While not published, I’ve mostly written novels. I’m used to thinking my stories at novel-length, so condensing a story to 10,000 words or less? That takes work. There’s so much I want to show in the worlds I create, but if it’s not relevant to the actual story, it has to either be put aside completely or told in such a way that the reader can accept it within their suspension of disbelief. If you’re a short-story professional and you’re reading this, know that I am in utter awe of your abilities.

(Sidenote: No, I will not put my old novels up anywhere for people to read. The last one I wrote was in my early 20s, and it was horrible. Please don’t ask; I can only cringe so much before my face starts hurting.)

On the other end, I’ve been putting my recent education via Deborah Chester’s “Fantasy Fiction Formula” while working on notes for the next projects. While I’d love to have a long-running series of the current project, “Post-World Postmen” could easily be a one-shot novel to be put on the shelves. The other projects could function between 5 and 10 books, if I wrote them well enough and they were picked up. One such project is my latest attempt at writing urban fantasy (one of my favorites because it is very-much-so a genre that I find difficulty writing) and another is a very basic superhero story taken with an odd angle. When Post-World Postmen is finished, I’ll be tackling these stories while begging agents to take my book to the publishers.

The Question of Monetizing

It has been brought to my attention that I can use this site to make a little money. I was told, by both people and ads, that I can design this place to be a spot where you, the reader, would pay for the content I put out into the world.

Now, let’s understand a few things.

I do want to make money from my writing. Becoming a successful (that is, funded) writer is both a dream and an ambition. I’d like to actually be home to see my kids grow up instead of the “two hours a day during a week, Sundays guaranteed” thing I have going on at the moment. I’ve been tempted to set up a Patreon, because if anything else, having people pay me the occasional dollar would force me to adhere to a writing schedule/routine.

But this place? I’m not so sure about that.

I’ve seen charities I’ve wanted to support, and in the future (that is, when I figure out how to set it up and it get attention) I will set up donations for people to give money to those charities, but beyond that I don’t want to turn this place into a money-grabbing cesspool. Yes, I want to make money for my words, but this is a place I can put my thoughts down for the simple joy of knowing someone would read it.

I’ll be adding a couple of new pages within this site soon, writing prompts and gaming notes. Maybe I’ll give Patreon another look.

Enjoy the Sunday, folks.

The Struggle of Writing With a Day Job

Today was my day off! I did not have to be up at the hour of “whatthefuckisthetime”, did not have to make the mad-dash out the door, did not have to mindlessly sort my letters, and did not have to walk 12-16 miles for my daily bread. As it’s a dream to finally finish the novel and send it off for editing/possible publication (and start work on the next one), you’d think I would have taken this opportunity to seclude myself at my desk and plunk away at the keyboard.
Alas, you’d be wrong.
The main reason I don’t use my day off to fully embrace my introversion and write for 8 hours is a reasonable one: I love my family and it kills me that I don’t get to see them that often. A couple weeks ago, my daughter, soon to be 4 years old, was up with me while I readied to head to the office.
“Will you be gone all day?” she asked. I was buttoning my shirt and looking for my satchel.
“I’ll be gone all day,” I said. “But I’ll be home in the evening, at least by dinner-time.”
This little girl stood by the door and gave me a blank stare. “I never see you,” she said. “I wish you were home.”
I’m not going to lie, people. Being told by your child that they miss you, and the reason that they miss you is because you’re gone for most of the day, between 8-12 hours, just fucking hurts. On top of that, when I get home, I’m too exhausted to really play or do anything except sit down and decompress. I’m on my feet all day for my bread, so I take full advantage of the couch when I get home. I have to wait until the late-night hours, when everyone is asleep and my mind is finally clear of the mail, for me to focus on the story. Until that moment, I try my best to be present around the family, which can get troublesome, as both kids are stubborn and don’t like being told things like “we don’t push” or “stop leaping off the couch into the pile of laundry” or, my favorite, “if you don’t stop running without looking, you’re going to hit a wall at full speed”.

But wait, that’s not the only reason I struggle to write.

One of the problems with being in a full-time job of old-school trappings is that it becomes a fight to be both an old-school husband and a modern day spouse. Yes, I work my long hours to provide for the family. But I also want/need to handle my share of the chores, and that has a higher priority than being useless in the house and smacking the keyboard with hopes of entertaining the masses. There’s dishes to do, animals to feed/care for, and the yard to maintain. If I was already a successful writer, and not gone for most of the day, I don’t think I’d notice these chores. They’d all be done before 10. But as I do work a ‘real job’, I have to have the mad-scramble of taking care of all of these things in the few hours I have between “I have clocked out!” and “I’m gonna pass out now!”, thanks to the sheer exhaustion of enduring the elements for the daily bread.

But wait, there’s STILL more.

This one is an honest trapping of the writer’s mind: it’s a bitch to want to write after work, and the day off is such a joy to have that I unknowingly embrace the entirety of a day off. I relax (as much as I’m capable of), I goof off, I play friggin’ video games. This is a discipline issue, but dammit man, I never get to do that and it’d drive me crazy to not.

I’m looking into a possible career change that wouldn’t take me away from home for so long. I’ll stay in the federal field if I can, as I’ve already invested almost 10 years into it. But I’m looking into something like programming or IT, so I’d be able to do more work remotely. That’d be something, right?

I did manage to get almost 800 words down today, in snippets throughout the day. I still need to attend to my lunches for the week, and then, then, I’m going to attempt to write more.

Cheers, folks.

Hannah and batting practice

It’s that wonderful time in the life of the parent where you attempt to teach your child the ins-and-outs of a sport you haven’t played in over 20 years. It’s proud papa-talk, but she’s getting the hang of it, I’d say.

Batta-batta-batta SWING!

Of course, I had to follow the tradition of dads all throughout history: attempt to give a batting lesson, then get hit by a full-force swing in the thigh. Hence the sitting down at a distance that gave me this photo opportunity.