Returning to an old blog.

After the parade festivities, I ended up getting about only two hours of sleep.

Not because I was doing anything fun or interesting, but because I was sitting in my living room, trying to calm my very active mind and to get it to relax.

So, on the way to rehearsal tonight, I was dozing off in the car because I was so freaking exhausted.

Rehearsal went great. Which they always do. Good group, things are working. It's great. I'm glad I don't have to stress about that.

But then I get out of rehearsal and it just kicks back into gear. I sort of dozed off when we got home. But I woke up, having barely slept with any consistency.

I'm so very tired. And sad. Heartbroken even.

I wish I could flip switches to make emotions stop. I wish my weird, all over the place emotions didn't burden people so much. I hate how high maintenance I am. Poor Melanie. But, also, thank God for her.

I had a former friend message me about my sorrows. "Get over it, man." This after he sympathized with others on social media expressing much the same. I pointed this out to him. "Those people don't have terrible worldviews. It would actually be sad if they died."

Not verbatim. I don't have the messages anymore. I wasn't really upset. He's as frustrated as everyone else. He didn't know how to express that. I'm not going to hold his statement over his head. Honestly, I still have people I consider friends who would agree with his thought. It hurts, but compassion is rarely held in any kind of sacrosanct solidarity. Rather, compassion is usually selective.

I hope sleep comes my way soon.

I want to keep on my feet. But that feeling is back. That feeling that I'm a blight on existence itself.

 

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Post by Brit Ward.

Free Writing 12/5/2013

Pepper your thoughts with rubbish.
That's what I do every day.
Don't listen to the gibbering masses.
They'll lead you astray anyway.

A long dither 'bout whether she blathered o'er here, thither, or home.

She cried and cried, and cried some more.
The sound was awful, I can say.
She did this because her daddy died,
And how she was never going to be okay.

So silently solemn, I soothed succinctly soliloquys searching her soul's sorrow.

But never enough, she yelled at me
Words and words, never hearing nay
Insisting on the importance of and
Reminding me the things her father would say,

"Look at you, you useless lump, a son I always wanted.
You've ruined my life, with your feminine strife,
So take these words that ne'er shall be blunted."

And with evil words spent, her mind in disrepair
Her stubborness immune to any sway,
"Tonight I'll end it all, with the point of a knife,
And sing heavenly praises most gay."

And that was the fucking end.

My finishing strategy for my NaNo book!

So, I won NaNoWriMo last month (which, you know, was just a day ago.) And I have a NaNo novel. Only, I really don't, as I have anywhere between 40k and 60k left to write for the novel.

Now, it's easy to lose momentum after writing for all of November, so I'm going to alter my writing for the next month.

Basically, I'm going to revise my first 50k words until I'm caught up again. And then, I'm going to be very, very methodical as I finish the novel. Revise each page as I write. Revise and revise until I'm satisfied and then move on.

I probably won't be done in December, but that's okay. I rather enjoy this book, so I figure the best route here was to write with care, and do the opposite of what I did for NaNoWriMo.

Nothing against literary abandon, but I have a hefty tome on my hands, and I need to exercise some care.

Free Writing 12/1/2013

"I got nothing," he said, putting the cards down as a couple of laughs sounded across the table. He stared at the two laughing, laughing at some only half-funny joke before he cleared his throat and said, "In other words, I fold."

"Oh, sorry," Elizabeth said, looking at Ronnie's now abandoned hand. She looked at her hand and then said, "I guess I fold too." She laid her cards down, the ghost of her laughter holding strong as a leftover grin.

"Then I win!" Sam happily reached out and grabbed the stack of chips at the center of the table, though Ronnie suspected that his happiness, like Elizabeth's, was from the laughter they had been sharing. Still, he seemed to have no problem bringing the pile in front of himself. "I'm usually never this lucky."

A silence passed as suddenly both Elizabeth and Sam's lips were held in contained laughter. But, before long, they held it no more and the laughter broke out, the result of some joke that Ronnie apparently was not privy to. He looked between the two of them, wondering if there was something specific about anything anyone said that was funny, or if they just happened to be so far along in the near delirious laughs that everything spoken brought out a fit of giggles.

"I'm sorry no one else bothered to show. Kind of sucks it's just us," Ronnie said.

"No, this is great!" Elizabeth said with a big smile. She added, "This is a lot of fun." Sam didn't add anything, himself, though he nodded in solid agreement with Elizabeth.

"Good, I'm glad." Ronnie looked down at the cards that constituted his hand, all face down on the table. "Cards aren't usually my strong suit."

(This is normal Free Writing, but I think I'm actually going to continue this little story. I like the three characters, I like the implied dynamic, and I like the awkwardness. More from these three tomorrow!)

The End of NaNoWriMo 2013

All month, we've had a local group for write ins, helping encourage all involved to cross that 50k mark for NaNoWriMo.

I learned several lessons going to these write ins.

1. I'm not good at writing in public. But I love helping people write.
2. In spite of not being good at writing around people, I still wrote remarkably well in my own time and have really developed a new approach to novel writing.
3. Writing is a powerful tool for unifying people of vastly different personalities.
4. You can't deny the thrill of being able to tell a group of people that you just won.
5. I love writing. I already knew this one, but I'm thrilled that every time I write, it just feels better and better.

I'm going to miss these write ins. But, doubtless, I'll draft many of the folks I've come to know into our various projects, like film and the like.

So, here's to a great month. Sad to see it go. But glad that several new novels will be gracing the world with their existence.

Free Writing 11/30/2013

(Free writing! With typos, of course.)

Don't touch the tree
That's where he died

But who died?
What's his name?

He went by Chuck
At times Charles

Was he nice?
Did he love?

More than you know
More than I can

What happened?
Why'd he die?

Too much life lived
But heed too late

You miss him?
Does it hurt?

I admire him
Can't live the same

Given up?
Just too much?

I cannot tell
I will not know

Least he saw.

Yes.

(Poetry is not my strong suit. But I enjoy sorting let the occasional transform into a specific structure of words. In this case, a fictional character named Charles is remembered for living life, but not living with any sense of caution.)