Written were hundreds of words on my tales of woe for 2016. It sounded kludgy and hackneyed so instead, I am going to answer these questions from Gala Darling:
What were your top five moments of the year?
Going to rugby practice and not dying
Finding out the lump in my right breast was not cancerous
Spending time at the cabin with TEH
Finding a green sequined skirt for 1/2 price
Spending NYE with my brother, SIL, and TEH
The beautiful drive from east coast to the cabin in late August
Coming home again
ummm….
366 days (2016 was a leap year) and I’m struggling to make a list. For 2017 I am going to write down each good thing that happens and throw it in a Mason jar and January 2018 I should have a nice fat list. What are you really glad is over?
The elections. The lead-up and the final day were torture but now that it’s over, I am getting better equipped to shape the future. How are you different today than you were 365 days ago?
I’m much more mentally stable. Thank deities for good drugs. Is there anything you achieved that you forgot to celebrate?
Probably but see question one — I barely come up with five things to celebrate for the year. What have you changed your perspective on this year?
I became more aware of my institutional oppression and I’m actively working to be more “woke.” My reading goal is to read non-white, male, American authors and read more non-fiction. Who are the people that really came through for you this year?
The usual suspects: TEH, Kate, Kristin, CMMRB, and many more. What is something you tolerated for a long time, but now you will not?
Ignoring my health. I’ve slid along thinking I was eating healthy and being more active. To some extent, this is true but not as much as I thought. I’m no longer going to accept “good enough” as a mantra. What old beliefs did you let go of?
I accepted wholeheartedly I do not believe in a Judeo-Christian god. What was the one thing that you found really challenging, but can now see supported your growth?
Continuing with meditation and doing yoga fairly regularly. If you could go back in time, what would you tell yourself this time last year?
You’re going to be okay. It’ll be slow going, but you’re going to be okay.
My goals for 2017: Expand my intellectual horizons
Read more non-fiction and works by non-white, American, male writers. My reading last year was pitiful. Only 30 books! I’m going to shoot for a book a week and dedicate 25 – 45 minutes a day to reading.
I’m also going to read news outlets outside of my typical bubble and subscribe to newsletters that make me feel enlightened and get off of lists that aren’t helping me with my goal. Expand happiness quotient / do more self-care
550 days of continuing meditation, WOOHOO. Body wise, I’m no longer going to accept “good enough” as a mantra. I turn 45 in 2017 and I want to be healthy and strong. Challenging myself with being active is going to be scary but worth it. Continue being diligent with self-care. I also need to remind myself that change is slow. The past is the past, start every day with a clean slate
Seeing mother during the holidays confirmed what I’ve been telling everyone, in regards to her, all along: no amount of whinging, begging, or wishing is going to change the past. She is who she is. Seeing her this holiday was painful but a solid reminder that I shouldn’t let the past shape my future for anything. Write more
I say this every year (honestly, every day), and I’ve always held myself back. Always, always, always. Less looking at how to write / obsessing about planning and execution and more on writing itself. See more of the world, even if my world is within a 25 mile radius
My mother-in-law asked me how I liked living in the city now that I’ve been here for more than six months. I lamented I wasn’t doing more to be active in the city but I was making, albeit small, changes to rectify that. I need to drag TEH out into the world with me. Make more time for adventures!
My talking therapist chides me on the amount of goals I always set for myself and never seem to accomplish. “Do one or two things!” she says. These goals aren’t “lose 50 pounds by my birthday” rather “eat better and exercise.” Nia Shanks wrote a great piece, and give practical tips, how to beat resolution failure. The main point she keeps driving in and on is to break whatever you want to do down into workable general actions (drop processed sugar from my diet) rather than specific steps (eat only X grams of sugar a day; drop all “white” food, etc).
So that’s me for 2017. All those naysayers on how resolutions don’t work, go fuck yourself you micromanaging assholes.
cabinet particulier the reboot –>> On restarting my new fiction series
In 2012, laid up from ankle surgery, I came up with an idea to while away the time: I’d write a book. The book centers around an American actress living in England who has massive stage fright but continues to get jobs due to her extraordinary beauty. As she gets long in the tooth, a patron gives her a Kodak Brownie as a gift to keep her occupied during her downtime and she discovers she’s brilliant with a camera. After I fleshed out my character a bit, more ideas came forward: Edwardian period, magical realism, fairies, Arthur Conan Doyle, motorbikes, and a murder and you have a fantastic world in the making.
(This doesn’t mean I’ll be using all the things or anything else comes up but hey! having too much is better than not having enough.)
The name of the project is “Cabinet Particulier,” which is a term used for enclosed rooms in restaurants where men would meet their mistresses. The working title seems appropriate for a book based on a failed actress with the Edwardian version of a questionable background.
(You can read the beginning of my research notes over at exitpursuedbyabear.net.)
Months march on and in 2014, TEH and I decide I’m taking a gap year to write my book. Anyone who’s been keeping track of me these last few years know shit didn’t end up turning out that way.
(The story I’m spinning when future employers look at my resume is I took a gap year and the book stalled, which is mostly true.)
It’s almost five years (!) since the original idea smacked into my brain and I’ve decided it’s finally time to give my book the time it is due.
Let’s answer some questions: What is the Edwardian period: Period of time begins around 1900 and ends at the beginning, mostly, of WWI (1914). The dates are a bit fluid, with dates extended on either direction but is considered the gap period between Victorian age and the Roaring ’20s. Some scholars consider it to be the tail end of the Victorian era while others, like myself, see it as a wholly different period. The period is named for the English king, King Edward VII, who comes into power after his mother, Queen Victoria (the name sake of the Victorian era), dies. In the US, the period is loosely referred to as “The Gilded Age” and in France, “Belle Époque.” Why the Edwardian period: I knew I wanted the book to be historical fiction and I also knew I wanted the period to be close to contemporary times since there would be more research available (hah!). I tend to gravitate to periods pre-Depression era (1930s) but I wanted something different than your usual molls and gangsters of the 1920s. The turn of the 20th century was huge with big changes: Cars were becoming affordable and popular, same with radios, telephones, and electricity. Cameras and bikes were also coming into their own. People were becoming more literate, printing was cheap, and you saw the rise of mass produced books and magazines. The attitudes were more relaxed than the perceived stuffiness of the Victorians and lifestyles was more opulent and extravagant. I also wanted it to be pre-sinking of the Titanic (1912).
In short, it was an era where anything and everything could be possible. Influences: When I began my research, I found women, more so than men, were commercial and artistic photographers, so giving her a new job was easy. Popular travelogues of the era were written by women. There was a spike in the belief in the supernatural — The Victorians loved their ghost stories, seances, and research into the otherworld carried over to the beginning of the century. It became more socially acceptable for a woman to have jobs that would have been unseemly in the Victorian era, namely actresses and models. Thanks to telephones and postcards (yes, really), communication was easier and faster. This is also the rise of the middle class so you’re seeing a lot money spent on vacations, luxuries, and entertainment. Research: has been sketchy. Finding material that works specifically with that period has been hard. While there seems to be a zillion blogs/websites/books on Victorians and the Roaring ’20s and forward, the Edwardian period seems to be forgotten. Much of the social commentary on WWI tends to lean towards the Roaring ’20s rather than the time before it. Since many scholars and historians consider the period to be late-Victorian, what I have been finding for resources tend to be footnotes in those works. I thought the popularity of Downton Abbey would see a rush of amateur historians coming to the rescue, but no. I’ve been expanding my search terms to find more information – Art Nouveau is such an example. Where are we at now: I took a fiction class in the fall of 2015 and workshopped the first chapter and it was well received. I’ve been playing around with characters, theme, and story lines so the basic idea, “failed American actress living in London,” is starting to flesh out. Since I gave away my print books on the topic, I’m starting my research from scratch. There is an accompanying Pinboard, Pinterest, Tumblr sites as well as a RSS feed if you want to follow along. Posts, as always, will be cross-posted over on Facebook. My Scrivener files are still intact. What’s next: Now that my meds are under control which means my focus is better, I’m going to sketch out a plan of attack. I know I need to do a lot of research and I should also work on note taking of character / plot / scene. I bought a mechanics book on novel writing to help with the basics. (I’ve found celebrated books such as Stephen Kings On Writing are nothing more than expositioned mental masturbation. The first rule of writing is there is no formula for writing. Reading 300 pages of essays from famous authors does nothing for me. That’s great you drank a bottle of gin before you sat down and wrote The Great American Novel™ but not everyone is going to be that type of writer.) I need to read, read, read works of the era and whatever contemporary works on the era I an find.
In short, there is a lot of work to be done.
The last few months has been a study in the discovery of self as I’m having a lot of deep thoughts™ on a near daily basis as they run the track inside my brain. Nearly every single winner of that race always seems to steer me towards my relevancy and mark in the world. There is a toss up if I am thinking such things because it is winter and depressing as hell outside or that my 45th birthday is in six months.
Maybe it’s both.
The last few months has been a study in the discovery of self as I’m having a lot of deep thoughts™ on a near daily basis. Nearly every single winner of those races tend to steer me towards my (ir)relevancy and (lack of) mark in the world. There is a toss-up if I am thinking such things because it is winter and depressing as hell outside or that my 45th birthday is in six months.
Maybe it’s both.
It is depressing, as a feeling not as a state. I do not feel as if I’m going to harm myself, do some damage to others or any of that sort but I am feeling a bit helpless and confused, and questioning where I’m going. Even during and shortly after the case came to a conclusion, I felt as if I was on a very clear path. Now that path is muddled and I’m at a loss of what to do and where to go.
To be sure my physical self is fine: I have a place to live (living with TEH where the south meets the midwest), food in my belly, my bills are taken care of, for now, thanks to unemployment. I do not want for material things and I am extremely grateful for what I have. I’ve taken to donating time / money when I can, even if it’s only a few dollars. I want to pay forward all the help I was given and while these gestures may seem small, it’s something.
I have been able to procure a talking therapist last month and we’re meeting on a near weekly basis. I have not worked with a talking therapist in over six months and it is such a relief to word vomit everything from my head with no fear of judgment and repercussion. Like many, I have a wonderful support network of people who will listen but they are not a neutral party to this conversation.
My talking therapist keeps drilling, tho I have a hard time believing, the importance of self-care and self-soothing. It’s not that unusual, really, to have these thoughts and they are not owned by those with short-circuited brains like mine. They are just thoughts, we need to accept them and let them go. We don’t have to act on them or be fearful of them. The talking therapist posited what kind of society are we if taking time out for ourselves makes us selfish bitches? Being able to take care of one’s self does a world of wonder for our lives.
We do not have to do all the things.
We need to remember to put ourselves first– a concept I rationally understand but have a literal difficulty in implementing.
Yesterday I found myself in a state over something I couldn’t control but was desperately attempting to. I took to my meditation app and I could not concentrate for fuck all. It was a struggle to keep focused on my zen buddha nature as my mind kept wandering over to that particularly riddled state and other things that were not important enough to give as much currency as I was giving them. Too fast for my liking, the 15 minutes are over and Andy from the app is back soothing me with his subtle British accent.
I do not feel better. I am now frustrated because I could not complete the simple task of sitting still for 15 minutes and being present.
An example of a daily frustration: I worked in the state of New York when I was living on the east coast this summer and since I worked long enough to garner unemployment, this is who is feeding me each week. The conditions tho are bit long and can get tiresome of what I need to report every week in my job search. I have to, and I do, track everything from job searching and profesh website1 updates to interviews and rejections. I have to work on job searching three days a week. Many of you may remember when I was heavily job hunting for librarian gigs I was searching every fucking day.
My medicating therapist spoke on the influx number of jobs coming to the area. Sure, if you’re into light industrial and retail. Several websites put my earning power at $93K. I have never earned that much, and while I’m glad for their hopefulness, it gets a bit irritating that the jobs they send pay in the $15/hr range. If that. Most jobs are paying in the $8-10/hr range.
I’m going to be a pretentious, over privileged asshole. I worked hard for my degrees. I made $ButWillMoreThanLikelyNeverSeeInThisArea so I have settled for $ReasonableAmount – which is significantly less than $ButWillMoreThanLikelyNeverSeeInThisArea. I’m finding a lot of jobs that require at least a college degree paying $10K less than my $ReasonableAmount.
I would gladly settle for a retail job at my favorite stores but the pay there starts at $9/hr. I calculated working 40 hours a week, which would be impossible, the gross would be $30 less a week than what unemployment brings. If I work a day, I will not make close to what that day would bring me on unemployment. Retail jobs are out. Tutoring jobs, which pay between $18-22/hr, would be ideal but I would have to hustle to find work and those gigs are not guaranteed source of income. Tutoring jobs are out. I’ve been rejected from positions I’ve interviewed for, with a $10K a year less salary than my $ReasonableAmount, for being overly educated. My resume is in front of your face. What on earth would have changed from submission to the interview?
I have removed degrees, modified what I did at jobs, cut my resume from six pages (academic) to two (standard). I have resumes for different fields. I have placed a variety of my resumes on eight job boards, including a state and city sponsored ones. I call staffing agencies and specialty recruiters. I have emailed recruiters that I have worked with in the past. It is not as if I’m not looking for a gig, but I don’t think it’s entirely unreasonable given my education, employment history, and skillset, asking for $ReasonableAmount is not, in fact, unreasonable.
And for the love of all that is holy, do not take this as an invention to email me your suggestions on how to find a job. My interview rate per number of job applications (1 in 5) is better than the norm (1 in 10), so obviously I have that down pat — it’s a matter of actually getting someone to hire me.
What was the point of that angrily worded section? To give you an idea of a daily frustration. Instead of stepping back, coloring or knitting or working on something else to self-soothe/self-care, I stew. Fuck the man and all that has and will potentially happen because I’m getting nowhere.
My talking therapist is an optimist. The right thing will happen at the right time, she says. She believes it too. She tells me I’ve got options. I’m starting an extensive front end web development program in January. If I get off my arse, I can start selling my writing. There are other things I can throw in the fire. I am not, by any means, out of ways to improve my standings but it just might take a bit longer. Take a bit of work.
Work hurts.
I have to remember, as my talking therapist keeps telling me, things, no matter how much I want them to, will not change overnight. Every small fucking step I’ve done this year, even if it feels like I’m spinning my wheels, is an improvement over before. I need to think of 2016 as a year of growth rather than a year of nothing. Because I did do work. I did make some ground.
But the work hurts. It is painful and maddening and slow.
Talking therapist said that’s okay, it will hurt. By being here, acknowledging on being present, you’re slowly changing something. It’s new and unknown. That is okay.
That is okay.
1. I’m consolidating my librarian website (lisa.rabey.net) with my writing one (lisarabey.com). Choose your own adventure, motherfuckers.
Downloadable template to track things that make you happy / grateful / practice self-care.
[est_time] read
Earlier this year, I worked on a project of documenting things I was grateful for and things that made me happy. I only got a few months in as I suddenly found myself with a job, I moved 1000 miles, and until October, my life was in job / location flux.
But even in that short amount of time, I came up with 99 things to be grateful for and 100 things that make me happy. Here is the list.
(I know numerous people found the list to be a great template to create their own lists so feel free to download!)
Since Tuesday’s upset, I’ve been working on loads of self-care to get me through this time and it’s been helping. I’m a big proponent and advocate of self-care and I think it’s one of the most important things we can do for ourselves. While we should always fight injustice, we’re not going to be any good unless we in the place to fight for ourselves.
Let me put it to you this another way:
If you don’t love yourself, how in the hell you gonna love somebody else?” ― RuPaul
Here are more things to add to the lists: Self-care
Getting off the internet. Period.
Read
Meditate
Bake
Go for long walks
Knit
Play video games (I’m currently enthralled with Animal Crossing. Friend code:4613-7073-9492)
Working on my projects
Text with close friends
Breathing exercises
Snuggling with TEH
Cleaning house (don’t judge)
Drinking hot tea
Sleeping on freshly laundered sheets
Making lists and knocking things off those lists
Doing something kind for someone/things
Eating chocolate
Long near scalding showers
Long hot baths with epsom salts (TEH only has a large walk in shower but if I have access to a tub, damn straight I’m getting my bath on)
Read tarot cards
Online shop (but not spending anything!)
Watch Bridget Jones’ Diary, Pride and Prejudice (2005), Harry Potter series, or any other favorite movies
Writing letters / postcards
Yoga
Wearing one of my perfume oils
There may be some cross-over from the original list to here but that’s okay. When I’m starting to feel anxious or stressed, I use one, or many, of the things listed above to calm me down.
What is your self-care?
TheExHusband is not one for being active in politics. Sure he votes but he votes for his conscious and his reasoning as such is pretty sound (to him) but we tend not to get into political fights even if we disagree. He did the much the same this time around, however, he aligned much of his vote with mine (#ImWithHer) as he believed she to be a better candidate than Tr*mp and he was supportive (mostly) with her ideologies.
After we voted at 6:15AM, we arrogantly believed Hillz would take the presidency because every major news outlet told us so. They was predicting the margin would be wide, 538’s gap was 80/20. Hillz triumph seemed like a sure thing. I started watching CNN after we came home and lasted about four hours as the predictions started to waver as exit polls and interviews of voters started to occur.
(When the returns started rolling in, we watched MSNBC while I kept tabs with BBC, New York Times, and CNN on my laptop.)
When the ballot counting began, and Tr*mp started pulling ahead, pundits tried soothing the nation with, “Losers always pull ahead with the smaller electoral votes and peter out around the 200 mark,” and, “Urban counting takes longer than rural counting due to population density, so calm the fuck down.” But the train wreck and horror as time wore on of our election slowly proved otherwise.
TEH was knocking back vodka/fruit punch (I believe he had four) while I was fetal position on the couch, one glass of wine barely finished in front of me. I have never seen him like this — this agitation and worry. It was clear he was worried, very worried, and if his own person was shaken by the obvious outcome, what did it mean for me? Him? Our future separately and together? And most of all, our country?
When time started ticking after the midnight hour, my breathing became short, I was panting, and a physical anxiety attack started to happen. TEH got me a Klonopin which blissfully hazed me for a few hours until around the 3AM hour when I heard the announcement the remaining states had fallen to Tr*mp and he was now our next president of the United States.
Then I started to cry.
TEH, slightly sloshed on vodka, and myself, hazed up on Klonopin, our mouths became agape, and the it was the end of the world but we were not feeling fine.
As I watched my timelines across the internet, many felt the same as we did: anger. Disbelief. Shock.
But there was also hope.
This just happened to me (cross-posting from Twitter)
Going back& forth w/ the organizers who escort people at abortion clinics (to volunteer) & they said, “you have to be prepared for filming.”
(It’s legal for the protestors to take pictures and film you.)
I told them I was fine w/ that & gave them the details on #teamharpy, b/c honestly, once you’ve been smeared on internet, anything is gravy. They said they knew from googling me when I emailed them to volunteer but ALSO because they were following the case while it was happening.
It’s weird, for me, people were watching outside of library world and I’ve also come across them irl who’ve offered up sympathy. And in some way the case is even more valid nearly two years on from the dismissal. Tr*mp and the allegations about him and how the media just swept that shit under the rug is PERFECT why women won’t come forward.
(I am so desperate to not name names and let loose a string of obscenities about them, but last time I did this, I named names and I got sued. So.)
The morning after, admittedly, I was a bit manic, I started taking on a zillion things: donating / volunteering / spreading support to overcome my anxiety. (I had another panic attack later yesterday afternoon so my actions from that morning were not completely bright.) But as the anxiety marched on, my mania started getting worse, and I felt pulled too thin.
I wanted to do all the things but my self-care started to show cracks and I knew I had to pull back.
First, I needed to grieve, which I didn’t do. Next, I need to assess my life and I was not realistic about how much involvement I could do. Third, I needed to figure out how to best spend my time rather than going crazy on all the things. (TEH is worried my overextension may be problematic to my mental health.)
After I stepped back from my crazy morning, I became more frightened of what this potential presidency will mean on a personal level. First, my mental illness and gender are going to be heavily questioned and possibly terrorized. First and a half, if ObamaCare is rolled back and Medicaid cut, I am seriously fucked. Second, my pathway into spirituality will have to be locked down to the closest of friends (and on my anonymous blog) since it doesn’t fall into the Judeo-Christian tradition.
It is also knowing once this post goes public, I’m opening myself up for attacks, criticism, and threats.
After calming down a bit, I decided to take action as much as I mentally could:
I signed petitions and passed on those websites on my timelines for others to sign and they to pass on
I donated small amounts of money when I could to the places really close to my heart
I contacted the local abortion clinic to volunteer as an escort and I will be starting training soon
I contacted my local suicide helpline to volunteer and that training will start soon as well
I searched Facebook for groups / organizations / events I could locally attend / join
It seems like a lot but it doesn’t feel like a lot as my natural instinct is to do all the things. But it’s what I can afford to mentally, physically, financially do and I take comfort that anything is better than nothing.
Through all of this, I’m keeping my white privilege in check. I’m acutely aware of what is made available to me mainly has to do with my skin color. I have a roof over my head, food in my belly, and clothes on my back. I’m also acutely aware if Obamacare AND Medicaid get repealed, TEH and I are half-seriously considering getting married again so I can have health care (if I’m not working at a place that offers it).
It is my duty, no my responsibility, to help those that are not as fortunate as me and fight as hard and as much as I can.
Below you’ll find a list of phone numbers to call if you’re in crisis and a list of lists compiled by other outlets of how you can help. If you find this useful, feel free to share it on.
Here is the ACLU’s national general list of rights for public demonstration (but be sure to CHECK your local state as some of these may not apply / there may be more)
National Popular Vote will generate a letter for you AND send it to your legislators
Jezebel’s list of pro-women, pro-Immigrant, pro-earth, anti-bigotry orgs you can donate / volunteer / support
Your rights if Immigration & Customs Enforcement agents approach you
An open letter to Our Nation from 100 women of color leaders (has an incredible list of various groups you can donate / volunteer / support at the bottom of the page)
Complicated relationships with suicide and the meaning of death.
Saint Jerome Writing by Caravaggio
[Crossposted to Medium]
First things first: I’m collecting donations for the Out of the Darkness Suicide Prevention 5K walk which is happening on November 5. Here is my story:
When I was 17, I attempted suicide. It was through a suicide prevention crisis hotline that got me the help I needed. I am also bipolar and the National Health Association report those with mental disorders are 30 – 70% more likely to attempt suicide. I know too many people who have either thought of or attempted suicide and I want those numbers to be 0. I tattooed a semicolon on my wrist to be a constant reminder my story, and everyone else’s, is not over.
I’m also walking for my mom who attempted suicide in 2001. Suicidal thoughts know no age, no race, no income barrier, no religion and more. Please help me fight against suicide prevention by donating to my walk.
The resulting donations have been amazing! My original goal was $200 and I doubled that in the first two days, and tripled it within a week. If you have a few bucks to spare, please considering donating!
This essay has changed topics at least twice before final publication. First, it was a meditation on spiritualism of the pagan variety which is long overdue and definitely needed. Then on to recounting seeing my mother for the first time in over four years which turned into talking about suicide.
Which, you know, is a sunny topic.
Suicide and I have a complicated relationship: I started writing a book when I was in my pre-teens about it (which made for interesting fare for research at the library) and then there is my own attempt at 17 which was a revelation and a curse. A revelation I was not alone in my attempt though at the time it seemed like no one had ever felt that way and a curse as just like talking about mental health is a stigma (let alone having any mental illness) so too is talking about suicide, especially if you attempted. I rarely talk about my suicide attempt and enough years have filled in from then to now the recollection of what happened is hazy: the smooth move of my arm to the bottle, the bottle opened, the drugs down my throat, then as the drugs took hold, the very thing pushed me to die was now attempting to have me live.
(I need to note here friends got to me just in time and force fed me hamburger whose grease had not been drained which prompted me to throw up every last thing in my stomach, which of course included the drugs. The EMTs were called, which led to my mother being called, which led to them not taking me to the hospital as I had already thrown up the drugs and my mother is/was a nurse so I should be “fine.”)
What I didn’t mention to my story in AFSP was my mother’s reaction – something along the lines of “I got called out of work for this?” to direct quote, “Next time you try, don’t use my pills.” While contacting a local suicide hotline IS true, the motherly lack of care of me and my brain following my attempt never happened.
When I attempted suicide, there was some reasoning behind it: I didn’t feel like I belonged; I wasn’t loved by anyone; no one was there for me. When mother attempted suicide in 2001, we never really found out why she attempted — or the whys when she attempted again a few months later. Perhaps there were no reasons on the attempts but here she is, 15 years later on still being an asshole to everyone and ruling as if her suicide mattered and mine did not.
Nothing has changed. Everything has changed.
As the decades have passed, I catch brief glimpses of that day. I know it was spring/summer. I know my action was spur of the moment and not planned though it was never far from my thoughts. I know that singular attempt was enough to want me to live a life worth having. I wanted to go to college, see the world, maybe get married and / or have kids.
All the things I have wanted and continue to do.
I want a life not just to live but to be alive.
Stop taking advice on how to manage your writing career – that’s a writer’s greatest struggle of all.
26 fiction book ideas
33 fiction story ideas (shorts / novellas)
19 fiction stories in progress
6 non-fiction essays in progress
6 fiction short stories finished
8 fiction short stories to be edited / revised
1 themed short story collection started
Afraid to say how many #100DayProject entries (i.e. not many)
And the big one:
10 life projects
When I tell my therapists I have projects in the works, I am referring to life projects. Things like “find a job,” “update/manage lisa.rabey.net” (librarian site), and so on are all individual life projects. Each “project” requires its own energy and resources. “Finding a job” meant spending 30+ hours a week on job searching, writing applications, finding references, and anything else associated with that task. I also spent five+ hours a week researching and updating my librarian (main career goal) site to keep myself fresh and relevant in the field.
Those two projects are related (but separate) and seem like they should take up a good chunk of my time. They are and they did but I didn’t have just those two life projects to keep me busy: I have 10.
Let’s give another example: Code Louisville (life project #1) uses Team Treehouse (life project #2) as the foundational courses for Code Louisville’s cohorts. I reasoned I needed to also have a website to showcase my work which led to the creation of a consulting business (life project #3) for site design / content curation (of which I had enough knowledge to be dangerous but I was taking zero classes for, so I needed to take more classes to supplement (life project #4)). These life projects could be streamlined and consolidated into a single connected project (take only foundational courses needed for Code Louisville and use the website only as CL cohort increased, stop consulting services and taking additional classes).
But I didn’t think that way. I thought if I could do all the things, my chances of getting employed / noticed / famous would increase. We know how this story ends: Spread too thin and I was not a master of any and mediocre at best for most. How do I do I approach this to make sense in my head and to get the work done?
James Altchuer has the 5/25 rule. You make a list of 25 things you want to do and keep only five, the other 20 are distractions. I am using this advice to manage my projects better. Out of the 10, five were put on hold indefinitely. Two were consolidated (Code Louisville / Team Treehouse) which leaves me another three projects I can handle: update EPbaB (and the newsletter) once a week, work on my woo-woo makey feel good stuff, and writing for a total of four projects. Code Louisville / Team Treehouse are time specific and not immediate so that’s on the backburner for the moment; updating the personal blog and newsletter takes 10 hours a week (closer to five to seven but I want to be generous with time), and the woo-woo makey feel good stuff is my daily meditation, working on DBT, seeing a therapist which is also another 10 or so hours a week. In theory, since writing can be done at anytime and anywhere, I have about 30 – 50 hours a week I can devote to writing.
On paper, this sounds great, but there is more coming down the pipeline. I’ve applied for several online tutoring jobs which while it nets me some much needed cash, it also means I’m going to be working about 20 or so hours a week which will eat into my writing time. Plus there is general life stuff: errands, going out, dog things, etc which has an unknown amount of weekly allocated time. Finally, FINALLY, there is the writing itself. I have books to read, notes to make, ideas to simmer, when do I actually sit down and just bloody write?
Writing is on the forefront of my brain for the last few months and I want to change my framing of approaching it. If I do X (which I’ve done a million times), then X would surely, finally (not really) happen. Good intentions, bad follow through and it’s fucking with my goals. Look at the writing numbers above: 26 book ideas stretching back to at least 2001. 80% of the ideas will never see the light of day. The remaining five, maybe 2 will come to fruition if I actually get cracking on them. The other numbers will roughly have the same percentage. The only increase, and probably better completion of, are the non-fiction essays since I can knock those out fairly quickly.
Therein lies the rub: writing isn’t just about writing, it’s about everything you do before (and after) you put pen to paper (fingers to keyboard). There are queries to write, research to be done, edits to be made, notes to take, possible classes to sit in, books to be read, and if you’re self-publishing, there is far more work to be done for promotion and hustling oneself out into the world.
I get overwhelmed with it all, fuck off the world and play Animal Crossing. Surprise, surprise – nothing is finished.
900 words later, we get to the point: How do I handle writing projects? Walter Mosely’s slim treatise, This Year You Write Your Novel can be summed up as such: Allocate X hours in the morning for just writing and spend the afternoon doing administrative tasks (email, errands, research) and within a year, viola! A novel. Jonathan Franzen (jackass) has widely noted he has his wireless card removed (to prevent internet distractions) and once, “…writing in the dark, wearing earplugs and a blindfold.” to finish another novel. (Pompous twit.) But it worked for him. Other writers have even more wildly different approaches. I know of one writer who, with deadlines looming, writes whatever is due before the final hour. NaNoWriMo‘s approach tells you if you write 1600 words a day, NO EDITING, in the month of November, you too can have a complete (unedited), albeit, short novel.
Here I am, with more ideas to shake a stick at, finally time I can reasonably carve out to write, and I’m writing a blog post about managing writing projects instead of, you know, actually writing.
All is not lost! I use a 9″x12″ sketch pad to plot out my life and now I have a visual idea of what I can reasonably handle even if the other ideas are 10000% awesome. I’m, for the first time, learning from my reading in addition to enjoying it for pleasure. I’m reading technical books to refresh my English comp classes, I’ve started plotting (new!) some stories to get an idea of how I want the stories to land. I’m keeping in mind the advice I gave a few weeks ago and using the spreadsheet of doom to track everything. I am starting a task for the day and completing it rather than have many tasks unfinished. Progress on reframing my approach, tiny but visible, is being made.
It’s hard. Writing is hard. We do not come forth and spill out Harry Potter or Ulyssys on the first tries. We know of the rejections and the waiting and the struggles. We forget these things when we see authors we love become more famous or in some, become obscure. We cannot be everything at once and in all life projects, yet we try to be. We have a voice we want to be heard but we keep strangling it on the behalf of others advice with the thought of shame we are not doing things “right.”
And that’s our greatest struggle of all.
The creation of the spreadsheet of doom, the overly complicated yet super effective way to track your writing.
I’ve made lists and spreadsheets long before I was a librarian so when I desired to take my writing one step further and begin to submit my pieces, I needed a way to track everything without losing my mind. I’ve searched for such a thing but most of the tools were lacking. Then I came across Jamie Rubin‘s spreadsheet and later the one from The Sleeper Hit and the great spreadsheet of doom was born.1
I keeping a few of my examples to give you a better idea of how it works, starting from the left tab and over:
Upcoming deadlines Pretty self-explanatory. It has the name of the publication, theme/idea, due date, cost (if any), payment (flat rate or per word), and link to the submission information.
Stories I only count finished but you could break it up to include working as well. Title, abbreviation, word count. It should be noted some places have limits on word count hence this column. DO NOT MODIFY THE COLUMNS IN GREEN. This will become important later on.
Submissions Some of the cells will have drop-down options for each cell not green. Date (date you submitted); market (which populates from the market tab); status (which populates from the configuration lists tab); leave the next three green columns alone; last date (when the piece was accepted); leave the next green column alone; and lastly, contact and notes.
Places to pitch The basic agreement is to collate listings of your favorite websites where you want to write and include the idea/theme of that site as well as the contact information. 75% of this list was compiled by The Sleeper Hit and I’ve been adding as I go.
Markets Market is similar to places to pitch with the difference by adding type of payment (populates from the configuration lists tab), the next six green columns pulling from the submissions tab, and the last green column pulling from the publications tab.
Publications A list of all places you’ve published coupled with how much you made for said sale. Story column will have a drop down generated by the abbreviation of your stories tab, markets pulling from markets tab; type pulling from configuration lists tab; fill in payment with how much you got paid (which will then populate the total payments column on the markets and payment summary tabs); payment date (date you received payment), and payment type (populated from the configurations lists tab); link to the piece and finally, year (which will be used in the submission and payment summaries tabs).
Submission summary for those who like charts.
Payment summary for those who like charts.
Configuration lists which are populated through the workbook. You can add cells (starting below the last filled cell) as necessary but do not delete the columns.
Instructions are for the Jamie Rubin parts of the workbook with links to their blog piece describing the process.
Some notes:
Yes, this seems overly complicated and could probably be simplified in bits but I found its current status to work well. Markets and publications and places are used interchangeably. (I should probably fix that some day for consistency.) As I’m a very visual person, having the visual gives me a better idea of how much work I’ve done in writing and submitting. At least one more tab I’m going to add is one for novel writing for daily word counts. (I don’t count blog pieces, journal entries, or anything of the sort since those have no value other privately for me.)
There you have it!
1. The spreadsheet can be modified to fit a variety of projects, not just writing.
“what the hell do i write about?”
this is a question i’ve mulled over for ages and i can’t seem to find a satisfactory answer. i tried chick lit many years ago but while i loved to read it (shut it), several of my pieces started out strong and eventually fizzled. i suppose if i found an editor who could help make a difference it would have been different, but in the end my heart wasn’t into that genre anymore.
next came fantasy/sci fi/paranormal/magical realism. i love the works of terry pratchett, jasper fforde, and others, and i’m keenly interested in mythology and fairy tale, and while that’s all well and good, and i have notes up the wazoo on various pieces, i just cannot get going on building my worlds.
then i started dabbling in mysteries with cabinet particulier (working title), “…a book project about a near-failed Edwardian actress who finds she is extraordinarily talented with a still camera. A little too extraordinary. It’s 1907. Throw in a bit of magical realism, fairies, Arthur Conan Doyle, motorbikes, and a murder and you have the makings of a fantastic world” (i apparently write fabulous summaries), but that’s stalled not because i’ve lost interest but everything else going on in my life has pushed the book far into the background.
i’ve been contemplating recently on two very important points:
i should keep writing no matter what i do
and this quote by theodora goss: “i tell myself that I’m allowed to be jealous of another writer if i’m willing to be jealous of everything, the good and the bad.”
the last one is particular poignant because i follow two women writers who’ve started from nothing and ended up blowing up huge. i’m jealous of their success, their recognition, and their fans who love them. but i remember both struggling, finding an audience, wanting to be read more than anything in the world, their failure after failure and lastly, never ever giving up.
one thing i’ve learned about myself this past year, and one trait i’m thrilled to finally have down pat, is starting something and continuing on. i’ve meditated for 413 consecutive days; i’ve recently started weight watchers and i’ve been diligent on keeping on track (and so far losing 12 solid pounds since starting and 19 pounds from my highest weight recorded earlier this year); doing yoga on a continual basis, and the most important one: being smoke free since january. these are but small things but knowing i can start and continue a single thing has helped pushed me into doing more things i can actually follow through with.
this new ability is v. important. i have adhd and coupled with my other brain gifts, starting projects, following through, and finishing those projects has only succeeded 1% of the time. so why the (positive) change? i attribute it to drugs, mainly, but the feeling of doing something and finishing something has made a huge impact on my life. i remember the feeling when i finished my book; this feeling of accomplishment and satisfaction i created something and i gave it to the world, which gave me a natural high.
and that high is addicting.
i’ve spent a good portion of my morning reading through what i have written in scrivener and upon closer inspection, things aren’t as half bad as i feared. the writing spanned from chick lit to magical realism; some better than others (despite my earlier assessment) and i found myself wanting to complete some of that work. there is a lot to work with, with some pieces closer to completion than others, which is only right. i have some fairly good ideas i cooked up and i can see where the mania pushed some work further down the road in terms of tone and plot while others are dark and short relative to the depression i was going through at the time. there is quite a few non-fiction pieces in addition to the fiction, with smattering of erotica and poetry (which is terrible. i am certainly no poet.
my voice in some pieces is fresh, while others are still in need of a lot of work. i caught myself, after reading a few pieces, finding stuff similar to other voices. the question gets turned not from, “what the hell do i write about?” to “how can i make this mine?”
“what the hell do i write about?”
the question remains valid. i am worried, and to be frank still am, i would be regulated to writing about the things i feel strongly about (myself, mental health, libraries, comics) rather than widen my horizons into other areas (short stories, novels, erotica).
i’ve always struggled with anxiety about my writing: it’s trite; it’s not strong enough; the story has been retold too many times. i feel overwhelmed i cannot compete on the big stage. my writing is never good enough.
i’m going to add more pieces of advice i received about writing:
read your work out loud
remove as many “thats” as you can
use a thesaurus liberally
watching your “-ings”
watch your verbs
just because you’re sick of your writing doesn’t mean someone else is
the last piece stays with me more often than not and is underscored by people who tell me they love my writing. so why don’t i have belief in myself?
“what the hell do i write about?”
in the past i felt writing about this topic would get done to death, but today i think it’s okay to keep hammering the point when necessary because it’s a good reminder it’s okay to be scared, overwhelmed, and insecure. not everything is going to be perfect from the belly and it’s okay to have some bad work as well as exceptional work.
the last piece of advice i’d give a new writer: it’s okay to be scared.
p.s. i’m going to do a variation of the #100dayproject where i write one page a day for 100 days. i’m not going to post that shit on instagram, as dictated on the project page, but i think in the end i might post here to my blog or do something for accountability. anyone want to do a project along with me (doesn’t have to be writing) for moral support?
The Art of Sentimentalism — are we defined by our stuff?
[Crossposted to Medium]
The collection of “me” stuff began in my late teens after one of my mother’s manic episodes when she tossed out most of my brother and I’s childhood. Since then, pictures, mementos, and anything helping to define who I am or was I saved no matter how insignificant it can or could be. (I saved the certificate for the year I won the school spelling bee which cracks me up years later as I’m a terrible, terrible speller. Long live autocorrect!) There is not much that marks my childhood other than spotty memories, a small wooden box of things I saved from grade and middle school, my baby book, and a handful of print pictures. My younger brother has fared much worse as his amount of childhood things is even less than mine.
I think often of what will happen to my stuff when I die. While my sites will go dark (no one would be paying the bills), I diligently have them crawled so one day, I hope, someone will stumble across my work and say, “Goddamn! This woman was prolific! (And far interesting as well.)”
Like most, I want to not necessarily be in the index but at least a footnote to the memories of the world.
As I continue packing, I occasionally find bits of past Lisa and now I debate, “Do I keep it or do I toss it?” While I have not read The Life-Changing Magic of Tidying Up, I do know the book posits you should only keep things giving you joy. Imagine the shock of my bookish friends when I told them, since October 2014, I’ve donated nearly 1500 books to various library systems. My collection remains mostly of my Austens, my Pratchetts, my collection of Anglo-Saxon/Medieval/Viking histories, my Salingers and Fitzgeralds, and my TBR pile which is too fucking enormous. I got rid of books I didn’t see myself reading again, or referencing, or even in some cases, caring about. My Austens, my Pratchetts, and the rest of “my” books spark joy so those got kept. I slashed through my DVD collection as I spent several long nights converting the 100+ collection of physical to digital media to be placed on my server with 90% of the physical media to be donated. If I want to watch Bridget Jones’ Diary for the 900th time, it is simply a matter of a few clicks rather than digging out the DVD and going through that ritual. These are things bringing me passion and joy where as 4-Eyed Whores does not. (It’s nerd girl porn. Literally.)
(4-Eyed Whores was given to a friend and not buried in the pile to be given to the library. What kind of monster do you think I am?)
The book cull will get even more severe as I sort what I’m taking to my next future home versus what is going in storage until it can be retrieved – again. My Austens, my Pratchetts, and most of the books bringing me joy will be snuggled in their cardboard homes while a smattering of them will be placed in my new home while even more will be donated to the local library system.
(And for those nearly hyperventilating, I was vaguely smart into cataloging this current collection before the donated books went into their box. I did not do this to the first culling back in October 2014, which is my shame but I’ve already come to terms with that.)
(And I haven’t gotten into the details of the hundreds of books I lost when my brother’s basement flooded in the winter of 2008. My stuff was stored there between moves and I lost most of my paper everythings.)
Even with the great cull of books and physical audio / visual media, there are many, many boxes I have cataloged (of course, I am a librarian) simply labeled “office knickknacks.” Lanyards from the many conferences I’ve attended. The remnants of the Etsy shop I used to maintain and the items I cannot get rid of. Tchotchkes from vacation pasts like the miniature of the Pieta from when I was in Rome. (The Vatican has a killer gift shop, yo.) Plastic photo boxes of things saved from trips like brochures, plane tickets, and other small items (one plastic photo box for each European trip = six boxes). Stuffed animals made or bought for me. Various electronic doohickeys that belong to something but I have no idea what and I should probably not throw those things out. I am keeping those things, though those cardboard boxes outnumber the book boxes 2:1. Those things do give me joy and mark me as a person.
Lee Randall, in her piece “For the Love of Stuff,” furthers my argument stuff is a narrative of one’s life and “my things are me and I am my things.” I felt some relief in reading this essay because I was growing tired of the constant barrage of pieces written on the new “minimalism” and you’re saving the world when you get rid of things that you no longer “need.” Not want, but “need.” I want people to get a sense of who I am when they come into my home, to get a feel what I like and what makes me happy. White walls, sterile furniture, and smattering of arty pieces just don’t cut it.
I want physical reminders these are the things “sparking joy” which also give deeper meaning to my person.
We have come to the point of things given to us by boyfriends past. There is a tiny collection of Beatrix Potter mini-books M. gave me which I kept, the love note still inside. The picture of P. and I at his brother’s wedding and we both look extremely happy. The nightclub t-shirt given to me by A. when he was working as a graphic designer. The earrings given to me by TheEx though their matching necklaces have long since been donated. These trinkets do not pain me and for most of them, I smile at those memories. These are things kept.
When I got to my apartment in Connecticut, I found many things given to me by TheBassist which got tossed into a box. The breakup was still too fresh and I was indecisive on whether or not to keep them. Friends suggested, since the breakup turned out to be brutal rather than amicable, I burn them. Instead, I kept them. They’ve been taunting me since with their presence in my storage locker a reminder of a time in my life when things weren’t going so great. When I was unpacking, and now packing again, I pushed that box out of mind to be dealt with at another time. Now that time has come where I must ask myself, “Do I keep, toss, or donate these items?”
Memories are sneaky bastards. What seems so clear one day can be muddled the next.
I strive to keep a positive attitude on the relationship between TheBassist and I as a whole as it wasn’t all bad and we did love the other, but clearly not enough to give the relationship a foundation it needed to keep going. I have these things that while they no longer give me pain at times, I have given them some kind of value and I wonder if I get rid of them, will the memories fade even faster and soon to be forgotten? Do I want to forget him as completely as possible? How important was he in my life that keeping those items won’t intensify what pain is left even in their innocence of just lying in that blasted box? Will I “find joy” in getting rid of them?
These may seem like insignificant answers to many of you — the obvious answer would be, of course, to get rid of them. But these things, I’d argue, are not things to be easily replaced. The signs he made me when I got off the plane or his band’s CD he has lovingly inscribed to me or the Neil Gaiman book he gave me years ago, also inscribed. Once those things are gone, they can never be replaced since their tangibility and worth is only for me.
But I must reframe these questions to how keeping these things will affect my relationship with TheExHusband. As most of you know, he and I are working on getting back together and when I land in Louisville in October (after spending September at the cabin), we are seeing a couple’s counselor to work on the things we should have worked on in our marriage. TheExHusband has been and always will be my always. Is it fair to him for me to keep the mementos of TheBassist, even if I claim their innocence in value? Are they worth keeping as a potential sharp thorn to what has happened these last few years?
What fills me with joy?
For many, if not most, the building of one’s personality through things seem kind of silly, maybe even trite. We should be known, it would be pointed out, for what we have done and how we treat people rather than what decorates our homes. But I cannot agree to that point, at least wholly, just yet. My mother erased much of our childhood when she threw almost everything out and while many have things that spark them with joy about their growing up years, those years are empty for my brother and I. Keeping things, no matter how insignificant, allows me to fill in the holes of my life where once nothing existed. But I ask again – should I save anything or everything? Curate my memory to be only of joy and light and not negative reminders of things gone wrong?
Aren’t I, in effect, whitewashing my own history to satiate whatever I think will help me be whole?
I have issues with people wanting to erase our social history by, for example, taking cigarettes out of movies from 50 years ago now we know cigarettes are carcinogenic. The past isn’t always sunshine and roses and the idea of “the golden years” is a myth.
Each generation has its own atrocities and in the attempt to remove the bad, we’ve gilded the good and gilt can flake off.
In the end I will more than likely keep the book and the CD (and the Joy Division t-shirt I left at his house since it’s my favorite one) and the rest will get tossed. I don’t need the hand-lettered signs, the letters, or the random knickknacks he has given me. They are just “things” where as the book and the CD have whole different set of values. I’m sure, knowing me, the tossing of the rest will be some kind of exaggerated march to the bin shoot and the ceremony of dumping the items down the incline into the bowels of the apartment building. Those items blur the line of worth between keeping and donating and in the end, they are just simply junk.
