Writing Prompt Wednesday: I was a lonely child.

Did you ever give a pet name to a plant, a car, a toy? Tell me about it! What made that item so important to you that you personified it?

Well, this prompt has my number. Okay. So I grew up an only child. I had a vivid imagination, I loved school, reading, and being left alone, and as such, I could count my friends on one hand. I didn't have time for anyone who didn't fit my vibe. Honestly, nine-year-old me knew who the fuck she was and what she was about. Anyway. Being alone most of the time was all well and good, but I needed someone to talk to. I had always loved having little friends to carry around - a stuffed animal, a small plastic toy, and in one case that is another story for another day, a Super Mario doll that I took to a sleepover.

This is the story of Spyri.

I forget exactly what year this was - third grade, maybe? My parents had bought me some decorative shells somewhere on one of our many trips to Cape Cod, and someone had the brilliant idea of affixing googly eyes to one of them: a long spiral shell that I named "Spyri," and fixated on immediately. I carried them around in my pocket, drew pictures of them in art class, and in all likelihood sat them on my pillow at night and lamented to them that my crush didn't like me back. 

One day, I brought Spyri with me to school. When it was lunch time, for some reason, I took them out and put them on the table to watch me eat a PB&J and some applesauce. You can probably tell where this is going. When it came time to clear the tables and go out to recess...Spyri was nowhere to be found. I had a perfectly natural response to this, which was to have a complete and total meltdown, crying hysterically in the middle of the cafeteria. The adults in charge tried to help, including one of the janitors who - bless them, honestly - dug through one of the trash bins full of pizza crusts and government-issued processed cheese food singles to try and find this stupid fucking shell with googly eyes on it that I had an unhealthy attachment to.

Alas, Spyri was nowhere to be found, and poor little me became so utterly distraught that my mom had to come pick me up. She still had to do the shopping for the week, and I remember so clearly being in the car when Pearl Jam's "Daughter" came on, sending me into hysterics again with the lyrics the picture kept will remind me, you know, because my shitty little art class picture I drew of Spyri, the anthropomorphic gift shop shell, was the only thing I had left of them. 

Prompt, I see that you are asking me what was so important about this little shell, and well. Even a surly little friendless nerd needs companionship, you know?

This time I mean it

So the last two years, huh? I really don't have any words for what so many others have already eloquently described at length; the best I can do is throw my hands up in the air and make fart noises. 

Yet, despite it all, I have made a lot of headway tackling some of my own goals during these Unprecedented Times (TM). I managed to stay active and lost somewhere in the neighborhood of 30 pounds. I got a new job that I'm really enjoying so far, after an almost comical and definitely incredibly traumatizing journey that I should probably write about. I started looking very seriously at my relationship with alcohol and cut my drinking back to almost nothing (something else I should probably write about!!)

And writing! I took a seminar through Grub Street in January called "Creating A Sustainable Writing Practice," and when I learned that the instructor was starting up a weekly Zoom writing group I signed up for that shit SO fast. And wouldn't you know, after the first session I decided it was time to dust off my novel and get to revisin'. 

So I'm back babey, and I mean it this time. Will be posting in here when the spirit moves me, talkin' about the writing process and grief and snacks and mental health and whatever else is on my mind at the time. Not going to overthink or edit too much and let's see what happens.

Ever onward, ever forward.

Mason jar of whiskey in my bathrobe pocket.

(Original post from January 2018.)

 The Universe has been pretty annoying lately with imploring me to get back to writing. From my dream wedding in September when all the intuitive, spiritual people in my life met each other for the first time and all agreed that I needed to write again and still continue to text me about it, to a very persistent Tarot card that keeps showing up, to when I fell on some black ice a couple weeks ago and fractured my tibia.

Wait. One of those things is not...

Except, well. Maybe it kind of is? I don't know, I don't necessarily believe that "everything happens for a reason," in fact, sometimes the atoms in this universe randomly crash together in ways that are pretty inconvenient. However, as this year began, I've been thinking a lot about the role that your choices play in the direction your life takes. So it's at this moment, sitting on our lumpy futon in my filthy bathrobe, with a massive green cast that goes from my toes to my crotch, drinking whiskey out of a jar and watching perhaps my 400th episode of Parks & Rec today, I totally forgot the fucking point I meant to make because it's been so long since I constructed a sentence that didn't end with me hitting "send" on an email client.

Thank you in advance for your attention to this matter. Please let me know if you need anything further, Kind Regards, Your Esteemed Colleague Who Gets Nothing but Rapturous Joy Sending You Five Emails per Week About the Same Goddamn Item and Could Probably Speed Things up by Picking up the Phone but Refuses to Based Partially on an Irrational Fear of the Telephone but Mostly on the Principle Goddammit,

Amy

I may have made some of that correspondence up.

Oh, right, so anyway, I decided that if the Universe was going to fuck my shit up by breaking my leg, I might as well try to produce something during this time and write some stuff, however inane and rambling. It's my Frida Kahlo moment, so to speak, minus, y'know, the talent and the rampant bisexual extramarital affairs.

So. If you've managed to read this far, welcome back to my blog. Please ignore the time stamps, for time is but a construct that just exists to make us feel bad about not progressing at the same pace as our peers. As John Fogerty once sang, "Oh don't go 'round tonight/It's bound to take your life/There's a bad moon on the rise." Uh. Sorry, my husband just put on a Creedence record and I'm kind of drunk over here. You know what I'm trying to say. Right?

I am a writer. I am definitely a writer.

Hello friends. I'm so glad you made it despite me giving you very little reason to to so. Go ahead and help yourself to a cup of coffee, a glass of wine, some cookies that I bought at 7-11 on my way over here. Have a seat in one of these folding chairs I've haphazardly scattered around the room. Stretch a little bit. We're in for a long post.

I realized recently that the one thing - the only thing - I have ever felt 100% sure of in regards to my own abilities, is writing. From a very young age I was writing "books" about my adventures, my cat, and a delightful array of fictional creatures like daffodils that sang Eric Clapton songs, or little fuzzy monsters that appeared to serve as wingmen (wingmonsters?) to help me win over my 4th grade crush. I read these stories aloud to classmates in order to elicit laughs, and by god, I got them. Later, I would go on to write bad poetry as an outlet for my unrequited love affairs (do you sense a theme here), and then some pretty good poetry that won me a generous writing scholarship my senior year of high school.

In college, I majored in journalism, mostly because I figured hey, here's a good way to have a career as a writer. I know. I know. But I did some good work in those years! I discovered a passion for social justice, and helped some friends start an independent magazine based around identity and racial justice. I wrote op-eds. I got a few stories published in the student newspaper. It wasn't much, but I was creating, and felt at home in my own words.

And then...I graduated, and almost instantly fell into a crippling depression that would last years. I lost the structure of daily classes and thesis deadlines. I lost a reliable social network. I self-medicated with alcohol and meaningless relationships. I tried and failed to start a career that I loved, over and over and over again. Once it seemed I was starting to claw my way out of quarter-life ennui, my beloved younger brother died unexpectedly and my world entirely fell apart. So my mid-20's were...tumultuous to say the very least, and an utter flaming bag of shit to say what I really feel. It took a very long time to sort a lot of things out. I didn't write anything for almost an entire decade, save for filling journal after journal with self-reflection, self-deprecation, self-doubt.

And then, in 2015, I decided to try my first NaNoWriMo, wherein I made a poor fictional young woman go through all of the same things I had just gone through. It was too much. I abandoned the draft for almost three years.

Until last year. I was imprisoned in a cast with two broken leg bones, once again hopelessly depressed and desperate to create some meaning from a seemingly meaningless accident. So I returned to my novel (see my previous post, Muscle Memory) and I finally finished it. Not too long afterwards, I was fortunate enough to have my manuscript accepted into a graduate-level editing course at Emerson College, whereupon two extremely dedicated student editors proceeded to tear it to shreds.

Now, I had a mountain of incredibly thoughtful and poignant feedback that was delivered to me completely for free, and naturally I did what any aspiring novelist would do, I saved it to my Google Drive and completely ignored it for 6 months straight.

The creative process, am I right? You work your fingers to bloody stumps on a piece of art, and then just abandon it on the side of the road as if it were a bedbug-ridden sofa. I just don't want to look at it anymore, you tell yourself. I'll get back to it when I'm ready, you lie. Like a literal lightning bolt will come from the sky and strike you when it's "The Right Time."

Listen, I believe that there are things in this universe that can't be explained, and that sometimes the universe does provide some signs and guidance along the road that, if you're paying attention, can at times seem extremely obvious. However, when it comes to the creative process, that shit is 100% on you, buddy. The Ancient and Wizened Deity of Prose does not descend from a shimmering cloud to give you a kiss on the cheek and say "Now, my child, now is the time to Make Your Art." No, you fucking put down your third new game of Skyrim this year, and you get back to your fucking novel.


ANYWAY, all this to say that I am getting back to my poor, bedbug-ridden novel, left on the side of the road this past December.

And in the meantime! I need to keep those writing muscles toned. So I will be returning to this blog that I also abandoned last year to document the noveling process, random shit that comes into my mind that I think is utterly hilarious, perhaps to workshop a thing or two.

People still blog, right? People still read blogs, right??

Re-entry: A Balancing Act

It's been almost 2 months since the cast came off.

2 months of feeling the air on the skin of my leg again. 2 months of wearing a pair of shoes on my feet instead of just one lonely shoe. 2 months of standing up in the shower, walking to the grocery store...you know, your basic human stuff.

Also, 2 months of realizing how much damage has taken place; of appreciating the subtle balance that takes place in the bones, the muscles, the joints, the tendons when the body is functioning properly... and the utter chaos that takes place when it is not.

I am in constant pain from the moment I wake up until just before I fall asleep. It's a roll of the dice every day as to what is going to hurt, but hurting is practically guaranteed. On a good day, I can do a little bit of stretching and be good to go. On a bad day, like yesterday, the pain is radiating from my bones, my joints, and my organs, and getting out of bed is not an option.

I know I've come so far in the past seven (SEVEN) months, and what I'm feeling is normal for how long I was off my feet. I also want to fling myself on the ground and have a screaming tantrum because I just want my body back to the way it was before the accident.

Finding a good locus between the good and the bad is evading me.

The above statement also applies to how I feel about current events in the United States.

There's not much else I can say about what's going on in this country that hasn't already been said. But, much like my broken body, this broken political system makes me feel sad, furious, and helpless. How can you possibly feel hope in the face of extreme despair? How can you see both simultaneously?

I'm not a religious person by any means, but the spiritual teachings of the Tao Te Ching have always appealed to me, specifically the passages about balance. The idea that light only exists because dark does as well. And so, in difficult times, the darkest challenges also present the opportunities to shine brightly.

I am trying to focus on the shining light manifesting in the generous and brave acts of people donating, and volunteering, and speaking out against the deeply fucked up shit that is happening in the US right now.

There is shining light in my body too, I know.

This is much harder to find.

I hope I find it soon.

Muscle memory.

Learning how to walk again after a serious injury is an experience. I got switched to a walking cast about three weeks ago - not one of those sturdy-looking air casts, mind you, but a cement cast, similar to the fiberglass, with a dorky-looking sandal/shoe that you strap to your foot, that looks like something you definitely should not be putting any weight on.

I began by using both of my crutches for support, essentially mimicking the action of walking. "Yes, I remember this, heel-toe, heel-toe, wonderful, just grand." The first day, my knee joint felt like it might explode, understandably, since I hadn't used it for eight weeks. Then, gradually, I was able to hobble around the apartment successfully enough, so I began just using one crutch, on the left side.

Hurrah, now I was able to actually carry a glass of juice or a plate of food from the kitchen to the other room, rather than putting my comestibles in a container with a lid and placing it in a tote bag around my neck, not unlike a Saint Bernard.

I won't lie, it hurt at first, both at the break site and I don't know, my knee, my ankle, my foot, my back... (I know you're singing that Khia song in your head right now, don't lie to me) There were days where I overdid it the day before, and I would lie on the couch all day feeling exhausted and depressed, cursing the slow march of progress.

Around the same time, I decided that I really wanted something to show for this sedentary period, a revisiting of my creative pursuits that I could wave around as proof that this time actually had meaning, as opposed to just some random accident that completely fucked up everything. I had started writing a novel for NaNoWriMo back in 2015, of which I completed maybe a little more than half, maybe a little less than three-quarters. Over the years, I've gone back and added some more here and there, but never really committed to finishing the damn thing.

What a great goal, and how bad-ass does that sound: "By the time this cast is off my leg, I will have finished the first draft of my novel."

So I opened up the document (last save, July 2016), said "Hello, this is your creator speaking" to all of my forgotten characters, and got right down to typing.

Almost immediately, I got ideas that would fill plot holes that had been evading me for literal years. I rewrote some dialogue, bringing characters into the foreground that had been pretty one-dimensional before. "Yes, I remember this, show, don't tell, wonderful, just grand."

Not unlike re-learning to walk, I'm re-learning how to tell the story inside me. And on all counts, it feels pretty dang great.

On depression.

Hello, I am back.

I haven't written anything in a month, because honestly, I've been extremely depressed.  The kind of depressed where all I want to do is distract myself with internet memes and hours upon hours of video games, because doing anything else will make me have to look my feelings in the eyes and acknowledge that they are, in fact, real. The kind of depressed where I am actively willing for time to pass because the present moment is nothing but stasis, a holding pattern. The kind of depressed where I stay up until two in the morning because I don't see the point of going to sleep when there's nothing to wake up for.

This has been really fucking hard, y'all.

There was a period of time earlier this month where I had to reschedule my follow-up appointment at the hospital two weeks in a row because of seemingly endless Nor'easters (thanks, Big Oil!) that just so happened to hit the day of my appointment. Prior to that, this appointment had been the beacon of light in my broken-leg-fog; it symbolized progress, and above all, hope. It meant a shorter cast, which meant the possibility of walking, which meant a return to something resembling a functioning human existence.

To have that hope postponed, not once, but twice, well. The first time, I did what any normal person would do, I immediately got very, very drunk. Then I cried for about an hour. The second time, I felt flat, completely numb. I had moments where I legitimately felt that I would be in this cast for the rest of my life. My husband began to seriously worry about me.

When the possibility of a third storm with terrible timing loomed, I thought to myself, If I have to wait another week, I'm not sure if I can do this anymore. I consider myself to be a pretty strong lady, but I was on the verge of giving up completely.

My husband and I watched a documentary about Stephen Hawking the other night, in which he talked about the progression of his ALS, and losing functionality of his body little by little, over time. I looked down at my fiberglass-encased limb and thought, I can't even deal with one broken leg. Then I remembered that I have a mental illness, and some days even getting out of bed feels like the most heroic of achievements.

The third storm never ended up coming. I made it to the hospital this past Tuesday. The short cast is on, and I was given a cast shoe, meaning I am now learning how to walk again. Hope glimmers once again on the distant horizon.