It Is What It Is

Things have been weird. This past week has been an influx of life--two friends announced new babies, there was an elopement, there two engagements--it has been a bit much. The sudden feeling of life starting to gear up and get more serious with more changes to come.

See, i always felt that the 20s were about who you were and who you wanted to be... Making the the perfect balance between where you came from and where you wanted to go. It's a struggle and a balance of sorts that has to be dealt with; a necessary self examination of goals and history so that you could figure out the next steps of life.

But the 30s is about what life you are working towards. You begin to make choices; will i get married? will I have a family? Am I making a career? Am i making a home for myself. It becomes about the end game, the actual goals that are being accomplished and what they really mean to you.

I think that is why the novel has become so important. i am looking at where I am going with my life, where my choices really are taking me. part of it is about whether I am making a career that I want. That i might have to consider that I will not be having children or having a home in the traditional sense. And if i am making those choices--am i doing it for reasons i can live with?

It's been very hard and very adult. Events of the last week have really driven the point home to me and now I have to start really questioning and pushing and creating the things, relationships and moments that will take me to the next step.

It's a bit much--but it is what it is.

Turning A Curve Into A Line

I have been spending a lot of time watching football and playing pool. I spend my Sundays on the floor at Dominic's house and my weekends, every other one, at a pool table somewhere in this city.

It feels like I'm turning straight

Now this doesn't mean I get what i am doing--I don't really understand football and pool continues to be an embarrassing public affair--but I am learning to try and appreciate new things. this is unlike me because I normally have to have something perfected before I can take it out of the house but somehow Johnno convinces me that everything will be alright.

It's kind of amazing how he is doing that.

So instead of being worked up and worried about appearing dumb or clumsy I work on trying to find myself doing better, getting smarter. Now I'm not about to quote stats or run the pool table anytime soon but it's nice to know that I have the skill set to at least try.

I think that is what I am learning the most--that and how to be butch. Really butch!

It's A Little Bit Late But Just On Time

So I should have written this entry a week ago--Johnno and I celebrated the six month anniversary of living together. We went out to dinner before spending the night playing pool and trivia at the local tranny bar. It was nice and sweet and something we needed to go out and do for ourselves.

The funny thing is that living together has seemed like the easiest thing in the whole wide world. Sure we have had to adjust to sleep patterns and personal space issues but for the most part I find myself comforted by the fact that we start and end each day together. It is silly and romantic but i like the idea that he is the first and last person I see and vise versa.

In the words of "Kill Bill 2"--he is my favorite person.

And i continue to be amazed by how well he work things out together, the balance that we continue to refine each day through the good and the bad. there are some things that I have to work on but so does Johnno.... It is a process but one I am so grateful to have started. I'm not saying forever but i'm not ignoring that either.

But if these 6 months are how things will be for a long while--then I can be happy

Worries and Words

So I have been reworking my novel and it has been rather complicated and difficult. Both Johnno and Samuel have given me notes, good notes, and it has made me rethink certain aspects of the story. I have been recapping each chapter on notecards and breaking them down scene by scene.

Part of the issue has been knowing that i have to scale back the story, count down on word count, and reshuffle the events in the story. I think that I may even have to restart and rework what I have written so far which scares me.

It scares me because I am worried that I am making excuses not to finish my rough draft. And I am getting to the point where it feels difficult to call myself writer when I can't finish a novel--I wouldn't call some a dress designer if they couldn't finish a dress, a painter who never finishes a canvas or a songwriter who never made a song out loud.

So now this means that I am doubting myself and my ability but more importantly my commitment as a writer. And I am scared if I can't put down a finished rough draft of a story i care about--then what does it mean about me as an artist? As a creative person?

Or am I being too hard on myself? Am I turning my creative process into a self-defeating one? And how do I get past this? Do I wait on the new words to fix the old ones and hope that causes me to become more focused and driven? Or is this the start of me letting go of my dreams?

And who does that make me?

Le Sigh

So I decided to do NaNoWri again this year. I'm cheating because I am actually using the goal of the project to force me to finish my rough draft of my previous NaNoWriMo. What is depressing is that I feel like I have GROSSLY overwritten my book and i'm not even halfway where I have to be. It is 80,000 plus words and I still haven't gotten to the heart of the story and I am lost.

What sucks is that the few people who have read the book thus far like it. They like the characters and the plot which makes things hard because I know at some point i am going to have to cut so much out to get it the standard young adult size. It makes it hard to keep going and yet I know I have to.

I need to have a finished novel under my belt if I want to call myself a writer still. and yet i am at a loss of sorts.

I Guess Sleep Does Matter

In this picture you can tell I just want to coma out.... Not sure if it is the rain or the cold or what but I am sleepy all the time... And it is obvious



Maybe I just need a full coma day? Not sure yet...

Not of Me--But Who I am Today

Here's the latest. I know most people aren't into social causes but this is what I am doing today and who I feel I am. It's not about being gay but about making safe for all kids--the gay ones being bullied and the straight ones being bullied for "acting gay". Everyone knows someone that happened to.

Far East Movement - Like A G6 ft. The Cataracs, Dev

Music Whore

The Video is awful but I am obsessed with this song



So Euro trash

Super Sleepy

Here is just sleep me--pre work and post nap. It's all glamour all the time.

What I Know Now

I have been spending my time working on the novel. Not so much writing but reordering, rereading and reworking--all the things you should not do during a rough draft that is unfinished. But I needed to put myself back in the work, the story, the characters and see what I have done, what I like and what I want to change going forward.

Of course i am not sure where this will leave me with the NaNoWriMo. I am a huge fan of the idea behind the concept--that it should be a new project if one decides to get involved in the project. The key to NaNoWriMo is to try and open up the creative juices--to write something fresh, to let what words and images come as you go through the process and see where the "muse" wants to take you.

So now I have to try and see what I can get done in the next few weeks--to try and finish up the rough draft that I am working on. I hope I can start something new too but am trying to finish what I have started.

That seems to be the core of what I am learning during this--to tell the full story and know that other stories can come when the time is right. And that by not finishing things I am letting myself not believe that the finished product is worth anything--that is not try at all.

A Rough One
I almost didn't post today... I have spent my last 24 hours out and about--Dominic had his annual Horror Movie Fest and it turned into a slumber party for Sunday football. I slept on the floor, ate nothing but nuts and cheese and bacon, with no shower or change of clothes.

It's not a pretty picture



But what I realized was that I needed to post this picture so that i can see what i look like after a good night out. it's easy to get caught up in all the things I should be doing or feeling or having or making.... But sometimes it is nice to just enjoy what I have--a scoial life, good friends, and a bust schedule

The Project Continues



This is a quick one... Just me doing hair before I run out the door for a Saturday night! not the best, not the worst, just me....

More Than One Project

Today's picture is simple. Just a sweat, gross, messy me post working out aka the other big project going on in my life.. And it's not even a picture from real workout but a quick 30 minutes I managed to stick in the middle of the day--even though it looks like I sweated out after an hour long jog



But I do really like this picture. Not sure why

It feels butch

Another Day--Another Picture

This may not be the best picture but I like the emotions (?) behind it. Just me on the floor after I finished working out. I just feel more relaxed than normal I guess...



Not quality photos but a nice picture nonetheless

Day Two of the Image Project

(I should call this something better)

Today's picture is first thing in the morning, brushing my teeth and posting the photograph before I overthink things. It is what it is

NaNoWriMo And Other Unfinished Things

I am debating whether or not to do NaNoWriMo again this year--which isn't so much about if I can do it, or if I have the time to do, or if I want to do it... I do, can and have done all of these things. But where I am torn is that I have not finished my last NaNoWriMo story--and while I could cheat and pick up where I left off--it doesn't seem like it fulfills the point of the exercise.

To write the full story in 31 days.

So now I am trying to see if I think I can get back on track with my old novel--finish out the rough rough rough first draft by the end of the month.... And then START a new novel right away. It is crazy and silly and possibly not good for my health but it does feel doable.

Maybe this is the new challenge I need?!

A Project

In order to try and get over my current hang ups--I am going to try and take a new picture everyday of me... Not glamorous photos but of me doing stuff around my house, in my neighborhood, just out and about.

I want to be more comfortable and see myself clearer. Not to look a certain way or develop my "pose"--but to face reality.

Headbands

I have been thinking a lot about perception... How we see ourselves, how we want to be seen, how other might see us... It started with a conversation about bathing suits--bikinis--and this friend was debating whether or not she could pull one off... I made her try it on and I could see that she didn't believe me when I told her that it looked good. That I would kill for stretch mark free skin, the type of ways that her body seemed perfect in the suit. She looked good.

But that is not what she saw--no matter how much I tried to make her see it.

One of things that moves me as a writer--why I focus on young adult fiction, why I like working in reality television, why love fashion the way I do... It is all about the idea of perception and who are and want to be. The biggest struggle in life--why bullies hurt, why judgement matters, how words and deeds can break people so easy is because they all tie into how we see things--see ourselves. And this is something that does and should change over time--from who we are at 16 to 26 to 35 to 41 to 57...

And yet I wonder how that works. How some people see themselves in such strong or weak light. I know that most of us want to be different things--the smartest or the sexiest, the creative or the witty. I know that there are days when I wish I was the guy who could just wear simple jeans and a t-shirt with a solid swagger--to have that confidence in the simplicity, the fuckabilty, the ease of just being.

And other times I want to be the muse--the guy who wears the most interesting outfit with the best stories who does the most brave and unique things. I want to wear headbands and roller skate on week nights while finding new bars and learning how to ride horses and motorcycles. The writer who makes the reader want more, to be more, to see more.

But at the end of the day i never see myself that way. It's not that I see a bad person but rather a bland one. I get too worried to push myself, to worked up to try new things, to scared to finish what I start. I worry that if I do what I want that people won't see the way I would like. They would laugh or be bored or wonder just who I thought I was.

I am--in someways--no different than my friend in the bikini. Seeing things that aren't there, being capable of so much more and so much better than I could ever possible imagine. I wonder how one changes that. How one can learn to embrace something more and let go of the unneeded. The truth in life is that no one will care if I wear a headband or hockey jersey, if she wears a bikini, if she wears whatever she want or I do whatever I feel.

But the perception of that seems off-kilter.

Getting Better

So there is all this big hoopla about gay suicides and celeberty youtube videos--not to make light of the situation but I just don't get it. I remember what it was like to be 13 and worry about what would happen in school each day, how it felt to be picked on and teased and a bunch of rich, thin, successful people telling me it was fine?

Would have earned a big middle finger from teenage me.

If we really want to stop bullying--whether gay, straight, nerd, jock, fat, thin, ugly or pretty--then we need to share the stories of what bullies are doing. I think most teachers, parents, and all adults would benefit from knowing what kind of beahvior really is going on in schools. Because telling kids one day you'll be out of high school isn't solving a problem. Not in the slightest.

I think if people understood what teenagers are truly capable of--the physical violence on a daily basis, the verbal threats and taunting, the fear that such a social environment can create. Most people would be surprised by how far it does go and how uninvolved teachers are in protecting students.

I know that I never once ate lunch in the high school cafeteria for all four years I was in school. I was too scared of all the harrashment I faced that day to be able to do that--I spent days in the library, other days outside by the back docks, other days I would hide in the bathroom for the full 40 minutes. I was always on guard against people---even the ones who were nice I always expected to say shite, to start shite about me because that did happen ALL the time. And while I was only physically threated a handful of times--one of the times I actually punched someone back--it was worse to constantly be picked on, tease, name called, and scared...

I learned to survive by becoming a snob... I turned all my energy into studying and writing, reading and researching... I figured out that my best chance was to get into all the colleges I wanted and I would leave that town and never look back.

And I did that.

Now I have an amazing life--one filled with all the things I never thought I would have growing up. And yet I still wish that I could have gone through a normal high school experience. I wish that I had made more than one friend through those years, I wish I had done more and been more, I wondr what it would have been like to not be constantly the target? What would school be like with out the bullying?

I wish that people understood how hard it is to go through that. How extremely terrible and diffcult it is to even trust and relax in that situation. Hearing how awesome it can be is not an answer--the answer is to talk about how to stop what is happening now. Today.

One is Never Enough

I am spending this week trying to detox... I have been feeling like all I do is make sloppy decisions--too many nights drinking, too many reasons to not quit smoking, too many excuses fro why to not work out... I want to try and get myself back to somewhere that I can be happier with.

It's not that I am doing this for anyone else besides myself but it is nice to have other people want the same things for me. But it is hard to talk about these type of changes because it feels like if you fail or fall back that suddenly everyone knows what you aren't capable of.

I don't like that.

So instead I have to remind myself that one is not enough but two is too many. To stay on the course and remember what I am doing and why...