This is the year where hope fails you...
This year has been...less than spectacular so far, I'll admit. Things were working out alright. I was out on my own, with a solid friend and roomate, making good money, doing my thing. In the last six weeks, though, things have taken a pretty ridiculous nosedive. I was suspended over some horseshit accusations, then the company went bottom-up and left my parents, four siblings, my roomate, and myself completely without jobs overnight. It took six weeks to get unemployment to pay me. My sister is back in the hospital. I have to go to a family barbecue next week. Its a nightmare.
Then again, I'm not complaining.
See, I wouldn't trade this for anything. Not all the money in the world, man. No fucking way. My bills are getting paid, at least for the moment, and the money from that job never really mattered to me that much. It was a means to an end. But when I really look at it, that place was taking all the best out of us all. We're intelligent, capable people, why are we wasting time in a place that can't (through no fault of its own, really) appreciate that? Why work 90 hour weeks when we could find something else that paid just fine and only work 40? Because that wasn't an option before. It was always "I'll look at it on my day off....next week" or "This might be great but I can't take a pay cut" or "Gosh, if only I had the time to do this". Well, those aren't issues anymore. We all have time to pursue the things we want to do, rather than settling for what comes up first. We're all in a better place, I think, and I can't imagine better people to be stuck here with.
Speaking of people, I want to thank you.
I'm not, I find, really cut out for a regular life. Nothing about it appeals to me, emotionally or intellectually. Finding a job, settling down, getting married. It seems great and I have some friends that are very happy that way. Russ and Cathryn (whose last names I won't mention but whose initials are absolutely Bauer) are incredible people that found each other, marked their territory, and mated for life. I love them both, more dearly than I know how to say, and I love their bond and their happiness. I hope they live forever that way.
It just isn't for me. I like paying bills. I like having responsibilities to keep me grounded. But I need open roads and blank pages. I need plane tickets and midnight truck stops and strange hotels in strange cities. I need to move and not be constrained. So, sure, I'll pay my rent and my insurance and I'll need some income to do all of these things but, when it comes right down to it, writing and music have always appealed to me so much because I'm just not made to stay static.
So that's what I'm doing. I'm sitting here, getting my unemployment, looking for writing jobs and, in the meantime, planning my adventures. I'm starting a second blog devoted to my writing. I'm starting a novel while I edit two (maybe three) others. I'm tuning up my banjo and singing and, by the fucking gods, I'm living the life I need to live because, for the first time, I feel like I can.
I want to thank you for understanding that even when I didn't. I've been told, never directly or in such detail, by a dozen people over the years that this is what I was meant to do. The writing and the traveling and that life. I need to tell stories. I need it. That's what I'm built for. I'm made to talk and write and make people laugh. I'm here to rely on and be relied on by this group of people that give me more than any partner ever could. My friends, my family, and I have this deep, unbridled love that is exactly what I need to sustain myself. So that's what I'll do.
The thing that I love about my closest friends is the ambiguous relationship we have. People that would be just as comfortable with passionate sex at three in the morning in a hotel room in Cincinnati as they would be borrowing ten bucks for gas during a tight week, or discussing the merits of teaching Shakespeare's comedies rather than the same old Romeo and Juliet fare at every high school in the world over a cup of coffee and a pack of smokes. I don't have platonic relationships because I'm not platonic. Its always just a little bit romantic, a little bit sexual, completely innocent (naturally) but something special. Something not many people share. Thank you for that. Thank you so hard.
What I'm getting at is simply be thankful for what you have and don't let the world get in your way. Things will work out as they will, the wheel weaves as the wheel wills, there will be water if god wills it, the word is the law is ka. That sort of thing. Learn who you are and learn to love it, because this life is pretty fucking awesome, if you ask me.
Ecstatically Yours,
-S.R.
Saturday, June 9, 2012
Friday, May 25, 2012
On Writing, or, Nerdgasm Central
I'm a writer. There, I said it. It is somewhat liberating, declaring yourself something other than human. I'm other things, sure, an alchoholic for instance, but none of them are quite as profound or (in a grim, drug-addled sort of way) as romantic as being a writer. Or maybe all of those other things are part of what make me a writer. Alchoholism is certainly prevalent in our collective imaginations of writers. Anyway. The point is, I'm a writer. I didn't need to tell you that, because you probably know me. And if you don't know me, you'd assume I'm a writer because I have a blog and that blog uses clever pop-culture and nerdgasm-inducing literature references and an array of impressive words. But I didn't say it because you needed to be told, I said it because I needed to be told.
See, I've strayed for some time and that's terrible. I forgot that in addition to all of the fancy poetic ideas like talent and ability, writing also requires more mundane things like work and dedication. I strayed. Then, like a space shuttle without enough fuel to escape the gravity well, I came hurtling back. All is well again. Kinda.
You must understand that I've relied on nicotine to help my process for more than twelve years. I've come to rely on it and, in a self-perpetuating cycle, used writing as an excuse not to give up smoking. As a bit of an aside, don't let that fool you. I genuinely enjoy smoking. However, recent circumstances have thrust it upon me and I've found myself without it. So I sat down to write and, for the first time, came up blank.
What the fuck?
I've used it for so long, smoking and writing fueling one another, that they became somewhat fused in my head. I couldn't do one without the other (this was a two-way street. If you've ever seen me smoke heavily, I was writing. Or drinking. Usually both, although one of them may have been just in my mind.). So I decided to sit down and piece my brain back together because, as I said before, I am a writer and that means I need to write. Its a fundemental function of my continued existence.
I decided to look at what drives me first. What makes me want to write? What fuels that creative muscle? What pushes me to sit for hours and lose myself in a story or a poem or a blog or hate mail? I set smoking aside. Honestly, that idea is old and its somewhat ridiculous. I understand the chemical benefits of nicotine, but that's not what makes me want to write. Once past that roadblock, I came up with some pretty awesome stuff. Shit. Sorry, I went two full paragraphs without inserting any vulgarity. I have a reputation to uphold here, guys. Anyway.
I love to read. I can easily get distracted by television or a movie, and become engrossed in what's happening, but that's a shallow sort of distraction as complete as it might seem. No, what really catches my attention and gets me going is a good novel. Now, I like the classics and I dig the epic poets and playwrights too, but if I want something to really blow me away, something I'll read over and over again just for the pure joy of reading it, I'm going with Fantasy.
There are some exceptions, of course. Of my top ten favorites of all time, only a handful are fantasy (that list is dominated by Orson Scott Card's Ender's Game, David Wong's John Dies at the End, Milton's Paradise Lost, and Whitman's Leaves of Grass although I admit I strayed a little from the "novel" criteria there and that is by no means indicative of the rest of the top ten). However, of the hundreds of books I own an overwhelming majority of them are Fantasy. I'll dive into anything from shared worlds like Dragonlance and Forgotten Realms to the epic sagas like Robert Jordan's Wheel of Time or Stephen King's Dark Tower (which I put on equal footing with some of the epic sagas we teach in English Literature classes worldwide) to the old sword-and-sorcerery paperbacks or the new, gritty subgenres filled out by guys like John Marco and Brandon Sanderson.
So it should come as little surprise, I suppose, that I write primarily Fantasy. Other writers, I find, give me that push needed to sit and write, among other things I'll get into later. In fact, I used to scoff at the idea that one could take inspiration to write fantasy from anything but other Fantasy writers. I was, clearly, wrong. Margaret Weiss, for instance, is one of the most successful novelists in the genre and she adamantly doesn't read Fantasy. Perhaps because she feels it would be too easy to lift ideas from other writers in the genre. That's sort of an issue with fantasy. Any review you read of a popular new novel will harp on how it defies the typical genre stereotypes. Fantasy writers have gotten such a bad rap for so long about their voices and their work all sounding the same that, in the last fifteen years or so, the genre has exploded with fresh ideas simply because the novelists are trying explicitly to be different from one another. Stephen King originally started thinking of his Dark Tower novels while reading Tolkien, but set them aside for years, literally, so he wouldn't simply regurgitate what he'd just read.
Alright, so some of it comes from reading but getting everything from reading, even reading a wide variety of things, is dangerous. So what else? What else brings me to that place?
Well, video games. See, games have become this really captivating medium for telling insane stories. They've taken on a breadth and depth that put them on par, I think, with films, plays, and novels. Not all of them, of course, and there are still those that try and fail, but games like Mass Effect or Elder Scrolls or Saints Row have set the stage for things to come. It doesn't matter, the story is what grips me and makes me want to write. That and some of the badass action sequences. My stories are always visceral, I think, filled with physical conflict, and I like to be somewhat cinematic in how I portray that violence. That visual aspect, I think, is lacking from a great deal of written media.
Okay, good, so you can throw films in there as well. Athough, honestly, mostly science fiction films. I'm not sure why, but they really get me moving. Now, as I was having these epiphanies I started wading through some of my writing, trying to focus on where I could start to try and organize things, put them on a track for success. I also read through Stephen King's On Writing. If you haven't, I strongly suggest you pick it up. Writer or not, its a fantastic read and it includes all manner of really awesome information. Such as some very useful tips on keeping yourself disciplined, organized, and how to come back to writing after you;ve been away (in King's case because of a nearly-fatal car crash and, years prior, kicking some insane drug addiction-in my case, lack of ciggarettes).
So what else? What other nuggets of wisdom did I glean?
Dr. David Bell, Novelist Extraordinaire, (one day I'm going to talk him into paying me for referring to him that way) taught me two very important things. Well, actually a series of very important things but a number of those had to do with re-enacting various 80s kung-fu montages and they're neither here nor there. What he taught me about writing, though, cannot be understated. I've heard it from a thousand places but for some reason when he said it, it stuck: Write what you know.
That doesn't mean don't branch out and learn. I'm constantly researching horses and sailing and sub-atomic physics for my writing. It means write what you know and expand upon it. The other extremely important thing he taught me, by the way (and this is in all seriousness, I still have the e-mails to prove it) was that if I could just "learn how to punctuate the fucking dialogue [I'd] have a career in writing"(I'm paraphrasing, and I'm not doing it using MLA format because I'm a grown-up and I don't have to). Sound advice, and something I look back on frequently to keep myself grounded.
So what do I know? What's the final thing that gets me writing?
Fucking metal.
Look, I love music. I'm a big fan of tons of genres, tons of styles. I keep an open mind on things, and if its really music I can at least respect what an artist is doing, even if I don't particularly enjoy it. That said, as much as I respect and enjoy, say, Eminem, I can't write it. Metal though, holy fuck.
I think metal and fantasy have this really amazing relationship, for one thing. Both are composed of literally dozens of fractured subgenres all trying to gain ground and stand on their own, while being simultaneously united by a common thread, or as critics are fond of calling them, tropes and stereotypes. Both metal and fantasy, first and foremost, owe their real genesis to aged (or dead) men from England decades ago, and fuck you if you don't think that's the truth.
Both have expanded dramatically in popularity in the last two decades, as well as broadening in scope. Both have distinct subgroups, and both have groups among them that are intensely dark (black/death/viking/blackened death metal vs. gritty, bloody fantasy like Brian Ruckley's Godless World Trilogy), while also retaining their lighter sides (Edguy, for example. Kender, for another).
Also, has anyone ever looked into how many metal bands have written songs about fantasy novels, characters, short stories, ideas, or wet dreams? Fucking all of them. Seriously. Look into it. Bands like Rhapsody (or Rhapsody of Fire, I guess, I'm not sure which one they go by now) have created their own fantasy universe specifically to write songs about it. Nightwish's entire brilliant career has been all about Tuomas Holopainen's fascination with Tolkien, Dragonlance, Disney, and hot scandanavian women (only poetically, of course).
I am the opposite. Rather than the fantasy obsesssed metal musician, I'm a metal-obsessed fantasy writer. In fact, every major piece of fiction I've written (and most of my poems that aren't influenced by either vaginas or alchohol, honestly) has been, to some degree or another, insipred directly by the lyrics, artwork, or general atmosphere of a metal song. I have playlists on my media player that I listen to while I write, organized by the type of scene I'm working on. Seriously. I'm writing an entire novel based on a handful of lyrics from Blind Guardian and Amon Amarth and a dream I had about my dear friend Courtney (who has, through her work and mine, taught me some incredible things about writing) where she totally killed the fuck out of a sea-monster. Fucking metal.
So what I'm saying is simply: I'm back from the dead, assholes. *laser sounds*
Serendipitously Yours,
-S.R.
P.S,- I thought of including lists of my favorite books, albums, and games here (both because I'm a narcicist and because I have this wierd compulsion to list things that my parents will absolutely vouche for) so if anyone would like to indulge me, go ahead and let me know. I'll add it in edits.
See, I've strayed for some time and that's terrible. I forgot that in addition to all of the fancy poetic ideas like talent and ability, writing also requires more mundane things like work and dedication. I strayed. Then, like a space shuttle without enough fuel to escape the gravity well, I came hurtling back. All is well again. Kinda.
You must understand that I've relied on nicotine to help my process for more than twelve years. I've come to rely on it and, in a self-perpetuating cycle, used writing as an excuse not to give up smoking. As a bit of an aside, don't let that fool you. I genuinely enjoy smoking. However, recent circumstances have thrust it upon me and I've found myself without it. So I sat down to write and, for the first time, came up blank.
What the fuck?
I've used it for so long, smoking and writing fueling one another, that they became somewhat fused in my head. I couldn't do one without the other (this was a two-way street. If you've ever seen me smoke heavily, I was writing. Or drinking. Usually both, although one of them may have been just in my mind.). So I decided to sit down and piece my brain back together because, as I said before, I am a writer and that means I need to write. Its a fundemental function of my continued existence.
I decided to look at what drives me first. What makes me want to write? What fuels that creative muscle? What pushes me to sit for hours and lose myself in a story or a poem or a blog or hate mail? I set smoking aside. Honestly, that idea is old and its somewhat ridiculous. I understand the chemical benefits of nicotine, but that's not what makes me want to write. Once past that roadblock, I came up with some pretty awesome stuff. Shit. Sorry, I went two full paragraphs without inserting any vulgarity. I have a reputation to uphold here, guys. Anyway.
I love to read. I can easily get distracted by television or a movie, and become engrossed in what's happening, but that's a shallow sort of distraction as complete as it might seem. No, what really catches my attention and gets me going is a good novel. Now, I like the classics and I dig the epic poets and playwrights too, but if I want something to really blow me away, something I'll read over and over again just for the pure joy of reading it, I'm going with Fantasy.
There are some exceptions, of course. Of my top ten favorites of all time, only a handful are fantasy (that list is dominated by Orson Scott Card's Ender's Game, David Wong's John Dies at the End, Milton's Paradise Lost, and Whitman's Leaves of Grass although I admit I strayed a little from the "novel" criteria there and that is by no means indicative of the rest of the top ten). However, of the hundreds of books I own an overwhelming majority of them are Fantasy. I'll dive into anything from shared worlds like Dragonlance and Forgotten Realms to the epic sagas like Robert Jordan's Wheel of Time or Stephen King's Dark Tower (which I put on equal footing with some of the epic sagas we teach in English Literature classes worldwide) to the old sword-and-sorcerery paperbacks or the new, gritty subgenres filled out by guys like John Marco and Brandon Sanderson.
So it should come as little surprise, I suppose, that I write primarily Fantasy. Other writers, I find, give me that push needed to sit and write, among other things I'll get into later. In fact, I used to scoff at the idea that one could take inspiration to write fantasy from anything but other Fantasy writers. I was, clearly, wrong. Margaret Weiss, for instance, is one of the most successful novelists in the genre and she adamantly doesn't read Fantasy. Perhaps because she feels it would be too easy to lift ideas from other writers in the genre. That's sort of an issue with fantasy. Any review you read of a popular new novel will harp on how it defies the typical genre stereotypes. Fantasy writers have gotten such a bad rap for so long about their voices and their work all sounding the same that, in the last fifteen years or so, the genre has exploded with fresh ideas simply because the novelists are trying explicitly to be different from one another. Stephen King originally started thinking of his Dark Tower novels while reading Tolkien, but set them aside for years, literally, so he wouldn't simply regurgitate what he'd just read.
Alright, so some of it comes from reading but getting everything from reading, even reading a wide variety of things, is dangerous. So what else? What else brings me to that place?
Well, video games. See, games have become this really captivating medium for telling insane stories. They've taken on a breadth and depth that put them on par, I think, with films, plays, and novels. Not all of them, of course, and there are still those that try and fail, but games like Mass Effect or Elder Scrolls or Saints Row have set the stage for things to come. It doesn't matter, the story is what grips me and makes me want to write. That and some of the badass action sequences. My stories are always visceral, I think, filled with physical conflict, and I like to be somewhat cinematic in how I portray that violence. That visual aspect, I think, is lacking from a great deal of written media.
Okay, good, so you can throw films in there as well. Athough, honestly, mostly science fiction films. I'm not sure why, but they really get me moving. Now, as I was having these epiphanies I started wading through some of my writing, trying to focus on where I could start to try and organize things, put them on a track for success. I also read through Stephen King's On Writing. If you haven't, I strongly suggest you pick it up. Writer or not, its a fantastic read and it includes all manner of really awesome information. Such as some very useful tips on keeping yourself disciplined, organized, and how to come back to writing after you;ve been away (in King's case because of a nearly-fatal car crash and, years prior, kicking some insane drug addiction-in my case, lack of ciggarettes).
So what else? What other nuggets of wisdom did I glean?
Dr. David Bell, Novelist Extraordinaire, (one day I'm going to talk him into paying me for referring to him that way) taught me two very important things. Well, actually a series of very important things but a number of those had to do with re-enacting various 80s kung-fu montages and they're neither here nor there. What he taught me about writing, though, cannot be understated. I've heard it from a thousand places but for some reason when he said it, it stuck: Write what you know.
That doesn't mean don't branch out and learn. I'm constantly researching horses and sailing and sub-atomic physics for my writing. It means write what you know and expand upon it. The other extremely important thing he taught me, by the way (and this is in all seriousness, I still have the e-mails to prove it) was that if I could just "learn how to punctuate the fucking dialogue [I'd] have a career in writing"(I'm paraphrasing, and I'm not doing it using MLA format because I'm a grown-up and I don't have to). Sound advice, and something I look back on frequently to keep myself grounded.
So what do I know? What's the final thing that gets me writing?
Fucking metal.
Look, I love music. I'm a big fan of tons of genres, tons of styles. I keep an open mind on things, and if its really music I can at least respect what an artist is doing, even if I don't particularly enjoy it. That said, as much as I respect and enjoy, say, Eminem, I can't write it. Metal though, holy fuck.
I think metal and fantasy have this really amazing relationship, for one thing. Both are composed of literally dozens of fractured subgenres all trying to gain ground and stand on their own, while being simultaneously united by a common thread, or as critics are fond of calling them, tropes and stereotypes. Both metal and fantasy, first and foremost, owe their real genesis to aged (or dead) men from England decades ago, and fuck you if you don't think that's the truth.
Both have expanded dramatically in popularity in the last two decades, as well as broadening in scope. Both have distinct subgroups, and both have groups among them that are intensely dark (black/death/viking/blackened death metal vs. gritty, bloody fantasy like Brian Ruckley's Godless World Trilogy), while also retaining their lighter sides (Edguy, for example. Kender, for another).
Also, has anyone ever looked into how many metal bands have written songs about fantasy novels, characters, short stories, ideas, or wet dreams? Fucking all of them. Seriously. Look into it. Bands like Rhapsody (or Rhapsody of Fire, I guess, I'm not sure which one they go by now) have created their own fantasy universe specifically to write songs about it. Nightwish's entire brilliant career has been all about Tuomas Holopainen's fascination with Tolkien, Dragonlance, Disney, and hot scandanavian women (only poetically, of course).
I am the opposite. Rather than the fantasy obsesssed metal musician, I'm a metal-obsessed fantasy writer. In fact, every major piece of fiction I've written (and most of my poems that aren't influenced by either vaginas or alchohol, honestly) has been, to some degree or another, insipred directly by the lyrics, artwork, or general atmosphere of a metal song. I have playlists on my media player that I listen to while I write, organized by the type of scene I'm working on. Seriously. I'm writing an entire novel based on a handful of lyrics from Blind Guardian and Amon Amarth and a dream I had about my dear friend Courtney (who has, through her work and mine, taught me some incredible things about writing) where she totally killed the fuck out of a sea-monster. Fucking metal.
So what I'm saying is simply: I'm back from the dead, assholes. *laser sounds*
Serendipitously Yours,
-S.R.
P.S,- I thought of including lists of my favorite books, albums, and games here (both because I'm a narcicist and because I have this wierd compulsion to list things that my parents will absolutely vouche for) so if anyone would like to indulge me, go ahead and let me know. I'll add it in edits.
Thursday, May 24, 2012
Break-up Letters Part 2
I can wax poetic and make you look pathetic. I'm not so sympathetic I can't still be diarrhetic. Cause I'll make you shit with my rhetoric and I'll make you sick to your stomach, bitch, and if you can't sit down and you can't spit then I'll split you straight through the guts with this. I'll be pedantic, but predictable, all the while still irresistable, or miserable, dismissable, and yet, infinitely kissable. I'm cruel and foolish, leave you drooling, stupidly staring at the ceiling, feeling, reeling, bent on stealing breath and bet that I ain't missed yet, I'm caught in your throat and I'll break your neck. So sit the fuck down til you're next on deck.
I go from exotically erotic to neurotically despotic, despondent to resplendent, dependent to indispensable. Indefensible, ultimately reprehensible. I'll fetch you low and scratch your bones, burrow deep down in and find you home. I can spit you out like blood in my mouth, turn your insides out and make your women bow down.
You can come at me but I'll finish you, diminish you, replenish you just to get at you. You can leave or die, but its yours to choose. I have no appetite for destruction, I'm the epitome, so you're shitting me if you think running your lips means dick to me. Cause I'll tear your fucking head off and not even blink, I'll gut you like a trout, boy, so don't even think that you can come around, settle down, and flap off your gums, or I will shatter your teeth, just keep on sucking your thumb. I'm the stuff that makes your nightmares, and leaves you shitting your pants, so you can gamble on your life with me, but you don't have a chance.
Devastatingly Yours,
-S.R.
I go from exotically erotic to neurotically despotic, despondent to resplendent, dependent to indispensable. Indefensible, ultimately reprehensible. I'll fetch you low and scratch your bones, burrow deep down in and find you home. I can spit you out like blood in my mouth, turn your insides out and make your women bow down.
You can come at me but I'll finish you, diminish you, replenish you just to get at you. You can leave or die, but its yours to choose. I have no appetite for destruction, I'm the epitome, so you're shitting me if you think running your lips means dick to me. Cause I'll tear your fucking head off and not even blink, I'll gut you like a trout, boy, so don't even think that you can come around, settle down, and flap off your gums, or I will shatter your teeth, just keep on sucking your thumb. I'm the stuff that makes your nightmares, and leaves you shitting your pants, so you can gamble on your life with me, but you don't have a chance.
Devastatingly Yours,
-S.R.
Friday, March 9, 2012
Keeping Myself Alive
Of all the myriad things that make me murderously angry, being told how to live is the foremost. I understand my lifestyle doesn't suit everyone. The 70-80 hour workweek, the hours of solitary writing. The drinking. The banjo. The Xbox. I get it. My friends are mostly settling down or settled down. Most of them are married, or raising children, or both. Even my siblings have mostly grown into their adult lives. Me? I'm single. I'm living at home. I'm paying off my debts and spending the rest of my money going out and spending time with my friends. In short, I'm happy. If you think you know some way I could be happier, by all means suggest it to me.
But if you think the way I've chosen to live is in some way invalid, inappropriate, or incorrect, kindly go fuck yourself.
If I wanted advice, I would ask for it. If I wanted a girlfriend, I'd find one. Truth is, the older I get the more I think that life isn't for me. I'm too self-involved, too into my writing and my music and my free time. I like having the freedom to do whatever I want at practically any time. I don't need to share myself with someone, and that works just fine for me. I have friends. This small, beautiful handful of indescribably incredible people that are everything I could ask for and then some. Part friend, part lover, part companion, part sidekick, part superhero. There's laughter in these relationships like nothing I've ever known. There's support and comaraderie and sex and passion and alchohol and conflict and, above all, there's love. This vast, unfathomable thing that occasionally slams into the chest and leaves you gasping, clawing at the air as if it will help replenish the breath that was forced from your lungs. What is having a partner all about if not those things? And I have them, almost a dozen times over I have them. People get used to how intense a relationship with me can be or they quickly decide not to be my friend. That's it.
I'd like to change some things here and there, and I'm moving toward doing that, but I'm doing it because I want to. Because it will make me feel good. I don't need to compromise because I'm taking someone else's feelings, or goals, or capabilities into account. I don't need to worry about that. I can be impulsive. I can make my lists of pros and cons. I can go either way I want, because at the end of the day its my decision.
Likewise, if you don't care for the people I've surrounded myself with, you can see your way out any time. I don't judge you based on the people in your life, please refrain from doing that to me. Or, most assuredly, I'll fucking kill you. I'm self-involved, like I said, but those people are, everyone, important to me. And before you spit any kind of poison their way, think about how hard it will be to run your mouth with no teeth left in it. If that's not a deterrent, I'm sure we could peel your eyelids back and show you one.
I'm a private person, by nature, so the fact that I've allowed you to get close to me should be an indication. It should indicate that maybe, just maybe, you're not the only one I saw some worth in. That maybe those other people in my circle are beyond your need to judge and defame. If you're not in that circle, well, now maybe you have some idea about the cause.
Either way, the point of this was mostly a reassurance. I'm happy. Really, I'm more content than I have been in quite some time. If that doesn't show, I apologize. And if that doesn't suit you, well, fuck you.
Gloriously Yours,
-S.R.
But if you think the way I've chosen to live is in some way invalid, inappropriate, or incorrect, kindly go fuck yourself.
If I wanted advice, I would ask for it. If I wanted a girlfriend, I'd find one. Truth is, the older I get the more I think that life isn't for me. I'm too self-involved, too into my writing and my music and my free time. I like having the freedom to do whatever I want at practically any time. I don't need to share myself with someone, and that works just fine for me. I have friends. This small, beautiful handful of indescribably incredible people that are everything I could ask for and then some. Part friend, part lover, part companion, part sidekick, part superhero. There's laughter in these relationships like nothing I've ever known. There's support and comaraderie and sex and passion and alchohol and conflict and, above all, there's love. This vast, unfathomable thing that occasionally slams into the chest and leaves you gasping, clawing at the air as if it will help replenish the breath that was forced from your lungs. What is having a partner all about if not those things? And I have them, almost a dozen times over I have them. People get used to how intense a relationship with me can be or they quickly decide not to be my friend. That's it.
I'd like to change some things here and there, and I'm moving toward doing that, but I'm doing it because I want to. Because it will make me feel good. I don't need to compromise because I'm taking someone else's feelings, or goals, or capabilities into account. I don't need to worry about that. I can be impulsive. I can make my lists of pros and cons. I can go either way I want, because at the end of the day its my decision.
Likewise, if you don't care for the people I've surrounded myself with, you can see your way out any time. I don't judge you based on the people in your life, please refrain from doing that to me. Or, most assuredly, I'll fucking kill you. I'm self-involved, like I said, but those people are, everyone, important to me. And before you spit any kind of poison their way, think about how hard it will be to run your mouth with no teeth left in it. If that's not a deterrent, I'm sure we could peel your eyelids back and show you one.
I'm a private person, by nature, so the fact that I've allowed you to get close to me should be an indication. It should indicate that maybe, just maybe, you're not the only one I saw some worth in. That maybe those other people in my circle are beyond your need to judge and defame. If you're not in that circle, well, now maybe you have some idea about the cause.
Either way, the point of this was mostly a reassurance. I'm happy. Really, I'm more content than I have been in quite some time. If that doesn't show, I apologize. And if that doesn't suit you, well, fuck you.
Gloriously Yours,
-S.R.
Break-Up Letters (Part One)
Dry-heaving melodies, I'm singing you to sleep. I'm retching with the wretched in the faint glow of the streetlight. Torrid and tormenting echoes of lamenting all the nights I spent reflecting shadows of myself. Sometimes I wonder if you ever saw my face. Those charming, twisted cocaine grins that hooked in your blood vessels an created and addiction, those were never really meant for us, just byproducts of my condition.
I seek to slake my thirst and then I spiral toward the worst and sheathe myself with nimble words and softly spoken verse. You curse, a plume of icy breath escapes you, churning as it dissipates in the January air. I remember that last snowfall clinging jealously in dark brown hair. I spat your curses back at you and swallowed twice their number, then weaned myself with venom and awoke midway through summer. You were just a ghost by then, your spirit all but broken. The facets in your diamond eyes are splintered, cracked, and hopeless.
You scattered your ashes in the leeward wind and left me in the mountains. You dipped your crimson lips, I thought, to kiss, and tore my larynx out. You slit my gut and peeled away the flesh and forced your fingers in, to dine on the divine and be reminded of your wilting sins, to drip my blood into your throat, to see me smitten, spitted, spitting, spinning, grinning shit. Follow the pulsing in my veins to where they all collide. I will be a meal for you, but only one more time. So take this little heart of mine and feast, but make it last.
For when next you want a piece of me, you'll have to eat my ass.
Yours,
-S.R.
I seek to slake my thirst and then I spiral toward the worst and sheathe myself with nimble words and softly spoken verse. You curse, a plume of icy breath escapes you, churning as it dissipates in the January air. I remember that last snowfall clinging jealously in dark brown hair. I spat your curses back at you and swallowed twice their number, then weaned myself with venom and awoke midway through summer. You were just a ghost by then, your spirit all but broken. The facets in your diamond eyes are splintered, cracked, and hopeless.
You scattered your ashes in the leeward wind and left me in the mountains. You dipped your crimson lips, I thought, to kiss, and tore my larynx out. You slit my gut and peeled away the flesh and forced your fingers in, to dine on the divine and be reminded of your wilting sins, to drip my blood into your throat, to see me smitten, spitted, spitting, spinning, grinning shit. Follow the pulsing in my veins to where they all collide. I will be a meal for you, but only one more time. So take this little heart of mine and feast, but make it last.
For when next you want a piece of me, you'll have to eat my ass.
Yours,
-S.R.
Friday, January 13, 2012
Wound Upon Wound
I've got fire in my veins from the venom or the heroin, a scalding rush of fluid searing holes in my soft tissue. I've got the smell of dozens, of scores of bodies in my skin. The taste of hundreds of mouths in my own. There are trails left by wandering fingers in my flesh, deep purple bruises and livid red tears that never seem to heal despite the pain eventually fading. They're tender to the touch, but even the memories of where those old wounds came from have vanished. There's a bite mark beneath my left shoulder. A slender thing, despite the welts that perfectly trace the imprints of teeth sunk into me. I wonder, occasionally, where it came from.
Its all that way, little scents and faded scars, the bits and pieces people have left behind. Mementos that I've long since forgotten.
I take her most nights. Rarely does she surrender to me easily. I find that I relish that feeling, the challenge. Conquests have never been difficult to come by. Just this once, it is refreshing to find someone with a little fight in her. A little bit of steel in her spine. A little cynicism for the world of flesh and romance. Too many of these little birds have thought to solve all their problems in my arms. I'm not into saving. I'm no messianic lover. I'm destruction in all its glroy, wrath in all its power. I will use them and cast them aside before they can do the same to me.
I forget to avoid being haunted. The ghosts of all those old loves would follow me, weeping or shouting or stabbing at me until I shook with fear or despair or disdain. Until I shrieked in the night and clawed out my eyes. It would all be very Shakespearean. Unrequited love only has its place in sonnets and the yellowed pages written by dead men.
If I seem to be made of glass, I apologize. I'm more constructed of knives and razors, of poison and plagues. I shatter like porcelain and reassemble like liquid steel. Sharper with each thrust. Harder with each blow. Stronger with each life I take in my palms and crush.
What I mean to say is simply don't fall for me. For what I can give you or, as rare as it occurs, who I am. Because I will devour you. Your steel and your cynicism won't protect you. Surrendering to me will not spare you. I'll spit the teeth and the shards of bone out and leave them behind. The undesirable things, the indigestible. The rest will travel in my guts until I've consumed it.
Then I'll forget you, save for the wounds you leave behind.
In time, even those will fade.
Deviantly Yours,
-S.R.
Its all that way, little scents and faded scars, the bits and pieces people have left behind. Mementos that I've long since forgotten.
I take her most nights. Rarely does she surrender to me easily. I find that I relish that feeling, the challenge. Conquests have never been difficult to come by. Just this once, it is refreshing to find someone with a little fight in her. A little bit of steel in her spine. A little cynicism for the world of flesh and romance. Too many of these little birds have thought to solve all their problems in my arms. I'm not into saving. I'm no messianic lover. I'm destruction in all its glroy, wrath in all its power. I will use them and cast them aside before they can do the same to me.
I forget to avoid being haunted. The ghosts of all those old loves would follow me, weeping or shouting or stabbing at me until I shook with fear or despair or disdain. Until I shrieked in the night and clawed out my eyes. It would all be very Shakespearean. Unrequited love only has its place in sonnets and the yellowed pages written by dead men.
If I seem to be made of glass, I apologize. I'm more constructed of knives and razors, of poison and plagues. I shatter like porcelain and reassemble like liquid steel. Sharper with each thrust. Harder with each blow. Stronger with each life I take in my palms and crush.
What I mean to say is simply don't fall for me. For what I can give you or, as rare as it occurs, who I am. Because I will devour you. Your steel and your cynicism won't protect you. Surrendering to me will not spare you. I'll spit the teeth and the shards of bone out and leave them behind. The undesirable things, the indigestible. The rest will travel in my guts until I've consumed it.
Then I'll forget you, save for the wounds you leave behind.
In time, even those will fade.
Deviantly Yours,
-S.R.
Tuesday, November 29, 2011
Who Wants A (Thankless, Payless) Job?
I've done a lot of reading lately, and not much of anything else. Its like hanging in stasis. Suspended, unmoving, trapped. I'm not running in place because that would require effort. I'm not stuck in a rut. My mind churns on and on, hurling thought at me from whatever nebulous place it originates until I'm filled with it, choking on it. I swallow, force it down, and keep hanging there. Swinging gently back and forth in the midday sun. Strung up for crimes against humanity or crimes against creativity. I'm not dead. Something like me can't really die this way, but I am decaying. I'm rotting and the things I used to enjoy are consuming me just as they wither away from malnourishment.
I'm wasting away here, and I fucking hate it.
Maybe this is that place I needed to find before I could not sink any lower. I spend my hours leaping back and forth between wondering about women and whether I'll ever settle down and stop being this lonesome, loathesome thing that just wanders into people's lives and quietly vanishes. Or worrying about a job that, honestly, doesn't mean anything to me. What do I care? Let the store burn down. I'm not seeing any benefit of all my work. I'm not heaped with praise for the way I do my job. Its a bullshit, dead-end fucking nightmare day-in and day-out. Nothing changes, nothing improves, and I'm getting sick of wasting my time. I spend my time on these things, or wondering if I will ever actually lose all that weight I keep talking about.
But mostly, I wonder about writing. See, I've done all this reading lately and I've come to realize that I need a hand. No novel, no poetry collection, no cohesive piece of work is ever solely the creation of a single person. I have a completed draft of a novel that's simply sitting. I haven't touched it in over a year. I finished it, set it aside, and started working on something else. I figured in a few months I'd go back to it, do some re-reading and editing, take more notes, and build something concrete to send out. I know where it needs work, more or less, but I need help with it. I've got a short story I need a few pointers on. I've got heaps of poetry in a vague collection that I have no idea what to do with.
In short, I need a hand here.
See, I've decided to cut this rope and stand on my own again. To feel the earth breathing beneath the soles of my feet. I'm going to run. I'm going to fight. I'm going to beat my chest and thrash and scream if I have to, because fuck just hanging here. Fuck stasis. I will not be old and broken, still talking about what could have been. I've never been that kind of man. I've always hurled myself against the wall headfirst and damn the consequences. Somewhere, I stopped doing that. Somewhere, I just stopped. Well now I've got a bit of bone, just sawing away. I could really use a knife.
If you'd like to help (and therefore be lauded in Aknowledgements pages for all the world to see when I'm incredibly famous as a smithy of words) get in touch with me. I know, as human beings go, people have busy schedules and I'm not aiming for this to be a quick process. As I said, some of these things require a good deal of work. But your contributuions would be vastly appreciated.
Keep in mind that I'm mostly looking for help with the fiction. I would like some aid in arranging poems and cutting out those that aren't working, and help with that will not be underappreciated because its difficult work, but the fiction is always my passion. And keep in mind that I write fantasy. I will provide glossaries and notes and I'm available to answer any questions that come up, but its still fantasy and that can get a little bit...confusing for people the first time they attempt it. Unfortunately, I don't actually know many people who make a regular habit of reading my beloved genre but I think that's a minor drawback. Fantasy is really a wonderful thing. More people should get into it. And not simply so I'll sell more books.
One last thought, if anyone has a good eye for cartography or really any sort of artwork get in touch with me. I think visualizing things is always the best way to write about them and it would be very nice to have some character sketches or pictures of places. See how close I've come in my descriptions. And maps, obviously, would be of unlimited help.
I realize I may have swayed you by steeping you in my personal despair before I plead for help, but don't offer just to make me happy. I want help here, but I need dedicated help. If you can spare an hour a week, that's perfect, but I need that hour. I'll devote all my time and energy to making it easier on you, as a show of thanks for all your help, but I'll need that help to be consistent and willingly given. Otherwise, don't worry yourself about it.
Gratefully Yours,
-S.R.
I'm wasting away here, and I fucking hate it.
Maybe this is that place I needed to find before I could not sink any lower. I spend my hours leaping back and forth between wondering about women and whether I'll ever settle down and stop being this lonesome, loathesome thing that just wanders into people's lives and quietly vanishes. Or worrying about a job that, honestly, doesn't mean anything to me. What do I care? Let the store burn down. I'm not seeing any benefit of all my work. I'm not heaped with praise for the way I do my job. Its a bullshit, dead-end fucking nightmare day-in and day-out. Nothing changes, nothing improves, and I'm getting sick of wasting my time. I spend my time on these things, or wondering if I will ever actually lose all that weight I keep talking about.
But mostly, I wonder about writing. See, I've done all this reading lately and I've come to realize that I need a hand. No novel, no poetry collection, no cohesive piece of work is ever solely the creation of a single person. I have a completed draft of a novel that's simply sitting. I haven't touched it in over a year. I finished it, set it aside, and started working on something else. I figured in a few months I'd go back to it, do some re-reading and editing, take more notes, and build something concrete to send out. I know where it needs work, more or less, but I need help with it. I've got a short story I need a few pointers on. I've got heaps of poetry in a vague collection that I have no idea what to do with.
In short, I need a hand here.
See, I've decided to cut this rope and stand on my own again. To feel the earth breathing beneath the soles of my feet. I'm going to run. I'm going to fight. I'm going to beat my chest and thrash and scream if I have to, because fuck just hanging here. Fuck stasis. I will not be old and broken, still talking about what could have been. I've never been that kind of man. I've always hurled myself against the wall headfirst and damn the consequences. Somewhere, I stopped doing that. Somewhere, I just stopped. Well now I've got a bit of bone, just sawing away. I could really use a knife.
If you'd like to help (and therefore be lauded in Aknowledgements pages for all the world to see when I'm incredibly famous as a smithy of words) get in touch with me. I know, as human beings go, people have busy schedules and I'm not aiming for this to be a quick process. As I said, some of these things require a good deal of work. But your contributuions would be vastly appreciated.
Keep in mind that I'm mostly looking for help with the fiction. I would like some aid in arranging poems and cutting out those that aren't working, and help with that will not be underappreciated because its difficult work, but the fiction is always my passion. And keep in mind that I write fantasy. I will provide glossaries and notes and I'm available to answer any questions that come up, but its still fantasy and that can get a little bit...confusing for people the first time they attempt it. Unfortunately, I don't actually know many people who make a regular habit of reading my beloved genre but I think that's a minor drawback. Fantasy is really a wonderful thing. More people should get into it. And not simply so I'll sell more books.
One last thought, if anyone has a good eye for cartography or really any sort of artwork get in touch with me. I think visualizing things is always the best way to write about them and it would be very nice to have some character sketches or pictures of places. See how close I've come in my descriptions. And maps, obviously, would be of unlimited help.
I realize I may have swayed you by steeping you in my personal despair before I plead for help, but don't offer just to make me happy. I want help here, but I need dedicated help. If you can spare an hour a week, that's perfect, but I need that hour. I'll devote all my time and energy to making it easier on you, as a show of thanks for all your help, but I'll need that help to be consistent and willingly given. Otherwise, don't worry yourself about it.
Gratefully Yours,
-S.R.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)