Daunted. And, Like, Vexed

October 17

This is like to be a long rambler of an entry. Y'all bear with me, now. (Not that there's going to be a big payoff, or anything)

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I started updating my Bibliography page, including direct links to stories and poems that are available online. It's not 100% finished, but it's a long way toward completion. So now you aren't expected to go rooting through the archives on your own! I have given you the gift of ease!

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I have this little, informal mailing list, which is mostly for people who a) are interested in my publications and b) don't read my journal. I mean, why would people who read my journal want to be on a mailing list that pretty much only has any traffic when I'm crowing about some publication? And yet, a couple of people have said "What's this mailing list I heard about? Why can't I be on it?" So, if you wanna be on it, and hear stuff that for the most part you already heard about here, well, drop me a line and let me know; I'll add you. If I get a zillion responses I'll prob'ly set up a list on yahoogroups or something, but that seems like too much work just at the moment. :)

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Hey, so y'all head on over to Neverworlds, into the archive, and check out their reprint of my first published story, "53rd Annual Mantis Homecoming Dance" (the title is an homage to James Sallis's "53rd American Dream"). Most especially, check out the illustrations. The illustration in the body of the story is actually a brief animated cartoon thingy... so cool! I'm very happy with Neverworlds. Great f'ing production.

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Heather got a job! Joys and felicities! Old Man Poverty is no longer sharpening his filleting knife on my sense of well-being! (Sorry, Mike; I know I used that phrase in an e-mail to you earlier today, and I hate to recycle, but it struck my fancy, so there you go). We went out to Tropix last night and celebrated. They have cornbread at that restaurant, oh my, like my Southern relatives used to make-- but with this crazy fruity spicy salsa stuff you can slather all over it, which is an addition none of my aunts ever thought of making. I had jerk chicken, and yo, they gave me tons of food-- three chicken breasts! Each one as big as a normal restaurant portion! I ate, and when I finished I was full-- such a rarity!

Heather's in bed now, having turned in early. She has to get up early early tomorrow to go do some convention work (a separate catch-as-catch-can sort of part time job she recently acquired). Which is sad... I only got to spend about three and a half hours with her this evening. But they were exceptionally good hours-- we made fettucine al fredo and some garlic bread and watched Queer as Folk, which is quite good. And then we frolicked, me doing my part to get Heather nicely tired-out so she could sleep more easily. Ahem. She has to work a good bit this weekend... I'm telling myself that I'll get a lot of writing done while she's gone, to keep me from pining away. I hope I do. I also hope I can catch up with her on Diablo II... she's in Act III already, and I'm still a good bit from completing Act II...

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Trey has been writing a good bit lately about his conception of himself as a writer, about the writing process, about what makes people write... these are things that are on my mind, too.

I've been feeling oddly fragile, lately. My mood is quite mercurial, and I've been plummeting to listless depths with disturbing frequency. I'm having a hard time getting anything done. I've been lingering over this Marla story (which actually doesn't bother me, in and of itself-- I've found that my best stories often go slowly, like "Haruspex" and "Captain Fantasy" and "Little Gods"), and while I've been enjoying it, I've been excluding all my other work. This is not a good thing.

Heather and I had a long talk last night, trying to figure out the source of my anxiety. She thinks I'm suffering from psychic background noise, fallout from the terrorist shit. That's possible-- I was resistant to the idea last night, but it makes as much sense as anything. My sense of security is being eroded, I s'pose. But that's only part of it. I also feel (and please don't laugh at me, I know it's dumb, but I'm being honest here, dumbness and all) that I've sort of plateaud. (Wow, that's a funny looking word, and MS Word actually recognizes it; cool). I have the job I've always wanted. I have good friends. My writing is going well. I live with a wonderful, perfect woman. So why do I have this... hollowness?

I mentioned in an earlier entry that I'd been thinking about Zen stuff, living in the moment, and I said I simply don't operate that way-- I always have to be looking ahead. This is sort of annoying, now, because I'm in the midst, and I feel like I'm doing a grave disservice to my good life by being less than perfectly happy!

And it's not as if I don't have things to strive for-- novels to write! Trying to become a full-time writer! Winning a Yale Younger Poet award (which will never, never happen, but it's good to have an absolutely unachievable dream or two, you know?). Plenty of goals. But rather than exciting me... I'm finding them sort of daunting. I look at my to do list, which I haven't even written down because it's too intimidating, it's just in my head... okay, here's my writing-related "to do" list in no particular order:

• Write review of City Infernal
• Finish After Age and write review
• Send out Genius (and why have I not done this already? Why did I not do it yesterday? Why am I not doing it right now? I don't know)
• Finish Marla story
• Revise "Romanticore" (and Jeez, I think this was on the last to-do list I posted here)
• Read slush
• Contact poets and ask for submissions
• Do market research and submit poetry chapbook (at least I put the thing together; that's one small step)
• Revise Raveling (this is big. This is like three week's solid work, evenings and weekends)
• Write Rangergirl (which has been on hold while I do this Marla story). This is big, too, a month's solid work
• Write killer frog story (not an entry in the Killer Frog Contest, either-- an actual story about killer frogs)
• Write alternate-video-store story
• Get stories back in circulation
• Various collab things with Heather; we have ideas for at least three stories!

Daunted! So very daunted. Heather says I should take it one thing at a time, and I know I should, but my unspecified psychic distress is making it difficult. I have a really hard time sitting down to work on this stuff (except for the Marla story, which is pretty fun). But deadlines are approaching, for the reviews at least, so I have faith that I'll get those done soon. And Heather will be gone this weekend, and there's no better tonic for loneliness than writing... I think if I can overcome intertia, make a big push and put a dent in this stuff, I'll feel better. It's just... well. Daunting. As I said.

I love writing. I do get that itch, you know? And writing makes me levitate, which is nice. But I feel so scattered and fractured and fragile...

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Mixed Media:

I'm reading Coldheart Canyon. It's pretty good. Not my favorite Barker, but nice.

On musical heavy rotation, for some reason: Automatic for the People, R.E.M. Dunno why. Before that it was the Old 97's.

Watching Queer as Folk as I mentioned. Good stuff. Does weird stuff with stereotypes.

The first season of Buffy is being released in the U.S., with the other seasons (presumably) to follow. Finally! The drawback: it's coming out only on DVD. So, we can either get someone to dub them onto VHS for us, or we can invest in a DVD player. We're seriously considering the latter. I have a writing check coming in a couple/few months that could pay for a decent (not great, but decent) DVD player. Might be our Xmas present to ourselves.

I wanna get the translation of the Brothers Grimm by Jack Zipes; it's supposed to be really good, better than the other extant versions.

Books to which I'm looking forward: The Scar, China Miéville. (After I read Perdido Street Station, which I really oughta get around to) Black House, King and Straub. The new Newford collection, which'll be out who-knows-when. Ted Chiang's story collection.

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SF poetry is a cantankerous little world... the poetry corner topic at the Rumor Mill has been all a-buzz lately. I don't know... I just wanna get along with everyone. Sigh. I managed to avoid the only interaction of mine that looked like it might become a fight in the SF poetry world (discretion being the better part of valor). I just want to write, publish, be read, get paid...

And Kim Stanley Robinson has decided not to include the Rhysling winners in the Nebula Awards anthology that he's editing this year. Apparently he didn't receive them in time, and he didn't think they were very good, so he didn't want to make an extra effort to slip them in at the last minute. Apparently this isn't going to be a trend; the Nebula editorship changes, and next year's editor has said she's going to include the winners, but the winners this year are sorta shafted... I wish KSR would reconsider, but I s'pose it's too late for that.

Y'know, I photocopied short stories and sent them to KSR, for the Nebula awards antho. There were stories he couldn't find, didn't have, so he wrote to A Certain Magazine for help, as we are the repository of all things SFnal. I sweated over a hot copier on his behalf. Ah, well. It's not like I begrudge him. He's the editor, it's his choice. But still. Sort of a blow to SF poetry, which isn't exactly an unstoppable colossus to begin with.

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This has gone on long enough, I guess.