A Restart But Not a Hard Boot.

I am never going to post on this blog again if I don't re-establish some parameters. I can't even blog about why I'm not blogging, it seems.

So first things first, an update schedule, and a fitting punishment. I am going to tentatively claim that Monday will be blog day, starting next week. If I don't post on Monday I must share a video of myself apologizing in iambic pentameter by the end of the week. A heroic couplet. If I don't post it the line requirement doubles. And so on.

Now that that's out of the way, I can ramble a bit and you can ignore me or hang on my every word or somewhere along that continuum while I do so.

I have entered a funk, which happens to me a lot. I moved in the middle of spring and I haven't been in any positive sort of groove ever since.

This is because I feel like I need to be home to be comfortable. In typical male fashion, I think this entails essentially space over which I have dominion. Maybe it's not so oppressive as that, but I certainly don't feel like I am in an environment where I can expect any level of control over my sensory input. Wearing headphones to block out tv noise is not, in my estimation, a legitimate form of control.

Part of it also includes responsibility. If a space is "mine," then I feel it is my responsibility to care for it. And I don't feel that where I am. Thus I cannot get comfortable and my focus levels are at an all time low.

Couple this with drastically different waking hours than I am accustomed to and you have a formula for anti-productivity.

Even that attempt at personal analysis feels like an excuse. Everything feels like an excuse.

I am also frustrated by the circumstances keeping me in this position. Originally Rachael and I were going to find a place to live within the first month or so of living in Ann Arbor, but we discovered that we wouldn't get the hours we had been before moving and so the funds weren't there. It doesn't help that Ann Arbor is a pretty expensive region to live in. We keep waiting for a change, keep poking at possibilities, but nothing seems to be panning out and it's taking its toll on both of us.

Part of the reason we're locked into this region is because I want to go to school here and it doesn't make sense to sign a lease somewhere else only to get in. So bottom line is we're in A2 until March at the earliest when I find out the results of my second round of applications.

I have to learn to overcome my discontent or nothing is going to change. Thus this blog post. Because just ramming my will against my emotions because I think it'll be good for me will be nowhere near as effective as setting some concrete goals. Like updating my blog consistently again. And putting real effort into my writing. All while keeping up with my poetry and short story assignments which have the perk of colleagues to whom I am beholden.

Obviously this a step, but as humans we tend to break everything down into processes to understand them. The next step is setting aside a solid time and place for my work.

And prayer. God knows I need to be doing far more of that than I am.

I can think of a dozen different segues into other posts I have thought about making but for now I am going to end this here. It's good to be back, such as this is. If you read this all the way through, I want you to bug me about this. Hold me to my schedule. To my iambic sorries. And pray for me.

I'm not sick. I am not in trouble. But I need to be better than I am, because right now I'm not what I could be. And I want to live up to my potential.

Not just for me. For you. For God. For everything.

Tales From Further Off

August 2nd, 2012:

I have had quite a bit of time in the last few days to work on my creative projects without the distraction of the internet, or the need to deal with dishes, trash, or bored little sisters.  It has led to some writing, some drawing, some reading, and admittedly some playing of Game Boy games and copious napping.  Nevertheless, I have had time once again chisel away at the ending to Talas Ke, my first great work of fiction, ten years in the making and filled with the changes a boy makes as he grows into a man.

I have time to make casual observations, especially about my writing style.  For a very long time I could only write from an individual character’s perspective, either because of pride or because I could not stand the tone of my writing when it was not written from the limited third person.  This has shifted since I did much writing of Talas Ke—shifted to the point where I am finding it difficult to write with the same hard-line limited third person perspective that in some ways defines the narrative that is Talas Ke.  I find myself backing away to offer a clearer perspective than one character can offer to the reader, especially now that so much is happening.  To be frank, I feel stymied by that old style, having learned the merits to an omniscient narrator and picked up a stronger love for the old fantasies that used it than ever before.  I have grown as a writer, and it’s a hard line to walk when you have to make choices about how to finish your story.

I could end as Kvothe threatened to begin his tale.  I could say, “They lose one for the sake of the whole, and though peace is claimed, it is a brief and bitter peace.”  Not so succinct as “I loved, lost, trusted, and was betrayed,” but you get the picture.  Neither of these really suits a story spanning hundreds of thousands of words, except as a sort of parody.

I could be stiff and brittle, playing judge to the complex emotions the characters are struggling through.

I could be florid, letting it all flood through the cracks in their masks.

What makes it more difficult is that I fear much will change about the tale when I rewrite it, and I’m conflicted as to whether I should finish the story before I start such major revisions or if I should rework it all from the beginning, and save myself the loss?

Who am I kidding?  There will be a loss, whether I finish this story now or never finish it at all.  It is that kind of story, I am sad to say.  I’m not sure whether I know how to tell a story that isn’t about loss.  Not one I would consider good, anyway.  To lose, to have broken, is to be human.

To hope is also to be human, but a certain sort of human.  A stubborn one, one who breaks and fades but simply will not end.  It is this character that engages me, the broken-but-not-gone, whether the breaking was their own doing or not.  Perhaps especially the ones who broke themselves.

As I have said before, I find that I am my own antagonist.

Aside from that knot of life-threads that is Talas Ke, I’ve also done some work on my Hearthstead comic, which is depressing in its own right.  The subject matter was my choice, if that reveals a particular bent I may have.

I may have said I don’t like stories that end without hope, but I never said my own writing isn’t filled with hardship.

The emotional atmosphere of my drawing is a little more relaxed than all that, when I’m not trying to tell an explicit story through it.  When I’m working on my drawing—techniques, representation, all that—the intensity is a quieter one.  I am silently pressuring myself to improve, to become something better than a scribbling amateur so that I can take more joy in that art than I do now.  

I would say that music brings me the most joy, but even then my drive to improve (both composition and performance) makes me critical and obsessive.

Maybe all these things I’m admitting to reveal that I am an artist, or more likely they reveal that I am a perfectionist who suffers because my passion lies in places that cannot easily be perfected.  Don’t expect every creative person you meet to sound such dark notes about their artistic lives:  I have always believed myself a bit of a freak, and you are perfectly entitled to be an artist who feels vastly more joy in your work than consternation.

Perhaps I should stop listening to this cello quartet play a song called “Oblivion.”  It couldn’t be affecting my mood in the slightest, though.

You may have noticed in all that ranting that I made a reference to The Name of the Wind.  Well, I’m re-reading that book this week while at campmeeting.  On a related note, I probably ought to have brought The Wise Man’s Fear with me as well, since I seem to be plowing through the first Day rather quickly.

If you haven’t read the first two thirds of Patrick Rothfuss’s Kingkiller Chronicle, do so.  Unless you despise fantasy (I ask again, why are you still reading my blog?), or have that same sort of qualms that keep you from reading Homestuck, since their content is roughly similar in maturity level (that is, Homestuck has oodles more swearing, and the Kingkiller Chronicle has lots more sex, and both have lots of violent deathiness).  The best part of the storytelling is that much of it is done by the protagonist, in a framed narrative sort of way that makes the story that much more delicious.

And emotive.

Now, I have taken this long break to present you these words, which you are nearly finished reading.  It is time I returned to the task at hand, involving a certain character trying to redeem his entire race before they can [spoiler].

God bless.

A Portion of the Whole (And Some Thoughts on Church and My Walk)

I like church.  It's like a battery recharge, or a realignment, or time spent with a good friend.  You feel edified.  It's also exhausting, with all those people there, and me re-examining how I've been living my life since the last time I entered a reverent place of worship.  It sounds an awful lot like I've been doing my Christianity wrong, with that tendency to live a week and then be a Christian on Sundays, but I'm really...

Actually, I'm doing it wrong.  Not terribly wrong.  I'm not putting words in God's mouth and persecuting His children for the sake of my own perverted version of justice.  At least not consciously, or on a daily basis.  If I do do that, I want you to tell me right away.  If I'm a good man I'll shut up and walk away to pick myself apart in privacy.  But yeah, like most people, I'm actually kind of good.  But that makes my flaws all that much more terrible, and when I'm aware of that I pursue my Savior simply because He fixes like no one else.

I've mentioned before that I hate mistakes.  The worst mistakes in my eyes are the ones that can't be fixed—that can't, in some way, be undone.  I'm talking about mistakes you can't apologize for, that leave something broken and you powerless to make it better.

I follow Christ because there is no brokenness He cannot mend.

We've come to a sort of crossroads in our walk through Forget and Not Slow Down.  "Part of It" is central to the album, both because it begins the middle of the emotional narrative and because of how it fills this space.  Like "Candlelight" before it, this song has an afterthought (by the name of "Outro") which echoes the thrust of the song in moving forward through the album.

The most important aspect of this song from an album-wide perspective is that this is where Thiessen's "forget and not slow down" enamel cracks and we get a clearer glimpse of his condition.  Pay close attention to what he says in this song:


Part of It
(lyrics by Matthew Thiessen)

I've been working with adhesives:
Chains and locks and ropes with knots to tether,
But nothing's sticking to the pieces—
I can't seem to hold it all together.
But you should know
Because that explains
Why this all just fell apart.

It's not the end of the world
Just you and me
We're a part of it—everyone
We're a part of it—everything
And if a nightmare ever does unfold
Perspective is a lovely hand to hold.

Well I've been trying to ingest this
But everything to me just seems like nonsense,
And I'm not sure if I can get it.
I guess it's time for me to grow a conscience
To combat the lapse
That explains why all of this simply collapsed.

It's not the end of the world
Just you and me
We're a part of it—everyone
We're a part of it—everything
And if a nightmare ever does unfold
Perspective is a lovely hand to hold.

It's been forever since I've gone
But I'm the Cusack on the lawn
Of your heart.
May be forever till I go
But before then you should know
I could tear that place apart
I could tear that place apart

I swear this to you
I wish that this was not the truth
But it's something that you fell into
And crawling out is hard when you
Are not so sure it's what you wanna do—
Not convinced it's what you wanna do.

It's just the weight of the world
Giving out under the string
We're a part of it—everyone
We're a part of it—everything
And when a nightmare finally does unfold—
A nightmare finally shows—
It's not the end of the world
Just a calamity
We're a part of it everyone
We're a part of it everything
And when a nightmare finally does unfold
Perspective is a lovely hand to hold.

Outro
(lyrics by Matthew Thiessen)

I swear this to you
I wish that this was not the truth
But it's something that you fell into
And crawling out is hard when you
Are not so sure it's what you wanna do

I swear this to you
(When a nightmare finally does unfold)
I wish that this was not the truth
(Perspective is a lovely hand to hold)
But it's something that you fell into
(Perspective is a lovely hand to hold)
This choice is hard to make when you
Are not convinced it's what you wanna do.

When a nightmare finally does unfold
Perspective is a lovely hand to hold.

----

First of all, Thiessen's word picture in this first verse is awesome.  "Adhesives" obviously not restricted to glue, and all this because he's trying to hold together what he and She both know has already fallen apart.  I'm also a big fan of the guitar work and the reflective tone Thiessen starts with that escalates quickly into the complex emotions presented in the chorus.

"It's not the end of the world, just you and me" puts it pretty darn well.  "It" being Thiessen's continued insistence that life goes on, even as he admits he's a bit worse off than he first let on.  It's not the end of the world, just a nightmare, just the weight of the world giving out, just a calamity.  Not the worst thing, but it's bad.  Yet the chorus ends with the poignant statement "perspective is a lovely hand to hold," which is exactly what Thiessen's trying to achieve so that he can rise above the raw emotional core.  That seems to be the whole purpose of this album aside of a work of art.  He can't forget the hurt, the unseating, until he puts it all in a proper perspective.  And he's loosening a bit at the seams here.

He admits that he's trying to get a handle on things, but it's not settling in his stomach well and he's got some growing to do.  Maybe that statement was a little too esoteric, but it's all there in the second verse, man.

Need more proof about Thiessen loosening at the seams?  Check out the bridge.  He's hanging around, making [some sort of movie reference involving John Cusack that almost entirely escapes me], and he might be around even longer.  More importantly, before he leaves, you should know (and repetition helps you not forget) he "could tear that place apart."  Nah man, he's not upset.

Another note about the bridge?  Here his imagery is of staying in place, thrown into contrast with the themes of travel that have been running through a lot of the songs so far and even ones to come.  I might even draw a parallel between Thiessen's restlessness here and a line at the end of the album (shh, we'll get there when we get there).

Then Thiessen slows down to let "you" (the girl) know the truth, which is something she stumbled on and can't get away from easily.  He doesn't really clarify the truth he's swearing to, so I'm left to assume he's talking about the subject of the chorus, because he's not just telling himself that the end of "you and me" is not the "end of the world."  This is a sort of precursor to the mellowed out final song on the album, as well as Savannah, and just generally setting up a precedent for the slower, most retrospective aspects of music to come.

There's a lot of battle in this song between the chill, fun Relient K and Thiessen flipping out a little, and that, too, is why this song is central to the album.  After "Part of It" and "Outro" Thiessen spends the next two songs coping a little, to the point where he's confident enough to say he's "Over It."  But I'm getting ahead of myself a little.  There's a weird bit in this song I can't quite figure out.  Almost all the lyrics lists, and maybe even the official lyrics, seem to agree that the line is "giving (or given) out under the string," but I don't feel like the weight of the world would give out under a string.  I've always sort of felt like that line should end in strain, but listening closely it's pretty obvious he's singing string.  So I have no idea what that means, and it's weird.  There ya go, not every little Relient K lyric is chock full of great hidden meaning.  Or maybe it is, and I just can't get it.

Tomorrow we'll talk about "Therapy."  I was going to say it's one of my favorite songs on the album, but you may have noticed I kinda love them all.  See you then!

Flawed

Unless some machine broke the Turing test when I wasn't looking, you are a human being.  Regardless, if you're reading and comprehending this—and could have a conversation with me about it later—you are by definition (at least my definition) a person.  And as a person, especially as a human being, there is one thing you most certainly are.

Flawed.

This shouldn't be news to you.  All people are flawed.  I am a clear-cut example of this.  My unrestrained tendencies are towards nonsensical, bigoted thought and action, when my actions are social at all.  It is only with force of will and, more significantly, the reforging influence of my Heavenly Father that I not a mouldering cesspool of hatred and addiction.

It's inconvenient to be a writer and have a limited perspective, because it is best to tell a story when you know everything that's happening.  That's part of the appeal of world-building.  You have a greater ability to say with all authority what a miscellaneous character is doing and why than if you're writing in the real world where any reader can tell you, "No.  No, someone like that wouldn't do that.  Your story sucks."

All the same, I have a limited perspective, and when I am faced with that I find myself stymied.  I feel like I have nothing good to say because I don't know everything.  That's my perfectionism/fear of making mistakes coming through.  Yesterday I went to go exchange a fuel tank for a gas grill, and I started to take the tank inside.  Because, you know, I had no idea what I was doing, and for some reason in a situation I've never been in before I have a very hard time taking a moment to think out what the most reasonable thing to do is.  It gets harder when I try to take that moment to forcefully realign my scattered cognizance and the people behind the desks are left to stare at me like I'm some crazy person.

Or at least, that's what I feel certain they're doing.  In hindsight they were more likely taking a moment to hold conversation with each other to fight against the doldrums of working in a gas station.  But in the moment the only thing I can think of is how stupid I look, and I can't figure out a way to stop being stupid and get done what I came to get done.  Good thing I had a friend there to tell me what I should do and end the episode before my self-esteem went the way of the emo kid.

Okay, so maybe that last analogy was a bit much.


There is a wise man filling in for my friend over at Culture War Reporters.  This morning he posted about the need for us to be exposed to the graphic violence of wars going on outside our social circles, so that we can confront in a more human manner the full horror of war and not treat it like something that has absolutely no bearing on our lives.


"I don't wanna."  That's what my heart says.  I am repulsed.  I don't want to realize the totality of what's going on in the world outside my box of florid prose.  Why?  Because it scares the hell out of me, that's why.  No, I couldn't have put it milder without failing to get the point across.  I could give other reasons, too, but those are excuses.


There's nothing I can do, short of going over myself as a soldier.  And I will never do that.  I'm describing my visceral reaction, because I don't have a higher argument against service in military.  I don't want to believe wars exist.  I don't want to feel it in the depths of my soul, that place I so strive to keep quiet.


It's more complicated than that, because I believe "there will always be wars and rumors of wars."  Something fundamental about the universe needs to change before men and women will stop killing each other en masse.  I guess it's sort of ironic that a lot of people who think overpopulation is a major problem also completely detest war, because that's one good way to cull the population.


You see that?  That drivel?  That's the terrified spewing of a man who doesn't know what to think in the face of travesty.


And that man is me.


Now, I usually keep all that bottled up and deal with it on my own time, in the privacy of my own inner space, but I wanted to demonstrate the sort of stuff that goes on in my head before I handle it and exert my intellect on all that gross feelings stuff, so that you can know what I mean when I say I'm confronted by my personhood and feel like I don't have anything valuable to say.


Because that guy up there?  He's kinda my least favorite person.


So in short, some people are writing challenging things on their blogs, and I applaud my friend for his wise words.  As for myself, I'm just writing about what's challenging me today.  I don't really have much advice about writing or world-building today, other than to keep in mind that you, too, are a person, and your worldview is limited because you're human.

Grindin' XP

Moving right on through the revision process for the Hearthstead novel.  Incidentally, I don't quite have a name for it yet.  I'll probably need to confer with my cousin for a while to brainstorm one out.  Then once I'm done with that, I can move on to other projects like song-lyric poems, scene-writing for a friend's game, and starting the overhaul/revision process for Talas Ke.

Simultaneously job searching, of course.

I know it sounds like I'm ambition, but I guarantee you it usually just seems like I'm really lazy.  I don't know how that works, but it does.

I'm feeling more normal about the whole "graduated" thing.  It's still not exactly old news, but things are settling around me.

You know what's weird?  I've been getting up in the mornings (7:30ish) with the express purpose of working on my projects.  Never did that in college.  Now that I have all this time to spare (not really, but bear with me) I can actually get around to ordering it in a fashion that makes sense to me.

That's the way I like it.  Maybe it's a short-sighted thing, but I've always felt like I'm much more capable of improving when the pressure's off and I have time to grind my skills.  Maybe that's why I feel that way.  I must have a JRPG mentality towards self-improvement.

Didn't I warn you that I'm an incorrigible nerd?

Well that's that.  I'll check in tomorrow with an update.

Peace.

The Oncoming Storm

So there's gonna be a thunderstorm.  I was gonna save this blog for later, after I'd done a good bit of writing, but I might lose my chance if I wait too long.  So here it is:

As of today I know it's over.  The big projects I was worried about are finished.  There's only one thing left to do, and that's writer's workshop.  The part that I love.  I have a story to finish, and I don't know that I'll sleep till it's done.

I keep using language like that, even though I still have two exam periods left.  Honestly it doesn't really matter to me.  What matters is this story, and I want it done.  My vision's tunneling.

I'm a writer.  It's what I am, deeper down than a lot of the things I could say I am.  If I was terrible at it, and could never write anything that meant anything for anyone other than myself, I think I would still write, and profusely.

It's been written into me, so to speak.

What's on my mind is also what's on the mind of most of my friends.  We're graduating in a little over a week.  The thought is enough to drive me bonkers.  I'm terribly excited.  I'm paralyzed with fear.  Job?  The end of general education?  The full weight of responsibility?  Student loans?  Apartment-hunting?  There's an awful lot to worry about.

Which reminds me of the scripture, which tells us not to worry about what we are going to eat or wear or how we will be sheltered, because God is with us.  I guess the best I can do is to trust him.  Not that I'm gonna bury my talent.  I know how stupid that would be.

I really don't want to spend any more time than I already have on writing that isn't related to Fairies and the torment of the sons of Naris, so I'll leave this post where it is.

It's been a ride, guys, and it's only just started.

P.S.:  If you can spot the Doctor Who reference, you win.  Not, like, a prize or anything.  You just win, because Doctor Who.  Yes.