2019. What a ride y’all. I got a reminder a few days ago about this website’s everything getting renewed and I think that was the first time it hit me that a year’s gone by. A whole year. If there was a word to describe what’s happened in the intereim between this website getting created and now, sitting in a chair staring into the glowing depths of a space heater because there’s scary freezing rain outside… I think it’s tumultuous.
If there was a theme, and if there will be a theme going forward, I think I’m going to be a full narcissist and quote my own book, a decent enough segue to then discuss and reflect upon everything that’s happened this year.
“There is not, perhaps, a more visceral and passionate war in humanity than that between freedom and control.”
I’ve done a lot in the name of freedom this year, and I’ve done a lot in the name of control. I think the most glaring example in either case would be upending my life in North Carolina, where this blog and website and year began, and returning to New England to pursue a career opportunity at a workplace I’ve fallen in love with for the amount of challenge, education, stress, and excitement it offers me. With this change came a few unpleasant realities, returning home is always a mixed bag of emotions, as are ending relationships, and the challenge of reconciling the person you’re becoming with the person you are. The tumult here lies in exactly that reconciliation, and going forward I’m not sure how prepared I am for everything 2020 has to offer. But it was a decision I felt I had to make, one I stand by, and one I would not change for the world. The people I’ve met, the experiences I’ve had and will continue having, the things I’m learning, and everything that I feel I’ve been able to accomplish, not without screwing up (as essential a part of learning as any), are irreplaceable. They are the foundation of a new era, in a somewhat melodramatic sense.
The other large event of my life this year is, of course, the publishing of the first part of A Place I Have Never Been. There’s the Chekov’s gun of me quoting myself going off. Yay proper writing theory. The decision to publish the book in parts comes from an ease of editing perspective and a length perspective, as each of the parts of this book and the others to come in later books (there are four planned, and three and a half written now) average between thirty and fifty thousand words. That’s a lot of words, and breaking it up makes it easier both to edit and to write. But it’s out there, in the world, now. My friends, my family, my coworkers, everyone I meet can find and read something I’ve written, and that’s as terrifying as it is thrilling.
For everyone who does ask, A Place I Have Never Been is a fantasy novel set in the country of Telgora, a recently industrialized power on the verge of civil war. The book follows four characters: a revolutionary leader, an air force pilot, the leader of Telgora, and a rival politician, as they try to navigate through and survive in an increasingly confusing, and increasingly dangerous, world. Some rush to protect the ones they love, others to keep everything they have, but all dream of a better world. If only those dreams didn’t conflict with each other.
On the writing front, briefly and previously mentioned, I am now over two-thirds done with first draft of the third book in the series (rounded one-hundred and forty-five thousand words this morning), that I started writing in June. I also accomplished my second successful run of NaNoWriMo, writing my first murder-mystery novel, fifty-three thousand words, entirely within the month of November.
Recently I have written a short novella about heartbreak, entirely by hand.
It’s been a productive year, if we wish to add another adjective on top of tumultuous. In addition to the writing and the change of jobs we have to consider the founding and later re-homing of my self-publishing company, the building of this website, the start of my blogging, and a newfound interest in photography. So, there’s a lot to be proud of, I suppose.
If it sounds like I’m bragging, maybe I am, a little bit. There’s nothing wrong with being a little proud of yourself. In a year review, it helps to focus on the positives.
There’s plenty of the other stuff, too. One questions the meaning of it. There’s that itch that, even if you have everything you thought you wanted when the year began (and I don’t, but I have more than I thought I would), maybe you’re not quite where you want to be. You have to wonder where that comes from- that lack of satisfaction. That desire for peace that conflicts with your want of further accomplishment and activity.
For what it’s worth, and immediately going against my whole desire here, I am going to have a fun writing challenge through 2020 that I’ll share here. One short story a month from a random prompt generator. They’ll most likely go up unedited, so be prepared for that, but it’ll be a fun challenge all the same.
But, I say I want peace for 2020.
I would love peace more than anything.
But the reality of the situation, the reality of all the New Year’s resolutions and promises to be better, to eat better, to exercise more, to write more, to see and learn more, is that when I wake up on the first (probably from a nap on a plane because I’m the genius who plans a flight early morning on New Year’s Day), I’ll still be me. You’ll still be you.
There’s a bit of resignation there, but I would challenge a reading of it as acceptance. Change doesn’t happen in a night. It may feel like it in the most dramatic moments of life, like deciding to change jobs, to breakup, to move home, to click the button to make your book go live. But it doesn’t. There were steps to getting that job, and there are steps helping you keep it now. There were flaws in the relationship, and there’s an adjustment to being alone. The first draft of that book was almost six years ago, and the draft you published a little under a month ago shows less than 1% in common with it on a plagiarism checker (It’s a fun thing to try if you’re a writer).
These things take time, and while you’re still the you that you are, you might as well accept it.
Isn’t there a line somewhere about how admitting there’s a problem is the first step to fixing it?
There is a line from BoJack Horseman, honestly my favorite show right now and one that’s ending in January (there’s starting the year off right). It’s a quote that stuck with me enough that I impulse bought a very low-quality poster of that I later got set at Hobby Lobby. (Honestly, it’s grainy as hell but what can you do?)
“It gets easier. Every day it gets a little easier. But you gotta do it every day, that’s the hard part. But it does get easier.”
Maybe peace is a bit of a high bar for a New Year. A year without rain would make the whole world a desert. But maybe a chance for things to get easier is more reasonable. If there’s a chance at that, I’d take it.