Year 3 of pandemic near-shutin, starting to get horny for basically any person around town I have more than 3 brief, transactional convos with.

I have 0 feelings about my HS days, as the stereotype about stunted adults goes, but would be lying if I said I didn’t feel some smug satisfaction from my college inviting me back as a visiting artist 10 years later. >:)

I “killed” a “darling” because it just didn’t fit the story but jokes on me I’m just saving it to turn into yet another story.

On my days off I really just gotta sink the daylight hours into exercise and errands because when the sun goes down at, like, 4pm, I can physically feel my body start to slow down and wanna do absolutely nothing after that.

getting close to 50% done writing this ~novel~

feeling good about it being relatively short, as novels go, but also with room to develop the two main characters. the original “a” plot is now kinda on par with the “b” plot, and in fact the “b” plot is much, much better defined and direct in its trajectory, whoops.

a plot is emerging. even a few themes.

trying to decide if i want to include a recurring joke about a haunted cheesecake factory.

Had too many drinks on Friday night when my husband was out of town and woke up the next morning to discover I had made a SlideRoom account and started applications to Yaddo and MacDowell hahahahaha.

Can’t tell if I’m happier because I’m on the right meds “or” because my work environment is much, much more relaxed and transparent now. I’m supposed to be looking for the next Real Job but I like the way things are right now: I work Sat, Sun, Mon, take a class on Tues, have the apartment to myself to write on Weds, plan or teach the class I’m leading on Thurs, and on Fri I get to do more writing while alone and then I go see a movie for free. I also do sporadic freelance work, everything from handyman stuff for my neighbors to game scripts for hire, which is cool. I do stay pretty busy.

I’m reading and exercising a lot more than I would at either a service job that is more physical (this one is very active but not in the way my warehouse jobs were) or an office job where you end up being kind of mentally on the clock always.

More people should come see movies in the theater so I can make the case to the owner for a raise. Though I suspect they can find the resources if they wanted to, as they are zillionaires who bought the theater for, like, a fun personal project.

“last night in soho” was soooo stylish and beautifully made, perfectly scored, wonderfully acted, and fun to watch but then it really steps in it big time trying to Say Something about sex work and sort of about race, almost, and then just... going where it goes in the second half/end.

“they/them lesbians” is definitely just its own thing and i think thats fine. “non-binary” is obviously a huge catchall and it would be nice if people thought it meant literally anything other than “they/them lesbians” but meanwhile good for the androgykes.

While writing this novel (???) is going relatively well, all things considered, the fact remains that novels are just so fucking long and I have to type all of those words instead of telepathing them into a polished form.

I hope that this book is good and secondly I hope that it is picked up by an agent who sells it for lots of money so that you ol pal Julian who currently makes 12k/year can truly Emerge as a writer in the career sense.

I like reading other writer’s thoughts about their process or how a project is going but when people just insecurity-vent 24/7 it’s like... have you tried writing instead of tweeting through whatever this is.

Extremely bright and kind people will be like, “look, even a moderate case for prison abolition is simply that prison doesn’t work, and the law in general only really ‘works’ for those with existing power” but then be like “school is doing fine, though, love it, just needs a little more fairness, that’s all.”

I think if you find T*m H*ddleston sexually attractive you’re straight regardless of your identity, sorry.

What if I got really swole. What if, indeed.

I miss the job I lost but I do like that my current one keeps my hands busy without staring at a computer all day and then when I go home I can just not think about it until my next shift.

I also thought I would hate working a Second Shift schedule but it... rules? I can spend my mornings writing and exercising outside while the sun is up, and running errands when things are open, and when I’m working at night it’s like during hours I would just be dicking around playing video games anyway.

The pay is low but I can wear whatever I want, read books, see movies and get popcorn and drinks for free.

Customer service and food service is hard but I truly feel like a rare case where it’s still more manageable for me than office politics. 

The lede I’ve buried here also is that I think my Effexor is really helping. Between the meds, more sunshine and exercise, supportive friends, and some amount of creative success, I am indeed feeling a lot better.

It is frustrating that all of those things minus meds left me still so non functional that I torpedoed a bunch of stuff, but I also know meds without anything else might leave me spinning in place, too. 

I still refuse (well, politely decline) to go back to talk therapy, though. The only thing I have ever gotten out of talk therapy is re-traumatization and erroneous copay bills I’d already paid. It’s just not for me.

Queering the time I set aside for writing by spacing out for the vast majority of it.

(J/K but only... a little.)

Unrelated, I understand why some people on various antidepressants describe feeling “numb.” I don’t feel numb exactly, but there is a degree of arm’s length from the bodily parts of my emotions that’s related to the “sexual side effects.” I’m more, like, compartmentalized, even in moments where I’d prefer not to be. It’s very subtle, though, definitely not like being zonked out or anything. 

Seth is encouraging me to say screw it to a normal career and keep working part time while treating writing as if it were another part-time job that I put in work at, and every part of my body rejects this as a bad idea except that I do keep getting paid writing work, much of which pays better than I would be making with more hours at a normal job. So it’s like, okay, maybe... this is... fine.