I just got home from Mike Baltar’s house. Today is his birthday, and today is also the day we were to meet with the rest of our critique group. I am the only one that had a submission this month, and it was The Writer, The Knight, and The Lady. I’ve recently talked about writers and their relationships with other writers, but tonight’s meeting got me thinking about writer’s and their relationship with their stories. So let’s talk about that.

My relationship with my writing is this: it feels like an extension of myself.

My stories should be products of my intellect and skill. That would be a healthier way of looking at it. I go into the word mine and toil, committing effort and sweat, until something is extracted, polished, and presented for other people to consume. It’s a product, to be given away or sold.

It feels more like I’m scooping out a part of myself, dressing it up as best I can, and then putting it in front of other people to be judged. When someone finds fault with one of my stories, they are finding fault with me.

They’re not actually judging me, and I’m not quite that immature when it comes to receiving critiques, but I always have a little bit of fear. I have worked on this. I don’t get defensive anymore.

This sounds like my critique didn’t go well tonight. It did! The critique itself was very positive. It’s a decent story that is difficult to execute well. If I want it to be great, I’m going to have to put more work into it. Right now, it’s just kinda good.

Before the critique started, I thought about the story and didn’t think it would land very well. A couple of characters don’t get enough screen time to be very well fleshed out. There were problems in the story that I was aware of, and I thought that would mean it wouldn’t read well.

But, it worked. My group confirmed some of the things I suspected wrong with it, and now I can choose to do more with it, or leave it in the pile with the rest of the short stories I’m not doing anything with.

I care about every story I’ve written. They are both a part of me and my product. I want them to find good homes and do well in the world. They were written to be read by others, so that’s what I hope for all of them.

I suppose that’s all I have to say on the subject. I thought it would be more complicated than that. There are healthy relationships between the writer and their work, and there are unhealthy relationships. I recognize some of the places where my feelings about my stories have been unhealthy in the past, and I’ve worked to put some distance between me and the things I write. But I think there will always be a link between my sense of self-worth and the way my stories are received.

Today’s unplanned topic comes from a conversation on Twitter, which starts here:

https://twitter.com/writingiswar/status/1578430141075578881

First, it’s preposterous to me that someone should get upset about content warnings. Trauma is real. Giving someone a chance to look away and avoid something that will unsettle them is a low risk, low effort kindness. Maybe some people use them for other purposes, but who cares?

It turns out that the guy that blocked Chad is another author, and that really stuck in my craw. As Chad points out, “Why try to find other readers when we can tear each other down.”

Writing is hard work. It takes an incredible amount of time and commitment of energy and focus. Writers should know this.

We should be building each other up and supporting each other. I know what I’ve gone through while writing my novels. I’ve spent time querying and have experienced the bitter taste of rejection. While most people have given me positive feedback for my stories, I know what it’s like when one doesn’t quite land. Being a writer brings me incredible joy and satisfaction, but it can be harrowing, and I know that every other writer out there has gone through some of what I’ve experienced. Many have had it worse.

The right thing to do is recognize the shared commitment and pain, then offer whatever support we can afford. Kindness is often the greatest gift we can give, and it’s free.

I have read some stories from less prestigious writers that didn’t land for me, and I’m not going to publicly bash them. It doesn’t benefit them, and it doesn’t reflect well on me, either. I’ll criticize authors with bigger names when it’s appropriate, because a bad review from me won’t hurt them. But in general, it’s better to just say nothing at all if I don’t have something nice to say.

As writers, we should buy each other coffee. When we’re happy with another writer’s work, we should shout it from the summit of Social Media Mountain.

We’re colleagues. Coworkers. For the most part, we are not in competition with each other. We’re all carving out parts of our soul with an ice cream scoop and dolloping it onto the page for prospective readers. It should not be that hard to have sympathy for people going through the same thing as us.

There’s this guy on Twitter named Dave that has caused a stir. He sidles up to young women writers, promotes them, and then expects favors from them. He slides into their DMs and makes them uncomfortable. Several women on Twitter have recently exposed his behavior, and I’m not going to link to him or any of the people he harassed, because I don’t want to give him any extra attention.

I’ve already blocked him and moved on. Tonight, I want to talk about people like him and some of the secondary damage they do.

Some of these online predators have learned to disguise themselves in kindness. They seem polite and generous. As they stalk, they pass themselves off as attentive. They use positivity and platitudes to win their suspects over, so they can get into their target’s DMs and apply pressure, either subtly or directly.

Women shouldn’t have to second guess kindness, but thanks to guys like Dave, they do. There are too many men out their putting on false smiles, masking their intentions.

It puts me in a bind, because I try to be honest and positive. I strive to be a sweet man, not a nice guy. I want to lift people up. I also want genuine connection and friendship.

Unless your name is Melissa Buhl and you live in my house, I’m not looking to get in your pants. Seriously.

So what are some ways to tell a not-actually-nice person (asshole) from someone like me?

1. The assholes try too hard. Their motivation is for themselves and not for the person they’re interacting with, so their comments are a little bit off. Too heavy-handed, and they don’t know when to back off.
2. The assholes focus on young women. I offer kindness to anyone that shows up on my feed, regardless of age or gender.
3. The assholes are trying to get into their target’s DMs. I rarely DM anyone.
4. The assholes are focused on their targets, so they don’t usually post about different subjects, if they post anything at all. Most of their communication is in replies to other people. I post stuff, about a wide range of topics.

What should you do when you find someone online like what I just described?

First and foremost, check with the people they appear to be targeting. Maybe the suspect is socially awkward online and accidentally giving off some creeper vibes. If the people they’re targeting are fine and happy, it’s better to leave things alone and not create unnecessary drama.

Once you know you’re dealing with a creep, expose them. Take screen shots of the posts, making sure to get context. The creep is likely to delete posts once they’re brought into the light, so hold onto the receipts.

Next, report them. Use your best judgement. Be honest and be fair. Let your friends know that there is a predator out there. Let them see the receipts.

Finally, block the asshole. This is important, because there is no amount of arguing on the internet that will make the situation better. You’ve already done due diligence before you got to this stage, and you’re not going to change them. By now you should have done what you can to protect would-be victims. Blocking the creep is how you protect yourself.

If they go around the block, with an alt account or something, report them again, but do not engage.

That’s basically it.

I think the world needs more genuine kindness. We need to keep lifting each other up, and we need to listen to each other with empathy. We cannot let the creeps make us less than who we are. Act and speak with integrity, and be as kind as possible.

I don’t have a lot of time, so this one will have to be short.

It’s fine to have dreams and big goals. Reach for that shiny house and fancy car. Put “Full Time Writer” on your boar and do the things you need to do to get there.

But don’t underestimate the value of small goals. Those tiny victories along the way add up.

I have a large goal of writing 50,000 words in November. To prepare for that, I set a moderate size goal of writing at least 31 blog posts throughout October. The small goal is writing one blog post today. That means finding the time, coming up with the topic, and executing.

It’s not going to win any money or prizes. It’s not going to draw a crowd or make me any friends. What it will do is prove once again that I Can Do This.

It feels good to accomplish things, both large and small. If you’re struggling to see the light at the end of the tunnel, then look down and focus on putting one foot in front of the other. Keep going, and you’ll get there.

That’s what this is about. That’s what I’ve been doing for a long time.

Write the next story. Edit it. Maybe send it out. Maybe keep it in my pocket. Then write the next one. And then the next. One word at a time.

Just keep going.

The last couple of days, I talked about some unpleasant stuff. Tonight, let’s be positive!

Writing Excuses is a podcast that is, ostensibly, fifteen minutes long, because you’re in a hurry, and they’re not that smart (or so they claim). But the episodes are often longer than that. Sometimes when I’m listening to them, I’m not in that much of a hurry. And, they are demonstrably smart and good at what they do.

It kind of sounds like I’m saying that the people of Writing Excuses are liars, but that’s not the point I’m trying to make.

As a podcast, they’ve been going for quite some time. It started as Brandon Sanderson, Dan Wells, and Howard Taylor, eventually picking up Mary Robinette Kowal around season 4 or so. Those were the primary hosts, but they’ve expanded to have lots of different hosts. DongWon Song and Erin Roberts will be on the primary cast soon, which is fantastic, because I think the world of both of them, too.

Almost none of what I’ve said is news. They’ve won Hugos. They’re well established, and they offer great advice. So why am I talking about them tonight?

They host writing retreats, some of which are on cruise ships. Melissa and I have now attended four of these. We just got back from the latest a couple weeks ago. These are great events. They mean a lot to me. At times they’re instructional. Other times relaxing. Sometimes hilarious. Occasionally stressful. They’re adventures, hosted by people that really care about the community that they’ve built.

This last one, they went above and beyond.

Melissa and I attended in 2021, and no one got Covid during that retreat. We were hopeful that 2022 would be the same, but that wasn’t the case. A bunch of us caught it, and it wasn’t the fault of the cruise. We probably caught it at the hotel, before getting on the ship.

The Writing Excuses hosts made sure that those of us stricken with the plague did not feel left behind. And we weren’t just offered emotional support, though that was there and much appreciated. They made sure we had a place to stay in Galveston, since we weren’t going to be able to travel for a while. They put us up in a pair of AirBnB’s. Mary Robinette specifically stayed in Galveston herself, though she wasn’t infected, and she checked in on us to make sure we had everything we needed.

It feels like I’m understating this. The tail end of our cruise got obliterated by a virus, forcing us to go into isolation, but an effort was made to make it feel like we just had a longer vacation. An extended retreat.

I felt comfortable enough that I wrote while holed up in Galveston. I finished my latest novelette, which I’m currently calling The Writer, the Knight, and the Lady.

Writing Excuses is awesome. It’s made of good people, and it attracts good people. If you haven’t checked out the podcast, you should.

I feel like I’ve talked about this before, but I’m feeling too lazy to go look it up.

We, the inhabitants of The Internet, are collectively immature.

There are many parts of maturity, but the one I’m specifically focused on is the denial of reality. When confronted with views that are opposed to the ones we carry, Internet folk reject the opposing view and instead look for other people that support the perspective they carry.

We don’t just slip into echo chambers. We actively reject opposing views, sometimes attacking the people that present the ideas that offend us. When someone offers an opinion that is not in alignment with our own, we unfollow, mute, and block them.

I keep saying “we.” I try hard to keep an open mind, but it is challenging because I’m always right, and none of my views are wrong because keeping an open mind takes energy and patience, and the world moves pretty fast these days. I do tend to block people that are anti-vax, pro-fascist, or offer a perspective that is ultimately dehumanizing or harmful. But that leads to…

NUANCE.

It is extremely difficult to carry a nuanced view in social media, or online in general.

Nuance takes time and effort. Nuance demands more than 140 or 280 characters. Nuance is a blog post, and most people aren’t out there reading blogs. Ha ha!

Let’s go through a couple of examples of where it’s inconvenient to live in a technicolor world, when black and white is so much easier.

Black and White: It is always bad to kill someone.

Technicolor: Well… sometimes a bad person is going to something absolutely terrible and the only way to stop them is to kill them. Sometimes, you’re a soldier in a war, and your job is to shoot a gun at enemy soldiers, possibly killing them. Sometimes, someone gets sick and is in pain, and will never get better, and death is a merciful end to their suffering.

Nuance takes work. Let’s do another one.

Black and White: Freedom of Speech should be absolute. No speech should be infringed!

Technicolor: Well… shouting “fire” in a crowded theater is not protected speech and can lead to people getting trampled to death. Provoking someone to kill themselves is not protected speech and is morally reprehensible. Doxxing, SWATting, posting intimate photos of someone without their permission, and peddling child porn… these should not be protected speech. When speech and expression is weaponized to do actual harm, protecting that speech and expression is an amoral thing to do.

What if someone says something that hurts another person’s feelings? Am I saying that people shouldn’t be allowed to be assholes?

No. There is a difference between saying something mean and posting their address and phone number onto a public forum. There is a difference between telling someone to fuck off versus putting in an anonymous phone call, lying to the police, all in an effort to get a swat team to kick in another person’s door with guns.

Nuance matters. If you are incapable of this kind of discernment, you shouldn’t be in charge of hosting web content. This is a focused comment, and I’m not going to name names, because then this page might show up in a search engine, and one of those assholes might start doxxing and swatting me.

No thank you.

I’m talking about maturity like we all need to grow up. We can and should still play and have fun. Keeping an open mind and allowing room for nuanced views does not mean we have to be dour stick-in-the-muds. I may be a dour stick-in-the-mud, but that’s just how I’ve always been.

But McDonald’s has happy meals for adults now. Sometimes I wear a cape when I write. We should all stop working so damn hard from time to time and just be big kids.

Just… remember that there are real people with real feelings on the other side of the screen, and know that we’re all going through some stuff. Maybe we if just exercise a little bit more empathy and compassion, this whole Internet can be a little bit better.

Around the time I first started showing symptoms for Covid, President Biden said the pandemic is over. He said we still have Covid to deal with, but that the pandemic is over.

It’s a real headscratcher. Hundreds of people are still dying every day. As of right now, we are getting as many deaths a week due to Covid as the total number of people that died in the World Trade Center on September 11th, 2001.

Unfortunately, people are tired of living with the pandemic. They are tired of staying at home, wearing masks, and being afraid.

I don’t know what else to say about this. Tomorrow, I’m going to talk about nuance and maturity, but today I want to talk about Covid and why we should still be taking it seriously.

Pretending that the pandemic is over sends the wrong message if you want a healthy public. Telling someone that the pandemic is over, without any other context, suggests that maybe they don’t need to keep getting vaccinations.

There are still idiots that think Covid isn’t real. Or that it is just the flu. Or whatever other nonsense they want to use in order to deny the inconvenience of reality.

Most people have very mild symptoms if they get Covid after being vaccinated. That is not how I would describe my experience. I need to see my doctor, actually, because I’m pretty sure Covid damaged my lungs. It’s been more than 2 weeks, and I still have an uncomfortable cough and pain in my chest.

We need to be smarter about this. People’s health should not be a political talking point. None of this should be political.

There’s a virus going around killing hundreds of people a day, which has an exponential rate of infection even when people are protected, and if it doesn’t kill you, it might make it impossible for you to work for a while.

Let’s focus on that last bit for a second. Let’s pretend that Covid becomes weak enough that it no longer kills people at all. It’s just this really inconvenient sickness that makes it difficult for people to breathe or work effectively. Shouldn’t that be enough to make people stop and care?

Melissa and I are fortunate. We are in positions where we can comfortably miss work if we need to. Our daughter, on the other hand, needs her job. There are millions like her that don’t have the kind of support we’re giving her, and when they get sick with something like Covid, they run the risk of not being able to afford food or rent. Why should we be so callous with these people?

That’s not even considering people that are immunocompromised or have existing conditions that put them at greater risk when confronted with something like Covid.

So what am I saying? Am I suggesting we all go back into isolation again?

No.

I’m saying we need to continue to take it seriously. We need to stop pretending that the pandemic is over, and respect Covid for the deadly virus that it is. That means wearing masks from time to time, and social distancing when appropriate. And it means isolating when we get sick, so that we don’t continue to be vectors, allowing the disease to run out of control.

It also means staying vigilant on vaccinations and boosters.

Get “back to normal” but react appropriately if something happens. Melissa and I went on the Writing Excuses Cruise, and we got bit with Covid. Our response was to isolate as long as we could, until it was safe to come home. It was inconvenient for us, but we did our best to minimize the risk to others.

That’s it. Be your best and do your best.

Denying the reality of Covid is NOT your best.

Welcome to October, friends and family! It’s that time of year where I try to post something here every day of the month, as a way of preparing myself for NaNoWriMo.

Artists have their Inktober. I have Blog-tober. One year, I set out to write something writing related every day. As challenging as it was, I produced some of my favorite posts that month.

The Journey as a Writer

This whole blog is supposed to be about my journey as a writer. This journey has been going on for a long time. Sometimes, I talk about politics. Sometimes, I post short fiction. Sometimes, I talk about things in order to work through issues that are bothering me. This is all part of the journey.

When you set out on a journey, it’s important to choose a destination and a route. If you know where you want to go but don’t know how to get there, you could get lost. If you pick a route without a destination, you could wander in circles without purpose, knowing where you are, but never really going anywhere.

I want to be a full-time writer. That is a destination. In order to be a full-time writer, I need to be able to sustain myself by my writing, or be sustained. In order to feel like I’m having some success as a full-time writer, I must know that people are reading what I’m writing. One way to get that measurement is through number of sales.

Notice that I’m not setting out to be the next Brandon Sanderson or Stephen King. I just want to write. My definitions of success are not strictly bound to financials or popularity.

I thought there were two main routes in front of me: traditional publishing and self-publishing. With what’s going on with Penguin Random House and Simon and Schuster, with the big publishers consolidating and shrinking opportunities for new authors, the traditional publishing route looks more and more like a lottery ticket. Self-publishing, on the other hand, still carries with it all of the burdens of starting a new business.

The destination I have planned isn’t to become a master at marketing and selling books. My goal is to spend most of my day-job hours writing and revising stories. So, self-publishing has largely been off the table, though I’ve looked into a couple of options from time to time.

Smaller, independent presses may be a route that I hadn’t considered enough previously. It’s a compromise. I will still have to do a lot of work to sell and market, but depending on the small press, I may not have to do it alone.

That’s how I’ve been planning and negotiating my journey as a writer. I keep an eye on where I want to be, I try to plan my route as best I can, and then make decisions at every intersection along the way. I still have a long ways to go.

Novels and Blogging as a Journey

Planning a novel, a short story, or even a Blog-tober is similar, and simpler.

It starts with picking a destination. I want to write a novel about a psychic repo-man. I want to write a short story about baggage handlers, where the cargo is human bodies. I want to write a novel about a down-on-his-luck private eye living on The Moon. I want to write a novelette about a writer that gets his hands on a magic typewriter. I want to write a novel about synthetic humans solving crime and falling in love. This month, I want to write at least one blog post a day, to make sure I’m ready to write a novel in November.

Once you have the destination in mind, you plan your route. Some plans are more detailed than others. I wrote outlines for two of my three novels. I wrote shorter, less detailed outlines for most of my short stories. Some stories are simple enough I don’t need a detailed plan. The outline gives me a map, which I’m free to ignore whenever I want, as long as I’m still moving towards the destination.

With Blog-tober, I have to come up with the things I want to talk about in advance, so that I’m not floundering each day trying to come up with something to say.

Planning Blog-tober 2022

Today, October 1st, that’s what I’m doing. I’m at a Shut Up and Write, working on outlines for two stories, and developing my list of blog topics for the rest of the month. I’m also reaching out on social media, asking for topics from other people.

One person mentioned Inktober, suggesting I take that and riff on those. It makes me want to try some microfiction involving the Inktober topics. Here is an image of 2022 Inktober Prompts:

I’m not going to commit to tiny stories every day based on these prompts, but I’m tempted to do something with this list. Blog-tober is about writing at least one post a day. That implies it’ll be fine to post two, if the whim takes me.

We will see. Thirty-one posts is already a big commitment.

A bunch of tiny stories could be a lot of fun, though.

Welcome to Blog-tober 2022! Buckle up, because this one is going to be a bumpy ride.

A few months ago, my son Chris spent some time in a car with his girlfriend and another person, going back and forth between Sacramento and the Tahoe area. The other person had Covid at the time, and didn’t really tell Chris or his girlfriend. At the same time, my daughter Bryanna picked up Covid from work. I went by her apartment and took her a drink from Dutch Bros. Chris kissed his girlfriend and came home. Then we all found out about the Covid vectors, and I was sure Chris and I were both infected.

We didn’t get sick. We both tested negative. Bullet dodged.

A couple of weeks ago, Melissa and I went to Chicago for WorldCon, where there wound up being 60 reported cases of Covid.

We came home, and we didn’t get sick. We both tested negative. Bullet dodged again.

During the Writing Excuses Retreat 2022, the first reported case amongst our group was announced in the middle of the week. By Thursday, I had a tickle in the back of my throat, but tested negative. Thursday evening, my symptoms became much more pronounced. I hoped I was just exhausted, and that a good night’s sleep would set me right.

I woke up the next morning and felt like garbage. I tested positive. I am not Neo, after all.

Lots of friends and acquaintances talk about mild symptoms, and that it was no big deal. A couple people in my perimeter have said that if they hadn’t taken a test, they might not have known that they had Covid at all.

Lucky devils.

It hit me hard. One of the doctors on the ship gave me Robitussin and Nyquil equivalents. He may or may not have said something about getting lots of rest. If he did, I took it to heart. When I got back to my room, I took a dose of the red stuff instead of the blue stuff, in case I wanted to stay up and write during my sick time, and then I promptly crawled into bed and slept for 26 hours. Friday doesn’t exist for me.

Melissa was not sick at this time. She may have had the option to change rooms, but she didn’t want to leave me, and I selfishly didn’t want her to go, either. She brought me food and fluid throughout Friday, but I only remember a little of it. I was apparently very grumpy about it. I just tried to sleep to get to the other side of the pain, because there was a lot of it.

On Saturday morning, I got up and went to the bathroom. Melissa wasn’t in the room. She might have gone to deck 4 to read. She might have gone to find herself some food. I don’t remember. I didn’t want her to get sick, and I remember turning away from her all the time to avoid breathing on her. When she was in the room with me, I tried going to the opposite side. It turns out, that little dance was useless, but I really didn’t want her to get sick, too, because I at last knew first hand what it was like, and I did not wish for her to suffer.

I coughed as I entered the bathroom. Not a particularly weak cough, either. I put some force behind it, but it didn’t move the material in my chest enough. It moved it some, which is to say that thick, heavy mucus entered a part of my throat it should not have. It felt like a stone lodged near my vocal cords.

I tried to swear and discovered I could not speak. Then I realized I couldn’t breathe.

I could not breathe.

Fear hit me, but not panic, exactly. I could see myself in the mirror. My eyes went wide. I remember thinking, “Oh. This is Covid. This is how people die from Covid. Choking to death.”

That could have been my end. It was close.

I figured out that I could get a trickle of air in if I tried hard enough, and I did. Through what felt like a bent straw in my throat, I managed to inflate my lungs as much as I could, and then I tried to cough again.

The blockage ejected. I spit at least some of it out in the sink. It was colorful.

I could breathe again.

I believe the long sleep is what got me in trouble. I was a bit dehydrated, which made the mucus thicker in my lungs. After drinking and eating, I started to feel much, much better. There was still pain in all my joints, and a headache, and it hurt to swallow, but the pains were starting to recede. By the afternoon, the pain was almost all gone, and all I was left with was the wildly fluctuating fever and a world of snot.

Every day since then has been a ton of better. Right now, I feel like I have a head cold, and I’m almost over it.

Catching Covid while on the cruise meant that I couldn’t come home when planned. We came back to Galveston, and around 20 of us Covid+ people from the retreat got transferred to 2 AirBnBs. I’ve been keeping my spirits up, and trying to help the others around me. I’ve made meals a few times, and it’s been a pretty good way to deal with being confined. It’s been a good place to recover.

Yesterday was a bad day, though. Yesterday deserves its own post, but it’s part of My Covid Story, now, so I’ll include it here.

Yesterday, Monday, September 19th, started with a call from Chris. Our cat Paws was in trouble.

Paws had problems while we were away. About the time I started to show signs of Covid, Paws had stopped eating, and Chris took him to the vet. Paws needed fluids and food, and there were signs of multiple organ failures. It looked bad, bad, bad for him. He probably should have been put down at that point and saved him any additional suffering, but apparently the vet was more hopeful than that, and scheduled a number of treatments, thinking he would get better.

Monday morning, he was not getting better. Chris was having to deal with it all alone. Something happened. Paws made some kind of noise. His tongue was sticking out, and he stopped breathing for a few seconds. Things were happening, and Chris was scared. He put him in his car and started racing to the vet emergency care, which was about 20 minutes away. During the drive, he called Melissa.

Melissa spoke to him, and then I heard it in her voice. Covid. It finally got her.

We tried to give as much reassurance to Chris as we could, but there was only so much we could do. His two sick parents were halfway across the country, and the cat wasn’t showing any signs of life.

Paws passed away. He will not be there to greet us when we finally manage to get home.

A little bit later, I made Melissa take a Covid test. In the dim light, it looked like she tested negative again. She took a picture of it and sent it to the kids, and looking at it on our phones, the truth was made that much more obvious. In addition to her being congested, and having a fever, and aching all over, there was a faint line at the T on the test.

Melissa was not Neo, either.

If Melissa managed to remain Covid free, we would have transferred to a hotel in Houston tonight, then double masked and flown home on Wednesday. Our plans needed to change, so we’ll be here through the end of the week.

There is some relief in Melissa turning up Covid positive at this point. I’m no longer doing a weird dance, trying not to breathe on her. I don’t have to mask around her. We can cuddle when we go to sleep again, though she’s currently a bundle of lava.

Last night, I finished the first draft of a story that was very challenging to write. Today, I read it to her.

The company around me is very nice. There is a lot of support here. As far as isolation is concerned, a person could do much worse.

That is My Covid Story. I should probably add the words “so far.” I still have symptoms, and we’re not home yet. But I think I see how this story will end, and this is enough.

So far.

At this moment, I’m sitting in the conference room of the Liberty of the Seas. We are docked at Costa Maya, and the ship is mostly empty as people go offshore to enjoy excursions and land-based adventure. There’s a roleplaying game going on about 15 feet away from me. Several other people are in the conference room with their laptops open, quietly writing. I am on vacation, surrounded by My People, doing exactly what I want to do.

I should be happy, but… I just feel tired, and a little bit frustrated. Maybe a little bit disillusioned.

In the last couple of days, I’ve seen some things that I can’t unsee. It keeps me from being as naïve as I want to be.

I don’t know what’s wrong with me that I can’t just relax and enjoy the moment. I want to be present and appreciate where I am on this journey. I want to open up and connect. It’s just so, so hard.

This year, I’m volunteering to help with all the fiddly little things that make the conference successful. Things like rearranging chairs and tables in the conference room, rotating the daily challenge sheets, organizing and coordinating the Office Hours… that sort of thing. There’s no benefit to this activity. It’s just a way to give back and help other people have a good time.

This kind of service usually quiets the brain weasels, because it doesn’t let me just sit around and dwell on myself. I’m not sure it’s working, though. I feel unsatisfied. Anxious. Sad.

At one point yesterday, I sat still and considered quitting. Not the volunteer work, but the writing itself. Just… give up. There are so many people trying to do the same thing as me, and I don’t know that there is that much room in the world for it. Not everyone grows up to be an astronaut. Most writers do not become authors.

Why did I want to quit? It wasn’t for lack of confidence. At this moment, I feel like I have the talent and skill to be successful. I wanted to quit because we only get one life, and I want to be happy. If I reach the end of my life and I have dozens of completed novels unpublished and unseen, will I be happy? Will the measure of happiness in my life be high if I spent all of it wanting something I could never have?

Some friends encourage me. They tell me that I’m going to make it. That something good will happen. But there is so much about this business that is outside the writer’s control. It takes luck, which I’ve never had in ample supply.

The doubt is a brain weasel, digging through my thoughts and emotions, chewing away at the wiring of my brain matter, making it hard to enjoy the journey.

I’m not going to quit. I will keep going, even if it means I end up in the scenario I just described, having spent my entire life pursuing something out of reach.

But some days it is really, really hard to find joy in the work. I’m on a cruise, surrounded by writers and acquaintances, with no pressure upon me other than what I’ve placed upon myself. I should be really happy right now, and the brain weasels are getting in the way. Perhaps by the end of the week, I will feel better.