Despite having a little time off and the availability to work on things for my website, I didn’t do all the “end of year” things that so many people program and just let go. I find as often as not that I get frustrated by recycled content. There are certainly things to look back at – both good and bad – but there are also many things to look forward to.
No, I don’t do resolutions. I made a new year’s resolution many years ago to *never* make a new year’s resolution again, and I haven’t since then. I post about it every year, and it hasn’t changed.
I received a summary of my “year in books” from Goodreads. I was extremely disappointed in my summary. Not because of the company or the format or anything like that. It was the simple fact that I ended up with less than 10 books for the year. It was just about 2,600 pages of reading total, but the “books read” also included one that I literally shelved as “DNF” because I couldn’t bring myself to finish it. It would be easy to be very depressed about this lack of quality reading, but I’m going to take the advice of a random internet person and be happy that I was reading. I didn’t stop reading, I’m just going slower than my previous years of 2 or 3 books per month. I’ve had a lot going on in my life and reading for pleasure became something of a challenge – but I didn’t stop. There are so many people out there that don’t read at all, and I do NOT want to join those ranks. I’m taking it as a win that I kept plugging along.
So this year I’m going to keep doing the things I love. It will still be a challenging time as things move and change and grow in the family life here. I’ll still have to work at making the time to actually accomplish things, but for some reason the start of this year doesn’t feel as bleak as some in the past. We’ll see.
Up next – some of that “creating” stuff. More to follow~
Remember way back at the end of the summer? The sun was out, the weather was warm and there was all this time to just sit and ponder the particulars of being a parent. Writing and creating posts just whenever the mood moved. Something about drama and what parents should… something. I don’t remember.
Here we are in the dark and chilly days of mid-November and somehow two whole months have disappeared. Oh, I know where they went, but they’re are gone just the same.
Having two, non-driving teenagers in different clubs and school based activities has proven to be quite the challenge. Morning, noon and night the schedule here is relentless. Then of course is the drama – the laughing, the tears the yelling… and that’s just me.
There is of course also my professional world. Writing is NOT the day job, and the day job is jumping. On the up side of that, I have accomplished a major first step in my career that has taken me many, many years to get to. It’s just a step, but an important one.
In the end, some of my creativity has suffered. I would not trade a minute of it for sitting and staring at the blank page. Writing is a solitary endeavor in the end, and I have NOT been solitary. I am just fine with this. Long nights and ugly weather will pen us in and give ample time for posting things up to an old fashioned notion like a blog. Hopefully I’ll get here more than once a quarter…
A friend forwarded this editorial/opinion article to me. I read it and had more of a reaction to it than I thought I might have, so I wanted to put this out here for further discussion.
Thanks for sending this one along. It was an interesting read, but I think it highlights a couple of things that I have changed my mind about over the years.
The author talks about all the things to hide from your children. This is untrue, and in fact can lead to sincerely dangerous consequences for your kids. Do you want to have a raging argument in front of your kids? No. Do you want them to understand it’s OK to disagree so long as you work something out to mutual agreement? You bet. You can’t have the mutual agreement without seeing / understanding the differences and disagreements. This I think is one of the core issues with so many children that come up not understanding the privilege they have. They fail to understand how the world works and they are crushed when somebody denies them anything – even if that thing is of no consequence in the greater picture. It’s why so many are deemed to be “Karens” who demand to see the manager about how much milk is in a coffee.
People are chaotic, messy and individualistic in the extreme… but they need to see others and understand the shared environment we live in. Hiding the swirling chaos of the world from a kid doesn’t help them. Protect them from it? Of course. Just be certain they understand and can see what’s going on out there. It’s how they go about making the world a better place as society moves forward. They need to know the history or root of why things are happening, so they can (hopefully) do better than we did.
Children also need to understand that the emotions they’re having are real and can’t be dictated by others. “Putting on a brave face” only becomes a saying if you allow them to see that you are scared too. Show them you have feelings and allow them to understand how you process these complex things in life. I have told the younger couples I know with kids – you will never have a mirror that will reflect YOU as clearly as your kids do. They dominate your time. They are with you almost constantly for years, and so they see far more than you think they do. Don’t lie to them. It’s a bad road to travel. Don’t hurt them purposefully, but allow them to fail and recover on their own when they’re young and the consequences are limited (or can be so long as you’re paying attention). It’s one in a long list of very important lessons.
I understand what the author is saying. It was extremely stressful to have (my daughter) get on a plane and fly away for a year. It’s not even like the author’s situation where we could soothe our emotions by knowing she’d be home for the next holiday. She wasn’t. Not for the one after that nor the one after that either. It was a long and stressful year – and we all shared that with each other. We are better and stronger for it. Now we’re trying to do the same thing for a wonderful young lady here from France. It’s going to be a wild ride, and one that we share all our emotions with them for.
I am going to add here that this is a learning process and there is no substitute for experience. There’s only one way to get experience and that’s to do a thing. Sometimes you fail… and that makes all the difference in the world. It’s how you learn and a way for you to discover new things. A partial quote from an old movie I enjoy, “…think what you’ll know tomorrow”.
I have come to discover that writing in any form is a struggle. Yes, I know – all the writers and creative types I know just collectively said “duh”. I get it, but sometimes saying it (or typing it) helps with the reality of making a change.
I am a writer that runs on inspiration. Long haul work is extremely difficult doing that, and finishing something the size and scope of a novel is exactly that – a long haul. I suck at that.
I’ve been chipping away at the edges of writing for many years, but what I have been doing is clearly not working, nor is it getting me the result I desire. I need to finish more, but in order to finish more I need to actually create more. I can’t sit and wait for inspiration or the ever elusive (thought to be mythical) ‘free time’.
So – I’m going to be squeezing things in. Maybe the edits won’t be great. There will be grammar and spelling issues. I can’t edit if it’s not created. The secret story in my head will never go anywhere without trying to record it in some form.
That’s a simple view, I know. It’s one of those easy to say, difficult to quantify kind of things – to some degree. There are clear examples of what is wrong. Those are the easy ones. It exists in more than one form, and it relates to so many levels of what we do in the science fiction and fantasy fan communities.
I’ve been sitting on this one for a while. It’s a tough topic. I expect somebody will dig this up and that it will cause me problems in the future. This is why it’s on MY site. I own it. It’s mine. I have taken some time and given this much thought and I think it’s important to continue this conversation. That’s the key to all of this. It’s a conversation. It’s something we need to address now and as we move forward. There is no simple solution and there is no easy way to make this go. We need to keep communicating with each other.
Let’s start with the easy stuff. There are some people out there who think, for some unknown reason, that they should be the ‘real’ fans of Star Wars. They’ve declared some nonsense about how people who are not white Americans can’t and shouldn’t ever be in the movies that have been loved since 1977. They’re easy to spot. They’re terrible. There’s simply no place in fandom for people that can’t accept that people who make up less than 12% of the entire world population don’t rule everything and can’t exclude everyone else. Above and beyond a basic level of stupidity, there is no place in civil society for those who make death threats against actors for portraying a character in a movie. That’s a kind of crazy that slides into another topic entirely (we’ve created our own hell-scape of cults of personality) and isn’t what I want to get at here. If you want to read more, check this article out as a starting point. There are lots of conversations going on out there about it.
The part that’s much more difficult to deal with is at a very personal level. It happens far too often these days and it worries me for the future of fandom for a whole different reason. Toxicity is eating away at the core of fandom – from both sides. The grievance crowd is going to destroy fandom.
Being the vocal minority doesn’t make you right no matter how right you believe you are. When somebody says something you don’t agree with, it doesn’t mean you are allowed to have them thrown out of the building. If your feelings get hurt it doesn’t mean the other person is automatically a bigot, problematic or any other sort of label YOU believe they should carry. When you think you want to lash out at others, you need to ask why you feel this way and maybe… just maybe… take a step back and allow some time to think about things.
We are all guilty of this to some degree at some point in our lives. We are emotional creatures. We react. We want to defend ourselves and those we care for. It’s natural. IF you’ve been the person that has been slighted, ignored, insulted and treated badly all of your life this is something that builds. This feeling turns into something ugly and dangerous. How we conduct ourselves when these sort of things come up matters.
What am I trying to say? Let me start with my own example. I have worked on convention staffs for many years. I love helping make something for so many people to enjoy. There are challenges, but anything worth doing has those. I have worked with all sorts of people from all over. Fans are great folks and have made some of the most wonderful memories for me. I volunteered to help with the previous world con, a staff team I hadn’t worked with before. I was trying to find my way and see where I could fit in and help. Then the GOH mess went down and I withdrew my help. Did you catch the part about it being volunteers? Yeah, even if you pay me I’m not hanging around for that. The most worrisome part was this was accepted. Not questioned, just accepted.
I wrote about it in a previous post here. Back in February of 2021 in fact. So here we are a year and a half later and I think the issue has only gotten worse. I don’t want people to think this is some kind of ‘crying out’ because I feel like I’m being repressed or something. I’m clearly not repressed or disadvantaged. I know there is privilege living here and I try to be mindful of it. I’m also don’t want this to be a ‘virtue signal’ kind of bullshit. I can’t stand that. “Look at how wonderful and accepting I am! I’m clearly not the problem you’re talking about…” Ugh!
Maybe I am the problem. I don’t know that without talking to others and having them talk to me.
Here’s where the real challenges start. Yeah, I’m a middle aged white guy. I know a lot of other people who look just like me. That’s who I have always associated with. It’s culturally my background and that has a huge influence on my opinions and bias. I have been told more than once that my opinion doesn’t matter simply because I’m a white male. I’ve been told to get over being told that. I’ve been given the ‘so how does it feel’ bit. I’ve been excluded from conversations and told that project submissions were only open to ‘others who need a chance’. While it wasn’t me, but a friend – there was even something in writing, “Well, you’re an old white guy so you must have done something wrong…”. In writing. From a supposedly professional group.
Really? We can’t find it now, but give us time? You’re a white guy so all the problems are your fault? This is all the wrongs of history that (may or may not have) happened to me so now I’m giving those to you! Take that medicine you horrifying bigot!
So, back to the maybe I’m the problem part. OK. Fine. Maybe I am. I can accept that I need to be more mindful than I am and work harder to be better. I certainly try, but success is relative to viewpoint. There are lots of places looking to get more diverse work out there and I don’t qualify for that in this field. OK. I’ll take it.
This didn’t just happen to me. It’s happening over and over again with people taking advantage of the simple fact that people have started to pay attention to what’s being said and taking action on it. Grievance culture. It’s insidious because how do you argue against things like, “you can’t call that person a freak just because they don’t look like you”? You don’t. You can’t. Even when the definition of the word freak is, “A person, animal or plant with an unusual physical abnormality”. Webster be damned! You can’t point that sort of thing out! How dare you?
Where’s the line? When can you tell anyone else what to say, how to think about something or how to address a situation? We’re all products of our own cultural backgrounds. What if I make a mistake? Am I to be punished and then banished forever? Who is the arbitrator of that judgment? Public opinion is fickle and dangerous. Swaying with and allowing the grievance crowd to simply take over is going to destroy volunteer run conventions… faster and more certainly than aging out or poor attendance ever had a chance to.
Don’t believe me?
At this past Balticon (#56) a woman of color living with a debilitating physical condition, parent of a trans person, and long time panelist and guest was summarily chucked out due to a complaint. A single complaint.
I was there when they came to get her. It was the panel I was moderating. I was standing there. I can’t speak for how others feel, but the lone staffer seemed quite respectful when asking her to gather up her things and accompany him to con-ops. He wasn’t loud and he did not make any accusations while there. He didn’t express anything other than, “please come with me, we’ll talk elsewhere”. It was a very simple and quiet thing that most had no concept about anything happening at all. I feel that the characterization of being treated ‘criminally’ is inaccurate, but again – that’s from the outsider point of view. In the end, that little bit that I witnessed isn’t important but it gives context for the rest of my message. They weren’t coming for me… this time.
I regret not digging into things more while I was there. I attempted (successfully) to steer clear of personal drama. I attend and work cons as a matter of enjoyment, and I find that type of drama stressful rather than enjoyable. Maybe I needed to do or say more… but there’s a problem with that. The grievance crowd. How can I help when my opinion doesn’t matter or is discounted or ignored out of hand?
This isn’t about me, but this whole post is to explain where I’m coming from. The only thing any intervention by me would have done is muddy the waters (at best) or cause a significantly bigger issue (at worst). I have been seeing a distressing trend in fandom – pushing people away rather than working with them and trying to relate to them. I have been called a racist, accepting of racists, problematic and told flat out to my face that I’m a white, straight (assumed), middle aged man and therefore part of the problem and that it’s not possible for me to be part of the solution. I have been marginalized by my appearance and had power taken from me on that basis. What it looks like to me, in a deeply oversimplified way, is that those who have suffered that treatment before are now taking any and every opportunity to do that to others rather than working to make things better for everyone. Sort of a ‘how do you like it’ approach to being in power.
Conventions are not my direct livelihood, nor to they help or hinder my day job. My reputation in the convention circuit doesn’t stop me from putting food on the table for my family. Conventions are some people’s livings or a significant portion of them. Their standing and reputation there matters. If somebody came at my job in that way I’d be more than angry – and rightfully so. The person in question is a pro and while I have found her point of view odd at times, I have never felt that it wasn’t important. I love the stuff she brings to panels. Having diverse opinions matters. Having authors like her, and so many others is vital. I’m sorry that she won’t be back (and if I were her, I wouldn’t be either).
The culture of con running is in trouble. This is not the first time I’ve encountered a mess like this. It’s the reason I won’t work on con staff for other cons anymore. There’s part of me that’s very sad about this. I do love doing all these wonderful, creative things.
So long as I’m unfailingly polite and professional there’s nothing to latch onto as a complaint. Maybe I need to say more. I deeply believe that the science fiction and fantasy community needs to be more accepting and welcoming. I said, specifically at the panel I moderated, “If you can’t find that person, be that person…” and gave some examples. I will continue to go to Balticon (and others) if they’ll have me (I understand that I’m a ‘D’-lister that just fills space). I think there’s a dangerous culture growing around the idea of ‘you didn’t say exactly the right thing’, and I fear for the future of convention staffs across the board. I hope by continuing to attend that I can in some way be part of the solution. I told people I wasn’t going to virtue signal and I don’t want this to sound like that. I am, however, going to reach out to people about this when I have the chance. I want to stand up for others. I want the toxicity to go away. I’m sick to death of the grievance crowd. I want fans to be able to keep doing the things they love. I hope to be able to continue to have important and meaningful conversations about making cons a safe and accepting place for everyone. I hope you’ll join the conversation too.
This past Memorial Day weekend I was lucky enough to go back to being a panelist at a live, in person science fiction convention. I was and am very happy to be able to get back to that sort of thing. I’ve missed it. At this point, with so much time passing between the event and the actual writing of my post(s) I suspect there will be details that are hazy and that will make the summaries shorter than they may have once been.
The con took place May 27 – 30, 2022 at the Renaissance Baltimore Harborplace hotel. Right in the middle of Inner Harbor. The location was (and continues to be) something of a sore spot for many people. The hotel itself is expensive. Parking is generally expensive as well, but the con made arrangements for a deal with the parking company and that worked out really well. I was able to save a fair amount of money compared to past years by setting up my parking in advance. The area itself, the places around the con seem to be struggling. All but a very few businesses in the area are gone. The restaurant choices were thin and did not lend themselves to quick con based meals. All the other shops, including the shopping mall previously below the convention are are simply closed and gone. The absolute lack of options was one of the most challenging aspects of attending. The room, the amenities and the rest of the hotel related things were pretty standard.
Checking in this year was the smoothest it’s been in a long time. There was one minor blip, but in general worked and I was in and out of the registration area very quickly. The set up / arrangement of the convention spaces was very similar to years past, with the notable exception of splitting the dealer’s room into two different spaces. This worked for me, though it’s questionable what the vendors themselves thought of the arrangement.
One of the bigger changes as an ‘in person’ panelist was the addition / continuation of virtual panels. I’d brought my own laptop along and set it up in my hotel room. This turned out to be a good thing. There was mention of a space being available on site for folks to participate in the virtual panels, but from what I witnessed of that it was less than successful. Running all the tech for all the panels AND having a place for a panelist to just drop in and use ‘extra’ equipment didn’t seem to go well at all. I don’t think any mention of availability should have been made for the panelists and I think the panelists should have been far more prepared than the ones I witnessed were. Thankfully, my connection went off without a hitch and I got to participate in a virtual panel to go along with my in person sessions.
The pandemic made a lot of other things feel slightly different or out of sync with what I have become used to over the years. Attendees were there, and wearing masks as was the rule. They were generally friendly and happy to see others in person, but the numbers seemed down. I understand the hesitation of many, so this wasn’t entirely unexpected but I hope it’s not a sign of the death of in person cons (and that death has been rumored for many, many years of course). The other aspect of this con for me was a profound shift in who of my friend group were there. My family didn’t attend. People I always went to dinner with didn’t attend. People I’d sit and share a drink with or bump into between panels weren’t there. Even things I did get to do with friends seemed muted and worn. Yes, I went to dinner. Yes, there were games and chatting and all of it seemed… slightly surreal. I was adrift and on my own and that is certainly not my convention experience in the past.
It was a good con for me. I did a bunch of panels, ran a workshop and bought a handful of things from wonderful creators. I also managed to (mostly) avoid con drama. I say mostly, and that deserves an explanation, but also that deserves its own post. All in all, it was good to be back. I hope and look forward to doing it all again next year.
Two distinct parts developed in my head when I was thinking about how to write all this down. I’m going to start with the part that most folks will be interested in and let you decided if you want to carry on further.
Part I – Europe
That title sounds grandiose, but it gets to the point of what I want to say. Earlier this week Russia attacked / invaded an eastern European country. Declared war and started hitting them with rockets and blowing people up. My daughter is IN Europe right now. She’s been there since August and is planning to be there until this coming summer. I felt it was justifiable to do some research and put a few things together. The kiddo is roughly 3,100km (1,925mi) away from the fighting. For people that struggle with putting a picture to a vague number like that it’s roughly the same as saying I am in the middle of Pennsylvania and the fighting is in Phoenix, Arizona. It’s about the same distance.
My considerations about this.
First, that’s a really long way and generally should be safe enough. Generally. Conventionally.
Second, it is still the same land mass and is therefore drive-able, rather than being across, say an ocean so that doesn’t help my anxiety. It’s about a 34 hour drive according to the almighty Google.
Third – a chunk of that is across NATO territory (where the US would likely get directly involved) AND where she’s living is right next to Switzerland in the Alps. She’s as safe there as she possibly can be.
Overall, I don’t know that it will impact her stay overseas. That’s the part that makes it challenging, the not knowing. I can ‘not know’ here in the US and that’s a lot easier because there would need to be an awful lot of bad before things really change where I am right now. The problem is it’s better to ‘not know’ when the kiddo is here and not there.
As of this writing we haven’t had any updates from the exchange student program. That’s for both the kids overseas (that I know of) and for the kids here in the US (again, that I know of). I suspect they’re keeping a close eye on what’s happening and will go with whatever the department of state recommends. It’s important to highlight that. This exchange program is governed (ultimately) by the department of state and is part of the citizen diplomacy functions of our country. I believe getting to know our neighbors around the world and making them part of our family is an important part of making the world a better (and safer) place.
So, we pay attention and we wait to see what happens.
Part II – Old is New
Red Dawn (1984)
I can generalize things for members of Gen X here. We have always expected this. The mighty bear (Russians or USSR – whatever) was always going to attack. This is the only result from the era of the cold war, it’s just 30 years or so later than we expected. I suspect that my friends from the younger end of the millennials and the Gen Z kids won’t understand. This was an ingrained part of our culture and our media growing up. It was the news. The red threat was always there. This is not new, it’s old and late.
What do I mean? Who was the opponent in Rocky IV? That’s right, Ivan Drago. Who did Rambo fight in the second movie? Yeah, that’s right, it was a Russian helicopter. Hunt for Red October anyone? War Games. Red Dawn. Invasion USA. Those are the splashy action movies, but there were tons of cloak and dagger movie / television adaptations. Falcon and the Snowman. Firefox (Clint Eastwood thinking in Russian). When it wasn’t serious, it was mocked. This could be Spies Like Us or a Wendy’s commercial (very nice). It was pervasive. It was inescapable. This was the world.
Now that it’s here, I’m not sure how to feel about it. I mean, they’ve always been the bad guys. The propaganda worked. I don’t see redeemable qualities. I don’t see roads to peace, I only see roads to the world becoming a nucular wasteland. I don’t believe the generation in charge knows how to do business that isn’t set in that pattern. I don’t know if I would know either – it’s all I’ve ever known. I hope the Ukraine remains whole and independent. This is when we need cooler heads to prevail – because escalation doesn’t end well for anyone. I hope this war does not spread. I do not want World War III.
A starting point. I need some kind of warm up. Sitting and staring into a blank page is a genuine challenge – and one that will be overcome. Writing can be developed, just like any other ‘muscle’ so we’re stretching, then digging into a workout.
From time to time I check out a website called “Post Secret”. The idea of the project, if you’re not familiar with it, is that people write a secret on a post card and send it in to an address. This secret is then shared anonymously for others to see. Some are silly. Some are angry. Many, many secrets make connections and help other people see that they are not alone. I suspect my own life would be significantly different than it is today if something like this had been available when I was a kid.
I have spoken to friends and shared before that when I was in my pre- and early teens I was really into Dungeons & Dragons (I still am!). I started playing and gathering all things D&D very early on. This was also the time of the Satanic Panic. Other kids in my neighborhood were told not to associate with me because I played this game. Some kids didn’t get rules that applied to that degree, but their parents removed any and all chance of them owning anything related to D&D. The quote from one mom was, “We understand this is a game of imagination that only needs a paper and pencil. We know we can’t stop that, but we refuse to support it.”
That’s extremely rough when it’s aimed at somebody just developing social skills. Your friend group, likely already limited based on choices that didn’t necessarily fit the social norm of the time, being bent, battered and reduced because a swath of the adults in your life give you “we refuse to support it” as the answer to you wanting to play a game and be social.
I saw this postcard on the Post Secret site:
The person that sent it in is a little younger than I am, but likely caught the back end of that same panic. It also shows (to me) the deep, far reaching social nature of this game. The reason it endures. Fantastical, imaginative and connection creating. When you find ‘your people’ and they join the amazing journey into a place that doesn’t exist anywhere except your mind it is a powerful thing.
For many, many years I refused to share my passion about D&D. I’m not a professional author (clearly) and not a professional artist (witness my art) but I have played this game, and others like it, for the vast majority of my life. Having had all my early attempts to connect with others about it met with reactionary, panic based push back I was not interested in reaching out to get smacked down or insulted. It became habit.
Putting this out here in writing (again) I think is part of my process of getting past that. Yes, given the massive success and mainstream knowledge / understanding of D&D these days it doesn’t seem like a huge leap, but it feels that way to me. I am used to push back, insults, and demeaning nicknames. I’m not over that, but I’m working on it. I’m certainly not intimidated by any individual these days. Also, I know, intellectually, that people are aware of what I do and what I am interested in among my friends. I have recently started extending that awareness out to others, including people I am associated with professionally. I am still attempting to maintain a clear demarcation between work life and personal life (as my lovely wife likes to say, ‘don’t shit where you eat’) but I am not longer hiding things like the YouTube videos or the Twitch stream from them either.
I am who I am. I am passionate about my hobbies and enjoy sharing them. I love this stuff. Maybe not as much as sex, but this ‘secret’ was out there and did what it was supposed to do… it made a connection.
All that writing, and I didn’t even pull a muscle. Time to keep going. Maybe I’ll write up some adventures for the campaign I’m running…
Sometimes I forget how much I used to ‘cheat’ and grab time to write from various places. A few minutes here, a couple of paragraphs there. These days those moments seem to be filled in, like water flowing down between ice cubes in your glass. The big objects are there and still relatively the same, the spaces in between are suddenly filled.
Here we are 2 weeks into the new year and I haven’t posted anything yet.
Looking back, it makes sense. There are lots of things I don’t share out here on the internet. There are things that people outside of my immediate, real world circle don’t need to know. There are things they don’t get to know. I realize that my readership numbers are not such that this is an actual problem… but perhaps someday. I will continue to treat this as if somebody actually reads this and cares.
So, along those lines I can say that while many things have changed, even more have stayed the same. Something I have noticed though is a distinct continuation of the creativity slump. When I looked back at my previous “welcome to the new year” post it showed that I’d read something more than 30 books that previous year. This past year I didn’t break 20. That’s dismal for me. A deepening slump.
I’ve submitted less of my writing as well. There just hasn’t been the inspiration… and it’s pretty clear that I need a muse. I’ve been pushing along my D&D playing and writing things for that, but it’s not translating into a creative bump the way it used to.
I have all the bits to work on miniatures and terrain… and have slumped terribly there too. It’s just not moving. There’s lots of amazing content out there to teach and show how to create excellent terrain. There are some amazing artists on my socials that show off great works (and let’s be fair, some not so great – but that’s just as helpful in many ways). I still haven’t been able to even muster a dungeon tile set.
So, what do I do? Where do I start?
I don’t know. I don’t have a good answer for that. It fills me with fear that the drive to do those things is seeping away. I love all that creative stuff. I crave great stories. I want my stories, my art, my creativity to be out there and be part of this amazing, creative world… and it’s just not going.
Claiming something and doing something are two different things. I have told any number of people that I have the ability to walk to work at my new place of employment. This is an entirely true statement. It is another thing altogether to actually walk the walk as the saying goes.
So I did it. I walked to work today. I learned a number of things along the way.
First, walking to work should be a matter of personal and environmental health, but actually comes down to schedule and payload. Walking to work requires that I adjust my schedule. Takes me about a half an hour to get there. That’s significantly longer than when I take the car AND totally limits my ability to react quickly / get someplace quickly in an emergency. It also limits how much stuff I can drag with me. Packing my dress shoes, lunch and other stuff into a bag and slinging it over my shoulder doesn’t make for a lot of carrying capacity, as opposed to just tossing stuff into the back seat and then grabbing it again on arrival.
Second, there’s a bias to driving. There are certain things that are simply part of how I consider things when I’m driving. One example is my mask. Masks are required when entering the building I work in. I don’t think about it because my mask is always in my car and I just grab it and go… only I didn’t bring the car. Guess where my mask is? Yeah, still in the car. Had to pick up a temporary mask at the desk on the way in. I realized I forgot something else I needed today. When driving, I’d think very little of popping out at lunch time, doing what I needed and getting back. Today? Not so much. What I forgot is staying at home.
Third, and this is where it gets gross, is environmental concerns. I’m lumping stuff together here as it relates to being active and being outside. No, walking to work shouldn’t qualify as ‘active’ but it’s still a physical activity. It’s an outdoor activity, so the weather the time of day and other people (and their pets) all become part of the equation as well. Bluntly, even when I’m just strolling someplace – I tend to sweat like Conor McGregor at a spelling bee. When I got to the office, I was sweaty under the backpack I was using to carry stuff. I was also outside and it was a damp, foggy morning. I felt pretty damp by the time I got in the building here. It was dark out when I left. I took extra care in crossing any streets. Then there were all the pet owners out with their dogs. There were quite a few – and I had no desire to deal with them. There weren’t any who stayed on my side of the street while I was walking, but the… remains of one such walker were in clear evidence on the sidewalk. Sidestepping that was important. I don’t want to show up at the office smelling like poo.
Once I got up to my desk it actually took me a few minutes to adjust, change shoes, and generally pull myself together after my stroll. Some of the “adjustment” stuff might get easier with practice. Some of it might not. The only way to know, is to walk again… although probably not tomorrow. There’s someplace I need to get to right after work and walking there just isn’t going to cut it.
What I need to figure out next is how to record myself speaking while I take this time to walk. I have a friend who does a ‘cast of his morning walk every day. I’d love to use that time while walking to help push creative things ahead on this page. Hopefully this will continue to be a thing. I’ll keep you all posted!
