the_gneech | Entries tagged with deep thoughts

So NaNoWriMo is going the way of the dodo. Posts about it on Mastodon or Bluesky all tie that to their embrace of AI, but what I’ve seen suggests that they’ve been struggling for some time. Given how excited I was to participate in it once upon a time, I would expect to have stronger feelings about it, but honestly I just don’t. I have reached the stage where I assume unless proven otherwise that enshittification of anything good is a matter of when, not if; as such, I just don’t emotionally invest in such things the way I once did.

But I’d say that NaNoWriMo is an exemplar of a larger trend of the web and post-web era: so many of the web’s best things are just not viable economic concerns, and should never have been treated as such. Just like nobody should reasonably expect to somehow make a living building model trains or hiking mountain trails, “encouraging people to write” is a valuable activity on its own, but trying to make it financially remunerative is just not a thing that will go anywhere. In the same vein as “the Post Office is a public service, not a business,” our culture has an unhealthy fixation on trying to make everything profitable somehow, even things that just aren’t.

There’s a reason so many artists and other creative types can only make a living via some kind of patronage arrangement. Art, writing, other creative pursuits are immensely valuable to society without being profitable, in the same way that exercise or brushing your teeth are valuable to an individual person without being profitable. There are exceptions of course, creative people who can make a living or even thrive through their work—but there are also professional athletes who make a living or even thrive through doing exercise. But those exceptions are extreme outliers.

If NaNoWriMo had stayed in its lane, so to speak, and always been considered a valuable community activity and event instead of a money-making enterprise, it would still be alive and well and beloved by many. (The whole AI thing was a huge blow to their reputation, of course, making the beloved part less of a slam dunk… but who knows how much of the AI thing was a desperation bid to make a profit? I’m not versed enough in the matter to have a meaningful opinion on it.)

So, alas, poor NaNoWriMo. I am proud that I managed to succeed at the challenge once or twice, and I’m grateful for the impetus it gave me. But the truth is it had long stopped being relevant.

-The Gneech

Including this page! I'm not sure what I'm going to do or how I'm going to do it, but I've been having a kind of an odd slow-motion epiphany over the past few weeks, that more or less boils down to "The world is gonna do what the world is gonna do, and wishing it would do something else isn't going to help."

Sounds obvious when I write it down in black and white, I know, but that's kinda the point of an epiphany, you finally actually understand something you've known intellectually all along.

This doesn't mean fatalism or just passively accepting anything that comes my way—I'm not about to just roll over and not try to create things or make the world a better place. But it does mean decoupling my thoughts and emotions from outcomes, and doing my best to let go of "I wish it woulda..."

For example! This very page. This is the rather pale ghost of my LiveJournal, which in its heyday was a major and vibrant part of my life. It was rare that I went a day without posting at least something, and it was much more common to post two or three times over the course of the day. I felt like I had a lot to say, and I felt like people were listening, and there were a lot of other people on my feed that I wanted to hear from.

It was great, and I loved it, but it's gone and not coming back. I can either lament that and wish it wasn't so, or I can look at Dreamwidth, here and now, for what it is, and decide what (if anything) I want out of it.

Right now, I don't know. These days a lot of what I would have posted to LiveJournal goes either to my Patreon, to Mastodon, or to my Discord community. Does this Dreamwidth page offer something that they can't or don't? That's the kind of thing I'm thinking about.

No conclusions yet. :)

-The Gneech

Current Mood: contemplative
Current Location: the apartment with no name

Alas, sales were sluggish again today. While the raw income was higher than yesterday, it was mostly on books, so I’ll end up keeping a bit over half of what I actually brought in. I did have some fun conversations, and got some very nice compliments on my art, but I actually spent most of the day being completely unable to get anyone to look me in the eye. XD

The con is bloody big. It feels like what Dragon*Con felt like back in 2000, except that Dragon*Con had more diversity of content. It feels like the furry fandom has become very self-referential, with a handful of archetypes or themes being repeated over and over again—kawaii cuteness, edgy inversions of kawaii cuteness, proclamation of marginalized identity, or porn. And while any and all of these themes can have value, it’s kind of monotonous for them to be the sum total. Maybe we’re just in a cultural slump (those do come around from time to time), but I can’t think of a single thing that’s jumped out to me as new and distinctive in the fandom recently. The “floor” of craftsmanship has risen quite high—the base level of fursuit now is where the “amazing” ones were when I came into the fandom, for example, but they all kinda look the same.

People keep telling me that they like my art because “it looks like old-school furry,” which, I mean, I guess it would! But… what does “new-school furry” look like? Is it the painterly look of someone like Kenket? Is it 3D VR avatars? I dunno. Does my art look that different from somebody like Kadath?

I don’t know. Be more interesting, furry! XD For all the numerical inflation, you seem to have fallen into a rut. XD

-TG

PS: I did warn you they were random thoughts. XD

Current Mood: contemplative
Current Location: Hyatt Rosemont

It is just the nature of the beast (so to speak) that if you hang out in furry art circles, you see a lot of strange stuff. Lots of young people working out their problems and/or their kinks in a relatively safe anonymized space = art drawn while down mental rabbit-holes.

And, y'know, that's fine. As long as it isn't cruel and doesn't promote bigotry, as long as everybody involved is having a good time... I don't have a beef with it. Much of it is not my bag—I love me some cute fanservice but I'm generally not a fan of straight-up raunch—but in the words of Egg Chen, it's like a salad bar: take what you like and leave the rest.

But sometimes... once in a while... I am confronted with a piece that just makes me stop and go "...Buh?" Sometimes it's a case of "Bodies don't work that way!" (um, just because secretions come from there doesn't make it an orifice), sometimes it's "Why the heck would you get into this???" Occasionally it's "CAN WE PLEASE GET OFF (insert fad that annoys me here)".

I generally keep my thoughts to myself when this happens; I'm not judgey, just confused. But still. What the heck. XD

And yes, this was prompted by a piece of art that crossed my path on social media this morning. XD

-The Gneech

Current Mood: confused
Current Location: Oak Creek II

So my new year's ruminations post perfectly fits the mode of my life for the past few years, by being done nearly a week after I intended, squeezed in between napping in the car after my shift and trying to get something else done this afternoon.

Life has been stressful, friends. So much so that I didn't even mess with my usual yearly review post last year... because it felt like there was no point. :P

I haven't exactly advertised, but I haven't hidden either, that financially we crashed and burned a few years back, when my various job-hunting and entrepreneurial efforts all came up zero, followed by Laurie's job (which had been foreseeably circling the drain for years) finally collapsing in on itself and her own job-hunting and entrepreneurial efforts met with about the same success as mine.

In the time since then, we've been buoyed by the kindness of my sister allowing us to basically use one floor of her house as an efficiency apartment. It's out in the middle of nowhere and we don't have much in the way of kitchen amenities, but there are worse lifeboats. Laurie found a job that was best described as "better than nothing," and I picked up a barista job where we could share the (very long) commute, and that's where we were when 2022 started.

But, in a turn of events I haven't felt since sometime before 2010, this year has actually been better than the year before it. Laurie's job got a serious upgrade, to the point that we're actually looking at getting our own place again, and if we can pull that off, I'm going to pick up my own job-hunting as well. I started picking up extra money as a professional Dungeon Master one night a week, which has been a very interesting experience and increased my own income noticeably. And best of all, I finally managed to find some help getting me through my writer's block on Suburban Jungle in the form of Spiritwolf. With his help I've FINALLY finished issue 8, as well as a working outline for issue 9.

I can't express how huge that is.

So this year, finally, I feel like I have enough of a handle on my life to look at where I am, and set some goals for where I would like to be this time next year. I mean, if the past several years have proved nothing else we don't know what tomorrow will be like, but I do feel like maybe life is taking on a more recognizable shape again. So, 2023... what do I intend to achieve?

1) Move. I am super-grateful to my sister and her crew, but our living arrangements are a pretty significant source of stress I want to clear out of our lives. We may never be back in something as nice as The Hobbit Hole again, and certainly not on our current income, but not losing 2.5 hours to the Beltway every day, having a kitchen of our own, and being able to come home after my shift is done instead of having to find somewhere to put myself until Laurie is off of work will all be huge and free up both time and mental bandwidth for other things.

2) Continue Rough Housing. I'm still looking at probably bringing it to a close after issue 10, which would give me enough material for two large collections and allow me to feel like I gave it a proper run. But as much as I love it, the emotional and financial rewards of it just do not compensate for the time and effort. Once upon a time, when I dreamed of somehow "being a cartoonist" in any meaningful way, working nightly and weekends on Suburban Jungle felt like I was trying to build a future; now it feels more like trying to recapture the past. I don't know if I'll get all the way through issue 10 this year, but issue 8 is done and issue 9 will follow shortly, so it's possible. If nothing else, I'll finally have something new at AnthroCon again.

3) Reclamation Project Year Two. Speaking of having something at AnthroCon, one of my resolutions for early 2023 is to get this book done. I've received several new submissions since Midwest Furfest, and will do one more big call sometime this month. I have too many people who've been waiting too long for this project to move forward, and fans asking for it, to let it stay hung any longer. I don't like being the single largest obstacle to my own project. XD

4) Big Income Boost. I want to live comfortably again. I don't (and never have) cared about the trappings of wealth, I just want a clean and pleasant place with a little space to put my stuff, do my work, and take care of my cat. But what I do care about, is not having to think about money all the damn time. Weighing the probabilities of whether or not the car will die this month, being certain that I can just go to the grocery store and there will be funds to cover it, etc., are more of those sine qua non things that really screw up my productivity, and ironically, the less I need to care about money the more likely I am to bring it in. Whether that boost comes in the form of a traditional job (doing what? I don't know these days), illustration work (I still have those art lessons I invested in and have only used about 1/10th of), or something that has yet to present itself to me, I need to keep my eyes peeled for opportunities on that front.

5) My Health. My day job has me on my feet for several hours each shift, so it's not like I'm not getting any activity, but it's mostly standing in one place or running back and forth over a single 10' space during rush periods; and because I'm eating a lot of Starbucks lunches (on the grounds that it's already payed for), I have gained a lot of weight around the middle. I very much miss my weight lifting and honestly any kind of fun exercise–not that I have much time to get any as it is (see also the 2.5 hours of commuting every day). One of the places we're looking at moving to, we've lived before, and I used to actually enjoy jogging there, so maybe I can do that again. If we end up someplace with a weight room, heck, if we can get our finances to a place where I can set up a VR rig and start playing Beat Saber even, who knows? But the timer is running out before my body decides it doesn't want to play any more and, well, seeing so many of my friends getting old around me, is really starting to upset me.

6) Integrate With My ADHD. Figuring out the ADHD diagnosis a couple of years ago was a giant bombshell, and has been a journey ever since. First was just re-examining my life in the new context, to re-frame so many things I thought of as "character flaws" as instead being "symptoms." Second was to just sort of allow the ADHD some room to breathe, to indulge in the various behaviors it leaned towards instead of fighting them and beating myself up about it, to see what the effects and consequences would be, and learn what approaches were healthy and useful, vs. things that ended up with wasted time, effort, or making things worse instead of better. I'm still in that stage to some extent, but I feel like I'm nearing the end of it. It turns out that, with the exception of the beating myself up part, my ADHD was reasonably well-managed, thanks to a lifetime of building my own support structures and coping methods. Getting back to that state, but now with a healthier sense of self and self-esteem, will make items 1-5 work much more smoothly.

7) Take Control of My Time. All of the above lead to this one, but this one in turn informs and underlines all of them. I started this post talking about how I've spent several days trying to get to a time and place where I could write it, because that's where my life is right now. Laurie and I seem to spend almost all of our time either in the car, or recovering from being in the car. I am in a constant state of trying not to fall asleep where I am (not a good state for driving for hours, let me say), and always four interrupts deep on whatever I have to do, while the ADHD is screaming loudly in my ear about what I want to do. It is, as I said above, stressful. My real goal for 2023, more than anything, is to get ahead of things again, instead of chasing after them. A tall order, yes, but I've been there before and I can be there again.

So, those are my resolutions, if you care to look them as such–my roadmap for the next twelve months. Whenever I get stuck trying to figure out what to do next, I'm going to look at these and think, "Okay, what can I do that serves these goals?"

Hoping for great things... and for the end of Interesting Times.

-TG

Current Mood: thoughtful
Current Location: a Starbucks... somewhere...
Current Music: some bossa nova I don't recognize

So today I happened upon a review of a tabletop RPG called Wanderhome, which is all about furries rebuilding and healing after a devastating war. In that regard it joins Reclamation Project, Kipo and the Wonderbeasts, Biomutant, et al. in the "furries fix the apocalypse" genre, which I am pleased to be a part of, but in the RPG space, it also immediately makes me think of two recent standouts: Burn Bryte and Thirsty Sword Lesbians.

All of these games have as a core premise that they are "all about the feels," so to speak, instead of the usual gaming priorities of killing monsters and taking their stuff. Both Thirsty Sword Lesbians and Wanderhome particularly use the characters' emotional states as the touchstone for their mechanics. This is not a totally new idea: Gumshoe often had characters' chances of success connected to their defined traits, and of course GURPS and the HERO System were famous for disadvantages/flaws (particularly "Psychological Limitations") as character-building components, and that was 1985, guys. XD

But these newer games don't just include this aspect as part of a larger mathematical and narrative framework, they lean into it, hard. It's kind of awkward to use the term "queer" outside the context of sexuality or gender identity, but it's the closest analogue I can think of. Even the straight characters in these games are queer AF. XD These are worlds full of neurodivergent, norm-disregarding, existing-hierarchy-smashing characters, often with a radically kind agenda, and I'm here for it.

That radically kind part is where "cozycore" comes in. Like the aesthetic movement of "cottagecore," this genre is about creating a place of comfort for those who have been traumatized, a warm place to escape a cold world. With the possible exception of Burn Bryte (which is actually hopepunk, a related but noticeably different vibe), these places are cute. They are soft. The over-the-top "Here comes the Evil Queen and oh no, she's hot!" camp of Thirsty Sword Lesbians may not seem like the Frog-and-Toad gentleness of Wanderhome, but what is TSL founded on? The willfully self-indulgent, tropey escapism of fanfic, a world where "hurt/comfort" and "redemption arcs" are foundational pillars.

After forty years of "darker, grittier" all the everything, this is not just a breath of fresh air, but I'm hoping it's a harbinger of a cultural shift in the making. Counter culture becomes popular culture and the fringe becomes mainstream, and lord, if a culture could ever stand to become more kind and way more hella queer, it's contemporary western culture.

Maybe living and dying by the sword can finally give way to just plain living, by the plowshare?

-TG

Current Mood: contemplative
Current Music: InkyGirl meowing for lunch

Well the whole "will he/won't he" scenario went down via the worst possible result, which is unfortunately the tendency of this timeline. #FuckThisTimeline But now that Oblong Putz has started Twitter careening towards the nearest brick wall, hooting "YOLO!" all the way, it's time to re-examine my online presence, and to that end, I want to post here more. DreamWidth is probably never going to capture the "right place right time" phenomenon of LiveJournal, but honestly it's valuable to just write something every day, whether it creates a community or not.

But also? As much as I was joking yesterday, the fiery crash of Twitter might be a blessing in disguise. It was tweeting that had already dealt an unrecoverable blow to everyday blogging before Russia gobbled up LJ, and how many 25-tweet threads should have just been a journal post?

(All of them. The answer is all of them.)

I don't for a second expect people bailing the bird to start posting here in droves; the most patient will move to Mastodon hoping for a Twitter-like. The ones who bounce off of that platform's even-less-pushbutton-than-DW nature will, I'm guessing, end up on Instagram or even (eeeeeew) back on Facebook. But what I'm hoping for is instead a cultural shift. All morning I had a peculiar premonition that the past (mumble) years of Twitter were in some ways an anomaly, a fad with really long legs, the junk food of social media. (And I'm as guilty of chowing down as anybody.)

This is not a prediction–I've been burned enough times by thinking I knew what was ahead to stop thinking that ever about anything. But it is a possibility, and one that I'm excited about.

So one of my projects for this week is to clean up my web presence, and that includes posting thoughts here more often than "once every bazillion years." I don't have the luxury of a desk job any more, so I can't just log in and bang out a post between projects the way I did during the Glory Days of LJ, Mastodon will still be my go-to for quickie posting. But the past three years for me have been largely defined by an inability to focus, and in a lot of ways I just feel like I'm out of practice.

Time to make DreamWidth my practice!

Why DW and not Gneech.com? Honestly, because I want Gneech.com to be a little more formal. I don't want to be posting "Three Good Things" posts or random goofy bits of nonsense there, but here that's totally fair game. That and, crossposting and moderating comments on Gneech.com is a pain. >.> That site, as well as JohnRRobey.com and BringingTheAwesome.com could all use complete reworks, but that's a big project, and right now I only have the bandwidth for incremental improvements.

Also! I'm looking for communities and other ways to connect. If anyone has recommendations, I'd love to hear 'em. :) In the meantime... see you tomorrow. ;)

-TG

Current Mood: hopeful
Current Location: a Starbucks... somewhere...
Current Music: ClariS - Kakurenbo

Watch on YouTube

Last night in his Beat Saber stream, Ink Blitz was asking his viewers about their music preferences, and described mine as “’70s, ’80s, and ’90s stuff,” to which I replied “It’s way more than that!”

Of course, his exposure to “my music” comes mostly from the things I request in his streams, plus music I’ve played on my own art streams etc. in the past, so it’s skewed by things like what’s actually available to request, and what suits the mood of the venue. And in those contexts, it’s true that I gravitate mostly towards bubblegum pop or new wave and ’80s alternative. But that just scratches the surface: I have a deep love for ’30s/’40s swing, Japanese city pop (“that anime sound”), baroque and classical (Mrs. Gneech and I have very different opinions on Vivaldi), bossa nova and calypso, and lots more.

The truth of it is that I approach music the same way I approach just about everything else: I look for depth, I explore the weird corners of genre, and I apply that “bringing the awesome” philosophy of searching for things that are better than they need to be. I like glam and putting on a good show, I give preferential treatment to songs that are about more than just “Baby I Loooove You,” and melody is way better than rhythm. I’m not super-into vamping (once I’ve heard a riff three times, I consider that riff done), I think patter must be used sparingly and with a sense of whimsy or not at all (which destroys 90% of rap for me), and I cannot tolerate anything designed to excuse or comfort small-mindedness or deliberate mediocrity (looking at you, most of country-western).

So you might find me listening to Clannad one minute and Cab Calloway the next, then rolling into a Jazz Butcher song that gets followed up by Lady Gaga. So it’s hard to just point at a genre and say “This is my jam.” My jam is the creative process that went into making the music, at least as much as the time period in which it was composed and the medium it was presented in. There are some genres that I’m more drawn to because they embrace those processes more than others (jazz, new wave, etc. all have that counterculture “done because it’s good first and if it makes a buck that’s fine, too” creed), but I can find music to like just about anywhere.

-TG

As I write this, I’m sitting at the drawing table pictured, wearing the headphones and necklace pictured. The rest is a bit harder to pull off. >.>

So! How was 2018? On the grand social scale, of course, it was a dumpster fire. This is hardly news. All the worst people, frantically trying to destroy not just the USA but the whole world, before it all comes crashing down and they end up shooting themselves in the bunker. It’s as inevitable as it is sad. But those of us who are working to build something better will keep working.

On my own personal front, by comparison, it’s been what you might call a challenging year– not in a drama and angsty way, but in the form of taking on difficult obstacles and working to overcome them. This came mostly through the coach training, which was a deep dive into 49 years of mud and gunk that needed cleaning out, but was also singularly more effective than decades of counseling had been on that front. (Which is not to bag on my counselors over the years, but they just didn’t have the intensive focus of the coach training.)

So, looking back on my plans for the year, how did I do?

Gneech, Life Coach. This is up and running! I have passed my exams with Accomplishment Coaching and I’m about 2/3 of the way to my first ICF certification. Right now I’m working on fluffing up my client base a bit more, and I expect to go on to become a Mentor Coach for next year’s program. I’ve got a coaching blog up and running, and I’m looking forward to big things on this front in 2019.

Help Laurie Get Her Business Running. Well, I did help! She’s still working on it. >.> The business exists, we’re getting our insurance through it, so that’s good! The rest of it is up to her. 🙂

Stable and Reliable Income. This piece is still under construction. As the coaching business grows, it will naturally come to pass.

Figure Out What’s Up With My Writing. Honestly, I just didn’t have time to work on this with the coach training going on. I have a project in place to take this on again in 2019.

Sell. A. Book. Didn’t happen, ‘cos above.

Issues Seven, Eight, and Nine. Seven done. Eight 1/2 way done. Nine will have to come next year.

Continue Fixing the Country. I’ve marched, I’ve voted, I’ve campaigned, I’ve called my reps a million times. It’s an ongoing process.

Take a Vacation. Alas, did not happen.

It essentially boils down to “the coach training was huge and intense and took most of my mental energy.” So a lot of other things didn’t get done while that was happening. I have no regrets, though– this was something I badly needed.

What did happen was that for the first time since I can remember, I really and truly became friends with myself– like, all of myself, even the parts I had not been willing to talk to since I was four. There was a specific moment that I had never forgiven myself or let go of the pain and shame from, which I confronted and processed… finally. Only forty-five years later! But better late than never.

Confronting this moment led to the birth of Nii-chan, about whom I’ve written at length elsewhere. In a lot of ways, she is the best version of me, and whenever I find myself wondering what I want to do about something, or who I should be in a moment, I ask myself “What would Nii-chan do?” She’s like the integrated version of the Three Lions and an Otter, but even her version of Business Guy is a lot happier. (Nii-chan is also practice for my next incarnation, so I can hit the planet running when that comes to pass. I don’t want to waste forty years of my next life trying to figure out what I want to be when I grow up.)

So, yeah. It’s been a big year on that score. But where do I want to go in 2019?

Bring Rough Housing to Its Conclusion. 2019 will be the 20th anniversary of Suburban Jungle, and it seems a fitting place to bring that chapter to a close. My current plan is to finish the story at the end of issue ten. As my hand tremors get worse, it is becoming harder to keep up with what was already an ambitious production schedule, and honestly, I think that story-wise, RH will be done at that point. So I’d rather finish something and feel good about it, than to drag it out to stay within the familiar.

Writing Goals. My goalposts on this front are two short stories sold, an agent secured for Sky Pirates of Calypsitania, a furry novel written for NaNoWriMo, and an anthology project created with FurPlanet.

She-Ra Writing Gig. Seeing Seanan McGuire geek out about landing the writing job on Spider-Gwen made me realize that I wanted that experience in my life. Spider-Gwen is a character that Seanan was pretty much born to write, and honestly, I feel the same about Catra and myself. I have no idea how I’m going to convince the She-Ra writing team to let me on board, but I’ll find a way.

Full Coaching Client Roster. My goal is 14+ clients by this time next year, including five Creativity Klatch clients and three Mentor Coaching clients.

California Trip. I miss Big Sur like whoa.

222 Pounds. Something that wasn’t on my 2018 list was losing weight– so naturally I made big strides on that! XD Specifically I lost 30 pounds since May, bringing me to my lowest adult weight yet. I have another 50 pounds to go to be at my goal weight of 222, but I am confident that I will hit it this year.

Continue Continuing to Fix the Country. Keep going ’til it doesn’t suck.

So, yeah. That’s where I’ve been, where I am, and where I’m going. I think 2019 is gonna be a great year. 🙂

I'm not sure exactly when I picked up the catchphrase "Where Gneeches go, parties follow!" but it has to have been at least the late '90s. I love it because not only is it a statement of intent (to wit, that I will make life a party wherever I go), but also because it's a D&D pun. In any game where I am a player, I am generally in the "party leader" role.

But I have been putting more thought into just what it means lately, and for all its simplicity how really deep it goes into both who I am, and who I want to be, and my deepest values. It's why I create comics, and specifically why I create the KIND of comics I do. It's why I love the furry fandom so much. It's why I like cheesy bubblegum pop music, even knowing that so much of it is intellectual popcorn. It's why the crapsack-worldness of current events has got me so much more riled up than I usually am.

But going into my training as a success coach, one of the things we've already worked on is identifying what our core really is– "If you lived in a perfect world, where everyone was healthy, lived in abundance, and so on... what would you want to bring into it?" Some people come up with answers like "love," "serenity," and so on. My word was "delight."

And on a side-discussion with my counselor today, I mentioned that trying to figure out what it was about California that I wanted in my life that isn't there. "How would California Gneech be different? What's there that isn't here?" And that the answer I had come up with, based on the prevalence of sunshine, and the ability to get out and do stuff year round, was that in my head at least, California was just more fun than the east coast.

And the moment I said this, once again, something in my mind went "click." Why is Suburban Jungle full of blue skies and beaches? Because that's fun. Why do I say "Where Gneeches go, parties follow"? Because parties are fun! (At least if you're doing them right.) What is "Bringing the Awesome!" all about, when you get right down to it?

It's about making life fun. It's about making life a party.

Like so many things, it's obvious in hindsight. But now, I think possibly for the first time in my life, I really understand it. Forty-eight friggin' years old, and I finally got my cutiemark. ;D

Thanks for the revelation, Universe! Sorry I was just too dense to see it before. XD

-The Gneech

Current Mood: excited
Current Location: The Bookshelf
Current Music: Dick Dale– Miserlou

New Year's Resolutions by Grant Snider for Evernote

What to say about 2017? I mean, yeah, lots of the perfectly-predictable awful shit that we were yelling about in 2016 came to pass right on schedule. But most of the adults in the room, once it was clear that it was all going to happen, turned their efforts to slowing, fighting, or just mitigating it as best they could. If 2016 was the year of yelling "Look out, there's a train wreck coming!" then 2017 was the year of hitting the brakes and getting as many people off the train as we could, and 2018 will be the year of cleaning up the mess– and sending as many of those engineers and switch operators to jail (or at least to exile in disgrace) as possible.

And for all the usual suspects wailing and gnashing their teeth on social media that 2017 was the Worst Year Ever, it had its good points. Bee populations have increased by 27%. The snow leopard has been taken off the endangered species list. Scientists have successfully re-bred sections of the Great Barrier Reef.

But on my own personal front? 2017 for me was largely about getting back my mojo (thanks, Austin) and, just as Kimmie predicted, a year for new beginnings.

Austin Powers wishes you a happy new year, you sexy bastard.

Austin Powers wishes you a happy new year, you sexy bastard.

So, reviewing my goals for 2017...

Issues Five and Six, Plus the First Collection. Nailed it. Very pleased. :)

Publish That Book! Nope. -.- Revised it, kept sending it out, still nope. Somebody else published my book. I nearly hulked out and tore the place down. It was not pretty. I don't know what's going on here, the energy around it has turned all weird. This needs addressing.

Finish Another Book! Also didn't happen, despite starting two and putting more work into the the not-Tolkien book from last year as well. As with publishing the Sky Pirates novel, I feel like there's something weird going on with me and my writing, and I need to devote some time to diagnosing and fixing the problem in order to move forward next year.

Start a Company. Progress... but not in the direction we were going at the time. XD The project laurie_robey and I were working on at the time was going to be a sort of "lifestyle magazine/blog/podcast" kind of thing where we highlighted local features, organizations, points of interest, hidden treasures and the like, a more mainstream "Here's cool stuff about [city]!" kinda like ProudToBeAFurry.org was intended to be for the furry fandom. That particular project ended up not having any legs, as evidenced by how easily we got distracted onto other things... but it was replaced by the serious pursuit of commercial drone photography on her part, and life coaching on mine. Go fig! More about those below.

Move to California. Well... no. We moved back to Virginia instead. XD But honestly, I'm fine with that, and I'll tell you why: there was too much baggage. I was fixated on going to California like Thorin fixated on the Arkenstone, and it was completely messing with my head. That fixation drove my willingness to sell the Hobbit Hole (which was a mistake it took me three years to realize how much I regretted), caused a lot of stress to our relationship, and was leading me down paths that would have led to me being just as miserable in California as I ever was in Virginia or Maryland. And if nothing else, being in Maryland highlighted a lot of the good things about Virginia that I knew I would miss, but didn't truly realize how much. Now, we may still go out there someday. I love Big Sur like crazy and will probably continue to nurse daydreams of Pismo Beach and San Luis Obispo. But if/when that happens, I want it to be for the fun and joy of it, not the kind of desperation that was making me stupid about it before.

Stronger faster slimmer better. Didn't happen this time around. I have lost some weight at the B&N job by virtue of salads for lunch and being on my feet all day, but I spent a lot of time in Maryland sitting like a lump eating comfort food.

Bring the Awesome! This has been working! And paying dividends. My mood is up, we are in a new place we like better, we're making progress on careers. The "Unsuck Our Lives" project is paying off!

Edit Myself Less. This is kind of a hard one to report on, because it hasn't come up as much as I expected. I mean, I have been pretty much speaking my mind when I felt like it needed to be spoken, so mission accomplished? But I also haven't been in as many situations where the inclination to keep things to myself was a problem, so it hasn't been that much of a challenge. Honestly? I'm fine with that.

Reverse course and mitigate/repair damage to the country. Been doing this. Lots of marching, calling various reps, supporting grassroots organizations and spreading the word. And it is helping, in ways both big and small. We've still got a lot of work ahead of us, but there are more good people in this country than there are assholes, and we're going to win.

So, a mixed year, but definitely more positive than negative for me.

Where to in 2018?

Gneech, Life Coach. Next weekend is a "trial session" of professional training from Accomplishment Coaching, and assuming that goes well, I will be enrolled for a year's course leading towards my first level of certification by the ICF. Life coaching is a bit like the I.T. world, where there's no legal requirements and anyone can hang out a shingle and get freelance work, but accreditation by professional organizations definitely helps you build both your skills and your reputation. The Accomplishment Coaching program is also designed to get you up and running with a practice quickly– which means having income again. This is a good thing. ;) I have some ideas about where I'd like to go with the career, but they're all fairly vague right now and I have a lot to learn first. But I'm excited to get into it!

Help Laurie Get Her Business Running. I'm probably too close to Laurie to be an effective life coach for her– but I can support her, help provide resources, and so on.

Stable and Reliable Income. Items one and two, combined, become this. ;) Followed up with clearing debts, building savings, and getting back to investment.

Figure Out What's Up With My Writing. Seriously. My hard drive is littered with perfectly-sellable books that for whatever reason I'm not getting anywhere on. Sky Pirates of Calypsitania is now something like four years old without selling, while other authors are succeeding with it. It's a lot like the whole thing of people looking at Suburban Jungle, saying the art is great, and then not buying the book. Do I have something weird going on psychologically with making money from creative pursuits?

Sell. A. Book. Pursuant to above.

Issues Seven, Eight, and Nine. Because that would be awesome.

Continue Fixing the Country. 2018 elections are going to be huge and important and I'm going to work with Flippable, Indivisible, and others to kick serious ass in this department.

Take a Vacation. Laurie wants to see New England, and I'd enjoy that too. Maybe in the fall? We'll see how finances and schedule can be arranged.

In a lot of ways, these feel a lot less "dramatic" than previous years' goals, but also less melodramatic, too. Instead of going into 2018 with dread, terror, or even guns blazing, I've got a feeling of calm purposefulness, and I think that will serve me well. This year's post isn't a manifesto, it's a game plan, and I kinda like it that way.

It's a little early for bedtime, so I'll just say "Good afternoon, world, and have an awesome new year." ;)

-The Gneech

Current Mood: good
Current Location: The Bookshelf
Current Music: Strawberry Alarm Clock– Incense and Peppermints (in my head)

I have decided that, as much as it annoys me, I am once again going to have to punt on NaNoWriMo, because, just like last year, November is just too damn crammed full of stuff. The big one is moving, but even that could be handled except for picking up the seasonal job at Barnes & Noble. Between now and the end of November, I have three days off: one is Thanksgiving, one is Moving Day. The rest of the time, I'm doing 8-hour retail shifts during the height of Christmas shopping season.

When you combine that with a half-baked story outline, and the fact that my mind is in a completely different space because I am all interested in coming up with new career and money-making options now that we're moving back to Virginia, you end up with NaNoWriMo simply being too far down on the list of priorities. On top of all that, I don't want

laurie_robey to be doing all the packing and moving herself, again. We've moved like that way too many times, never again.

But fear not, dear readers! I am still going to write the book, and it wouldn't surprise me if I finish it by the end of January, but I am not going to cram on it for NaNoWriMo. Instead I'm going to go back and write up a proper outline using the ~22k words I have already as a launching pad. I know my basic cast, I know a lot of the core issues of the book, and I know generally where I want it to go, so that's a good foundation. But I discovered when writing Tend On Mortal Thoughts and Sky Pirates of Calypsitania, that I really, really like having a complete and fairly detailed outline; writing without one makes me feel like I'm trying to create a sculpture out of pudding.

I plan to write at least two novels between now and the end of 2018, of which this year's NaNoWriMo project (Child of the Tower) was one. The other is the Sky Pirates prequel. These books have two separate markets and eventual fates: Child of the Tower is intended to be the first in a new series of furry fantasy novels, while Clockwork Caper (the Sky Pirates prequel) will go to mainstream publishers, either as fantasy or teen fantasy/adventure. I do at some point need to fall in love with Clockwork Caper as its own thing– right now I still kind of think of it as a vehicle for finally getting Sky Pirates of Calypsitania on the shelves. (What can I say? I love Sky Pirates of Calypsitania. Not only is it the best thing I've written so far, it's also exactly the kind of book I wish I could read.)

So, About Those Money Goals...

I have put a lot of thought into creating a career lately, because what I've been doing just ain't cutting it. I enjoy both my art and my writing, but I haven't gotten to the point where I'm making the kind of money I want and need from it, nor have I found a way to make myself approach and think of it as "a real job." I haven't nailed down why this is, but I'm also tired of gazing into my navel about it and just want to get on with life already. To that end, I am now looking at other options.

I have also figured out that my "rebel tendency" nature has been sabotaging me on a lot of fronts, that one included. My secondary tendency is "obliger," and so while as a rebel I resent having to have customers or clients, as an obliger secondary I'm a lot more likely to actually DO something if I've promised some not-me person that it will be done. So as weird as it may sound, one possibility I am looking at is that of a life coach.

The various aptitude tests I've gone though (such as the Highlands Ability Battery) always come up with "writer" at the top (for obvious reasons), but also tend of have "counselor" highly rated. My problem with that has always been the same reason I never became a veterinarian despite my love of animals: I have an overactive empathy, and I don't want to get tangled up in other people's (or creatures') trauma and pain. I know counselors often find it cathartic; I suspect I would just turn into an emotional wreck.

But a life coach? That's a different matter. First of all, it's not so personal. I don't need to know that someone was sexually abused by their neighbor as a child in order to help them become successful or build new lives. Furthermore, assuming I'm good at what I do, my "mission accomplished" moments will be success stories, where I've helped people create richer, fuller, and more satisfying lives and make the world a better place. Who wouldn't want that?

And, let's not mince words here, being good at it can also make you rich too, almost as a necessary side-effect. Who's going to be interested in getting you to help them get their lives in order, if you're living on what was supposed to be your retirement and hating your own life? Life coaching is one of the few professions where being rich and happy is actually a job requirement. XD

But the thing is? I think I could do it. As

inkblitz says, I've got a lot of experience in life. The pain of losing so many people in so short a time, overcoming depression, denial, and deep-rooted self-worth issues, have certainly taught me a thing or two about getting through (and over) one's crap. And if

jamesbarrett's sister's declaration that I am an indigo has any kind of truth beyond sheer crackpottery, then not only can I use my gifts to help the world, it is literally what I came to this planet to do.

Right now, I've got a lot to learn and figure out about the idea. I don't know the ins and outs of life coaching, or even how one gets trained in such things other than reading a lot of self-help books. ¬.¬ But I do have resources! Besides the entirety of the internet, I have my counselor to consult. She's a trained professional and I've spoken to her and I know she has colleagues who actually are life coaches. Plus, well, I work in a freakin' bookstore. I'm sure I can find some interesting and useful materials there! ;D

While I was sitting around waiting for my shift to start earlier today, I put together this as a preliminary to-do list on the topic:

Get life together ;P

How does one do it?

Make contacts/find mentors

What does it entail?

How make money?

Running a biz/managing money

Building a brand

Gotta deal w/ Rebel Tendency!

Possibly create a Rebel Tendency Support Group? ;)

So right now it looks like that's where the rest of my energy in 2018 is likely to go. Between all of that, and Laurie building her drone photography or other businesses, it's going to be a very interesting year. But it's gonna be soooooo much better than the ones leading up to it have been!

I'm pretty darn excited, actually. :) It's really nice to be looking forward to my life again. But now, I need some sleep. G'nite world, and have an awesome tomorrow. Turkey Day tomorrow! Remember to go to Shout Factory starting at noon EST for the MST3K Turkey Day Marathon! We sure as heck will be.

-The Gneech

Current Mood: excited
Current Location: Ginger Court
Current Music: Super Freak, in my head

I've been re-listening to Jen Sincero's You Are a Badass and You Are a Badass at Making Money on my rides to and from Barnes and Noble, and one of the things she talks about is your relationship with money, as evidenced by the things you say about it. And there's no denying that I grew up getting all kinds of messed-up messages about money from my parents.

( Idea the First: I Can't Have Nice Things... )

Current Mood: contemplative
Current Location: Ginger Court
Current Music: Enya– As Baile

re: Veterans Day, my dad served in the South Pacific in WWII. He hated everything about it and would not willingly talk about it. He was strongly anti-war, anti-militarism, and anti-imperialist the rest of his life. The conflation of “military” with “patriotism” was something that particularly irritated him, although in his usual fashion he would just mutter and give sullen looks about it.

I think it’s important that in recognizing the service of veterans, we also recognize that America has a strange, almost cult-like fascination with violence that we need to address. Our video games and movies et al. are created to breed violent, competitive young males, so they can be pointed across the sea like attack dogs. The current flareup of fascism is directly related to this.

If WWII, often hailed as the last “morally justified war” could do so much damage to my dad, I can only imagine what the neverending war since then has done to countless Americans and the world.

I love my dad. In his memory, I do what I can to move us to a better way of life.

Anyway. Just a thought I had.

-The Gneech

Current Mood: contemplative
Current Location: Ginger Court

Feel like crap for no good reason today. Trying to grind through because there's a lot of stuff I want to get done and there will always be things trying to prevent me from doing them, so when those things are my own internal bad wiring I can at least say "no" to that.

Through a roundabout path I recently happened upon Gretchen Rubin's concept of "four tendencies" and discovered that, true to form, I have the rarest and most problematic tendency, that of "rebel." The tendencies are based on how you respond to expectations, whether internal or external.

Upholders respond strongly to both internal and external expectations. They tend to be sticklers for the rules, but also self-motivated and with a moral code that can override the outer laws and traditions of the world around them. Hermione Granger is listed as an archetypal upholder; I'm not sure if I actually know any personally.

Questioners respond strongly to internal expectations, but not so much to external ones. They always want a satisfactory explanation for anything– if they don't think there's a valid reason to follow a rule or complete a project, they won't. laurierobey falls into this category. I suspect Sirfox is as well, but it's harder to tell.

Obligers respond strongly to external expectations, but not so much to internal ones. These are people who can stick to an exercise regimen if they've got a buddy or a class, but will immediately stop as soon as nobody's "checking up" on them. Sandy Rathbun was in this group, and I suspect so was Mammallamadevil.

Rebels do not respond well to external or internal expectations. They can be summarized as "You can't tell me what to do– and I can't tell me what to do either." Once they decide they want to do something, there's no stopping them, but until they want to do something, you can expect them to resist with all they've got. That includes things they decided a month ago that they wanted to do, but that they don't want to do right now, which can lead them to be just as frustrating to themselves as they are to the people around them. Like I say, I am a rebel. So is Hantamouse, which is simultaneously why the two of us get along and why the two of us fight.

There's a lot more to the framework than just this, and it's also just a tool, not some magical solution to figuring out personality quirks and interactions and things. But within the framework, I think there's some interesting insights.

I was at a presentation by Ms. Rubin, and I tried to ask (but didn't get called on), "If a rebel instinctively says 'no' to any expectation, even their own, how are they supposed to keep from eventually sliding into a Bartleby-esque catatonic state of just never wanting to do anything?" I hoped that her book might have an answer for that question, but I have since discovered that... no, not really. The book had very simplistic reverse-psychology suggestions along the lines of "I bet you can't lose 20 pounds in ten weeks!" Seriously? What am I, seven?

But this is a problem that I have found myself facing over the past few years since being effectively self-employed. I used to hate my day job fiercely, and come home to work on my writing/art/etc. with the zeal of a workaholic because it was what I wanted to do. Now, the writing/art/etc. is my day job, but instead of being energized and excited and kicking ass, I am now fighting with the constant desire to sleep all day or play video games or whatever else instead.

A devotee of the four tendencies would say that's my rebel nature, and it may very well be. But that just puts a label on it, it doesn't actually give me any tools to combat the problem.

I have contemplated going back to a day job just to give me something to channel my resentment back into other than my own work. But as I get older, I don't have the endurance I used to. That Starbucks job I had in late 2015 was only part time and still left me feeling dead most of the time. I can only imagine how wrecked I would be trying to go back to 40 hours of writing code or something similar at 6 am in the friggin' morning. I can't deny the pay would be better, but if it left me too tired to do my real work, it would be literally selling my soul.

I know that I am motivated by desire. Everything I've accomplished was because there was something I wanted to happen. I created Suburban Jungle because I wanted there to be a comic like Suburban Jungle for me to read. I wrote Sky Pirates of Calypsitania because I wanted to read a book like Sky Pirates of Calypsitania. But right now I'm in a mental and emotional spot where desire is hard to come by. Grief has damaged my ability to feel enthusiasm. Frustration has damaged my ability to feel hope.

So right now, I am operating on almost 100% pure stubbornness. Which is frankly exhausting. So I guess on reflection it's not quite so random a blugh, nor quite a case of feeling like crap for no good reason. I'm fatigued.

-The Gneech

Current Mood: tired
Current Location: Ginger Court

I spent the morning grinding my gears on this stupid question of the test in SF, and eventually looked at it this way:

BEST CASE SCENARIO: I ace the test, they call me to fly out to SF again in a couple of weeks for interview, and if I get hired we start frantically moving, for a civil service job which while it would pay the bills is unlikely to be exactly thrilling or remunerative in one of the top three highest-rent places on the meta-flipping PLANET, causing me to probably be job hunting again in six months.

WORST CASE SCENARIO: I run up more debt on the credit card, don't get the job, have to cope with another discouraging rejection, and am still grinding away on the job hunt.

DETERMINING FACTORS: Who knows? I might be their star candidate and the test is a formality, they're just not allowed to say so. Or like I said before, they might have a chosen candidate already and are just forced to go through the "we tested other candidates" dance. Without at least having a phone interview first, I'm going in completely blind.

So all of it was a roll of the dice, and historically, dice are not kind to me. It's a recurring joke in my gaming circles, actually, that I create these crazy twinked-out powergaming characters, only to be constantly foiled by my inability roll higher than 33% of the desired result. I've long ago given up betting on anything but the most stacked-in-my-favor odds, and even then I prefer the sure thing if it's available.

But the worst part of it all, honestly, was the feeling of desperation. Being so set on the idea of some job, any job, out in CA, that I'd be willing to hop on a plane blind to the outcome, is just inviting the bad wolf to come and bite me in the neck. So I e-mailed the job contact asking if they had any options for remote testing. She replied that they didn't, so I thanked her for the opportunity and withdrew my application.

She said, "I'm sorry to hear this," which is the most information I've received about it one way or the other, but I also note that she's not sorry enough to try to change my mind, either. And I also didn't get the information until it was too late for it to be useful, so... ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

Identifying that feeling of desperation was the clinching factor me, tho. Frankly? I'm tired of chasing things. Whether it's a job, or a book sale, or trying to get someone I like to hang out with me, whatever it is. The never-ending pursuit of ______, sometimes to the point of going down crazy mental rabbit-holes, has got to stop.

Universe, you can start chasing me, instead.

I still want to go to California, but I'm not going to tie myself into knots to do it. I'm going to keep applying to jobs that will get me there in style, but I'm not going to enslave myself to the idea in the meantime. If it's just a matter of paying the bills, I can find work around here (or work that does not require an office at all) that will do that in the meantime.

It's kinda what I was getting at a while back about "How would California Gneech actually be different?" There's no point in setting myself up to be living a life of quiet desperation on the left coast instead of the right coast. At the end of the day, the externalities of where I am have less to do with my development and state of mind than the internalities of who I am. Until I can find and maintain my own core without worrying about what's going on around me, moving to California is like changing the cosmic desktop wallpaper. It is prettier, but it doesn't actually make things better.

-The Gneech

Current Mood: contemplative
Current Location: the center of the universe
Crossposts: http://the-gneech.livejournal.com/2687105.html

The devs working on my life have apparently gotten stuck on what's supposed to happen next, because I've been stuck grinding this same level for a year now.

It wouldn't be entirely accurate to say that no progress is being made: I'll soon have another issue of the comic out the door, and a new project officially launches on Monday. I am back down below 300 lbs and continuing to improve on that front. But the "waiting for _______ to get here" theme that has been a defining element of my life for way too much forever, is still there, and I am honestly pretty sick of it.

After conferring with all affected parties, California is waiting on the appearance of a job. To that end, I've been sending off applications, an average of 4-6 a week, and I have had some interviews, but the net result keeps being "We want someone with more formal experience." A story that I had thought was sold came back when the anthology it was sold to got cancelled; I immediately sent it off to another another anthology, but it was declined. I have received polite no-thank-you's from almost all the agents I sent the Sky Pirates book to, and the remaining ones I don't expect to hear from, meaning that to carry that any further, I'm going to have to go back to square one and find a whole new batch of agents to send it to... or write another book.

In LoA circles, the general advice is to act as if you've already got what you want, and life will arrange itself accordingly. So I've been trying to figure out: okay, if I could snap my fingers and just have the life I wanted today, what would actually be different? How would Fully Actualized Gneech in California look and act differently from Grinding Gneech in Maryland? What is it that I picture being different?

Unfortunately, the answer all seems to be in externalities. Sunnier days, being closer to the beach and being more active outside generally, more of my friends in one localized area, that kind of thing. But when I think about what's actually bugging me right now, it's mostly concerns about finances, worry about the piss-poor state of the country and the broken climate, and feeling isolated. The finances and the isolation I could theoretically fix here by finding a local job (and/or selling some friggin' books) and using Meetup.com to find some clubs or a gaming group or something. The country and the climate are larger, long-term problems that are going to be problems anywhere. I have been avoiding digging in locally because I don't want to have to dig back out whenever the theoretical California job appears... but that leaves me floating in limbo.

Honestly, if I could get around the money problem, the rest would fall naturally into place. Drawing comics and writing books are things I naturally do, those are my "vocation." Turning them into a source of comfortable income is the place where I always run into trouble. It was fine when

laurie_robey was bringing in sufficient income for the both of us, but that isn't the case any more and we have to deal with that.

I think I need to go back and do a refresher on what I actually want my life to be like, the proverbial "ideal day" exercise, and do a little compare/contrast to figure out how it's different from my actual not-so-ideal life and why. Then I can refocus on concrete ways to move from the one, to the other.

-The Gneech

Current Mood: thoughtful
Current Location: Ginger Court
Current Music: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SF58Lsvqg5E
Crossposts: http://the-gneech.livejournal.com/2684868.html

From the Metaquotes LiveJournal Community...

"Why are you writing to your elected representative instead of seeking to overthrow a foreign government from your living room" is a question that I feel answers itself.

-The Gneech

Current Mood: amused
Crossposts: http://the-gneech.livejournal.com/2683508.html

I woke up in the midst of a fierce mental debate, which I can only assume my brain was already having with itself while I was asleep, on the topic of how a society inoculates itself against memetic viruses. In particular, I'm thinking of the current kerfluffle in the furry community about quasi-fascist furry groups. [1]

Fascist ideas are best compared to a virus that infects tolerant societies. The same way an actual virus uses your own body's mechanisms to invade and destroy, fascist ideas use the mechanisms by which oppressed or disenfranchised groups in a tolerant society claim their civic liberties, to co-opt, overtake, and destroy those liberties for everyone else.

A story I recently encountered (now lost to the vagaries of the internet, because there's been so much churn) illustrated this perfectly. Someone who was a bouncer in London bars back in the '80s and '90s was explaining why they had a blanket "no skinheads" policy, and it boiled down to this: one or two skinheads would come into a bar, buy their drinks, and just sit quietly. Fine. Then a couple more would come in and sit with them. Then a few more. And as long as they didn't get kicked out, they'd keep coming in until there were eight or ten or more, and then they would start harassing the other bar patrons, spewing racial epithets and other hate, and from there it was either a fight or a police raid. So the bar would kick them all out and refuse to serve them.

Then it would be quiet for a while.

Then one day, one or two skinheads would show up and say, "Look man, I don't want trouble, I just want a drink." And, in a tolerant society, the inclination is naturally to say, "Yeah, that's reasonable, okay."

But then a couple more will come in and sit down...

And so it goes. So it has gone through pretty much all of recorded history. This is why so many people have a blanket policy of "Always punch nazis." Because you can punch nazis when there are a few of them, or punch nazis when there are a lot of them, but eventually, you will have to punch nazis.

So much for the tolerant left! WHAM

There are legit problems with this stance. It's too easy to just call everyone you don't like "nazi," just for starters. One reason I've always taken people to task for throwing terms like "fascist" and "nazi" around over the past decades is that the words lose their meaning. So in 2016, when we had actual, real, not theoretical fascists marching into power, people like me who objected to this were told again and again that we were overreacting. (SPOILER: We weren't.)

But the biggest legit problem with the "always punch nazis" stance (or "always ban skinheads" or whatever variant you employ), is a matter of logical consistency. On what basis can you say that it is not just all right but is in fact a moral imperative to ostracize fascism, that can't be then turned around and made into a tool of fascism?

I call this the Cake Conundrum. I.e., if I refuse to bake a nazi-flag cake, do I have a case to be upset when someone refuses to bake a cake for a gay wedding?

The answer here is yes, and I have a reason for that answer, but it is such a super-fine line of distinction that it's very hard to make work on a societal level, because it's all about context.

A gay couple getting married are, by definition, making a commitment on how they will conduct their own behavior, and live their own lives. Their choice does not threaten anyone else.

Fascism is built on the foundational idea of exalting one chosen group at the expense of all the rest. That is inherently a threat to the rights of everyone who is not a member of that group.

In a tolerant society, the former, even if it squicks you out, doesn't hurt other people, and therefore is legit. The latter, even if it gives you perks, hurts others, and therefore is not. [2]

This is why the term "hate speech" was coined, to give a name to this distinction between "things that are socially divergent but don't actually do harm" and "things that actually harm others." On a societal level, whether you prefer to snuggle guys or gals is no different from whether you prefer stuffing or potatoes. But if you want to ostracize, enslave, or kill other people? That is different.

It is a weird contradiction that the argument boils down to "It's okay to ostracize ostracizers." And I don't think it will ever stop seeming weird. But I don't see how you can have a functional and still free society without it.

Once again, it's like the virus model. Being intolerant of intolerance is the vaccination that prevents the virus of fascism from being able to invade and destroy.

-The Gneech

(Note: Comments closed because I have better things to do than listen to the usual trolls coming out of the woodwork and trying to distract, deflect, and distort. If you want to have an honest discussion on the topic, I can be reached through private channels.)

[1] Yes, there really are such things, as bonkers as it sounds. Forgetting for a moment the extreme cognitive dissonance of "I love fluffy adorable animals, and genocide!" I don't think I'll ever understand how "I've been ostracized and it feels bad..." translates into "And now I want to do it to everyone else!"

[2] There are people, and mind you I know 'em, who are like, "Eh, fascists aren't that bad..." These people are generally white, straight, and (almost always) male. In other words, "it's not a problem for me, therefore it's not a problem." This is the definition of privilege, and it really pisses them off when you say so. But it really pisses me off when I see it, so.

Current Mood: contemplative
Crossposts: http://the-gneech.livejournal.com/2680353.html

The other day

inkblitz posted a little thing about seasonal depression, which prompted a thought in my mind that I wanted to observe.

I've known Blitzy for something like five years now. We were thrown together by our online RP group but pretty much immediately clicked. And while the RP group is not the focus of either of our lives any more, the friendship has endured. By the standards of, say, high school or college friendships, we're practically blood brothers. But the thing is, we met as adults– in my case, as a middle-aged adult in particular. So for me, a period of five years, while nothing to sneeze at, still counts as being "recent developments."

When we met, I was still in the darkest parts of grief, and quite often depressed; during one of my conversations with Blitzy at the time, I said that having met me after my friends and family started dying left and right, so constantly mired in grief, in many ways he hadn't met "the real me."

But when did I stop being "the real me"? How long can an extended period of grief last before that is "normal"? My father died in 2011 after a long and stressful decline; Kerry died in 2013. I met Inkblitzer somewhere between those two events, and they've cast a long shadow ever since– as have the deaths of Sandy, FrostDemn, Buddha, my aunt Iris, and my mom, and the loss of our house and jobs of 15+ years, all in the same cluster. It's not like my grief was unwarranted. ¬.¬

But recently, something has shifted in me. I'm not sure exactly how, why, or when, although I did comment on it a little while back. I have started being myself again. I still miss everyone that I've lost, and it's not like I'm feeling peachy-keen about all the crap currently going on in the world, but there's an important internal difference.

I'm fine in the moment. I'm thinking about where I am and what I'm doing, instead of thinking about how much pain I'm in or what I've lost. The emotional wounds, as it were, seem to have scarred over. This manifests mostly in a better mood, a sunnier outlook, and a lighter, more playful approach to just about everything. I'm back to treating life like a party or an adventure, rather a slog that I have to just keep pushing through. When I think of "the real me," that's what I think of, the guy who wants to make everything more awesome, not the guy who is stubbornly refusing to give in and just sink to the bottom.

I mentioned to Blitzy that I was finally the real me again; he said, "I think I met the real you enough. At least at conventions. But yeah, I'm seeing more of convention you in general."

So I wonder. Maybe "the real me" isn't a fixed point, so much as an aggregation, and the me that was fighting through all that crap was "really" me too, me bearing the weight of what I was going through. But it still feels like being a different person.

-The Gneech

Current Mood: contemplative
Current Location: Ginger Court
Current Music: Debussy: Reverie
Crossposts: http://the-gneech.livejournal.com/2678573.html

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gneech.com -- John "The Gneech" Robey's writing, comics, and art.

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