Well, the past few days could have been a damned sight better, but now I am starting to see a whole bunch of things come home. One of them is part of me, and it's the one that I've tried to avoid.
I'm going to add a link at the bottom of this blog, which is by Stephen Fry. It is about four days old, but in it are some chilling and very sad details of what he tried to do to himself last year.
I've been there...not gone to the extent he did, but in the planning stages, and facing down a bottle that would send me straight to oblivion and whatever afterlife there might be.
Just so you know, this is NOT on my to-do or "Bucket List." Forgive me, but I fucking hate the latter term! If you have to fill a bucket with all your dreams and delusions, then you are not living life! You are still fantasizing about it!
As Henry Rollins said, "DON'T THINK ABOUT IT! JUST DO IT!"
At the same time...do we realize you cannot always just do it?
The process of life is one of hurry the fuck up and wait a while. I've been doing that. I'm waiting a long while for work, and my prospects are few. I keep plugging away in the hope that the luck will change, and I'll find employment in a field that actually values my presence in it.
That said, I've had to take the step of seriously considering selling the one thing I have that would give my future stability: my land.
This is my retirement, and hopefully it can remain there and we'll see what happens for the time in between.
I have long dreaded being in the place I was 20 years ago, when I was still paying my dues and watching the world pass me by. I eventually made my way up into that, and am back down yet again.
But I'm not done yet.
I am awaiting the results of the cover idea for "Parasite Girls," and then eventually we will get that out there in the eBook world. Meanwhile, I am looking for the follow-up, and I have plenty to do with there. But what one?
More and more, I think a lot of my stuff just is not ready, yet.
http://www.behance.net/torygates
Here is a new site, where the proof opening to "PG" shall be found. Also, the opening bit to "The Drifters" is here. See what you think. There will be more eventually.
Now...back to that darkening set of clouds on the horizon: I'm seeing it manifest elsewhere. Without going into dramatic detail, one of my relatives is suffering greatly from something I've written about in "Parasite Girls," but I can't even begin to describe what some are facing.
And what it does to those around that person, well you can pretty much tell.
I am sympathetic, and somewhat empathetic to the deal, because I'm in it. Sometimes I look further, and realize I am losing the ability to get beyond my own issues.
Even with all the optimism in the world, it's hard to find a future. I don't see much of one, and yet I have to say to myself that I will secure one somehow.
I see little hope for advancement in my chosen field, and even less in others. I find myself also wondering just how I am to progress in other areas. For all the idealism that things are improving, some of us are not.
One reason involves the technological changes--the world got ahead of me. One of my failings is a lack of aptitude and understanding of the computer age. As much as I'm interested in them, and enjoy what they can do, I don't understand how they work.
My mind is not that scientific. It is not that analytical. I wish it was, but then I'd wish too much.
I have opted out of a lot in recent years, and it's got nothing to do with personal issues with others. I just don't want to be bothered.
Stephen writes about that in the blog...some of us really do like our own company. He does not seem to unless he's busy.
I am a person that does not mind his own company, but going home to just my cats (though all know how I love them) is not good. I go home home to a shack I rent, and the devastation I plus the animals leave, well, you can imagine why I'm at my Office all the time.
The need for human contact is there, and I suppose that's why I'm here now. Problem is...I am having a very hard time interacting with the people that I SHOULD BE.
Nothing anyone's done, please understand. But I don't feel a damn thing in common with my colleagues...at all.
Is that why I write? Is that where these novels of angst, depression, abandonment and odd fantasy come from? I suppose I am writing because I am writing the world I wanted to see, and never did.
I still don't see it.
The title of the blog is from a Gordon Lightfoot song, "End of All Time." It's ended up in "The Drifters," and kind of fits. My own songs just do not for this story.
I must move on...I do at times with for the company of others, and perhaps that one that while we should not think about all the crazy stuff people do, but where is that contact, that comfort and familiarity? I don't see it here. I don't see it anywhere.
Anyway, here's what Stephen wrote:
http://www.stephenfry.com/2013/06/24/only-the-lonely/
I know how he feels. I know how my relative feels, and yet I can't even go there because I don't have that.
