The Spectrum of Metafiction (Interview in Bomb Magazine)
Wendy J. Fox, author of the fabulous short story collection WHAT IF WE WERE SOMEWHERE ELSE interviewed me for Bomb Magazine. We talked about tech lingo, parenting, metafiction, emoji vs. emoticons, writing about a writer as a way to write, and a bunch of other fun and crooked topics.
some honest and chaotic thoughts about creativity and book launch week (with A LOT of pictures)
So I did a reading at historic Powell's Books on Tuesday — the day of my book launch. But I also decided to use the days leading up to the book launch to push out all kinds of crazy creative things. I’m not positive that I can come to a grand conclusion about what this all means. But I’ll try, and at the very least, I can meander us through a picture-filled story that involves books and apps and social media and videos and music and essays and podcasts, and then I can land us (in the final postscript) inside a messy gazpacho filled with guilt and passion and triumph. Who wouldn’t want to go on that kind of adventure!?!?!? 🎢🛼🚌
8 musical shorts from an insecure writer (video)
About a year ago, somewhere in the dark corridors of 2021, I got stuck in my creative life. At the same time, I knew that my novel was going to come out with Red Hen Press in 2022 and I wanted to keep creating things. So what I did was take some of the basic stuff I learned about music from my friend Joey Helpish, along with some of the struggles I was feeling about the creative process… and I made eight, short, awkward, animated music videos about my creative struggles. In the past few weeks I’ve posted them on TikTok and Instagram, but since I totally don’t know what I’m doing on those platforms, I also compiled them together into one video (with some explanations between songs) for YouTube. And here it is. 📽📽📽
Book Launch Day!
🤯😵💫 OK. Holy shit. My book is officially out the door today! I ONLY CRY WITH EMOTICONS with Red Hen Press. I can't believe the day has arrived. I can't tell you how many people I should thank for this. It takes a community to write a book as far as I can tell. Thank you to all the dear people. For more info about the book, check out my book page. (And the latest episode of the Neurotic Tornado 😫🌪 podcast covers stage fright, book launch nerves, and a bizarre peeing nightmare. We also invite Jackie Shannon Hollis to talk about her public speaking experience with her memoir, This Particular Happiness out with Forest Avenue Press.)
#️⃣🔢 In the meantime, here are some crazy statistics about writing I ONLY CRY WITH EMOTICONS for you to ponder:
The Depression and Anxiety Episode (podcast)
With my novel (I Only Cry with Emoticons) coming out in just a few weeks, I figured it would be a good time for us to discuss my relationship to depression and anxiety over the years. Turns out that I used to date depression but now I'm hooking up with anxiety. So... yay??? Check out the latest Neurotic Tornado 😫🌪 podcast episode.
Gatekeepers & Creativity (video)
My novel is coming out in just a few weeks! And I’m thrilled to be publishing the book with a great press like Red Hen Press. At the same time, it’s been on my mind that—right now—we have this ability to share our creative work with an audience in so many different ways, some ways involve gatekeepers, and some don’t. And so of course I made a video about that.
Pain Scale from 1 to Fuchsia (podcast)
I suffer from chronic migraines. Every week I have to work through the ups and downs of how I feel. In this Neurotic Tornado podcast episode, my wife and I talk about how we manage our lives alongside my chronic pain.
Spiral of Foreboding (podcast)
The next episode of the Neurotic Tornado 😫🌪 podcast is live! So far, we’re actually pulling off the every-two-weeks schedule!… This episode was a little bit trickier to name. Even when I hear good news (like a positive book review or when a cool radio personality wants to interview me), I’m capable of being filled with dread and a sense of foreboding. So my wife comes up to the attic to help me figure things out. Again. ❤️️❤️️❤️️ We also talk about why my sense of object permanence is only slightly better than a baby's. 🥄🥄🥄 You can listen to the episode right from this blog post with the button below. But even better, instead of listening to the episode here like a digital caveman, you should really just subscribe to the Neurotic Tornado 😫🌪 podcast!
The Rebirth of the Neurotic Tornado Podcast
At the most inconvenient possible time, I’ve decided to restart my Neurotic Tornado podcast! 😫🌪 In this season (#4), my wife comes up to the attic and we discuss some of my mental baggage, especially related to sharing creative stuff with the world (like my forthcoming novel). I’ve been struggling with issues around obsessive thinking, anxiety, dread, insecurity, chronic pain, and more. And so I thought it would be a delightful romp to work through this stuff with microphones in our faces! 😜
On a serious note, I did want to talk about these issues and understand them better as I try to be a happier, healthier human. And my wife has some cool insights in this realm.
If you want to learn more about the podcast series…
Publishing Purgatory & Pants
I've lost my focus. I have a book coming out in two months and I have no idea where to put my attention. It feels like I'm doing nothing and everything at once. I’m working on too many things but don’t know which things are the most important.
So let me list out the pieces of my messy month and see if I can come out the other side with some insight that could be useful for anyone, regardless of what kind of month you've had…
Arthur Morgan and the Hero’s Journey (video)
I forget, who was asking me to make a FORTY-MINUTE VIDEO about how the hero's journey storytelling structure works in a 2018 video game called Red Dead Redemption 2? Oh, no one? Well, shit. My bad, because I spent a TON of hours working on this damn video. I've tried to make it accessible to non-gamers who are curious about storytelling in a modern video game (a game that happens to have an amazing narrative).
every draft has a purpose (video)
So here’s an approach to working through each draft that has been helpful to me. I’m not sure if it’s helpful to others or if it’s obvious or something else… All I know is that it was tiring to change my shirt so many times in order to demonstrate each draft in this video…
miscellaneous thoughts about my insecurities with publishing things
A few months ago, I posted about how I missed blogging. I wrote it as if blogging was dead, as if I wasn't writing those words on MY OWN BLOG... It wasn't until I got some feedback (thank you, Betsy! 😜) along the lines of, "so... why not keep blogging!?" that I realized there's nothing stopping me from posting things in just the way I once loved to do.... Nothing stopping me, except for me. But ME is a pretty difficult force to overcome. I’m so nervous about saying something the wrong way, or someone reading it the wrong way, or regretting something I say… 😱 To the point where I freeze up at the keyboard when I’m writing something specifically meant for a blog or for social media. It all feels a lot scarier and more complicated these days…
you should consider quitting (video)
Oh! I forgot to tell you that, a few weeks ago, I made a video about quitting... Or, not really quitting, but how I think about quitting... Or maybe it's more about whether it's worth quitting… Or maybe… You know what? Just watch the damn video.
the blog experience
I've been thinking about blogging. Not about blogging today, but just what it felt like to blog a bloggy blog post fifteen years ago. Until 2009, I had a blog on blogger.com and it was magical, just how easy it was to put words down in a post. Not quite a journal entry, and not quite journalism, but just this informal way to tell your story. Putting out these breadcrumbs for people to follow, to learn more about you, and whatever you were obsessed with that week. And then, the next week (or the next day, or the next month), you could continue along that trail with another post. You didn't have to think about any fancy website stuff or submitting your crazy consciousness for publication on some magazine's website. It felt so fresh and free.
Y'all know by now that I don't blog regularly anymore. I average about one post every two months, and typically I'm just using the post to point to some other video or project. I don't know when or why those chatty blog posts stopped for me. And in the meantime, blogging has become a less cool thing to do. Maybe because social media has filled that need. But I never got comfortable posting the same kind of content on social media. Social media feels so chaotic and noisy — and everybody's voices are all smashed together. The blog was my own stage to tell my own story in my own way. And then I could happily go visit your blog and listen to your unique voice on your unique stage.
I miss the blog experience.
acknowledgments (video)
So I thought it would be amusing to create a video where I make fun of myself attempting to write the acknowledgments for my book. But in the process of making fun of myself, I mistakenly stumbled into a sincere desire to stop and appreciate the things that allow me to be creative. So here's a video that's a mish mash of all those feelings…
the insecurities of one writer (video)
So I've had this sorta-close-to-ready video sitting on my laptop for over two years now. It's about various voices in my head that make me insecure as a writer. The thing about the video is that I don’t think I quite strike the right tone. It's a little too cheesy, but also a little too dark, but also not quite funny enough, and it has 12% more cursing than usual. So I guess I'm insecure about my video... that’s about my insecurities about my writing. And now, a few years later, I'm totally busy with other things, and I don't have what it takes to revisit this video and get it to the proper finish line. On the other hand, there’s something about this video that still speaks to me. I don't want to just throw it into the (digital) fire. So, I did what any mediocre YouTuber would do, I pooped out this messy content for the world to see anyhow.
the blog post that is boringly about this blog
If you're not reading this blog post right now then my migration from WordPress to Squarespace has failed. Oh, wait, I think I'm doing this backwards. I should've warned you earlier. Oh, wait, I actually shouldn't have warned you at all, because I know for a fact that you're reading this right now. What I should have done was warn the people who were left behind! …I'm clearly not doing this blog thing right.
non-gamer becomes gamer and then tries to explain games to non-gamers (video)
So I've gotten into playing video games. Nothing too hardcore — I mean, I haven't lost my day job and I'm still successfully married and I'm not all that good at the games I play. But I love playing games on my Nintendo Switch. And I want to talk through the delight I've felt from playing some of my favorite games in my favorite genres… This is coming from someone who previously looked down on gaming as a waste of time. Well, to hell with that. Playing a great video game has been an unexpected joy in my life these past few years… at a time when there have been a lot of not-too-damn-joyful things going on. So, yeah, here's the video where I try to explain that in more detail with some game footage. (Sorry about the video footage of me in the shower… At least it's censored!)
make something terrible (video)
I recently got some insight into my creative process from my kid's music teacher… who is now, somehow, my music teacher… even though I previously had no skill or interest in music. But he's really more of a creative mentor. The work we do goes from making music to making videos to managing time better, and it even informs my writing process. And how to worry more effectively. So I thought I could share with you some of the ideas I've gotten from his teaching style that have helped me with my creative life, and my... life life.