Faith McKay . Net

Breaking My Own Rules

Written by Faith on September 12th, 2009

I’ve been in bed sick the past couple of weeks, and as I’ve mentioned in my last two posts, sort of struggling with feeling sorry for myself. But, in the middle of that, I’ve been working over these short stories I have going. They’re all speculative fiction (this term encompasses fantasy, scifi, horror, etc.) and have a common supernatural theme in them, which I haven’t decided if I’m going to tell anyone else about until I’m done.

Anyhow, I think my theme is pretty cool, and ever since I had the idea for this project months and months ago the idea has excited me. My stories have this common theme, but they’re all fairly different stories, and excite me in their own unique ways.

One story in particular stars a brother and sister, Cory and Anna. I had written the first chunk of this story a few years back and never really touched it. It occurred to me today that I should finish this story, andd encorporate my theme into this story. I didn’t really remember that I’d written, but I remembered the general idea of it.

There is nothing that quite makes my head so big as picking up something I’d written years ago and forgotten about, only to read it and go, wow. This really isn’t bad at all! As a general rule (that I would love to start breaking more often) after I finish writing anything I feel like tearing it up and throwing it away. I’m quite pleased to be breaking my own rules on this one.

I’m a little bit scared to pick the story up now and continue it. I’m pretty convinced I’m going to ruin it. It looks like my general state of being is sinking back in….

I tweeted early today that I have more story ideas than time, which is really true. I have a novel going, about five short stories, and this evening I need to spend some time writing down all the thoughts I have for this other novel idea so that eventually, when I get to it, I’ll remember what the idea was. The problem is that when I write these things down I just sort of write my train of thoughts, so that I make sure to get them all down, and then later when I read these messy files I think “What was I thinking? This is atrocious!”

I guess I should try and write my outline files more like persuasive essays, convincing my future self that my current self does, in fact, know things.

When I write sentences like the one above I’m reminded how being a writer makes me sound like I’m becoming more mentally unhinged every single day. Early today I was talking about how I think my charachter should do these certain things and then burst out “But I can’t do that, because that’s not who she IS!” …because the people I made up are in some ways real, I guess.

Yeah, I worry about me a little sometimes, too.

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Observe More Closely

Written by Faith on September 6th, 2009

It’s hard to fight the urge to focus on all the things I cannot do, but I wish I could. It’s embarrassing that I focus on how frustrating these things are, instead of how lucky I am for all the things I can do. It’s particularly embarrassing when I hear stories about people like this amazing girl who is autistic, and still manages to live her life and accomplish amazing things. This girl, Carly, wasn’t able to communicate until she was 11 years old. I can only imagine that frustration.

I can communicate. I have many gifts at my disposal to communicate in many different ways. This is something to be incredibly thankful for, and I wish I didn’t sometimes slip into self pity and forget how amazing that really is. Writing is my favorite thing, it’s what I want to do most, and I can do it. Why focus on what I can’t do?

In an earlier post about Flannery O’Connor (a writer who had I had much in common with including being chronically ill) I included a quote I’ve kept on my desktop for a few years now to help remind myself of all of this.

“I am making out fine in spite of any conflicting stories…I have enough energy to write with and as that is all I have any business doing anyhow, I can with one eye squinted take it all as a blessing. What you have to measure out, you come to observe more closely, or so I tell myself.” – Flannery O’Connor

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wanting to be well

Written by Faith on September 4th, 2009

I’m chronically ill, but my worst symptoms come in waves. I’ll be able to function without anyone noticing much of anything for a few weeks, and then I’ll be sick in bed for however long it takes. It’s a miserable cycle and I never know how long anything will last, but that’s the way it is.

I’ve been feeling terribly sick for almost two weeks now, and throughout all of it, I’ve been trying to convince myself it’s all in my head and I’m a terrible person who WANTS to be sick, so she is. I’ve been sick for 8 years now, and I still only really accept that it’s true half the time.

Today I really tried to push myself to do things, convinced that if I believe I’m ok, I will be. The pushing made things worse, my head is in terrible pain, my stomach and back are screaming, and I have hot flashes. I fear this will never stop being frustrating. I feel so useless. I have to ask my husband to get me water, make me lunch.

I wish it was as simple as wanting to be well, and then being that way.

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If you have nothing nice to say…

Written by Faith on August 31st, 2009

Usually when times are rough I turn to inspiration, think about things, and move on. I have a collection of movies I watch over and over again and depending on my problem, I know which movie I should watch to get myself to think about things and help myself find answers. I have a quotes file and words I’ve kept written down from a wise friend–all of these things are where I turn for wisdom, for light, when things are hard and I have to pick myself up.

Right now nothing works. I watch new movies, read new books, new quotes, it doesn’t help. I have no wisdom for these problems, and the more I think about things, the more problems I come to see.

I need to do something, change some things, I see that much. Right now all I’m doing though is sitting here and waiting on my brain to figure out what to do next. Searching for answers I don’t know exactly how to find.

I guess this blog post is really vague, but there is so much it’s hard to sum it all up. Mainly my problem, I think, is loneliness. I guess I should make sure I really know what the problems are before I can figure out how to fix them though, right?

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Oh, the places you’ll go.

Written by Faith on August 22nd, 2009

It’s terrible to see that the last (and only) time I discussed our plans on here was back in April. This is probably because I try not to share this too much to avoid boring people, but since this really takes up a lot of my thoughts every single day, it is crazy not to talk/blog about it.

In April I shared that our plan is to get an RV and travel full time, we’ll hopefully be taking off late 2010/early 2011. I also said that we would be checking out an RV show in May, which we did do! There we discovered that we like fifth wheels that have layouts with the bedroom in the front, kitchen in the back.

Since then we work like crazy everyday, thinking of budgets and saving to buy the truck and the fifth wheel and everything we need to go to make these plans work. I keep finding more and more things to think about. I keep getting more excited, and more focused. I think about all the things that need to be taken care of, and what it will be like, the places we’ll go, the people we’ll meet.

Oh, I wish it was time to go now.

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