I have also felt like I shouldn’t write in my blog, while I have been struggling to write and turn in two pieces that I agreed to write last year. One is an introduction to a book, and the other is a short piece of fiction. Last week, I finally broke through on the introduction. After almost a full year of struggling and failing, I found it. It was so much fun to work on, so deeply satisfying to finish, and such a relief to turn in. I have never been this late on anything. I hope I’ll never be this late on anything again. I hope nobody notices that I’m writing in my blog when I haven’t finished the other thing, which I have started and abandoned too many times to count. I have probably written ten thousand words or so, trying to find the approximately 700 or so I committed to assembling into a story. I’ve tried to come at it so many different ways, from big ideas to small ideas, from limited points of view to omniscient points of view, and nothing is sticking. It just feels like I’m writing with someone else’s hands that don’t fit quite right. Maybe writing here today will help me find my own fingers again.

Really great work, everyone. Especially everyone who was really worried about the cost of living, you know, the milk and eggs crowd? How’s that working out for you? And all the Walk Away people must be sleeping so well these days. Just fantastic fucking work all over the place, you fucking chuds. They are planning to ban the Covid vaccine, so those of us who want to protect ourselves from all the stupid conspiracy theorist dipshits who think bullshit and science are just “opinions” are just fucked, now. You’ve doomed us all to the world you alone deserve. I, for one, will never forget what you did to us, and I will never forgive you. I hope you spend the rest of your miserable lives ostracized, alone, and afraid. May you never know a moment of peace. May you wear your support for this petty little tyrant like a scarlet letter, so everyone knows who you are and what you did.

Anyway, as you can see, I’ve been distracted and preoccupied with all of this endless horror. I’m just exhausted by ten in the morning every day, and try as I might to find other things for my attention and time, I keep getting drawn back to the news, hoping I’ll see The Headline, or some indication that the entire Republican party, its punditry, and its media echo chamber have finally stopped being singularly focused on protecting and covering up for a pedophile rapist and his child sex trafficking pals. And I haven’t even touched on the endless attacks on innocent people who have been declared Enemies of the State because of who they love or the color of their skin. It’s fucking disgusting, deplorable, infuriating, and has ripped the mask off of much of America. It’s been really hard for a lot of us who grew up reciting and believing “liberty and justice for all”.

That’s my head, every day. I’m worried for the people I love, I’m sick to my stomach as I watch six unelected, transparently corrupt, Christian Nationalists issue unsigned decrees that overturn the will of the voters as they hand more and more unchecked power to a criminal and his criminal organization.

It is so hard to tell stories, to find the joy and release in creative writing, when I feel like the world outside my window is on fire. Sure, my privilege currently protects me, but Timothy Snyder pointed out that if we have to remind ourselves of all the ways we are currently safe from political lawlessness, we are already living in an autocracy. That’s scary as fuck to me.

For a lot of us who are survivors of abuse, every day with this motherfucker making everything about him and his fragile little ego is jabbing a finger into a deep bruise that can’t ever fully heal. For a lot of us who have worked so hard to leave and overcome our abusers, to live our lives as fully as possible in spite of our experiences, it is an endless struggle of flashbacks and nervous system dysregulation, while we remind our bodies that we aren’t trapped with our abuser anymore. Thank god for EMDR. Thank god I can afford regular mental health care. Thank god he’s going to die and hopefully soon.

I haven’t wanted to write anything in my blog because what I just wrote is all I have been able to write. When I want to tell a fun story about playing Mysterium with my family, taking my son axe throwing for his birthday, celebrating my son earning his Master’s Degree and starting his PhD, or any of the things I couldn’t wait to write Before All This, I stare at an empty document while I write and erase ten words over and over again, hoping these will be the ones that grant me access to my Creative Self. And the harder I try to find them, the more effectively they hide from me.