Month: January 2015

And I would write 10,000 more
And I’d keep on writing more and more
Just to be the girl who wrote 100,000 words

(The Pretenders, I think it was? Bad parody, I know. I’m definitely no Weird Al.)

Serial Killer V: Trial by Jury

If it weren’t for these cuffs

They would all be dead

How dare they touch my things

My precious polaroids

The trinkets I saved

A beautiful collection

Reduced to exhibits 1A-10Z

Mixed in are “crime” scene photos

Was it really a crime

To follow my true nature?

A lion is not penalized

For stalking and killing her prey

IN this orange jumpsuit I sit

Fury built up inside

An intense hatred

For the twelve weaklings in the box

They cringe and gasp at the pictures

One even vomits

The whole courtroom was stunned

When I laughed at the retching

A psychologist takes the stand

I spoke with him earlier

Answered his condescending questions

“Why did you do it?”

“What were you thinking

“when you wielded the knife?”

He rattles on about psychosis

And schizophrenia

But I don’t hear voices

I don’t see things

I cry out at his diagnosis

And tell him

That I will rend his limbs from his body

The judges says something about order

I am restrained by two officers

If I only could reach a little farther

My fingers almost touch

The officer’s gun

I’ve been slacking on my novel lately, I admit. But I have a new idea that will help the story along as well as add depth (& word count). I’m hoping to have the motivation when I get home to start writing more, but it all depends on how tired I am after the work day.

The clay sculptures are turning out well, but I have moved from the dragons to a faerie house just to get some variety. Churning out so many of the same thing was getting tedious, not to mention stifling the creativity.

Tomorrow I won’t likely have time or energy for much of anything outside of work, but that’s the way it goes sometimes.

The creative juices are practically overflowing. After finishing a commission drawing, I’ve made almost half a dozen clay dragons and written a few hundred more words on my novel, and I have fresh ideas for the novel as well. Busy busy bee.

The dragons are a nice project, because they’re something I can work on quietly while my husband is working at home, and it helps occupy my time in the mornings between when I get up to have breakfast before he gets up and when I have to be at work myself. The materials are relatively cheap, and I plan on selling them on Etsy soon.

Things are falling into place. I hope. At least I have a way to pass the time when I wake up ridiculously early (as I have been lately).

Yesterday I was depressed. Not just “bummed out,” but full-on #depressed. I went to bed dreading today and hoping that I would not still be depressed when I woke up.

I wasn’t quite depressed when I woke up (more like disturbed, because I’d dreamt that my ex boyfriend was trying to steal a blood sample from me for some unknown but nefarious purpose), but I struggled through my shift nonetheless. I wasn’t necessarily down, but I wasn’t cheerful either.

After I got home, I became antsy and couldn’t sit still. I decided to use my sudden energy to make something with my #Premo #Sculpey clay. I was happy with how it turned out, as was my husband.

Cute, right? He even liked it so much that he convinced me to make another one to sell, and possibly more. I made one more, then baked them.

I spent much of the rest of the evening posting pictures of them to various social media sites as well as surfing said sites for ideas on other creative things to do. Time ran away from me, and an hour past my normal bedtime I was making a third dragon (no photo yet).

I stopped because my husband needed to get to sleep (& so did I, really), but though he’s been asleep for nearly an hour I’m still wide awake, mind racing.

What else should I try to sculpt tomorrow? What cosplay(s) do I want to plan for the next convention we go to? Do I think I can successfully make the ones I want? The list goes on.

Welcome to the #manic side of the #Force, so to speak. Lovely timing. Where was this energy when I was at work? I have got to get that switch checked.

It began on the drive back from the out-of-town office.

Things were normal enough. Chatting with my coworker, complaining about the rain. Normal.

About halfway through the drive, it hit me.

Depression. Smack in the face, just like that.

At first I wasn’t sure why I was so tired, why the concept of “tomorrow” suddenly seemed too daunting to think about. I’d certainly made it through the day without any problems.

Maybe it was lack of sleep. Maybe it was the last vestiges of whatever illness has been lingering in the back of my throat. Or maybe it just was.

Tomorrow still seems like too much to deal with right now. It looms ahead like a storm cloud even though there’s no logical reason for it. I’m trying, though, to remind myself.

Tomorrow doesn’t have to be scary. It doesn’t have to be depressing, and I don’t have to be depressed. Is it likely that I’ll wake up in the morning on an upswing? Not really, but maybe if I hold out hope that this depression is a brief episode I’ll wake in a better state of mind.

Committed to #drawing a #tangleart design for a friend, that is.

I’m almost finished. Tomorrow I should be able to put the finishing touches on it, and hopefully Friday mail it.

Not sure what type of packaging to use. It’s an 11×14″ paper size so I might have to do one of those mailing tubes.

Serial Killer IV

I hold my throbbing arm
Rage building inside me
The last victim fought back
Forcing me to be sloppy
My deeds now make the front page
I laugh at the word “Manhunt”
Little do they know
That word makes me safe
So long as it is a manhunt
They will never suspect me
I debate my next move
Shall I fight the urge
Resist the call
Or shall I continue
Move on
To my next kill
I know the answer
There is no way
That I can escape my destiny
But I can change my methods
No longer haunting the familiar social haunts
They will be looking for me there
Instead I creep into the library
The last place they will look
Surprisingly I find my prey almost instantly
Sitting there alone
In the nonfiction section
Ironically enough
Reading about Jack the Ripper
It takes only minutes
To get his guard down
It is amazing
What a push-up bra can accomplish
HE asks about my arm
I calmly blame it on my cat
Seeing as how the last prey
Was such a pussy
We walk outside the library door
Into a trap
The prey grabs my other arm
Pulls it behind my back
And tells me I am under arrest
They knew this whole time
The “Manhunt” was a myth
It was a womanhunt all along
And I am caught

Some time in the last few months my body decided I need to wake up between 0300 and 0430 every morning, regardless of how late I went to bed or whether or not I have to get up early the next day.

This wouldn’t necessarily be a bad thing if I could go to bed early enough, or if I could do whatever I wanted to when I got up early. The thing is, if I start working on some random project at three in the morning, it damn well better be a quiet one, and I can’t need too much light for it.

Scratch reading any kind of traditional book in bed. Or drawing. Sewing I can kind of do in the living room, but any of that for too long and I get sore. Typing is sort of not good, because I type loudly and I don’t want to wake my other half (no, that was not a bipolar joke–I mean my sleeping husband).

And there’s only so much entertainment to be found on Facebook or the TV at this time.

I really need a new keyboard for my tablet. Then I could maybe at least have a quieter way of typing.

The thing is, it’s not so much the “not doing anything” part that bugs me; it’s the “not being able to do anything” part. I seem to want to do more when I can’t do more. Shift the hours ahead a few and I’d probably not even have half the nervous energy I do now. I wouldn’t be bored for lack of options, I would be lazy due to too many options. Oh, the irony.

Three hours working on a piece for a friend, and I was so focused on what I was doing I didn’t know my hand was smudging the ink. I had to step away from it because I’m so annoyed with myself.

I’ve never learned to draw without resting my hand on the paper or canvas. The tremors from years of lithium treatment don’t help (thanks a lot, psychiatrist who wouldn’t take me off the med even after I kept complaining about the shaking).

Keep my hand steady, or keep my paper clean?