Maybe Just a Little More Magical Thinking

Since the past couple years have eroded any pretense of this blog being anything but a record of my descent into whatever this is that I’ve become, it felt suiting to end out this year with one last entry. This of course means that the only month I’ve actually ended up saving this year before going on blog hiatus was November, the incompleteness of which is giving me a tummy ache, but that said, I do think this will be the last entry for awhile, at least until I have something worth sharing. I don’t think I’m even going to put this one on social media.

Believe me, I’m tired of being miserable and I don’t want to ruminate on it anymore than I have to, but holy shit 2021… I feel like if I don’t post up a record to end cap this mess of a year, then I’ll risk being haunted by it forever. Sorta like it needs a memorial or grave marker or the like. The past couple years have been so beyond horrible for every single one of us, but I really gotta hand it to 2021 for doing to my personal life what 2020 did to the world as a whole. It’s not all doom and gloom, but it brings me legit pain to admit that 2021 is ending with me in arguably a more diminished place than how it began, which is really saying so much. This is all despite how much of an effort I gave to simply survive and find some semblance of happiness. This year really didn’t want to encourage that effort, but alas, at least I have a better idea of how much next year could suck, so I just gotta brace myself even harder than I thought I needed to this same time last year.

Physically I was in both the worst and best shape of my life. When I was able to take stock of how poor my health had gotten at the end of last year, I quickly realized I had to fix it or things could get bad. While I’m currently not as healthy or strong as I was during the summer, when I was at my best, I’m still doing a lot better than how I was at the start of 2021 (though the stress-induced issues I’ve been facing the past couple weeks have made me question this, I’m at least able to leave my house now, which was not an early 2021 vibe).

My relationship to writing has become incredibly complex, to say the least. Earlier this year I drafted my fifth novel—a book I had no business writing while I have others that need editing and querying. It was a story I thought I needed to write, and in short, it was a manuscript that left me far more bruised up than I ever expected. It left me without an interest in writing for a long time, and it frustrates me so much, because there were moments during that draft that my productivity was higher than it’s ever been—higher even than my previous record from a time in which I wasn’t even conventionally employed. In short, I haven’t really written much of anything serious at all since that manuscript was finished months back. And really, all I got to say about it now is how upset I am at the loss of time it’s going to take to get these few manuscripts actually, legitimately finished and done. I’ve managed to get back into at least steady editing form, and I’ve found that I’ve truly missed it. Not writing was like a little bit of death, but the bad kind. Not writing I might as well be a ghost. When it all factors together, I guess writing this year was a wash.

Financially, this year was an absolute killer. While some of the worst life expenses are done for good (and I’m so grateful to that), my house had several major repairs that needed to be done, all of which were reasonably exasperated by the absurd end times weather we’ve had this year. I’m terrified of what the stormy seasons are going to bring. I don’t think you’re supposed to talk about money and I imagine that goes double on the internet, but it couldn’t not be mentioned when thinking about the major setbacks and anxiety-meteors this year. I’ve not had a lot of security in my various living situations throughout my life, so the possibility of losing my home puts a heavy strain on a deep, not-at-all-healed part of my psychology, though I imagine that’s true for all of us to one extent or another.

I’m struggling to write this next paragraph. To put it simply, there are a lot of important people in my life that are no longer there. Some maybe just for now, I guess. Some for good. But oh boy, these sentences aren’t really coming out like I hoped—so maybe I’m not ready to write about any of this. Maybe I end this paragraph here for now without further detail. It’s been a lot.

The past couple months have been the most brutal of all. One devastating blow after another. The holiday season is always hell for me, usually because of the jobs I find myself working, and maybe a little unresolved trauma, but this one was one of the worst of all time. I’ve spent the past six weeks or so recovering from several events all happening at once—but like I said earlier, I’m tired of being miserable. I’ve been managing to make the small steps again, and really, what else can you ask for during the dark times but steady forward progress? So I guess I’ll be back on track soon. Sunrise, sunset.

But please allow me to wrap up with a true win. This has without a doubt been the best year of my life for reading books. I only missed one day of reading all year. If I can manage to finish a few more pages of the book I’m currently on before midnight tonight (which is N.K. Jemisin’s The Hundred Thousand Kingdoms, by the way, and it’s great, but you knew it was great already because it’s N.K. Jemisin), then I’ll have managed to have finished 18 books this year (largely a coincidence, believe it or not, for those of you who’ve been following this blog). I read a couple literary fiction novels like Melville’s Moby Dick, Brontë’s Wuthering Heights, and Tolstoy’s Anna Karenina (though I only finished the final parts, I’d been reading it here and there over a couple years). But mostly I read a lot of horror! From the classic literary horror of Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein, Henry James’ The Turn of the Screw, and the more modern classic of Shirley Jackson’s The Haunting of Hill House, to even some wild-as-hell contemporary indie horror in the form of Things Have Gotten Worse Since We Last Spoke by Eric LaRocca. In particular I’m glad I made a point to specifically read horror by diverse authors (such as the aforementioned indie novel) because it resulted in an in kind diverse range of horror styles for me to obsess over. The Changeling by Victor LaValle, A Head Full of Ghosts by Paul G. Tremblay, White is for Witching by Helen Oyeyemi, The Gilda Stories by Jewelle Gomez, The Only Good Indians by Stephen Graham Jones, and the classic literary masterpiece: Toni Morrison’s Beloved - which I think impacted me the most. I also read Faust for some reason.

Anyway, I usually sign off this blog with well wishes for the reader along their own creative journey, but right now I think I’ve gotten lost on my own journey and I don’t feel like I’m the person to be giving anyone advice on anything. That said, I think I’m going to end this entry in a different way, because I don’t know what to else to do and I’m not sure what I was wanting to do with this one. So continue reading only if you really want to.

Rest in peace, Grandmother. I’ll always wish for more time, but in the same way I’ll always be thankful for what you gave me, including your stubbornness. It was always a goal to get one of my stupid books in your hands while you were around, but maybe you’ll aways be around in some way or another. Either way, I know I can’t give up now any more than I could before.

Love you Meemaw, miss you forever.

Mary Martin

1927-2021