It’s been a rough week and I’m having trouble keeping the negativity inside or finding a ‘proper’ way to release it.  I think the last straw is that I’m working on my parents’ computer while printing out my fourth book for editing in a week and a half.  The keyboard is at an odd angle, the screen is at least two feet away, and the speakers make a noise that can only be described as hellish catterwalling.  I swear, these speakers are attempting to summon a demon who would probably get annoyed with the noise and go back home.  These are all besides the point.

People might not realize this through the magic of the internet, but I’m naturally a negative person.  I have an amazing level of self-doubt and I’m easily frustrated to the point of irrationality.  I’m not sure when this happened because I think I was a happy, if not extremely tense, child.  There are differing opinions on where this came from.  Some people blame college, most people blame me without giving a good reason, some people blame my wife, some people blame my family, and other people simply continue to point out why I’m wrong and making mistakes.  Oddly enough, nobody ever tries to blame that last group for promoting my negative mindset.  After all, you keep telling somebody that they’re going to fail, they’re probably going to fail.  It’s getting harder and harder to convince me that I’m going to fail, but the reflex to succumb to the idea is still there.  (Dear god, this computer can’t even work with pictures!)

Now, this all brings me to a point in my life that has been confusing me for a while now.  Specifically, I don’t think I actually match with my family.  Many times it feels like my family has no idea what to do with me or how to speak with me.  This might be because I would be what you consider the black sheep.  My generation of the family alone consists of a teacher, two lawyers, a doctor, a college student whose major I forget, and a biochemist.  So, the struggling author seems out of place there.  Most of my family never really bother to hear about my ideas, so they don’t really know what I do.  Yet, I get opinions and criticism from some of them.  Many of them try to talk to me about it, but I always get that sense that they’re simply listening to me to be nice.  I appreciate the sentiment, but there are only so many of these conversations that I can take.

This week was exceptionally difficult because I discovered several members of the family were against me.  I had previously mentioned that support is very important for artists and I believe this from personal experience.  One of my friends has stated that these are people that I should have know would be secretly against me until I succeed.  I agree, but it’s still frustrating to know that there are people close to me that are against me.  It would be a lot less frustrating if they were honest and talked to me about it, but that would only be a fight.  This same friend also said that the important people in my life are behind me, which is something I have to pay more attention to.  He is a wise man if not a little deranged, but that’s probably partially my fault.  (Two parental distractions into this: one about snow boots and another about crossword puzzles. I swear, I was born with an ‘interrupt me’ sign over my head that I can never see.)

Well, due to those distractions and an overall annoyance at this computer, I forgot a lot of the rage-based stuff that I was going to go into.  I do remember one point and it’s something I’m going to declare much to the chagrin of family: I’m unemployed while my wife works.  I know, I’m a horrible husband who lets his wife work while he takes care of the child, does the laundry, cleans the house, and does the domestic stuff.  I’m just a terrible, monstrous human being who obeys his wife’s demand of ‘I work while you pursue your writing and stop bitching about never getting anywhere’.  I mean, it isn’t like I’ve accomplished the following in the few months since I made this declaration:

1. Final edited Beginning of a Hero, Prodigy of Rainbow Tower, AND Allure of the Gypsies.
2. Wrote first draft of Family of the Tri-Rune.
3. Wrote Catalysts.
4. Halfway done with The Pen Name.
5. Outlined all 15 books of Legends of Windemere.
6. Consolidated all of my stories into Windemere and making them work.
7. Completed initial idea notes for Clyde’s story.
8. Created and maintained this website.
9. Spent most of my days being content instead of feeling like I was one snap away from beating up a printer/copier in the middle of a parking lot.

So, this post holds multiple uses for me.  I’d like to tell all the people against me to get out of my way.  I’d like the thank everyone who supports me and say that I’m going to strive to be more positive from now on.  Finally, this post is for me because I needed to stand on a soapbox to rant and end it with listing my successes.  I apologize if this soured anybody’s thoughts about me or put you in a bad mood.  I seem to have that effect on people at times, which is something else that I’m working on.

Now, I’m going to finish printing . . . okay, I’m going to pick up Family of the Tri-Rune from the floor because I  forgot to check the printer and I’m going to curse myself for not putting page numbers on it.  Then, I’m going to finish outlining Minion’s Log and, if there’s time, start outlining the ‘girl dream-hopping in a psych ward’ idea.  That one seems to have taken a hold of my brain and is managing to build itself without a conscious effort on my part.  I love my crazy brain.  🙂