Tomorrow we launch

(this is all part of the One Novel Three-Month challenge. Click here for more info)

Well, hell, the site is up and fully functional.

Milestones included changing the photo of myself from six years ago after realizing I used to be a total snack.

That and realizing I haven't updated any of my performances or appearances makes it seem like I dropped off the face of the earth. But that's work for another day.

Tomorrow is launch day, when I start harassing everyone on social media to follow, subscribe, read and resent. That'll be my big moment, getting my ass out in front of my world and manifesting some serious Main Character Energy. It's hard man, but it's also the whole damn point. I have to sell these puppies, I have to SELF PROMO. Pimp myself out. Network in an online incubator until I give birth to myself in a twisted grandfather paradox.

I'm practically allergic to it, which is probably why my poetry collection isn't killing it. That and the 3.6-star rating on Amazon. Jokes on them, that's my favorite number!

So here's step one- that's my point. Hitting up folks and saying, 'Look at me, look at me, look at me.' Becoming one of those YouTube videos that pop up on your feed with less than one thousand views. Christ, it’s scary.

But I take solace in the fact that I just have to beat Baller Industries. Tomorrow I think I'll introduce them a bit, give you some context. For now, I'll tease that in my younger years, I worked for (with?) them, and we produced two games.

Get rich or die gaming.

And

Get rich or die gaming 2: Rock Bottom.

I shit you not, it’s true. The first one even sold not so badly. They were on the original X-Box live.

I also want to write about the last six years, and what’s been happening writing-wise, and I want to talk about this book, because the truth is I already started it. Barely, just one chapter, but still. So I already know what I want to write about.

I remember when I used to write these pieces, bright-eyed and full of bush, I used to try to impart some kind of didactic wisdom on my readers, some kind of inspirational something or other. But the older I get, the less qualified I feel to give any advice. That's the truth, ever since I was 13. I peaked at my advice giving at 13.

All I can say is, it's worth doing bonkers shit. Ass out in front of the crowd, face-first into failure, ridiculous things that are likely destined for the scrap heap.

It feels awesome. It makes me feel alive. It feels meaningful.

I recommend the high.

Already I feel my over-sensitivity to criticism has kicked in because I sent someone the link to my website and they did not respond in our conversation. That's all it takes to discourage me. My skin is paper thin.

But that's good for writing in.

So let me tell you what I really tell myself, as someone who hates rejection, and has been rejected, and honestly has done entire pieces, including one at TEDx about getting back up. I tell myself it’s all training. It's all practice. For what, I don't know. But it will count, some day, in some way. And that's something.

Also, I will share a personal thing, because I think it’s relevant when it comes to the ever-perpetual fear of failure and the futility of all endeavors. Yesterday, a friend of mine at my open mic poetry essentially launched into an impassioned monologue about how a poem, and poetry I've written profoundly changed their life. They told me that one of the reasons they write at all, and all the wonderful things they have experienced because of our little community of poets, is partly down to the errand words and dick jokes I've blurted out on the mic. That and my stuff about not being a dick and mental illness making you mighty.

They told me I mattered to them, in a way I never knew. And it was after I read a poem about how we might never be famous or conventionally successful, but that if our writing, if our work dare I use the word, can reach one person, one member of our secret family, change one life for the better, then that is a win. And she came up to me to essentially tell me it was true, and how dare I even suggest that what I have done isn't meaningful.

And it is true. We'll never know what putting ourselves out there might do for someone else. I'm not saying I'm doing this out of some kind of profound altruism, I mean the world is fucked in a thousand different ways and I'm writing stories. Just that we matter in ways we'll never know. Unless that person is so generous as to come up to you, semi-tipsy, and tell you.

Shit, I did the optimistic advice thing, didn't I?

Ah well. It's my pump-up speech. Because this shit is going to be hard. Really hard, even. And scary. And important, to me at least. In my little corner, in the featherweight arena, I got a belt to earn. On Day 2 I'm still posting, so that's good, and tomorrow I'm getting utterly shit-faced at a free flow brunch with a dear friend and his wife. An interesting handicap to be sure for Day One of The Challenge.

I don't think I've got even one reader right now, so you'll see this in hindsight. Thanks for stopping by, and thanks for making it to the end, and thanks a bunch for supporting me, and thanks in advance for buying the book (hehehe).

Write On.

(If you like my jam, subscribe here for updates on the book and for scones)