Wow, it looks like I haven’t posted in, 6 or 7 weeks.

That can’t be good…

…It hasn’t been.

For most of my life I have wished I had some sort of excuse for feeling the way I do. I spent quite some time looking for external sources. (Look long enough, you will find some).

Truth is, it’s mainly just bad brain chemistry.

I haven’t had much in the way of actual set backs lately. I’ve just been seriously depressed.

People who don’t suffer from depression think that means I’ve been sad. While I have had moments of sadness, really I’ve been numb. Really, I still am.

But I get up and go to work. I still go to the gym. I cook dinner and wash dishes and do laundry. I even shower frequently. But it just feels like I’m walking through the world once removed, like trying to feel something through rubber skin. There is no motivation. What I do, I do out of sheer necessity and routine.

Which brings me to why I’m posting about this, now.

I have barely written in this last month and a half or so. Not blog posts. Not fiction. Not poetry. I’ve jotted down a few ideas, a few good lines here or there, but nothing substantive.

So, I decided to attempt to do, with my writing, what I did with my gym going: make it a routine.

For the entirety of my writing career – such as it is – I have been a burst writer. I don’t so much wait for inspiration as I wait for ideas. Once an idea grabs me, I run with it until I run aground. Then I rest and let the world percolate in my brain awhile, then: rinse and repeat.

But depression short-circuits that process.

As I am a big fan of the idea of engineering around my own shortcomings, I have decided to try to make a routine of writing. An hour a night, even if it sucks and I throw it out later. Even if I stare at the page for 58 minutes and only write one sentence. An hour. I’m hoping, over time, it will get me to a good place to do mental work, even when my brain feels like jellied fog on a frozen January morning. And who knows, something interesting might come of it after all.

Life is an experiment. Nothing’s finished until we close the lab.

Some of the writing will be the various projects I’m working on. Some of it will be content for the game I run; which I think will both delight and frustrate the hell out of my players. Some of it will be what this is: an hour where I peck away at the keyboard, trying to come up with something that feels interesting enough to post. (This does not mean I’ll be posting every night. Although, I will endeavor to make more regular posts.)

Even now, I wonder who would want to read this stuff? Even after looking at my number of subscribers, which is probably larger than someone like me – i.e. not famous – can reasonably hope to have reading my thoughts. I thank you for that.

I should probably end this before I get too sloppy-sentimental.

I’m here.

I’m on the okay-ish side of not-okay.

And I’m too stubborn to give up any time soon.

(A character trait I’m sure my mother regrets instilling in me, but one I’m grateful for nonetheless.)

Until next time…