bland title

Possibly, maybe, probably on hiatus. I want to keep writing but something has happened and I want to write about everything (and I have, twice over, and deleted it again) and finally feel free from everything that has been happening over the past few years. But, I can’t. So if I write I will feel as though it is censored, or false. It would not be true to write about happiness or rambles or anything of the kind in this moment given how I truly feel.

I wish I had it in me to be a good person, recognise the suffering I feel right now and want to help another out of it, so try hard to give another happiness. I know I will do this in time because I have time and time again, but in this moment, today. I can’t. I just can’t.

I wrote so much about everything that has happened and it didn’t help. It was just there, staring back at me in black and white rather than in a mess in my head. I barely even scraped the service.

Maybe I’ll be around and I’ll ramble and I’ll find small joys to keep me sane and keep me going, like in my cats. Cats are pretty incredible. They really do understand when you are sad and want to do what they can to make it better. My ferret, Pandora, she is incredible at being there for you when you are upset. After Seb passed away she clung to me, she would groom me and cuddle in close to me. Seb wasn’t her companion, by the way, they didn’t get along and so were kept apart, so it wasn’t mourning the loss of Seb the way me and Seb mourned Kib that resulted in Pandora trying to comfort me.

I love Ellen but when I watched her stand up and she laughed at the idea of a ferret as a comfort animal I can’t help but think she’s never known a ferret. I know what people think of ferrets, how people might use them. But, ferrets are incredible. They are so loyal, and so smart, and so loving. I miss my ferrets.

I guess I really can ramble about things when I’m feeling lower than low, when I don’t think anything can save my marriage. Please don’t think that I’d just say that after a small fight. This has been long coming and some things no matter how hard you want to help them and solve the issues, it just doesn’t work. Maybe I’ll go into details one day, I just ask that anyone reading this, that you please understand that it probably isn’t what you think and I have done a very good job of hiding what has been happening. From everyone.

Sometimes, it just is what it is and you have to face reality even when someone has tried really hard to warp your reality time and time again. But, we’re getting into tough ground here.

My stomach is turning at the thought of posting this. At living this. I just want to sleep. I don’t care how weak I sound right now. I’m writing this while raw and emotional and I am a person and people fucking feel. I’m a person damnit. It hurts when you lie to me, it hurts when you deceive me, it hurts when you use my mental illness against me, it hurts when you hurt me, I bruise, I ache, I bleed, I am a person.

Who am I protecting? What am I protecting? Why do I feel so much shame and guilt? Do I need permission to write this? To click publish on this?

“it’s complicated” “it’s difficult” “it isn’t what it seems” maybe it really is complicated and difficult and not what it seems. But what happens next? How does it end?

I can hear the train going by in the distance and it reminds me that the world is bigger than this. That life occurs outside of these walls and, and… I don’t know. Whatever energy I had left has gone. I don’t even know what I’m writing now let alone why.

I truly hope you’re well.

Arbie X

a rambling and back again

I think I’m just going to have a little bit of a write today, rather than continue with the short story I’ve been writing or writing anything in response to a prompt. I don’t really have a lot of time because my husband will need the laptop, and I’m not sure where I’m taking the story next. At all. I’d be fine with just stream writing in a short amount of time, but when I know I don’t have a lot of time I panic and my mind goes blank. Although, maybe it’s worth giving it a shot. Push myself a little bit more, you know? Yeah, I’ll do that. So, hmm… I guess I’ll leave this here and pick up where I left off tomorrow. A multi-day blog entry! Woohoo!

Okay, to the story I go…

(here is what I wrote yesterday, it’s fiction: if only in a dream…)

That was yesterday’s writing, but today were back with brand new writing! Shine the lights! Wuhuu! Okay, that’s a lot of pachazz… pujazz? Pajazz? I don’t know. That’s a lot of excitement for what will be just a return to the rambles. Rambles of Doom: Rambles Strikes Back.

I think I spent too long in the bath because I’m not half as physically excited as I mentally seem to be. In fact, I don’t think I’m mentally excited either. I think I’m anxious because I don’t have a lot of time left to write this before I miss a day. I guess I’m confusing excitement with anxiety, or perhaps I’m tunnelling my anxiety into excitement. Fairly certain I mean channelling, but there’s no turning back from here! There is no delete or backspace!

I’m finally getting better from whatever was wrong with me. I did have a fair few drugs (the prescription kind) thrown my way so maybe that helped. But, now I just have the cough. I’ve been enjoying being in the kitchen again after over a week of not being able to move around too well at all. Nuh uh. Not much strutting by these feets! I’ll be continuing to stay in though, because we have to, but also because coughs are dangerous things these days with all their spittle spray and so on.

I expect I’ll be up late again tonight. We’re gathering all sorts of things about my husband’s ailments and it is stacks of paperwork. It fries my little brain at the best of times but late into the night I begin to read all the words upside down and backwards. I think it will be well worth it though, so a few cups of tea will get me through it!

Oh! I did actually go and write the story yesterday when I said I was going to. I honestly do not know where I’m going to take it. It will probably be embarrassingly bad, but so what? We’re all writers here, many creative writers. We know what a draft looks like and we know that sharing those practice writings or drafts or first attempts back at creativity can be tough. I’m just posting it for whoever to see. I hope I can come up with an ending though. I don’t think it will necessarily be going down the original thought process I had, but that’s the joy of pansting. Who knows where it will take you?

I had an idea that I think would lend itself well to a comic, but I don’t know how to draw and I don’t want to put it to my friend who is an artist because I have a history of wanting to start something and not being able to. If I put a script together, then I’ll say something. But even then, I know she’s busy with her work. I’ll look into how writers find artists and how all of that works. When the time comes, that is.

Did anyone see the Queen’s speech? I saw a quote from it on Tony’s blog so went searching for it. I like the Queen. I might not be a bit follower or supporter of the royal family as such, but the Queen is good in my books. I’ll post it for anyone who might want to view it. She’s talking about gratefulness and strength during the time of the Coronavirus pandemic.

It felt good to ramble again. I might need to trim me nails though because they’re a bit too long and they feel uncomfortable when I’m typing. I’m pretty fast at typing so I don’t like anything getting in the way of that speed or placing letters where letters aren’t supposed to be! I always wonder how people with super long nails use their phones or type. I have a fear of nails being ripped off and so I cringe a little when I see the tip of a nail meet the plastic because it moves the nail and tugs on it and erugh.

I’d like to continue but you’re in luck because I need to go boil the kettle. I wonder how many other people are boiling the kettle at this moment or about to go boil the kettle. Are you boiling the kettle? Is my talking about boiling the kettle making you want to boil the kettle?

*insert X Files theme tune*

We’re still watching X Files and my husband loves it which is very fun.

Are there any aliens boiling the kettle right now? Would aliens boil kettles or would they have some other form of technology to create boiling water? Could they do it with their minds? Would that mean that they would never suffer from coldteaitis because they could just *du du du du duuuu duuuuuuu* and it would be hot again? Huh… neat.

I hope you’re all well!

Arbie X

(Real Arbie not fake oh no weird dreams Arbie)

 

NOTE: AAArrggghhhh it didn’t post and it’s now 00:48. I found it in my drafts. Whyyyyyy. 😦 Well, I’m going to count it because I wrote it on the 6th and tried to post it. Baaaah. 😦

 

Arbie featuring Chidi

This is going to be a difficult post to write. Not because of anything emotional, but because Chidi the cat keeps nudging my laptop off my knees with his nose. He’s pretending he hasn’t been pet in fifteen years (despite not even being two yet) just like how in the kitchen he pretends he hasn’t been fed in twenty years. Chidi has a food problem, meaning he wants all the food all the time. He has also mastered how to convince people we are cruel horrible people, with an expertly tucked tail and pitiful meow. Why? Because there is cream and he knows there is cream and we are the spawns of Satan for not allowing him to eat it all, all of the time.

Or something like that.

Chidi also tries to drink orange juice.

He also dragged our food off the table on Thanksgiving and threw it on the floor then looked at us with an expression of: “What? You knew I would given the chance.”

I love Chidi.

This is Chidi.

(he only wore the bowtie for the picture)

Chidi just expertly rested his head on the backspace key and deleted letters as I was writing. Who needs an editor with a cat like this?

I actually intended to write a little bit about X Files in this post. Although there wasn’t a specific thing I wanted to write about. I introduced my husband to it again today (I’ve tried a couple of times I think in the past) and this time he liked it! It wasn’t a failure like with Twin Peaks which he thinks is awful… I just… *Sigh* each to their own. The good news is he actually likes X Files, or it’s because he’s sick at the moment, whatever it is I’ll take it until he doesn’t want to watch it anymore!

I’m not sure what it is about these shows that I like so much. Me and a lot of people like that is. Maybe it’s the mystery, or the small-town mystery vibe some of the episodes have. It’s actually a bit surprising that I like it as much as I do given that I’m not overly interested in aliens and it’s a running theme throughout, even with other supernatural cases. I suppose there’s nostalgia to it as well. I used to watch it with my eldest brother most evenings. Odd that I’d remember that over when I first watched it.

I think soon I might start writing some fiction but not really expect it to go anywhere. If that crops up on here, be aware that a story might start but it might not wind up finished. I keep resisting writing because I don’t believe I have it in me yet to complete anything. But it took me about five years to finish a book. I still hope to one day get around to finishing the others. I understand why it took me such a long time, my mental health being as rubbish as it was, and because of that I also understand I might not ever finish anything again. I don’t want to give up though. So, it might just mean a bunch of half written stories again as I start to put together some beginnings endings and middles.

The one thing I’m hesitant about though is dyslexia. I was tested for it and told that I have it back in university but I never really got the chance to understand how to deal with it. I think it mostly impacts my ability to structure, maybe, I don’t know. Yeah, the truth is I don’t know but I hope to find out how these different things might cause issues for me and learn to deal with them. That’s what I’m trying to say. There’s no point in trying to do the same thing over and over again and then wondering why it keeps failing.

It was nice to write a little bit more today, even if it was pretty forced. I’m happy that over the past week I’ve continued trying to be creative even if it’s been difficult. I rarely feel proud of anything, probably because I know how easily I give up (or I tell myself I give up easily) so maybe I don’t feel proud but I do feel content that I continued posting on this blog. Yeah, that feels good.

Okay, time to end this while the going is good or whatever that saying is.

I hope you’re all safe and well!

Arbie X

not even fit to be called a ramble

I keeping writing and deleting posts and so this is the one I’m going to stick with whether it’s rubbish or not I’m going to continue writing it and I’m going to post it. Deep breath needed after that.

I don’t have it in me today to write anything. My head is a mess, maybe from this cough syrup, I don’t know. I know they can do that but I don’t know if it is that. I just know words ain’t wording right. I’ve looked at prompts but nothing has come to mind other than the prompt itself or an image of the word in my head. As though my brain is learning words through pictures like I’m a kid again.

I used to have this little computer type thing and I think a clown or something taught me words and numbers. My parents mostly taught me, and my teachers, but I like to give that clown its fair shout. Although thinking back on it now it might not have been a clown.

I forgot it was April fools day even though throughout the day I kept remembering. It was that kind of fleeting memory moment though, where it comes to mind and then drops through the sieve back out again. I don’t mind much, I doubt I’d have done anything for April fools anyway. I like jokes, I’m just no good at pranks and I live on the sofa right now.

It’s my devil couch and I won’t give it up, no!

Although this was a fun april fools treat. I wish it were real though!

This post isn’t going anywhere. Even my rambles have some kind of structure. This is just typing for typings sake. I hope you forgive me for that. It’s just, I’m at the point in habit building where if I don’t perform the habit then I feel angsty and I don’t want to give up on this writing every day and posting every day too thing. So, I’m sorry about this. I wonder if I went straight from habit to unhealthy addiction.

You know, I’m just going to leave this here. Fergus the cat has come and plopped himself over my stomach, blocking most of my view of the laptop (he has very large ears) and so I think I need to listen to him and stop writing.

I got thinking about that clown that might not be a clown again and I remembered a book I used to read. At the end was a picture of a little girl in bed with her toys on the floor scattered around and some tissues there too. I think of that picture every once in a while. When I was little it used to comfort me for some reason, maybe I was evil and liked other little girls to be sick… no, it wasn’t that. I think it was the colour scheme. I also feel sad sometimes because I doubt I’ll ever see that picture again. Funny that.

Okay short ramble over. Rambles have been rambled.

Because this is utter shite and I believe laughter, although maybe not the best medicine, is a pretty good one, here is another comedy video from one of my favourite comedians about one of my favourite genres (horror):

 

Hope you’re all well!

Arbie X

 

Where’d you come from? Where’d you go?

I thought it might be fun to ask where you’re from. Not because I’m a stalker, I’m only asking for country here not town or postcode! And, where in said country you would tell me to go if I were visiting for a day. Just a fun little virtual travelling game for us to play. I’ll share mine, too!

You can also, if you like, share the country that you would like to visit and the one place you’d see if you could only be there for a day. Hence the whole butchering of the lyrics for Cotton Eye Joe, rather than “where did you go?” we’re playing with “where would you go?”

 

I’m from England and I’d suggest you go to Yorkshire. That’s right, not to London, but up North to where my family is from, and where I played when I was a little girl.

 

Here are a couple of places I’d like you to see:

 

York

tripadvisor.com

visitbritain.com

York is an old, old city and is incredibly enchanting with an awful lot to see and do in a single visit! There’s a reason I set my book here and honestly, if I ever could, I would live in York in a heartbeat. Or, within a short driving distance at least. I have many pictures from York because it’s where I took my husband when he first came to visit me in England. So, I’m not just saying this, this really is a place I like people to see! I’ll fish through those pictures in the future when I start to do my picture journals.

 

Bolton Abbey

coolcamping.com

yorkshirepost.co.uk

 

According to my Mom, this was my Grandma’s favourite place. I have many memories here, including shifting through the sand looking at stones with my dad. There’s a picture somewhere of my dad carrying me on his back down one of the streams that I’ll have to find because it’s one of my favourites.

 

Whitby

thenorthernecho.co.uk

theguardian.com

 

I suppose this is because of the little goth kid that is still in me, but I feel like I have to include Whitby. My last memory of Whitby was being stung by a scorpion in a hotel. Yep, I was bitten by Count Scorpula. I still have the scar on my arm from the little bugger. But! That’s not why I’m saying to go. I’m suggesting it because it has a beautiful atmosphere and if you like Dracula then why not see where he supposedly crashed up against the rocks? This is also where my engagement ring is from. My engagement ring has Whitby Jet inside it, not a gem but fossilised wood. Neat, huh?

 

Haworth

worldwidewriter.com

pinterest.com

 

One of my best memories of Haworth was going with my parents and my grandma (my dad’s mom this time) and getting some cherry lips from the sweet shop that tasted like soap and were glorious… more recently when I went I bought a Wuthering Heights graphic novel that although it doesn’t taste like soap, was pretty good! Wuthering Heights is still one of my favourite books and so visiting Haworth, a village the Brontë sisters are associated with, is something I like to do. It’s also just a pleasant place to be. You might have noticed, but all the places I’m suggesting (apart from York depending on what you do) are pretty relaxing haha!

 

The moors and dales and dales and moors and…

moors: yorkshire.com

dales: en.wikipedia.org

 

To the best of my recollection, I mostly played on Ilkley Moor. But, the moors and dales are both places to see while you’re in Yorkshire. There are obviously many more, but I was only planning to post one and then it kind of went from there so here we have it. I’m leaving you on the moors to find your own way home! A bit cruel… but the scenery!

eheheh

I hope this was somewhat entertaining and that maybe your curious about one of these places. When I was younger, I used to feel a little jealous of my friends jetting off to different countries to be in the Sun, but now I look back on the places I was taken by my parents and I’m grateful. I think it gave me a bigger appreciation for the country I was born in, and I hope that if I do have children that we’ll be able to bring them up in England and drag them to different castles to sit on cannons in the rain, too!

 

Now for where I would like to go…

 

Iceland

grayline.com

I’ve always wanted to see the northern lights, and so I think right now I’ll choose Iceland. Although, just while writing this there are many other places popping into my mind. Tough luck fingers, we’ve already decided!

 

Sorry if this is incorrect in places or just really jumbled. This actually took ages to put together because my head is fully in doolaley land haha. Thinking is hard!

I hope you choose to join in because I know I have people reading from Australia to India to Canada and I would love to see the places you wish more people knew about or appreciated in your country.

Hope your happy, safe, and well!

Arbie X

 

 

Blogging Insights – Self doubt and writing

I saw this prompt being answered by Melanie over at sparksfromacombustibelmind and felt it fit perfectly with the poem I wrote earlier this week.

The prompt/question is from the blog Salted Caramel:

How often are you afflicted by self-doubt and what do you do about it?

Although my poem was written about my self-doubt when it comes to a whole host of things, yet stemmed from interacting with people (something I try to avoid because of the spiral afterwards) I have a whole host of history with my self-doubt when it comes to writing.

I even started writing a post with the intention to delve into it in-depth, for myself as much for anyone else. A chance to exorcise some demons, so to speak. But I find the topic so uncomfortable that the Word document sits open but with little more than a few paragraphs to it.

So, am I afflicted with self-doubt when it comes to writing?

Yes. Massively so. So much so that after publishing my indie book I took it from advertising, put it to $0.99 (I couldn’t set it to free), and hoped it would just linger in the abyss rather than anyone read it. When people asked what it was called I said I didn’t want them to read it, when a friend who had read it asked if he could share it on his twitter account (where there were people who once knew me) I said no. When mixed reviews came in, despite knowing that I fucked up on advertising (I advertised a fantasy as an urban fantasy) and that everyone has their own preferences, I allowed negative reviews to lead my own thoughts on the book and dismissed positive.

It was as though I was looking for justice to hate my work and I had found it. I both wanted people to read and enjoy my book and wanted to remove its existence from Amazon. I fluctuated on this here and there and eventually just left it alone, where it sits now. I still check it on goodreads and amazon, but it’s a negative feeling, as though I’m picking at a scab and not allowing the wound to heal.

That’s where blogging comes in. Blogging is freedom. Blogging is no drafting, no editing, no more than I ever feel like I might want to, and blogging is liberating because I write here without any doubt. Well, hardly any doubt. The odd thing though? I prefer my blog to not grow. I don’t want thousands of followers. That would be intimidating, and I know myself, I shy away from the spotlight. No matter how much at times I might convince myself I want it.

And, as anyone who has followed me for some time will know, I whine and moan and bitch on here and I write things that are embarrassing to remember having written. It can be like the morning after an intoxicated night and thinking back “did I really say that?” But that’s how I like it. This blog was never here to entertain others or to promote myself, it was here as a blog. As a virtual diary where people can come and go, if they so please. It encompasses all of me, I suppose.

I believe I come back to my blog whenever I seek courage to begin writing fiction again. It serves as both practice writing and practice in posting what I write. And, that is exactly what I am doing now. I want to begin writing fiction again, telling stories, and publishing them and advertising them for others to read. So, this is what I do about the self-doubt that afflicts my writing: I write posts I don’t care about. I practice in different arenas. The same way a comedian might trial their material in a small club before they take it to the big stage, I suppose that would be a way of expressing what I am doing here.

 

There is much more to all of this, including why I believe I harbour so much self-doubt in my writing and what fuels that fire into an important existence. For now, I hope the above few paragraphs answer the questions that were asked. I’m grateful for the prompt because it opened the door for me to begin talking about this, after putting it off for so long.

 

I hope you’re all well.

Arbie X

happy happy film film

Another brief post but I really want to keep up this daily posting deal. I wondered if any of you had films that you watch when you aren’t feeling too chipper? This can be when feeling down or when feeling unwell. Basically a pick me up kinda film!

When I was a young’un, one of the films I would always watch when I was home sick from school would be The Pagemaster. I might have mentioned this before but in a much longer ramble post! My husband suggested we put it on and I think I’ll take him up on the offer.

from IMDB

Maybe stories and books would always be important to me, or always have been. Escape means the world to me and kindness even more so. I used to say that if my book could just make one person happy it would be enough. Maybe it’s done that, I don’t know.

Even the song makes me feel better so I’m going to post it. I’m not sure what it is about this film, it just makes everything feel a little gentler and more magical, if that makes sense. I’m feeling a bit emotional today because it’s been a stressful week so that song is making me feel like crying.

If I could vanish into a story with my husband right now then I would. Imagine if we could take our loved ones through our favourite fictional worlds? Mary Poppins style into a painting. Although, one of my favourite series is the Farseer Trilogy and Tawny Man and I’m not so sure how safe we’d be there, but adventure!

Anyway, speaking of adventure, I’ll leave you with Horror, Fantasy and Adventure! Which genre would you want to wake up in if you had to choose?

 

Hope you’re safe and well!

Arbie X

 

Note: I’ve just seen that over on The Arty Plantsman there will be a film friday challenge where favourite films will be written about and we’re invited to join in if we like! Here’s the link: https://wordpress.com/read/feeds/90473664/posts/2641008321

FF – The Blank Page

Copyright Jeff Arnold

“It’s always the keys,” a voice muttered, hushed but loud enough for an interested ear to notice.

“Always,” another responded. “Here we sit, jostled into this harness, and yet what do they obsess over? The clickety clackety.”

“Don’t forget the ink,” a third voice snorted. “All that romantic nonsense, especially if someone mentions a quill.”

A unison of sighs, exasperated in their holding. A shuffling, swoosh of page against page.

“And what are we to them? Nothing,” the first voice spat would-be dried ink from its chest.

“No, we’re something alright, the one they complain about. We’re the blank page.”

 

 

Above is my response to the Friday Fictioneers prompt by Rochelle.

I’m not feeling too well so couldn’t ramble but wanted to keep up with writing. I enjoyed reading other posts and so wanted to join in.

I hope I got it right and that you’re all well!

Arbie X

Hour two of waiting in the car

I finally gathered enough courage to at least sit in the back seat. I feel unwell. Slight tremors beneath my skin, my eyes once large and eager to see this Outside world now left feeling shrunken: small spongy balls inside sandpaper prisons. Well, better in than out on that one, at least.

The feeling of needing to vomit no longer encompasses the entirety of my stomach. Instead it weighs heavy, even it too fatigued from the heat to lurch upwards.

I’m thankful for that, it can stay there. I hate being sick at the best of times, but here, finally in the shade of the back seat, I hope to draw less attention to myself than when I perched half-in, half-out, in the front.

Quiet now, Pen.

I hear movement to the far edge of the carpark. A distant hum, somehow navigating its way through waves far more easily than the rumble and familiar sound of traffic. This sound is high pitched like an insect, but I know it is manmade both in innovation and origin.

I would peer out through the small opening I have made, but already, my legs dangling through it towards the heat scorched cement, I feel exposed.

How many minutes have passed since I began this descent into sun drenched madness that I forget the tingle of rains first splashes against my brow? Should I pray, I would pray these beads of sweat that trickle to my neck be replaced by the evaporation of our lakes and seas.

I know that soon I will leave this place. That my path may have led me to this Outside, but in faith I know that it can return me home.

I’ll scrawl and scrawl until that can be so. Shiver only from the passing of… footsteps…

Heavy and strange. An unknown yet ever heard sound, they grow closer. How further into myself can I sink? How deeper into this shelter can I seek… distance from… they grow distant again.

I breathe in deep. Nothing but remnants of the exhalations of trees and the pollution that threatens to choke them.

I grow more exhausted still.

Pen, we must part. I fear discovery.

A man. “Dave,” she says, she screams so close to my sanctuary.

“Dave. Dave. Dave!”

Oh dear flutter of leaves above, what does she implore of this man named Dave!

A grunt. A response at last, at fair last.

“Do you want your wallet, Dave?”

Another grunt. Another cry of the question, soon to be intertwined with my own unless with every ounce of strength left I bite down on my dehydrated tongue, I demand of it, as I never have before: Do not speak.

Do not say, “Your wallet, Dave, do you want your damn wallet?!”

Another grunt, higher this time. But not in response to me. Finally, an outstretched arm, a wallet grasped. Yes, Dave, the holy grail of the Outside, it is yours.

 

Pen, we write this under watchful eyes, but it is a fortunate thing that we do. He has returned and without sorrow we may leave the Outside. Should we return, in agreement I think I will find you dip your lid at my plans. A second flask of water for me and perhaps further ink to quench you. Pen, with a roar beneath us and falsified breeze above, we are free.

The Leaf

On the tallest branch

a leaf trembles

larger than the rest

I realize it is not the same

 

Blown from some other

taller tree

within the silent still

it is different and alone

 

Across the way

its sisters

brothers

blow freely as one

 

I glance back

a moment passes

until I see the silence

the stillness

of what once blew

before it trembled

that lonesome other leaf