The comments I got back after my blog about father figures was very interesting. More than one reader was surprised I have a good relationship with my father. Readers have, publicly or privately, told me that some of the dialogue could have been taken verbatim from some of their own arguments with their parents, and used that to congratulate the authenticity of my writing.

It’s very kind, but that should not be the first takeaway there. The first takeaway is obvious – I am so very sorry for anyone who had to go through that, especially when I didn’t (not from my father). I am sorry for the negative and personal feelings my writing has conjured within my readers, and I’m sorry that I continue to do so in my stories in the name of drama and authenticity. I find joy and art in portraying a range of human emotion, so I imagine I won’t stop, but I’m listening if perhaps, spoilers be damned, I need to start adding trigger warnings on my chapters/pieces at the start. Perhaps I can see if this site editor has a system not unlike Discord’s where one has to click on a hidden block of text to reveal the trigger warnings. If there is enough reader support, I’ll look into that. Let me know.

There’s a bitter truth to the fact that I can write these situations outside of a direct correlation. In my personal life, I’ve been both lucky and unlucky enough to live a variety of lifestyles. I’ve gotten to live with a rich relative for a half-year and didn’t have to work during that period, and I’ve been homeless for a year. I’ve had loving parents, and also lived with an abusive relative. I’ve been unfairly hurt… and, I’m ashamed to say, I’ve unfairly hurt people. Those last two examples definitely take the wind out of my sails the most, and on occasion, when I’ve been too burnt out by the effects of my personal life, I’ve taken to these blogs to air out my emotions. This blog will continue that trend.

Due to factors I couldn’t control nor properly see at the time, I’ve hurt a dear friend badly. It’s incurred other consequences for me, but I care less about that. Above all else, my philosophy is something to the effect of “Cause as much joy for others, and try to minimize as much harm, as possible.” Given that, I didn’t live up to my philosophy. The friend dressed me down for it, rightly so, and a difficulty in writing emotion-based stories is knowing that likely, in one way or another, I’m going to relive this exact feeling someday when it happens to one of my characters. I still vividly remember pivotal moments in my stories, the majority of which are spoilers so I won’t go into them. But odds are, if you read any “difficult conversation” between two characters of mine, I can’t credit that entirely to my imagination. While the words are original, and while the circumstances are more often than not made up, the feelings are almost always inspired by a situation where I was one party or the other.

I don’t write with the explicit goal of making these memories, but sometimes I write up to a certain point and realize, “Oh no, it needs to end this particular way…” Spoilers for Chapter 10 of Final Answer, but the conversation between Sammy and Jason was inspired by a conversation I had with my last girlfriend where I kept being interrupted, and after a while I figured that it was free game for us to interrupt each other. After the first time I interrupted her, she noted it and highlighted that it reflected a deeper problem in our relationship that I needed to fix. I got angry, and after the fact, while digesting our fight, I asked myself how I would fix it in hindsight, and had the idea of a “talking stick” if we couldn’t talk without interrupting. Hence, hitting the dashboard.

I find Chapter 10 fascinating, because in previous chapters I likely teased that a moment like this was coming. Even so, people really liked Sammy’s personality. One chapter and one uglier conversation later and, if memory serves correctly, one reader noted that to them, even the intimacy between Sammy and Jason felt forced, fake, or shallow (I hope I’m not misinterpreting that comment, and it’s possible they felt that way beforehand, but they felt the need to point it out after chapter 10). My philosophy is that a reader is scarcely wrong, and if that’s how it feels, that’s how it is to them. I’ll only ever disagree if someone argues a character, for example, “Never did X Y or Z” even when the story clearly shows them doing X Y and Z. Sammy and Jason are in high school, and I often write people and especially high schoolers as more intense but more mature than they actually are – most couples are more shallow than even Sammy and Jason. That said, a reasonable counterpoint to this is that in the ecosystem of my stories, it’s still valid to call out the relative shallowness of their relationship, and I think I agree, but I also think, frankly, that the shallow “I like you, you like me, we’re excited to be in a relationship” is part of their charm. I wonder if the legitimate fight after their “almost fight” reinforced that their good bits feel forced. It’s something to keep in mind, perhaps.

Chapter 10 also shows us a frankly cute portrayal of friends that fight but always make up. Clever readers already understand the difference between Jason’s fights with Rose (at least at this point) and his fight with Sammy. I won’t divulge those themes just yet. For those readers, I fear I’ve experienced a lot more of the themes behind the fight with Sammy recently, and my heart is hurting for the person I’ve hurt, and I’m ashamed of myself for things getting to this point, let alone the other consequences for my life such events have incurred. It’s going to be difficult for me to maintain a consistent writing schedule for at least the next week, which is why I was able to finish a written commission so soon into the month. As well, when able, I’ve been chipping away at other projects. Once Chapter 11 of Final Answer is commissioned, I’ll also start working on that too.

Consider this blog a bit of a forewarning. Just as any machine needs energy or fuel, I have certain needs in my personal life that have to be met for me to, at least, write consistently. I haven’t been good at warning people in the past, so I’m warning you now while I’m of sound mind that a difficult part of my life has decidedly begun again. I apologize for how this may affect… anything. I know if I say “I want to do good, and failed,” people will comfort me by saying I’m human or my intentions were noble or something, but to me, it’s just not enough. If nothing else, I’m grateful this aspect of my life is so divorced from my personal life. I’ll talk to you all soon.