Write By Moonlight

157 Days of Not Writing.

There is this quote that I love, that I think about often but find myself ignoring. It is something that means a lot to me but only when it’s convenient, which goes against the whole meaning of the quote in the first place. It’s a quote from Henry Rollins.

“If I lose the light of the sun, I will write by candlelight, moonlight, no light. If I lose paper and ink I will write in blood on forgotten walls. I will write always. I will capture nights all over the world and bring them to you.” ~ Henry Rollins

It’s been 157 days since I’ve written anything. I jotted a few notes on my Freewrite during FanExpo last weekend, and I recorded a voice memo the week before that about a story idea, but as far as putting words on a page, nothing since February 7th.

On December 12th of last year I was laid off from the job I loved working for a company I loved. I was the Director of Safety and Security for Meow Wolf, and it was a dream job. After my position was eliminated I went into a bit of a depression.

Over the next three months I would live out my very own country song and it felt like the hits just kept coming. The educational nonprofit I was part of closed, which broke my heart. But things really hit when we lost Ender, our fifteen year old Australian Shepard / Black Lab mix. He was such a sweet dog.

Ender riding shotgun the day I brought him home. He never stopped looking at me like that.

If memory serves me, I was editing the Scissors: A Love Story when I took this picture of Ender laying by my desk fourteen or so years ago.

He was such a great friend.

I was spiraling a bit while I tried to figure out what was next. I needed something to focus on. I told my friend (and amazing editor), Spencer Hamilton, that I was thinking about writing and releasing a short story collection in time for AuthorCon: Scares That Care, which (at the time) was just two and a half months away. He agreed to edit stories as I wrote them and encouraged me to write like I was losing light. So I did. I finished four short stories (the fifth being Scissors: A Love Story, which I wrote in 2010 or so) and he Spencer edited the collection. I managed to format the book, make the edits, design the cover, and get everything ready to go with enough time to tighten everything up and have the book published with copies in hand to make a splash at AuthorCon. Then another whirlwind hit.

In early February a job prospect popped up out of nowhere. Not exactly the type of position I was looking for, but the company seemed great and the concept was fun. So I started a very fast paced interview process. Within a week of the first conversation they were flying me out to DC to spend the day with the owner of the company. Less than a week later I accepted the offer, the next morning I flew out to Charlotte for two weeks of training. I haven’t written a word since before then. When I got back to Denver I had less than two weeks to hire and train a staff of 35 before we opened the Denver location. So I got to work. I’ve been going full throttle, 50-70 hours a week since.

I still had my collection: Bury My Body Somewhere Nice ready for release, but the grand opening for my store was the same weekend, so I had to skip AuthorCon altogether. The book was still came out but all the work I’d put into the release was for nothing. No celebration, no panels, no lives, no readings, no giveaways, no street team sharing. Just crickets. Maybe I should have delayed the release until I could focus on it, but I went through a lot of trouble to make sure there was a physical preorder, and I didn’t want to let down the people who had ordered it.

That was just over three months ago. I’ve got a great staff that are at a point where they don’t need me there all the time, so I can spend a little more time at home. So I started mentally preparing to finally knock out the novel I had been working on before I got laid off (a 90s camp slasher), then start on the next Paisley book.

Then another opportunity arose that shifted things around a bit. One of my favorite people in the world came to stay with us for a while. We put him up in my office so he could be comfortable. Now, if you know me you probably have heard me talk about how horrible my ADHD is and how difficult I find it to write. It’s been a lifelong struggle but I had build systems to help and the displacement really felt like a speedbump. I lost my sanctuary.

Then I remembered the quote. “If I lose the light.” “If I lose pen and ink.” What about those things. I wrote most of In the Hills Above the Gristmill in a dank, unfinished basement with no heat with a single bare lightbulb above my head. I wrote for my first paid writing gig (writing for a Cartoon Network show) in the closet of our two bedroom apartment. And, all those years ago, I wrote Scissors: A Love Story in my car while I was waiting for my kids in the school pickup line. So I’m writing this to you now in a new place. The place I plan to finish my next book. In the closet under the stairs at my home. It’s a little space about seven feet log, three feet wide, and four feet tall. Roughly the same dimensions as a coffin, just twice as high so I can sit up.

I’ve got stories to bring to you.

Thanks for being here.

K

p.s. If you haven’t read Bury My Body Somewhere Nice: A Collection of Dark Stories, you should. And, if you have, you should review it everywhere you possibly can. It would really help the book, and really help me. I could use the validation. The same goes for my other books, too.

p.s.s. Yes, a LOT of other stuff happened in the last few months, including the murder of my nephew, but a lot of what happened impacted others as well (not that Ender crossing the rainbow bridge didn’t) so I am choosing not to discuss them here.