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 Each day feels new, and my memory of the one before is faint. I’m learning to adapt. |
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In September 2019, a seizure revealed a lime-sized meningioma pressed against my hippocampus—the part of the brain that governs memory and language. The doctors said it was benign, but benign didn’t mean harmless. Surgery removed the tumor, and three days later I opened my eyes to a new reality. I could walk, I could talk, but when I looked at my wife, her name was gone. I called her Precious—the only word I could find. A failure of memory, yet perhaps the truest name of all. Recovery has been less cure than re-calibration. Memory gaps are frequent. Conversations vanish. I had to relearn how to write, letter by halting letter. My days are scaffold by alarms, notes, and calendars. When people ask how I am, I don’t list symptoms or struggles. I simply say, “Seven Degrees Left of Center.” It’s not an answer—it’s who I’ve become. |
| It is six in the morning. The coffee is fresh. That alone feels like a small victory. I am halfway through "Sable's Run"  , starting the second half, which means I have crossed an invisible line. Not finished. Not polished. Just far enough in that the story no longer feels theoretical. It exists. It has weight.There is a strange accomplishment in this moment. Not the kind you post about with fireworks or checklists. It is the quiet kind. The kind that sits with you while the house is still asleep and the only sound is the page turning and the coffee cooling beside you. The second half is where stories either hold together or start asking uncomfortable questions. Why am I here. Did I set this up well enough. Am I brave enough to let it end the way it wants to end. This morning, I am not fixing anything. I am not revising myself out of the story. I am just reading. Letting Sable run. Letting the work speak back to me. Maybe that is the accomplishment. Showing up early. Pouring the coffee. And realizing the story carried me this far. |
| I am searching for balance in my day. Retirement gives me long hours that look peaceful at first, but they can fill up fast or slip away without warning. Some mornings I sit down to write and realize I have lost track of time. Other days I drift from room to room and wonder how I managed to do absolutely nothing. Finding the right mix of writing, reading, and simply living has become its own little challenge. Too much writing and my brain starts to feel like wet cement. Too much downtime and I start looking for snacks instead of sentences. Somewhere in the middle is the sweet spot, and that is what I am trying to find. I try to give my day small anchors. A little writing with my first cup of coffee. A bit of reading when the afternoon feels slow. A walk or something simple to remind myself that life exists outside my keyboard. Some days the plan works. Other days I shrug and try again tomorrow. What I am learning is that balance does not arrive on its own. I have to search for it. I have to shape it. Retirement gives me freedom, but I need to give that freedom some structure. When I do, everything feels steadier. The stories come easier. The quiet hours make more sense. I am still searching, but I like the idea that balance is something I can build one day at a time. |
| Today I realized something both funny and a little unsettling. The story I am working on has drifted so far from the outline that I may have revised myself right out of it. The plot wandered. The characters made different choices. The ending I planned quietly packed its bags and left. Now I am standing here asking if this is good or bad. On one hand, it feels strange to lose the path I set. I spent time building that outline. I thought I knew where everything was going. Now the story has a mind of its own. It twists and turns in new ways, and I am left trying to catch up. Part of me wonders if I should pull it back. But here is the truth I am learning. Sometimes the story knows better than I do. When it grows past the outline, it can mean the characters are coming alive. It can mean the world is filling in. It can mean the draft is becoming something real instead of something forced. That is not a bad thing. It is a sign of movement. Of course, it also means I need more coffee and a new set of notes. Every time the story changes direction, I have to rethink the map. My brain complains, but the work gets better. I can see it happening. So is revising myself out of a story good or bad? Maybe it is both. It is confusing, but it is also exciting. It means the story is growing beyond the plan. It means I am not just following the outline. I am discovering something new. And honestly, discovery is one of the best parts of writing. I just need to hang on and see where this new version of the story wants to go. |
| I am reading through my manuscript today, and I keep asking myself one question. What was I thinking? Some sentences feel stronger than I remember. Others feel like they were written by a tired raccoon with a keyboard. I flip pages and find surprises that make me laugh, cringe, or reach for more coffee. This is the strange joy of reviewing a draft. I meet the past version of myself, the one who wrote late at night and trusted I would understand the note that says “fix this later.” Now I stare at it and wonder what “this” was supposed to be. I thought I would remember. I did not. Still, there is something comforting in this chaos. I can see how far the story has come. I can also see where it needs help. That is the real purpose of reading a manuscript with honest eyes. Every rough sentence is a chance to improve. Every confusing moment is a signpost pointing to the next edit. So I keep going. I shake my head. I laugh at my own choices. I fix what needs fixing. I remind myself that no writer thinks clearly during a first draft. We just write and hope our future selves will sort it out. And here I am, sorting it out with coffee in hand and a sense of humor. It is messy, but it means the story is growing. “What was I thinking?” is not a failure. It is the beginning of the rewrite. |
| Writers talk about a novel having legs, and I finally understand what that means. It is the moment when the story stops dragging itself across the floor and starts walking on its own. Characters move without being pushed. Scenes unfold without being forced. The world feels alive enough to nudge me forward. When a novel has legs, I stop pulling it. It starts pulling me. I sit down to write, take a sip of coffee, and suddenly two hours pass. The ideas connect. The chapters grow. I even catch myself smiling at something a character said that I never planned. Of course, this stage does not appear out of nowhere. It takes a lot of early mornings and many cups of coffee. I think half my progress comes from caffeine and the other half from stubbornness. Some days the coffee keeps me awake long enough for the story to find its stride. Other days it simply keeps me from falling face-first into the keyboard. But when the novel finally stands up and walks, it feels worth every cup. It is a small victory. It tells me the story wants to be told. And once it has legs, all I have to do is keep up. |
| I didn’t think I’d make it. If I’m honest, I wasn’t sure this story would make it either. November has a talent for sneaking up on me with a stack of projects, a half-finished coffee, and that familiar whisper: “You’re writing again, aren’t you?” Yes. Yes, I was. But somehow, between late-night scenes, character rewrites, plot detours, and more than a few conversations with an AI ship who is far too sassy for her own good, I finished the draft of Sable’s Run before the end of November. And it feels… pretty incredible. This story surprised me. It’s a space western romance with analog tech, dust storms, old-world towns, and a ship with an attitude problem. It follows Lyra, a pilot who crash-lands on a low-tech moon, and Kade Rowan, a mechanic who just wants to be left alone but somehow ends up restoring a starship, protecting a town, and catching feelings he definitely didn’t ask for. And then there’s Sable, the ship herself — equal parts heart, intelligence, sarcasm, and loyalty. She became a character I didn’t expect to love as much as I do. November didn’t beat me this year. And Sable didn’t let me quit. If that’s not a win, I don’t know what is. |
| Today I learned something new about writing. The details matter. I know everyone says that, but knowing it and actually living it are two very different things. I am not a master of this yet. I am still learning. Some days it feels like the details are sitting in the corner laughing at me. I went back to review a few chapters, hoping for a quick clean-up. Instead I found a small parade of mistakes waving little flags. The town changed size. A character switched eye color without asking permission. Someone climbed a hill that did not exist in the previous chapter. I read it all and felt my brain tighten like a rubber band about to snap. This is the messy part of writing that no one warns you about. The canon never stays put. It wiggles. It shifts. It sneaks around the room while I am not looking. I keep thinking I will remember everything, but my brain has other plans. Today it decided to forget half my worldbuilding and send me on a treasure hunt. I will be honest. It gets frustrating. I stare at the screen and wonder why my own story refuses to behave. My head starts to hurt. I reach for coffee and hope that caffeine will magically solve continuity problems. It never does, but the ritual helps. The good news is that every time I fix a detail, the story feels a little tighter. The world becomes more steady. I get a small spark of pride, even if it took three tries to get there. I remind myself that learning is part of the process. No one becomes a master of canon on the first draft. Or the second. Or maybe the third. Humor keeps me sane. If I cannot laugh at myself chasing misplaced details around like loose chickens in a barnyard, then I will never make it to the finish line. So I let myself chuckle at the chaos and keep going. One day I will look back and see how much I learned. For now, I just keep reviewing, correcting, and hoping my characters stop moving their own furniture without telling me. It is the details. They are small, but they sure know how to cause trouble. |
| I opened one of my old drafts today and realized something strange. I had no memory of writing it. Not a single line looked familiar. It felt like someone had broken into my house, used my keyboard, and left behind a story with my name on it. There is a special kind of shock that comes with reviewing something you wrote long enough ago to forget it existed. First comes the worry. Did I really write this sentence? Then the curiosity settles in. What was I trying to say? By the time I reach the end of the first page, I start to feel like a detective piecing together clues from a past version of myself. The funniest part is that forgotten writing can surprise me. Sometimes I find a sentence that actually works. I smile and think, maybe I do know what I am doing. Other times I find a paragraph that makes me question my life choices. Then I reach for my coffee and remind myself that progress still counts, even when it looks messy. The gift of forgetting is a form of honesty. When enough time passes, I read my own work the way a stranger would. I notice what feels clear. I notice what feels confusing. I see the parts that need tightening and the parts that deserve to stay. So if you ever lose track of your own writing, do not panic. Treat it like a reunion with an old friend. You might cringe a little. You might be pleasantly surprised. In the end, you learn something about who you were then and who you are now. And the best part is this. You get to revise with fresh eyes. You get to start again without the weight of remembering every choice you made. Sometimes forgetting is not the problem. Sometimes it is the secret advantage. Thank you Raven   for the perspective. |
| Some days I sit down to write and discover that my brain has filed for a temporary leave of absence. The cursor blinks at me like it is judging my life choices, and I stare back at it as if I can intimidate it into giving me an idea. It never works. The cursor always wins. When I have absolutely nothing to write about, I usually start noticing strange details around me. The coffee mug with the chipped rim. The way the air conditioner makes a sound that might be normal, or might be a small creature living inside it. These tiny things start showing up in my writing because, apparently, my imagination takes whatever it can get during an idea drought. I used to panic on days like this. I thought a blank mind meant something was wrong with me as a writer. Now I realize it is just part of the rhythm. Creativity needs time to wander off into the woods and argue with itself. Eventually it returns, pretending it never left, carrying a half-baked idea that it expects me to be grateful for. So when I have nothing to say, I write about the nothing. I write about the silence, the strange thoughts, and the coffee that somehow tastes both weak and bitter at the same time. I write until the nothing starts to feel like something. And it always does. It just takes a moment of patience, a deep breath, and occasionally a cup of coffee strong enough to jolt the muse back from wherever it wandered off to. Some days the words flow. Some days they crawl. And on days like this, they stand around, shrugging. So I write about that too. |
| There’s an odd limbo I fall into every time I finish a writing project. It’s not rest. It’s not celebration. It’s more like wandering around my own house, opening cabinets and forgetting why I walked into the room. My brain keeps asking, Shouldn’t we be writing something? and I keep answering, I know… I know… I’m working on it. I always think the “in-between” will feel peaceful, like a mini vacation. Instead, it feels more like I’ve misplaced my keys, my plot, and possibly my sanity. I suddenly remember every abandoned idea I ever had and start poking at them like leftovers in the fridge. Some are still good. Some should have been thrown out a long time ago. I try to relax—read a book, drink a hot cup of coffee before it becomes iced coffee against my will—but the next story is always tapping on the glass somewhere in the distance. It never rings the doorbell politely. It just lurks until I notice it. So here I am again, between projects, pretending to be calm while waiting for the next idea to jump out and tackle me. It always does eventually. In the meantime, I’ll be wandering around, opening mental cabinets, looking for inspiration or at least a snack. |
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