1864: Trying Times

It is, as they say, a Difficult Time in my life, as regular readers will know. I also find it somewhat unfortunate that said Difficult Time in my life is coming, as with the previous Difficult Time back in 2010, shortly prior to my heading off to something that should be fun, exciting and pure escapism: my trip to Boston for PAX East. (I hasten to add that this Difficult Time is for different reasons to the 2010 Difficult Time, thankfully; I’m not sure I could go through another 2010.)

But, as difficult as it is to stay positive sometimes — and believe me, it is extremely difficult to stay positive right now — I need to focus on the things that I’m doing that are worthwhile, and that could potentially (hopefully!) lead to future happiness.

I have a real piano in my own house for the first time since I left home, for one thing. That’s pretty cool, and as I suspected I vastly prefer playing it to my electric piano. The electric, though awesome and great-sounding, simply doesn’t “feel” right thanks to being on a somewhat wobbly keyboard stand, and the sound of it coming out of an amplifier isn’t the same as the real thing at all.

Said piano is hopefully going to be the centrepiece of at least some of my future work, and I’m making all the efforts possible to make the music teaching happen. I’m getting business cards printed, I have a listing on one of the biggest online music teacher directories in the country, I have my own website and, once the business cards arrive, I’ll be giving them out to local music shops and other establishments in the hope of drumming up some business.

I’m also going to be doing some work for the local Music Service. I only have a couple of hours of this secured so far, but hopefully that will lead to more regular future things. While a couple of hours certainly isn’t going to pay the bills, it’s a foot in the door, which is good.

Then there’s a few writing-related possibilities in the pipeline. I don’t know if any of these will come to anything just yet, but hopefully they will.

And then there’s a few other potential means of making some money out there, too, all of which I’m exploring in the hope of finding something that will allow me to support myself and remain at least reasonably happy for some of the time. In practical, realistic terms, it’s probably more likely I will end up mixing and matching lots of different things, which maybe isn’t ideal from a “stability” perspective, but will certainly keep things interesting and exciting — and more importantly, allow me to work on my own terms, which is something that I’ve come to crave.

I am trying to remain positive. I really am. There are good days, and there are bad days, and there are days that are sort of in the middle that can go either way. Today has been one of the latter kinds; let’s hope tomorrow is a good day. Only one way to find out though, huh.

1008: Three Wishes

My mind regularly wanders, particularly when I’m trying to get to sleep, and often delves into the territory of rather predictable fantasies. No, not that kind of fantasy — well, not all the time, anyway — but rather the sort of fantasies that tend to provoke conversations in the pub or at the end of a house party. Things like “what superpowers would you like to have?” or “what would you do if you had three wishes?”

I’ve always found the idea of three wishes a fascinating one, ever since I first heard various genie-toting tales from the Arabian Nights and the subsequent primary school “I wish I had three more wishes” jokes. I’ve never quite managed to come up with a definitive answer as to what my three would be. The closest I’ve come is determining that I’d probably have two “practical” ones, one of which is usually ensuring that my body is in perfect physical condition — because, well, if you have the opportunity, you might as well ensure you’re in full working order, right? (And also I’m fed up with having an itchy scalp. TMI? Fuck off.) The second practical one is often ensuring I’m in a situation where I don’t have to worry about money. (This fantasy came up considerably more frequently while I was out of work, as you might expect.)

It’s the third wish I often spend a long time pondering, though. I figure once I’ve done the vaguely responsible thing and wished for things that ensure my affairs are in order, I can cut loose with the third one. (Of course, I could also set the genie free with my third wish, but where’s the fun in that?)

Several recurring possibilities usually enter my mind for this third wish. They probably say something about me. Please do not read too much into them. (Or do. I don’t care. You can do what you want.)

My first possible third wish (you’re following, right?) is the ability to “do magic”. Perhaps as a side-effect of my love of role-playing games, every time I imagine requesting this wish I picture the genie bringing up what essentially amounts to a character creation interface and inviting me to pick my spells. The magic I end up choosing usually ends up being of the elemental variety. Thinking about it, I’m not entirely sure why I pick this, because if there’s one thing that probably isn’t that useful in everyday modern society, it’s elemental magic. Whatever role-playing games might tell us, there are not monsters wandering around outside every town, problems cannot always be solved by setting fire to people who disagree with you and broken machinery cannot be repaired simply by calling down a thunderbolt on it. (In fact, some might say that usually has the opposite effect to repairing it.)

My second possible third wish is that my car would become a VTOL flying vehicle powered by anti-gravity technology which is physically impossible — so far as we know, anyway. Or it might be magic, given that said car doesn’t usually require any fuel. This is a fairly self-explanatory wish usually provoked by the fact I’ve been stuck in a traffic jam at some point during the day and inevitably found myself picturing what it might be like if my car could just rise up off the ground and fly over all the frustrated motorists beneath me. It would be awesome. Don’t say it wouldn’t be, because you would be wrong.

My third possible third wish is the ability to switch bodies with someone — usually a person of the opposite sex who has absolutely nothing to do with my normal life and who possibly exists outside of normal space and time. This is pure curiosity, and come on, who hasn’t wondered about how “the other side” lives? Different times I’ve had this particular fantasy have varied slightly — sometimes the other person simply ceases to exist when my consciousness isn’t present in her; other times she goes about her normal life and simply switches places with me willingly; sometimes she’s an empty vessel (like a robot body) built to hold my consciousness; other times, she is me in a parallel dimension and I am actually both people, I’m simply only aware of one at a time; other times still, the change comes without warning at unexpected moments. (The latter situation, I’ve recently discovered, is the plot hook of the anime Kokoro Connect, so naturally I’ve immediately started watching it.) My motivation for this wish is simply to see what it would be like living another life that is completely different to my own — opposite in almost every respect.

A variation on that third possible wish is to gain the ability to shapeshift. When I picture this wish, my imagination usually puts some surprisingly conservative limitations on my power. I can usually only shapeshift for a limited amount of time, meaning that I can’t just stick in another form — I’ll just change back to my real self after a set period of time has elapsed. I’m usually only limited to changing into other human forms, as well — no turning into, say, a xylophone or a fridge for me. It’s enough to have a similar experience to the “body-swapping” wish, though — I get to try out what it’s like to be someone completely different for a little while.

Obviously, I know all of these will never come true so it’s a completely moot point. But I wonder, if the opportunity did arise, which one I’d actually choose when the time came?

#oneaday Day 831: Another Year

So, as of the time of writing, I’ve just turned thirty-one years old. As becomes increasingly common as the years pass by, it doesn’t feel any different to being thirty.

I was mostly prepped for the supposed horror of turning thirty by my parents. My father in particular apparently didn’t take to turning thirty all that well, so I was expecting a semi-to-fully traumatic experience. It actually turned out to be a rather pleasant experience, as I was whisked off on a weekend to London by my girlfriend Andie, and then had the chance to see a bunch of friends for curry and good times.

A lot has happened in the space of the last year. Having been forced to move back home with my parents due to my shattered personal life from the year prior, in August I moved back out again. At the time I was working for GamePro and was earning a decent wage from it, too, so Andie (who was also living with her mother at the time) and I decided that we were both in a situation where we could get a house and move in together. So we did. And that was good.

Since that time, GamePro collapsed — in December of last year, to be specific. I was very sad about this, as I felt I’d found my “calling” — I did a great job of posting the daily news there, and my hard work was appreciated by the people I was working for. I was grateful for the opportunity, grateful to be accepted and appreciated in what I was doing, and grateful to, for the first time in my life, have a job that I actually enjoyed.

I was half-expecting the collapse of GamePro to signal another disastrous collapse in my own personal circumstances. At the time, I didn’t have enough money saved up to survive for very long and still be able to pay my tax bill at the beginning of next year. I started frantically applying for jobs and finding the same situation I had done prior to starting at GamePro — no-one was interested in me. I don’t know whether it was my lack of “relevant” qualifications for certain sectors, my wide-ranging experience that covered both teaching and writing positions, or something else. Whatever it was, it carried a significant risk of making me feel like absolute crap again.

Fortunately, I found myself with a new job before long, and I’m enjoying it. I’m constantly learning new stuff, too, which is a big bonus. My writing may not be quite so much in the “mainstream” public eye any more, but I’m find with that; it means that I have to deal with far fewer hormonal teenagers who can’t spell, punctuate or formulate an argument. I also haven’t had any accusations of being a paedophile since starting my new job, either, which is always nice.

What else? I’ve bought a new computer, bought an Android tablet, discovered My Little Pony, played all three of the “Operation Rainfall” role-playing games on the Wii, finally started playing Nier, started a few creative projects, started, stopped, started, stopped and started again at the gym lots of times… the list goes on. When put that way, it probably doesn’t sound all that interesting, really. But I can’t say it’s been a shitty year, unlike certain previous years I could mention. On the whole, it’s been a reasonably good year and hopefully things will just continue to improve.

Now it’s time to go to bed. I’ve had friends over playing TrackMania, Dungeon Defenders, 7 Wonders and Catan this evening, with more arriving tomorrow for further board game fun and frolics.

See you on my “proper” birthday.