Work!

I am on a massive work-kick right now. I am determined to do everything I can not to end up going under and drowning. I have multiple projects. Some of which are not based around my beloved Paltry Sum blog. The novel is getting rapidly towards half-finished. It has only taken me three weeks or so at this point, and I have been working on it like a demon. It is mostly mapped out, but for now I am concentrating on part two, which is called “The Clockwork People of Jackson Square”. I love the novel. I actually love most of the characters, they take on lives of their own and start getting hungry for resolution and greater share of the plotlines. They are demanding creatures. I tell them that they are just work, but they rarely believe me.

I have put a lot more effort into my poetry recently. Poetry is a sensitive animal. Lou Reed in “Songs for Drella” declares that Andy Warhol told him that he should have written fifty percent more than he lied that he had produced that day. Songs and poems cannot be churned out in a factory like Andy’s screen printings. Not all of us are geniuses with shortcuts to greatness, but Warhol’s advice rings loud in my ears. I won’t always be as young as I am, and I am certainly older than yesterday, each day that passes is an opportunity to work. I have to produce the bulk of my work right now, in the hopes that I can actually make a commercial success out of being a writer.

I have high hopes for the novel, I actually think I have something. It is a horror/supernatural story with a historical edge to it, and not in the slightest bit autobiographical. I have strayed far far from my comfort zone, and it is actually working. If I can finish it within the next month or so and start hawking it around publishers I might have a shot at securing a longer period of time for me and the kiddo. The Patreon is not proving to be a big hit. After all no one wants to pay for what they can get for free, but I must start making money.

I need to give the Boy a chance at going to college. He has started high school and is doing magnificently. He has some wonderful teachers who understand his experience of the world and are supportive and challenging. I am deeply grateful. He announced to me that he would like to become a lawyer or a detective. Whilst I am not entirely sure about having a cop in the family, a lawyer is always useful. I have to give him as much as I can while I am still around to give it. I have never been one to give up on life, even when it gave up on me, and that has not changed, no matter how much pain I am in on a day to day basis or how scared I am of the future.

California has been good to us. California saved my life. I carry a lot of guilt around about having to be nice to my abuser in order to keep me and the Boy safe. I had to placate, and anyone who knows me at all from my writing knows I am not a placating kinda girl. I have had to do a lot of this recently and it burns my soul. Buying time with false niceness, allowing gaslighting and downplaying of the truth is like acid eating into my sanity, but I am holding on tight. Things are pretty hard for me right now, but I do my best to put a smile on my face by the time the boy emerges from school, and be the happy, smiling loving ma that he deserves. If I fail, if I fall short it won’t be from lack of effort or work.

Writing is the only thing I can do with my life. It is the only thing that I am good at, but I am rapidly running out of time. I know what Andy would have said: Andy would have said Work, and work is exactly what I am going to do. I don’t think I have any other option anyway.

If you would like to support my writing and help keep me and the Boy in our house, I have a Patreon at

https://www.patreon.com/ThePaltrySum