Struggling to write...sort of...

Almost all writers struggle with their craft at times, and I've definitely had my own bouts of writer's block. This time, however, I know it's something different. I've never actually made a lot of money from my writing, but in the past, I could be confident that I might be able to buy a week or two of groceries, or pay a couple of bills, but sales have definitely fallen off as the economy continues to struggle, and this couldn't happen at a worse time. My family is continuing to struggle, and we've had to take some drastic (legal) actions to make sure that we can keep a roof over our heads. Still, with me not able to find a "real" job, I know that I need to be making more money off of my writing, and this is putting a whole new kind of pressure on my craft. In the past, whatever I made was just extra money, but now, it needs to actually help us survive, and because of this, I'm finding it hard to write. This is a pressure I've never felt before, and I'm not always good at adapting to change...

Having said this, there are still some things that I'm getting written. I have a story that I'm writing for Boundary Shock Quarterly that's almost done. When I started on it, I thought it would be about 4,000 words. I have one more revision to do, and it looks like it will be close to 7,500 words. Hopefully they like it! This has to be done by October 1st, so I've found myself able to focus with the deadline closing in on me.

Everything else I'm working on, whether it's fiction or RPG titles, is nothing but a struggle. Maybe I need more deadlines in my life. I've tried to set artificial deadlines to see if that can stimulate my creativity, but my brain just laughs at that and ignores those deadlines.

For now, I will continue to try to get everything written that I can. We need the money, but I really don't need this kind of pressure...but I guess that's the world we live in. Maybe I'll find a job soon, and I'll find it easier to write. I know that sounds absurd, but that's just me.

Taking care of a sick kitty

I've been absent from just about everything for the last couple of weeks as I've been nursing a very sick kitty back to health. Eclypse, the little calico in the picture developed a severe infection, and almost died. I noticed her acting strange late on a Wednesday night, and by Thursday afternoon, I knew there was something very wrong. When my wife got home that night, we took her to the emergency vet, and they determined that she had an infected uterus and needed to be spayed within a couple of days. When we got home from the vet at 11:30 that night, we spent the next two hours trying to find a place that would be able to do it on Friday, and wouldn't cost us a fortune. The emergency vet could have done it, but it would have been $6,000-$8,000, and considering that we're still struggling to pay our rent and put food on the table, this simply wasn't an option.

We finally found a place that would take her early Friday, so we dropped her off and waited. The first few nights were really touch and go because she was so sick, and she's such a little thing. At her heaviest, she's about seven pounds. It had always been our intention to get her spayed, but once she was old enough and big enough, we simply couldn't afford it, and we couldn't really afford it at this point, but letting her die was never an option. Our cats are our family, and we will do everything we can to protect them, and that includes getting fewer groceries for the next few weeks.

While it was a family effort to nurse her back to health, it mostly fell on me. For those of you that know cats, you know that when they live with multiple humans, they will usually pick one of these people as their person, and the rest are spares. Well, I'm Eclypse's person. She has always been very attached to me, and during all of this, she became even more attached, so she's been sleeping on me, and I've let her, no matter how uncomfortable it made me. At this moment, she is laying on a cat hutch right next to my chair at my desk, and she's been here since I started working this morning.

So, this has been my last couple of weeks. I'm happy to say that she is now on the mend, if we can just protect her from herself. She's a very high energy cat, and she now once again thinks it's time to run and jump on everything...but at least she's healing.