On writing.

Words have always meant the world to me. They have been my only friend, my solace, and my weapon when I needed one. Being able to write down my thoughts and feelings, even if only for my own eyes, has always brought me peace. In recent years, that peace has been disturbed and replaced with the turmoil of the worst creative block I have ever lived with.

Growing up, I always carried pen and paper with me. If I needed to jot down an idea that came into my head, I would refer to it later. I would refine and mold those ideas into something either spectacular or awful, though I was the only judge, since most of my works didn't reach the eyes of others until many years later.

I grew comfortable writing stories about other people - their struggles, their strife, their accomplishments. Writing someone else's story makes it very easy to forget your own, and unfortunately, I fell victim to that trap. While promoting the works of others, I forgot about myself.

At twenty-five years of age, I am now five years from my last nationally published writing work. Tonight, I broke out my paper portfolio and flipped through the pages, remembering how it felt every time I ran to a bookstore in search of one of my pieces. I would look through the magazine racks in calculation, looking for that fresh, crisp cover. Once I had it in my hands, I would flip through each and every page until reading my name. I didn't care about the editing or how my words may have changed. Seeing my name in something that reached beyond either my computer screen or shelf of notebooks was, and has always been, incredibly surreal. It has given me a sense of accomplishment unmatched by anything before or since. It has been everything to me.

For years, it was my identity. I was hungry to do more and be more, though continued to write humbling album and product reviews and sidebars. I grew complacent. Once in a great while, I would receive e-mail from an editor or reader praising my work, and even asking how I got where I was. It was both refreshing and inspiring, and I have always loved to share my experience with others.

Writing has never been easy for me, especially not emotionally. In recent years, I fell victim to the trap of not feeling good enough, not wanting to put myself out there in fear of ridicule or negativity. I have struggled since my last article was published in 2008 to shut off the part of my personality that has grown to need that validation.

Apparently, that switch is irrevocably broken.

In order to regain my comfort and focus, I opted to start at the beginning of my freelance writing career once again - AMP Magazine, based out of California. I picked up an interview for their upcoming issue, and will be working on that in the week to come. The familiarity of working with someone I grew used to as an editor, and the routine of a magazine I got to know very well makes me feel safe. I know what I'm doing, as I've done the same thing many times prior.

Not long after taking on this project, I sent off an e-mail to a fellow freelancer about taking part in a tattoo-related article she is working on for another publication - an article that has become near to my heart in the past weeks, certainly. Just this evening, I was on the receiving end of interview questions. Once it was finished, we planned upcoming collaborations, as well. Keep your eye on this space, as once I have more information I will be happy to give it.

Even if you give up on your story, your story will never give up on you. Don't get bored. Keep doing what you love, no matter what anyone, and most of all, your head tells you. Life life with head held high. Get rad and stay that way, it's the only way you'll survive.

Work and writing.

When I get off work, I want to run like hell some days. I feel like I spend eight hours a day like a square peg being shoved into a round hole. Most days, I have absolutely dick to do in the time between 8 AM and 4:45 PM - and it's not that there isn't work coming in, but when you type a hundred words a minute there probably isn't an office that can keep you elbow deep in work. At least I know mine can't. My fallback is data entry, and the one day I tried spending the entire eight hours doing it I found myself nearly passing out at my desk all afternoon. Real classy. "Hey, Liz, you got some drool on your chin, there.."

Not that I'm getting all 'Office Space' on the whole thing, but it's getting hard to take anything about this job seriously anymore. I don't make enough money to keep myself afloat, I don't have a real reason to care... I've been told from day one that I'm essentially disposable, so why work my ass off? Some days I just wake up with the best intentions, look over at a drawer of nice dress clothes versus a pair of jeans with studded belt and a sweater, say "fuck it", and wear jeans and tennis shoes on days that aren't Friday. We don't really have a dress code that anybody sticks to - this means you, 55 year old man who wears jeans and various Star Wars, Pink Floyd and Devo t-shirts all the time... hell, he came in in a Sulu yellow Star Trek uniform shirt once. Not even kidding. So the fact that the department's office assistant is a heavily tattooed bitch on wheels isn't a huge problem. Which, in a world where some heavily tattooed individuals take the 'high road' of filing for federal disability so they don't have to work... should feel like an accomplishment, right? Meh.

Definitely did not see myself rotting away in offices as I was growing up. I had fleeting thoughts of how awesome it would be to be a writer, a librarian, or, for chrissakes, a professional wrestler (we aren't all smart in third grade).... and you know what? I sat down at a computer in about fourth grade, got good at it, and now look at me. One of the faceless yes-men trudging into an office every day. Fuck. How did it happen? I did attempt college a few years back - for an Associate's degree in Funeral Service (I figured hell, I like animals more than I like people and I've helped put animals down so hanging with dead people can't be too bad...) until I couldn't pass the simplest damn biology class the school offered. That was the world telling me "Liz! Go back to being a writer, you idiot!" So I attempted 19 credits per semester while working 40 hour work weeks in order to obtain my Associate of Arts. Guess what happened with that? Yep. Burned out. Quit. And not just a little bit - in the 'oh my god, if I go to one more class, get sexually harassed by one more fucking biology teacher, if my boss won't get off my ass about my hours, when's the last time I slept?' gonna-blow-your-brains-out kind of quit. Total shutdown.

After that, I decided work was going to be it, for 'awhile'. I always told myself at about 19 that I would be self-reliant on writing by time I hit 25. Didn't seem too tall an order, things were looking up... yeah, until that whole burnout thing happened, leading to me moving back into my parents' basement and still clawing myself up five years later. No, I've never had a clear-cut idea of what I want. I've never been able to look at my life and say that, definitively, I needed to do anything but write. It's been the only constant. And guess what? I've been ignoring the itch for about two years or so as it stands right now.

Right now, the damn itch has turned into the plague, the 'Pox, whatever you want to call it, and instead of ignoring all the goofy ideas that float into my head every day, I'm opting to put them down, put them on a blog, and make a total jackass of myself for the world to see! Hey, at least it won't just be me feeling like a jackass in my head anymore... right? And maybe, just maybe, it'll get me one step closer to not rotting away in an office for the best years of my life. Summer's coming, after all.

What do you hate about what you do for money?