As I get more and more rest and gradually recover from my extreme burnout (and probably wind up back at just “bad” burnout instead of “extreme”), the idea I had for a TTRPG campaign just won’t leave me alone, so I’m going to start working on development (well, I already have been, to be completely honest). It might yet go nowhere, it might go somewhere fun, or it might follow the course of all of my campaigns by starting out with promise that slowly dwindles as I burn out and my less-than-engaged players stop putting in any effort. I don’t know. I’m definitely not getting my hopes up about being able to play out the idea I had in its entirety. I just… I WANT to be doing this again. I cut out so much of my day to day life and the one thing I miss the most, that still fires me up the most, that I only ever think of along the lines of “I wish I hadn’t had to end this,” is running games. I want to get back in the storyteller’s chair. I have such an interesting idea that I’ve been letting cook for a while and I really want to do something with it. I mean, I could write a story about it, but I really miss collaborative storytelling. I really miss looking at friends as I run a game and roleplay through whatever situations we wind up in. Dipping my toes back into D&D as a player has also whet my appetite for this kind of storytelling, so it’s all kind of coming together. I’ve got an interesting story, the world is practically building itself, and I think I’ve got four people who would be just as committed to playing this game (and doing their homework for it) as I am.
Continue readingSociety
The Economy And Society At Large Are Failing Artists
Recently, an… associate? Community member? Friend of a friend? Recently, someone I know vaguely in that way you know people who are in your community but with whom you’ve never had much of a direct interaction published a graphic novel (or second of three collections of a comic they’re publishing on the internet, depending on how you want to define things) and got not only zero support from her publisher but a string of such unhelpful responses that it would be easy to suggest that she was actively hindered. I’m not going to name the person, the publisher, or even the comic because I don’t want to drag any mud into her business, but it was absolutely infuriating to hear about what a shitty time she’d had in the publication of this latest book given that the one freaking thing a publisher actually does, aside from making the editing and printing aparatuses available to creators, is help to sell the book! All they’ve done so far is make sure copies show up at businesses and that’s the bare minimum for a business! You’d think that a company that was going through the actually significant hassle of receiving, editing, proofing, and printing an entire graphic novel would also spend some time and money marketing it so they can, you know, make some money of the damn thing! But no. This released with no fanfare, the creator was absolutely stonewalled when she tried to get the ball rolling, and she’s been left to do any amount of marketing by herself via social media. It’s absolutely infuriating.
Continue readingSometimes, There’s A Little Too Much “Cult” in Midwestern “Culture”
There is a strange religiosity applied to the concept of family in US culture. I originally started writing “Midwestern US culture,” but most of the examples that come to mind aren’t confined to the Midwest. There’s an entire line of movies (The Fast and The Furious) that is all about the primacy of the family unit, though they tend to define family a bit more broadly than most. There’s entire cultural background covering the importance of The Family as it relates to organized crime. One of the most popular types of stories these days is about found family or the lengths to which one might go to return to family. Family, regardless of how it is defined, is seen as something worth everything and valuable beyond measure. What makes this somewhat more sinister and unpleasant, though, is the suggestion that anyone lacking family is a bad person. Villains are frequently loners. The philosophy of those we’re supposed to dislike is often depicted as favoring isolation and a lack of attachments. Hell, all you have to do is look at advertising and media around the parent-oriented holidays (Mother’s Day and Father’s Day) to see the subtle suggestion that choosing to ignore your biological parents, or otherwise hold the way they treated you against them, is a moral failing. It’s pervasive.
Continue readingModern Existential Despair
Content Warning for discussions of the latest news from the supreme court, modern existential despair, gun violence, and a hefty dose of pessimism mixed with anxiety.
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