Woman journaling with coffee at a sunlit kitchen table
About Me

Finding Joy in Solitude: Why I Don’t Need a Relationship

Autumn

I walked into the dentist office for my appointment, and the receptionist commented, “You look so happy. Are you dating someone new?”

To which I exclaimed, “Oh my goodness NO!”

Then I revealed that the real reason for my happiness is that I can watch whatever shows I want without having to hear anyone else’s opinion about it, so my relaxation time is genuinely relaxing. Because, c’mon, when someone walks into a room and is all, “Oh, you’re watching that show again? You have an odd taste in TV,” it has a tendency to grate the nerves after awhile. I’m sorry, but I didn’t ask you to evaluate my preferences in entertainment, so please keep it to yourself and just let me exist in peace.

Or there was the other scenario, where they wanted to watch the show with me but then added constant commentary, like, “That character is being stupid.” Or pausing the show every 30 seconds to talk about something. My long-term takeaway is that I really hate watching TV with anyone who can’t shut their mouth. I’d list it as one of my top pet peeves, along with people chewing loudly, and ASMR videos that use that squishy squelchy poop noise because srsly what is up with that?

Lately I’ve been watching Arcane on Netflix, and I’m hooked. The idea of “hextech” is intriguing, the characters are complex and engaging, and the gorgeous eye candy animation certainly doesn’t hurt either. I’ve been finding the world of Arcane to be inspiring for my own creativity, giving me plenty to daydream about between episodes as well.

So …

I suppose that enough time has passed for the question of my dating again to become socially acceptable. To which the answer is still a solid no. I’m thinking that it’s a permanent no.

I have discovered that I like making decisions completely on my own. Quite a lot. I like my hairbrush having only my hair tangled in it. I like the way it feels to be with the kids when it’s just us. I like having solitude that I can count on every week. I like being the problem-solver of the household. Heck, I recently learned how to put air into my car tires to maintain the correct pressure, so I’m feeling pretty dang competent. 💪

Which means that whenever the question of “moving on” comes up, I will have to coyly sidestep it with a wink. Ah yes, relationships. I suppose maybe when I’m ready. Whenever Viktor from season 2 of Arcane materializes in real life with his staff and cloak. What can I say? A woman has to have her standards. 🤣

The answer to why I’m so happy isn’t that there’s a new person in my life — it’s that I’m finally in my own life.

Before, I was the sort that whenever I was asked, “Are you having a good time?” My answer was usually, “I don’t know. Is everyone else having a good time? I can’t have a good time if everyone else isn’t.” In retrospect, I was to exhausted from making sure that everyone else was happy, and justifying it by pointing out that everyone else was happy.

It’s weird, because I never saw myself as a “people pleaser” — people pleasers tried too hard, didn’t they? I was just trying to live up to being a good wife and mother, by being nurturing, patient, supportive, low-maintenance, and cool. It happened so gradually that it took me awhile to realize that it was not the life that I thought I had signed up for years ago — he had promised to support me being a writer, and instead he was demanding dinner. If I could take all those hours I spent on meal prep and clean up and put them into writing instead, I’d have myself an established career right now.

Anyway, my point is, no one was telling me, “Don’t be like that, you’re sacrificing yourself.” I was told over and over that I was a “good mom” and a “good wife,” when I should have been more of a bitch about making him share in the domestic work. Instead I got to learn that the man who had refused to lift a finger for me was cooking dinners for his new girlfriend, and I realized what a fool I was. My postmortem is that I was manipulated into becoming a people pleaser, not just by one person but by the culture at large that reinforced that it was something that I was supposed to do.

So here we are. I don’t need a relationship to be happy and I don’t need a man to be valid — I am my own person.

And that feels dang good.

About Me

…

Autumn

Years ago I told him that if he ever hit me again, then I was going to report it to the police. He had given the usual spiel — big emotions, loss of control, deeply regretful — and I was left feeling like I had to forgive. However, I did not want it happening again.

And it didn’t happen again.

But then about two years ago it came out that he had spent those years resenting me. He had considered my words to be a threat, that I had been controlling and dominating him, purely because I didn’t want to live with physical violence. He believed that it was his inherent right as a man to discipline me however he wished, and I had invoked the Corrupted System against him.

Sometimes it still haunts me.

He never hit me again because he didn’t want the legal consequences, not because he thought that I was a human being with a basic right to safety. Which means that he hadn’t lost control and he wasn’t deeply regretful — he just didn’t want me going to the police right at that moment and was manipulating me out of it. Then, when it all came to an end, I was the one who paid legally for not reporting the violence to the police.

It haunts me that he wanted to do more.

It haunts me that he resented me for not wanting to endure it.

It haunts me to wonder what he would do now if he ever got the opportunity.

I think that knowing that he resented me is scarier than what physically happened and didn’t happen. For years I lived alongside someone who wanted to hurt me and I had no idea.

Anime-style technician directing colorful data streams beside control room monitors
art

Exploring AI Art: Transforming Sketches into Animation

Autumn

OH EM GEE. AI is so cool.

Recently I started using AI art to work on drawing. I sketch, the AI creates the line art, I color in the line art, and the AI finishes the shading and details. I’m finding myself to be very satisfied with this process, as I get to see my characters without the self-flagellation of “Why do I suck at art?”

So then I thought, what else can AI do?

I decided to experiment with a site called Pika, as you can tell from the watermark. Upload my pictures of my characters, and voila, there’s motion. How crazy is that?

And yes, obviously you can tell that it’s AI generated. HOWEVER, with my life circumstances I would never be able to hire someone to do this sort of thing for me, so seeing my characters in motion is enough to make me go 🤯

Young person standing outside a cabin overlooking cloud-covered mountains
About Me

Overcoming Creative Block After a Toxic Relationship

Autumn

Over the last year, I’ve been internally more creative than my output would suggest. Which is basically a roundabout way of saying that I’ve been thinking a lot of things that never see the light of day.

I think that I’ve written about it before, but I really can’t be bothered to read back through my blog posts to find something to link to and all that jazz. Essentially, for a good long while I had someone position themselves as the Director of my creativity, and every project I pursued needed their stamp of approval. Then rather abruptly that person dumped me and is now living with a woman half his age. Go figure.

The thing is, people like that manipulate themselves into that sort of authority through the guise of teamwork — they aren’t gatekeeping you, they’re part of your dynamic duo. The editor to your writer. Literally. They constantly tell you that your creativity is messy without their guidance, and only they understand your vision well enough to push it towards something amazing.

Recognizing that something was wrong is easier than living without it. When it’s your own muscles that have to support the momentum after years of someone restricting their use, it’s hard. I’ve spent a lot of time wobbling, second-guessing, and feeling insecure.

I’ve written thousands of words for Runemaster that I quickly realized were rambling.

The thing is, my “director” wasn’t constantly cutting down long-winded passages because I had a tendency towards unfocused writing. My “directer” actually had very little input with Alice and the Warden for example, and I mostly remember him wanting me to put in more sex scenes. He said that he wanted to edit the story then never actually got around to it, and since I didn’t want to delay publishing because of him I did all the editing myself. “Dynamic duo” felt more like him taking credit for my work.

I keep asking myself why I’m so unfocused now when my functional thought process and workload hasn’t changed.

A year ago I sought a protective order against him, and was granted something softer for the long-term but effective enough (he continues to send me unpleasant texts that I’d rather not receive). I’m still realizing how different life is without him in it. I recently took the kids out for a day trip, and after packing the car and hitting the road, I found myself spending the first 30 minutes of driving wondering if I had forgotten something important because of how easy leaving had been. Why had my previous life been so hard in so many small ways?

Perhaps my writing is unfocused now because I’m having so many new experiences every day. My brain is constantly stopping to ask, “Wait, what? Is that really it?” I had grown so accustomed to someone throwing up roadblocks over every idea I had, that now it feels like something is missing without them.

It feels like standing in a doorway gazing out at the world and feeling overwhelmed with how big it is. What am I even looking at? Where should I go now that I’m free to go anywhere? Why is everything so dang easy? Life isn’t supposed to be easy, is it?

I also struggle to understand how someone can be the one to initiate a divorce then afterwards act like they still have a say over what you do in your life. Excuse me, but I will eat cancer-causing ultra processed food in microwaved plastic as much as I want, because I like it. Srsly, what did you expect would happen when you filed for a divorce? What makes you think that you have the right to punish me when you were the one who wanted this?

Unfortunately there’s a pressure to not talk about him, because talking about him means that I still think about him, and thinking about him proves that I’m not moving on. But I’m not sitting here thinking, “This was his favorite song,” “I miss him,” or anything remotely sentimental. I think about how much I hated following his principles and rules. I think about all the things I tolerated because I believed “that’s just how men are.” (Like using a ton dishes to cook something simple, then leaving the mess for me to clean up.)

I think about how being a trad wife was the biggest mistake of my life.

I still wonder how much of my mind was my own, versus how much was him utilizing chronic long-term sleep deprivation to insert thoughts into my head — and I believe that the sleep deprivation was deliberate too, because he interfered with my sleep as soon as I met him and he kept it going for years. I reached the point where I broke down crying because I just wanted to go to bed and sleep through the night without interruption.

Anyway, maybe this is too emotional. Maybe this is bleeding onto the page too much. I’m just so tired of feeling like I have to follow rules, and maybe it’s time that I engage in some oversharing. Maybe I’m dissatisfied with my writing because I feel like I have to follow all the rules of healing instead of just being raw with my words.

Because that’s the thing … there are parts of my life that hurt, but also parts that leave me ecstatically happy, and they’re both real. I would definitely describe myself as being much happier now, but that doesn’t mean that every day is full of energy and momentum. Sometimes the good moments teach me how much misery I was living with before, and it’s devastating. Sometimes I question why everything seems too good to be true now.

One thing is for absolute certain: I will never go back.

Grass trimmer and repair tools laid out on picnic table in garden at sunset
About Me

Raising Kids: Balancing Fun and Learning

Autumn

My dryer started making an odd noise, so I checked it and discovered that a screw had gotten wedged in the edge of the drum near the door. With two minutes and a pair of needle nose pliers, I fixed the problem myself. No hullabaloo. No performance of hardship. No consulting a committee. No fishing for praise afterwards. Just done like that. Done.

I was both proud of myself for identifying and solving the problem of the Weird Dryer Noise, and a little baffled that it was so simple.

Getting my weed eater put back together wasn’t quite as easy. I had my 8-year-old daughter help me with that one. My kids are learning the value of problem-solving and tenacity through example.

I realized that my kids have never had Happy Meals from McDonald’s in their lives, so I got some for them. They liked the toys, but declared the food to be generic fast food, and I told them, “That’s the point of getting McDonald’s.” So there, they’re getting a childhood full of normal experiences.

My kids and I have also finally dived into the world of Minecraft mods, particularly Create and Alex’s Mobs. I thought that my kids were making amazing things in vanilla Minecraft, but the Create mod has really taken their builds to the next level. Like holy cow. The creepers, on the other hand, still sneak up behind them and blow up their factories, so it’s still definitely Minecraft.

And the kids have been thoroughly delighted with Alex’s Mobs, especially with giving cockroaches maracas to make them dance. 😂

I am both sad and relieved that summer is going to be ending soon. I’m pretty certain that every day I’m with the kids I have been driving between pool parties, splash pads, parks, and Walmart. Apparently it’s infectious, because I’ve been going out a lot more on my child-free days as well despite complaining about how exhausting it is.

I’ve noticed that people are more open towards me now that I’m no longer doing the “trad wife” thing. Maybe the fact that I’m wearing pants makes them feel more comfortable, and less like they accidentally wandered into church. But as everyone likes to say, “correlation does not equal causation” and there’s also the giant fact that I’m no longer accompanied by a person who wears the expression of someone who stepped barefoot in fresh dog poop. All I know is that going out and socializing is considerably more satisfying than it used to be.

I was thinking recently about how all the cultural standards of what makes for a “loving dad” sound a lot more fun than the stereotypical “loving mom.” I’d much rather toss a ball, play games, and go on outings, than spend hours in the kitchen making homecooked meals and washing dishes — people really shouldn’t be linking homecooking with love anyway. Between you and me, I never got the feeling that the kids appreciated all the hours I spent in the kitchen anyway, and they would have been happier eating frozen chicken nuggets and getting more ‘mom time.’

In terms of my creativity, I’ve been wondering about where I should be posting the content that I’ve been working on. I’ve been very happy with how my hobbies have been going lately. Is anyone here interested? 😉

About Me

Daily Prompt

Autumn
Daily writing prompt
Share a photo of your pet and tell us one thing that makes them uniquely them.
View all responses

I adopted my dog as a puppy in 2024 as an emotional support companion. His mom is a Cavalier King Charles Spaniel, the dad is a mystery, and my dog is a whopping 15 lbs now. My mom likes to joke that my dog is the one who needs the emotional support because of his separation anxiety. He goes with me almost everywhere. I even put him in a backpack style dog carrier for trips to the grocery store, then do my best to ignore all the “Aww cute dog!” comments.

My dog is completely chill about going with me to firework shows, but the wind at night will set him off barking and growling.

Young person standing under streetlamp on empty suburban street at dusk
About Me

From Sketch to Glam: AI Art Transformation

Autumn

This is my character, Benjamin.

I used to draw all the time when I was a teenager, then quit due to circumstances. I’ve recently started drawing again.

However, a big difference between now and 2006 is that AI art exists. If you’ve looked at my past posts, then you have seen that I like AI art … and though going through a divorce and all that put an end to my AI art exploration, I still like it.

So, my latest fascination is giving my sketches of my characters to ChatGPT to improve.

My sketch is bad. Really bad. It makes me laugh every time I see it. I made this sketch in just a few minutes for stress relief when I was having a tough time while being sick. Since I laugh every time I see it, I’d say that stress relief has been accomplished.

And this is ChatGPT’s version. It has anatomy, symmetry, and detail!

Then finally, I asked ChatGPT for a full-blown “glam up” of that drawing. As in I literally used the words, “glam up” and that’s what we got.

I’ve been putting in a lot of serious thought into making a VN. Nothing too ambitious, but I would like to include character sprites, backgrounds, and maybe some simple animations. Since I am one person and a mere mortal, I’m going to be relying on AI heavily for the art. Personally, I’m very excited to use my drawings as the base for the character designs, with the AI doing the time-consuming work of adding color and details. I am still dirt-eating poor after the divorce and all.

In retrospect, I would not recommend the “trad wife” lifestyle to anyone, btw. Just because someone makes all the right promises doesn’t mean that they won’t toss you aside later, and rebuilding with the job experience of a 20-year-old but the expenses of a 40-year-old is no cakewalk. Maybe I’ve said this before, I can’t remember. 😅 But hey, it’s worth saying again.

BUT ANYWAY

I am officially kicking off my VN project. Stage one: character design. Begin.

Group of fantasy adventurers including warriors, mages, rogues, and archers in colorful attire with magical elements.
About Me

The Joy of Blogging and Gaming: A Personal Journey

Autumn

Remember back when I was all, “I want to blog more frequently”?

I do. 😆

ChatGPT spontaneously decided to generate an image in response to the above conversation. Some additional context (because I know that you’re dying for it) is that I recently took advantage of Steam’s super mega awesome summer sale and purchased Tales of Arise, and after an hour of playing I was gushing over how alluring the characters are. ChatGPT promptly started teasing me about how I develop crushes on anime sword boys, because I absolutely do.

I’ve been a huge fan of the Tales games for ages, but without getting into any trauma dumping, when Tales of Arise originally came out I was forbidden from buying it. So, having it now is kind of a big deal for me. Feels like freedom. And giggling. I’m already shipping Alphen and Shionne. 😍

But it was actually a random YouTube video making fun of the “alpha male” thing that got me started on the social rankings.

So yes, we started off with a serious topic and spiraled into absurdity.