On Sommertales. Check it out to learn The November Project's name and to see what it's kinda about!
Love you lots,
Deserae
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Prerna- Yes! One of my residents introduced me to her and I'm in love. I have a particular love for "Daredevil" just because it was the first song I heard by her. Fiona's a genius. Glad you know and love her!
Arianna- Thank you for the good luck and for commenting! I can't really respond to every point at the moment (I have a Hieroglyphs quiz tomorrow! Eep!) but I appreciate you taking the time to write all of that up. I am not healthy as is noted by the state of my hair in last post's video. But tomorrow is another day! Hoping it'll be a good one. :)
This post will probably be deleted soon. Or maybe I'll just change the video to something more attractive when I'm not tired and looking for something to do besides homework.
Love you guys mucho,
Deserae
P.S. Didn't forget the song! Here it is!
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Arianna- Thank you for commenting! I know what you're saying, but I think what I'm looking for this time around is just that extra-strength support. Not so much coaching, or critique partner eyes, but SUPPORT. Reminders that I can get words down on a paper. Inspirational quotes sent on Twitter. Encouraging lies about being the very best that no one ever was... There are quite a few of you guys who are doing NaNo and who've vowed to help me so you can all tag team! Yay! I'm trying not to look at the habits and bad experiences I've had in the past and am looking more toward focusing on getting through it this time. So positiveness, I think, is what'll really help and I don't want to put all that "pressure" on just you! I've got people! (I think!)
Prerna- You're an angel! Thank you! I think it really boils down to knowing what I can and cannot do. 25,000 words is cake (KNOCK ON WOOD). So if I do the two projects with these smaller goals, I'm more likely to finish. And maybe next year I can devote the whole 50K to one project! We'll see! I get SO distracted by the internet it's ridiculous. But I do know how lucky I am to have people cheering for me so thank you for that! THAT in itself is amazing and I promise to repay you in some way (let's pull a Rumple and say I owe you a favor. :])
Nicole- I've missed you, too! Your posts have been coming into my email so I've been keeping up from afar. But nothing's the same as this, you know? Actually talking with you? I've missed it so much BUT am glad you're doing so well! It makes me happy. Happier than Yogi Bear with a pic-ah-nic basket. I, too, am excited to see what I'll bring forth in November. 'Tis a mystery to me, but it's all planned out at least. Just needs to be WRITTEN. You're right about my life not being nearly as bad as I make it out to be, but seriously. School is not my thing. I'm here because I have to be. I love learning, but school? BLEH! Thanks for your warm wishes and luck. I will gladly accept all the luck you can throw my way so wrestle a unicorn if you can!!! You REALLY need to tell me more about this boy, Missy. The only boy news I have has to do with these guys, and... welp... We both know that that's not nearly as exciting as real life. :) Talk to me soon, yeah?
You guys must be wondering what kind of spank-tacular adventures I go on while I'm away. You guys must also know that I am both boring AND afraid of change. Mostly what I do whilst I'm away is eat, sleep, read, pretend to write, pretend to read some more, eat, sleep, attend a class or two, repeat. Now that I'm working, I guess I fit that in somewhere, too. But yeah, that's about it. BUT I HAS RETURNED. Missed me? I missed you too.
Usually when I come back to the internet it's for a reason. This time i's NaNoWriMo! Yay! I fail at WriMos, guys. I do my best not to get distracted by the millions of ideas floating around in my head, but it doesn't work. Or at least it hasn't worked YET.
I'm a lazy lima bean. Always have been, but no longer CAN be. Like, this job, Guys, DEMANDS I make good grades, DEMANDS I'm on time with deadlines, and threatens to throttle me if I don't follow through. Basically, I'm on the verge of being thuh-rottled.
I know myself. When I start feeling pressure, I withdraw. Stop caring. Shut down. Move on. But I'm doing NaNo this year to PROVE to myself that even I can change. That my bad habits don't define me. That when the pressure's on, I CAN handle it, despite what I've believed of myself in the past.
I'm doing NaNo--- but on my terms. I've been thinking about it and there are two elements I want to complete. The goal for NaNo is to complete a first draft of a novel by the end of November OR 50,000 words of said novel. I have a novel I'd really like to work on for NaNo. We're calling it MV. But I know that realistically, I'm going to get halfway through and realize OHEMGEE! It's NOT PERFECT! And then I will cry all of the tears obsessing over its imperfection and in doing so, I'll be procrastinating and NOT finishing the draft.
So my goal for NaNo is this:
-Finish 25,000 words of MV
-Complete a 25,000 word online series for you guys on my unused blog, Sommertales.
You know why that blog's been unused? It was supposed to be the host for my first ever webseries (NOPE! Not even YouTube Rules! which I'm sorry--- we'll have to talk about that one another day). But I'm going to use it this November and turn that unfilmed webseries into a multi-part novella for you guys to read. Yay!
Since you guys are brilliant, you'll know that 25,000 plus 25,000 equals 50,000. That's 50,000 unperfected words. 50,000 excuses I'll try to make for not completing NaNo. But 25,000 of those are FOR YOU. The reason I'm doing this is because I NEED YOU. I NEED YOU TO CHEER ME ON.
Every day.
For all of November.
I need you to tell me, "You can do it, Deserae. You can finish something. And one day, it CAN look amazing. But that day doesn't have to be this one. It can be tomorrow, or even the day after that. But all you have to do is FINISH. Please, don't give up." REMIND ME I'M DOING THIS FOR YOU.
Because if I'm not just doing this for me, I have more of a reason to go all the way, you know? If I convince myself that someone out there in the world NEEDS THESE WORDS, then good golly, I have to get those words to them! Somedays, you guys will get the bulk of my word quota for the day. Others, MV will get the bulk. But every day of November, I'll blog on Almost (Not Quite) There to give you guys an honest update on where I am and where the words are going. Do you think we can do it? Together, I mean?
Keep me sane, Guys,
Deserae
P.S. Thank you all for your love on the last post! I'm weird sometimes. Thank you for getting that. :)
I wasn't going to post today, but I wrote a song the other day for a book I'm writing. Of course.
The idea behind it came from one of my infamous mid-night thinking sessions. Sometimes, I'll wake up at three o'clock in the morning with a thought that just won't go away until I battle it out of my head. The other night, I was thinking about memory and--- well, to avoid going into the ENTIRE philosophical debate I'd had with myself I'll skip a bit--- I came to the conclusion that the person I call ME is only ME because of my thoughts and my memories.
We can definitely talk more about this in depth if you were curious how (or why) I just decided that randomly in the middle of the night, but the point, I guess, is that the revelation that I was merely memory made me think about that old nursery rhyme "Row, Row, Row Your Boat." If you don't remember it, here's the gist of it:
Row, row, row your boat
Gently down the stream...
Merrily, merrily, merrily, merrily,
Life is but a dream.
This sparked a whole other discussion with myself that started with me freaking out about existence, my place in the world, et cetera, et cetera, but ended with me thanking the Lord God Almighty that life isn't nearly as serious as we paint it to be. Believe me. I understand the importance of LIVING life. Why not? You only die once, after all. But if I'm just a memory, then that F I got in high school is just a memory and I can move past it. If yesterday was a whole twenty four hours but I literally only retained about five foggy facts, then nothing that happens today can actually touch me when tomorrow comes, can it? Not if I don't let it. Not if I can leave it in the past and walk away.
I know there are things we have to face, have to deal with. I'm not saying we shouldn't deal. I'm saying we shouldn't dwell.
Here are the lyrics to the song inspired by this crazy night of existential thinking. Perhaps one day, I'll work up the nerve to sing it for you.
"Life is but a Dream" by an opticALlusion
Row, row your boat gently down the stream
It's a good thing we all know that life is but a dream
Although it's fun while it lasts it was
fun while it lasted, yeah.
So, so it goes we are tethered by these strings
Made from torn up pantyhose and some broken bits of things
But somehow we all manage we've
all seemed to manage, yeah.
And I plead with you--- don't you see the truth?
Who knew the sun was a lie?
Guess we always did. Chose not to notice it.
Oh, oh oh, oh oh oh oh... Yeah life is grand
Even when you're stuck in the middle.
Oh, oh oh, oh oh oh oh... It's all pretend
But we'll just dance up until the end---
Right up to the end.
Tap, tap your toes to the great cacophony
Of our long forgotten hopes and our dried up misery
Because we know it don't matter, no,
none of it matters, yeah.
Ha ha we're going so fast we cannot see
The blurry visions of our pasts, of the whos we used to be
Like a mirror they shatter, our
reflections have shattered, yeah.
Did we live at all, if the bluff's been called?
If we don't wake, at least we dreamed.
I can see the end; let the fun begin.
Oh, oh oh, oh oh oh oh... Yeah life is grand
Even when you're stuck in the middle.
Oh, oh oh, oh oh oh oh... It's all pretend
But we'll just dance up until the end---
Right up to the end.
Take care, Lovelies! Have a wonderful week,
Deserae
P.S. I love the song here. It's "The Man Who Isn't There" by Oren Lavie. If you love it, love it lots. If you don't love it, what is wrong with you?
P.P.S. I forgot! One more thing! If you like short story contests where each and every entry is judged and looked at, get a Figment account (or sign into your old one) and try your hand at their Defy the Dark contest. Entries are due September 1st, but that's so doable, and anyone can enter!
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Arianna- Haha! I am the Queen of Linkage. Do you think they will raise a monument to honor my linktitude?
Maya- Girl, get your YouTube account ah-sap! So many awesome things to get into. So much to see. So much to share with thee!!!
Robin- Aww, thank you for coming to see me! I loved your comments on the posts as well. Were you entered? Which story was yours? Personally, I'm not too thrilled about the thriller either! But that's just 'cause I'm a big ole scaredy cat. ISLA and this mysterious fifth Perkins novels are the projects I'm most looking forward to by her. I, too, enjoyed ANNA best, but is it horrible that I wasn't the biggest fan of Anna and Etienne? Don't get me wrong, I love the story as a whole. But whenever I think about THEM, about their relationship, about the process of them getting together... I don't know. I could never fully love them like everyone else did. Again, thanks for stopping by! I look forward to getting to know you via the glorious interwebs.
I really miss doing these on My Ticket Elsewhere. I really miss Elsewhere and Home in general, but without my laptop, ALL OF THE THINGS have been lacking. Ag.
But today, I bring you news from the interwebs! I always find a way to stay connected, even when I can't directly be involved (I'm such le old lady neighbor). Drum roll, please?
FIRST, on ze YouChoobs, British web sensation Charlie McDonnell has... a girlfriend. Yes, she is lovely. Yes, I love her. Yes, a part of me hopes an' me dreams 'as died. Yes, yes... I'll be fine. Here is a video of her being cute and sweet and what not as she responds to Charlie's announcement. Linked above is a video of his announcement and the such. And you want to hear her sing? She's good at it. The only reason I consider this news is because I've been following Charlie and Bryarly's channels for... years. YEARS, I SAY! And they've secretly been dating for the past one. So yes, people. This is news. Aaaaaaaaaaahhhhhhhhhhh....
ALSO, for those of you who don't know about my favorite almost-not-quite-published authors, you MUST check out Claire Legrand and Natalie Whipple ah-sap. Claire literally has a butt-load of projects I am beyond excited for. The first of which, THE CAVENDISH HOME FOR BOYS AND GIRLS comes out in less than three weeks! EEP!!! Besides that, she is made of awesome. Unicorn-loving awesome. I adore her. With Natalie, though, I have a different kind of respect. I've been following her progress for the past two (and a half) years. I knew her when she went through a change in agents... when she got her first book deal for the 2013 release of TRANSPARENT... And I continue to follow her, to respect her for her kindness. For her words. For her wisdom and her advice. Every time she posts something, it inspires me. It helps me. So I'm sharing her with you. Her latest bit of writerly goodness has inspired me to stop doubting myself and to go for the gusto; maybe it'll help you, too.
LAST, but not least, Auror's Tale. Have you heard about it? Going to watch it? You should. Here is why.
Alright, All. Take care, and have all the warm wishes from all of the warm places.
Nicole- I love that you love Young the Giant! But bleg! Sorry orientation was a bit boringish. School is creeping up on you, Lassie... Use your super-awesome-ninja-tactics to make sure it doesn't follow Orientation's lead.
Arianna- Haha! I have music on the brain. What can I say?! I still like my zombie "Some Body That I Used to Know" rendition. Goyte would adore me, I think.
Ms. Elle Fredericks- I love you more than you could ever know. Thank you for the lovely comment and for being there for me on my bright days AND the ones in between. :)
Nicole- I'm so glad the post sat well with you and that you loved the song! Oh, my heart swells with joy when those words are uttered. :] Hey, Girl. Kick orientation's butt! You're going to have a great year if you remember to stay as beautiful as you are right now, but grow from anything Life throws at you to try to persuade you otherwise. You've got this!
My little sister reminded me of this song--- the one I'll leave for you at the end. Though it's not Christian or religious or anything, it expresses all of the sentiments of my personal philosophy: "...there's a bright day coming."
I don't know where that mentality comes from. From my ancestors? From the old spirituals that were sung to maintain hope? I don't know. I was never into all that "let my people go" stuff... But I do have to wonder why I have this thing instilled in me. Why, no matter what, I DO believe that things can only get better from here.
Prerna said something that I agree with. We gain strength from every situation, every block, every obstacle we overcome. "You'll be stronger because of the things you survive," she said. Tell me why I want to bust out into a ballad of Destiny Child's "I'm a Suh-vi-vah!"
Just a little reminder to all of you who feel down, or are angsting, or just need it... There IS a bright day coming. Be there, okay? Let's make a date.
I, Deserae McGlothen, want to see you on your bright day. I want to give you virtual (or actual) hugs and cookies. And I hope you'll be there for me on mine.
We'll talk words soon. I have plenty to tell you guys about the bookish world and what I'm up to.
Lots of love,
Deserae
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Prerna- Thank you and AGH! I TOTALLY AGREE!!! The whole ending of Felicity was like... Well, I wanted to pull my hair out. I get that the writers wanted us to see she'd have picked that boy either way, but NOEL!!!! NO-O-OEL!!!!! My heart ached for him. He so deserved better. I do hope to make him proud. :)
Maya- Yes, the tag was loads of fun. Thanks for including me! And thanks for trusting me with your story. You know, it's true. I've had to learn the hard way that I need people. It's hard to need, you know? More and more, I'm realizing people don't want my advice. They don't need my advice. They just want/need me. But I don't know how to be me without my words. Without my mind. Without my thoughts and opinions. I have to learn, though. I'm trying to readjust. There is always room and time to improve upon oneself. And I will. I'll improve if I have to. I'll stay beautiful if you will. Thanks for your love, I appreciate (and need) every ounce of it!
Nicole- Haha! Thanks, Hon! I'm going to try my best to enjoy being Noel. I hold grudges, too! That's something I've been working on, myself! I think I'm at a point where all of the grudges I used to hold are gone, and I'm allowing myself to start over with a lot of people... What I've decided is to forgive. To forget the wrong as a reflection of the person. But never to forget the wrong or what made it wrong. That way I can move on with my life, but be more prepared for when Life tries to challenge me the same way again. So I guess I don't hold grudges anymore... I hold myself responsible for doing better next time. And in this way, what you said makes perfect sense. It IS hard to know what to do in the moment, so when past experiences aren't enough to lead me, I decide to ask. To voice my concerns. To see if the truth really can set you free. So far so good, you know? So far so good. My friend and I are learning to understand each other better. That's all I could ask for. It's only going to make us stronger in the end. :) I accept all of your love and am sending you some as well! Take care, Hon!
