For less than the price of half a tank of gas, you can support my work and get my upcoming books? PLUS: my books can not only take you to new locations, but they can transport you through time! How’s that for fuel efficient?
DID YOU ALSO KNOW?
One of your options is Brushfire + Sketch, which is a copy of the graphic novel which is not only signed, but gets a one-of-a-kind character sketch by moi? I rarely do commissions or any kind of drawing for others, so this really is a unique opportunity that doesn’t come around often!
Happy International Women’s Day to the best humans to ever exist on this planet.
I don’t know what it’s like to be a woman. But I do know that anything that has ever been discouraged for women or prohibited for women to do or taken away from women has been done for one reason.
The male ego. Which I do know all too well.
The word “strength” is thrown around a lot, but I think a lot about what it means to be weak.
In my world, during my day-to-day life, I don’t think I ever interact with a woman that anyone could consider weak by any standard.
Conversely, more men than not display weakness by its many definitions, and that includes the dude I have to deal with in the mirror every morning.
Weakness is often confused, but women show us what strength is. Vulnerability is strength. Using your heart and compassion is strength. Being open, honest, and talking about things is strength.
And I have been surrounded by the most amazing women, who represent aspects of every amazing person who identifies as a woman.
Keep showing us the way. I, for one, am willing to follow.
People who belong uphold the status quo, both because it benefits them and because they can’t imagine any other way; the outsiders are the ones who push us ever forward.
I often find the universe giving me simultaneous, overlapping examples of something I need to learn or remember, because I am a slow learner and sometimes it needs to be obvious.
This weekend, I just happened to watch Jane, a documentary about Jane Goodall, and I finished Fear of a Black Universe, a book by physicist Stephon Alexander.
Both are examples of the outsider as proof of expansion, and both offer other examples and inspire you to realize your own.
Jane Goodall did more to advance our knowledge of primates, and their connection to humanity, than any other person had done prior. Jane Goodall was not a scientist when she was sent to the jungle; she was a 26-year-old secretary who had a passion for animals.
She was chosen because she was an outsider to the scientific community, and the person who picked her was wise enough to know that was valuable.
Stephon Alexander, however, is a scientist. But because he is Black and also has ideas that exist on the fringes of acceptable scientific behavior, he, too, is an outsider; he’s “deviant by default,” using his own words.
I’ve read a lot of books on science, and Fear of a Black Universe is easily the most challenging I have ever encountered.
These two people couldn’t seem more different, but it’s the idea of the outsider that connects them and resonates with me long after the last page is turned.
I have no business being anything.
I certainly have no business being a writer or artist. I barely went to college. I wasn’t born into connections, and the ones I have now I had to go out and get. I learn some rules and then ignore them and then make up some of my own.
But, as I have to convince myself every time I consider quitting writing altogether, that is exactly why the writing world needs me.
I bring stuff to this thing that others won’t, simply because they know better, and I don’t.
And that’s how we become better.
I have no business being anything. And maybe you feel like that, too. But I guarantee that, if you feel like an outsider, then that means you bring a perspective to whatever it is you do that most others just don’t have.
And if you’re on the inside? (Lucky you.) You could change the entire game by just letting an outsider in.
Happy March! It’s over zero degrees, so it’s a beautiful one. TODAY IS THE FIRST OFFICIAL DAY OF MY FIRE & ICE KICKSTARTER!
I made a video for you (just for you!), but if you prefer to read it, here’s everything I said in plain ol’ text:
“Good morning! Or good afternoon or evening. Whatever it is, I hope it’s good.
Happy March! February, am I right? Today is the official first day of my Kickstarter, Fire & Ice! It’s to raise money so I can publish both Brushfire, an all ages graphic novel, and Cold World, a sci-fi epic novel.
I want to say a quick few words about all this.
If you can’t afford to invest in this: don’t. Don’t do it. If you think you know a better place to put your money: do that. Please. The world is on the hard difficulty level right now, so I completely understand.
That being said: if you want these books and can afford it, I can’t express how much your help means to me. It allows me to make these the best I can, and I feel like this is the best work I’ve done. I love it so much. Also, there is a Kickstarter/Retailer variant cover for both books, and you will not be able to buy them in the future, ever. That is a promise. Only through Kickstarter and a select number of stores will they ever be available.
Now THAT being said: early squirrels have already donated 20% of my goal! I am already 20% there, and today is only the first official day!
And if you can’t invest, consider sharing the link and telling your friends why you think this is worthwhile, and I’m worthwhile. And be really specific about it, because my ego needs it. I’m kidding. But remember: the Kickstarter only lasts through March, which will be over before we know it.
I sincerely hope you’re all hanging in there. We’re kind of in a dark place right now, and I create things because I’m always looking for just a little bit of that light peeking in. I hope you’ll help me find it. All my love.”
Please take a look at all the photos here, too. You can see the regular and variant covers for Brushfire (the variant is the green-hued cover that I nicknamed “the Matrix variant”); the Cold World variant will be a book that looks like it’s entirely encased in ice, with no back text at all.
I know I should be better than a moth, but I am not. This story has swift twists and turns, so hold on tight.
I was driving past Buck Hill on 35 after work tonight when I saw the light: a spotlight, specifically, waving back and forth like a giant lightsaber over the hill, calling attention to a rainbow valley underneath.
I debated whether I wanted to stop by and see why it was calling me. I lie. I knew I had to go see what this was all about.
I parked and walked through the labyrinth of buildings until I saw a sign pointing towards the multicolored wonderland; “TUBING,” it read.
I found a ticket stand and stopped. The menu said they stopped selling tickets at 9 pm, which was confusing because the giant spotlight was clearly still telling moths like me to come, check this out, this will be worth your time, this will change your life.
There was a woman in the stand. I knocked on the window and asked whether they were still selling tickets.
“I just do the drinks,” she said, and then smiled. “You know what? You can just grab a tube and go down.”
“Really?” I asked.
“Yeah,” she said.
So I did. Suddenly, I was a person who was carrying a magical inner tube up a rainbow hill when just ten minutes earlier that wasn’t even an idea that existed. I felt so alive. I felt… like there was one more obstacle in my way.
Indeed, there was. It was another woman. She looked at me; she looked THROUGH me. She asked if I had a wristband. I did not. I asked if that was a deal breaker. She said it was.
I walked back down the hill and put the tube back, dejected. But I don’t regret it.
See, I know that, had I not tried, I would have forever wondered what kind of fun I might have missed out on. I would have regretted the idea that I could have, but I didn’t.
Instead, even though I failed, I tried.
And I will never, ever regret trying, even if the thing just wasn’t meant for me this time.
Hey, kids! My Fire & Ice Kickstarter for Brushfire & Cold World officially begins on 03.01.22, and runs through the whole month of March (and, somehow, is already 14% funded, by early squirrels who really, really like me).
This is a post to remind you that if you have a blog, podcast, want to do an interview, etc, right now is the perfect time to do that, as it’ll get people’s eyes, ears, and hearts to my Kickstarter campaign as it kicks off for real in just a few days.
This is a photo of that time I was on my dog’s podcast and we learned so much about each other, including the fact that she went to culinary school and traveled extensively through Europe when she was just six weeks old.
Just imagine what way less interesting things you could learn about me, and more.
Throw inquires in the comments, messages, or shout them at me in public.
Haven’t preordered your copies of Brushfire or Cold World yet? Here’s that Kickstarter I’ve been rambling on about; early people are my favorite!
There are bitter things in this world that we’d like to think have lost their taste.
We are humans, look at how far we’ve come, a society that believes that we are post-what-we-used-to-be. See how we have evolved and that history has been written, the future not a reflection but a brand new page.
Yet, here we are.
Countries are still invading other countries, like they’ve done since the beginning. Racism still objectively exists, a local spotlight showing us that it’s still alive in children and how they treat one another. People are still using their subjective beliefs to control and persecute other people, and then cry when they feel others are trying to control them.
It’s overwhelming. I was up last night when the explosions in Ukraine started, and I went to sleep unsettled and woke up duly so.
What does change are individuals. And individuals lead us to societal change.
So I’ve just been thinking about what it means to be you and me.
You have the right to be. No one has the right to take that away.
You are not and will never be perfect, and you will always be unfairly judged by others’ projections of who they think you are or who you are supposed to be.
You’re only supposed to be you.
This is a reminder to check your own projections of other people, too.
You are allowed to be broken, to be sad, to get mad, to make mistakes, and none of those things make you a lesser human, or means that you’ve taken any steps backwards in your progress. They just mean that you exist.
You can be sober and be a fun and interesting person. You can be drunk and not be any fun at all.
We often see the world in opposites: black and white, good and bad, up and down. The truth is that all of those things are assigned by us; we decide what they are and what they should be at any given time, and those things change over time.
The truth is that everything just is.
And what’s happening in the world isn’t new, but the best thing we can do is admit that it is happening. We can talk about it. And we can figure it out.
Because we’re human. Look at how far we’ve come; imagine how far we can go.
A cliché usually becomes a cliché for a reason, and that reason is usually because it’s true.
Besides watching his interviews and studying the examples of The Hero with a Thousand Faces, I hadn’t dug too deep into Joseph Campbell’s catalog.
Campbell was what everyone read. Lucas used Campbell to create Star Wars. Campbell was cliché.
I decided to read Campbell, but on my own terms. I wanted to pick up a book of his that hasn’t been mentioned in a thousand conversations, and I found Pathways to Bliss, the title of which is a thematic element of Cold World.
I can’t express how happy I am that I did.
It is a remarkable work and one that came at the perfect time; it was something I needed in my life right now.
Choosing just one passage is impossible, but this one lit a fire and I can see its influence on many of my favorite creators:
“We keep hearing about the revolution around us all the time: the revolution, the revolution, the revolution. Revolution doesn’t have to do with smashing something; it has to do with bringing something forth. If you spend all your time thinking about that which you are attacking, then you are negatively bound to it.
“You have to find the zeal in yourself and bring that out. That is what’s given to you — one life to live.
“Marx teaches us to blame the society for our frailties; Freud teaches us to blame our parents for our frailties; astrology teaches us to blame the universe. The only place to look for blame is within; you didn’t have the guts to bring up your full moon and live the life that was your potential.”
I was surprised at how wide this work was in its scope. It’s not one thing, and it really touches on everything.
It’s another book to add to your pile if you’re looking for something to enrich and uplift you, and improve your perspective. It’s a phenomenal tool if you’re a storyteller, too; it covers myth as well as any of his other works.
I’ve spent a lot of time with words lately that have taken the power out of believing in things. It’s been hard for me. These words inspire me to put that power into things worth believing in.
I know there are people out there who are having difficulty while having conversations about gender. I, with people I know personally, have been trying to build bridges between those gaps in connection.
A version of the conversation I’ve been having is in an upcoming book of mine, but I feel like it may be helpful as a post for those who have been having any difficulties in understanding. Difficulties come with change, and for everyone, change is hard.
Basically, I’ve been asking people two simple questions to challenge their idea of gender.
The first question I ask is: “Do you believe in a soul?”
Every single person I have asked this question to has answered yes.
The second question I ask is: “Do you think a soul has a gender?”
Every single person I have asked this question to has had no idea how to answer it.
And that’s the beginning of thinking differently. Once a person gets removed from the basic molecules that make up you and me and coffee cups, they start to think about what makes a living being a living being.
The unique thing about a word like “soul” is that it doesn’t actually mean anything. It describes nothing. When I say “carrot,” you think of a carrot. A carrot is a definable thing. A soul is, by definition, undefinable. The word “soul” means something different to everyone.
But it has a heavy pull on how we define being human. And once you think about the gravity of being, you think about the freedom you have in being exactly who you want to be.
For fun, ask a Christian who gave birth to Eve. They will, with a completely straight face, have to tell you Adam did. Adam, a man, gave life to Eve, a woman, even though any person with a working knowledge of how babies are made will tell you that can’t be.
Additionally, they are told that a Man, with a capital He, created everything when, in reality, everything is created by women.
Why that happens to be is not coincidental, and is another post altogether, but it’s good food for thought.
All these questions, though, mean nothing next to simple kindness, which is all we can give each other. I live by the code, “People are who they say they are,” and if I believe them and they lie, it says everything about the both of us.
Most people don’t want to lie. They want to be heard, and accepted, and loved. And that is the pathway to bliss that comes from understanding.
Not just thinking it. Living it as though it was Monday. My day off.
And that would have been fine, had today not actually been Sunday.
Now you’re probably thinking, “Is there anything so dumb that this man won’t write something about it?” and I’ll stop you right there and confirm that, no, there is nothing so dumb that I won’t write something about it.
Because something interesting did come out of it.
I woke up believing today was Monday. I do not work on Mondays. So I was more than willing to get up at a decent time and run a ton of errands, like I do on Mondays, the day I do not work.
Not for one moment today did I stress out over the fact that I worked at 2 pm, because at no point during my errand-running did I believe I worked at 2 pm.
And I realized I did today what I’ve been trying to do with my anxiety and stress my entire life, that no amount of breathing or relaxation techniques have been able to produce.
It was objectively a Sunday. But I was subjectively living on a Monday. And that is how I always want my life to feel.
Normally, on a day where anything is expected out of me, I immediately feel so filled with anxiety that it’s hard to even find the key and turn on. By removing those expectations, I was able to do all the things I do on my day off, and then do things expected of me.
It was wild, and something I hope to be able to reproduce without having to burn all of my clocks and calenders.
Though I can’t help thinking that at some point in my morning drive, I hit 88 miles per hour and today really had started out as a Monday.
The Den 