Ex-Con

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I went to the Baltimore Comic Con this weekend. I had to stop going to cons for a few years because money was tight, but I really need to leave my apartment, so I took the MARC train into Baltimore. I left after two hours, basically spending more time commuting than wandering the floor. And the fact that I got swindled for $100 as I was exiting the building didn’t improve my mood any.

Right before this, on my way out the door, as I was starting to feel overwhelmed, I noticed there were only about ten people in line to see Ben Edlund. A fellow comic artist once called him “the god who walks among us.” He wrote and illustrated indie comic The Tick, which was adapted into a popular cartoon, and then a live-action show which lasted six episodes, and then another live-action show which ran for two seasons. He was the head scriptwriter for Supernatural and Angel for a time, and he wrote an episode of Firefly. These are the ones I know of.

However, as I was standing in line, awkwardly carrying all the books and stickers and prints independent creators had been throwing at me, this guy two people ahead keeps looking at me, like, really intently. His expression is that of a person who mixed up salt and sugar with his breakfast cereal. He’s in a generic Jedi costume, and he seems to believe he is Jedi, in the way he comes up to me and starts speaking quietly, like he didn’t want to escalate this. Condescendingly, he tells me I was in the wrong line. The real line stretched over the horizon. No Ben Edlund for me.  

The whole experience was like walking on a swimming pool full of Lego, and then I met the swindlers. I decided that this was my last con. It was a bust, as far as I was concerned.

That is until I started thinking about it. Everywhere there were artists and writers I admired. Sometimes the only thing they were selling were original pages for hundreds of dollars, or I couldn’t think of anything to say, so I hovered away. People were wearing cool costumes, though I lost interest in taking pictures after a few minutes. Vendors were vending, which is where I found several issues of The Incredible Hulk that I’d been looking for for a while.And Artist’s Alley, always my favorite part, was vast and full of interesting people.

I did talk to some artists. I met Amanda Conner for the fourth time. I called her a filthy degenerate, and she agreed wholeheartedly. Her art is raunchy, but at the same time really sexy, with a cartoony aftertaste.

Her husband, Jimmy Palmiotti, is a writer and inker of exceptional talent, and he sat next to her. They’ve been married forever. The thing about comic artists and writers is that you don’t often see photos of them, so you have no idea what they look like. In the case of Jimmy Palmiotti, he looks exactly like you’d expect a person named Jimmy Palmiotti to look like.

Speaking of not knowing what an artist looks like, I also found Amy Reeder. Amy has got a real fairy-tale style about her, which she showed off in Madame Xanadu, which is about a powerful fortune-teller whose origins were in Camelot. I’ve gotten her autograph two times before this, and I can never remember what she looks like. There’s always the same woman in there with her, and I can’t recall who was who. I spoke to the empty space between them when I talked about how “Amethyst is the perfect book for your style,” and the one who uncapped her pen was Amy.

Likewise, I stood in line to meet Terry Moore. Terry Moore writes character-driven comic book epics in black and white. He pencils and inks his own work, and he hand-letters it. I wanted to talk to him about lettering, so I waited. I was beyond irritated that I’d been standing there for five minutes while this older woman chewed his ear off, especially about how superstar artist Frank Cho was never in his booth. And it wasn’t until Terry Moore said something to her that I realized that this was not Terry Moore, but rather his assistant. Terry was at a panel. I didn’t stick around because I was planning on leaving soon anyway, a path to the door that would take me by Ben Edlund’s booth. And you know how that went.

I had a great time in Artist’s Alley. Lately my obsession is with stickers—I’ve been decorating my sketchbooks like I’m a thirteen-year-old. This led me to a lot of tables to have brief chats with independent creators. My policy is this: if you call me over to your booth and tell me all about your comic or your book or even just your characters, I will buy what you’re, even though I hardly ever read. It’s what I’d want if I was on the other side of the table.

I think I will try this again, maybe next year at Awesome Con, DC’s comic book convention. It wasn’t worth the trip to Maryland, but the DC convention center is only a couple of stops  from me. Maybe I’ll feel less awkward around the talents I admire. Maybe I’ll meet all sorts of young, creative people who are really putting themselves out there. And maybe next time I’ll bring a tote bag.

I also got these.

A Day in the Life

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I woke up about ten minutes before my alarm this morning, and it still pissed me off. Oscar slept on the floor because I’d rolled over onto him at about 2:30. He knows my alarm means breakfast, so he bullied me into getting out of bed and feeding him. I brushed my teeth, cleaned out his litter box, made my bed, picked out my clothes for the day, and showered. Since it was super-early, I worked on a drawing until my favorite café in the DMV region opened at seven. I took the Metro the two stops and huffed and puffed it up some very Bay Area terrain. When I arrived, I enjoyed a breakfast sandwich while reviewing the proofs for my novel. I then continued working on my drawing and watched people for the next three hours, until the art store opened. I didn’t need paint, ink, or paper, so I just browsed. I also found the comic book shop Nicole had shown me years ago, but it wasn’t open yet. In this beautiful, late-summer day, I explored Silver Spring, Maryland and went home to open up my social medias.

The one and only post I could find that acknowledged what’s on my mind today was the car salesman meme, this one selling a plane that can crash into two buildings for the price of one.

I’m done until tomorrow.

The Furminator

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“Listen. And understand. That cat is out there. He can’t be bargained with. He can’t be reasoned with. He doesn’t feel pity, or remorse, or fear. And he absolutely will not stop, ever, until the birdie-on-a-stick is dead.”

In another regeneration, I went out a lot with my friends. Sometimes it was with one friend (Hugh or Mark) or it was a salon of drunken idiots (Rita) or it was rock and roll (Satanicide). Even though I was depressed, I cherished my adventures, and every Sunday, during my downtime at The Post, I summed them up and sent them out to a select group of friends who hadn’t yet told me to stop sending them.

I’m at an age where I stop telling people how old I am and start rounding up. My ex got custody of almost all of my friends in the divorce, and all of my hobbies are solitary, so I don’t have as many adventures anymore. That said, three big things happened to me Monday and Tuesday, and I’m going to report them to you.

First, Oscar is growing up to be a cat, where before he looked like a black ferret. He’s a teenager now, so all he wants to do is play, and when he’s not trying to convince me it’s dinnertime, he’s bugging me to get the birdie-on-a-stick and wave it in his face. He’s sweet, but I have a job.

One of my favorite things to do with Newcastle was take him outside to explore our backyard. One of my favorite things to do with Henry was put him in a harness and take him for a walk. I bought Oscar a harness, and a backpack so I could go for walks with him. It stressed him out, but if he could get used to it, he might have a good time.

Monday, I got him into his harness, which is hard because he’s coated with a thin layer of butter, loaded him in his backpack, and walked the three blocks to find the only open area of grass in my neighborhood.

I opened up the backpack, and he very slowly made his way out, saw me, and freaked out. He squeezed out of the harness and ran straight into traffic. I ran right after him, kicking off my flip-flops in the street, and I didn’t care if I got hit by a car, as long as Oscar got to safety. You’re not going to believe what happened next.

All four lanes of traffic stopped to let us make it across. I was expecting to watch Oscar die, but the asshole drivers of DC had our backs. I chased him through three backyards until he tried to hide under a hosta, and I scruffed him and brought him home. Because flip-flops are flat, you can’t tell they got run over.

That was Monday.

I love my job, but that doesn’t mean it doesn’t fray my nerves. Between ending my day with that and public transit (still better than driving), I don’t want to have to deal with the nuisance of our concierge only being at the desk 50 percent of the time. So when I pick up any packages that come in for me, I tend to pick them up after I get out of the shower. Don’t worry, I dress first.

At 4:30 this morning, I picked up a package from Missouri and just assumed it was the carved owl I just bought for my owl shrine. It was not. With Oscar’s supervision, I opened the box to find another box, and in that box was this mug:

I did not order this mug. In the mug was a business card for a potter who lived in Florida, along with something that looked like a bookmark. On the back was a lovely note thanking me (yes, me—it said “Dear Jeremiah) for the letter I’d sent years ago and how moved they were. Life was happening, so they hadn’t replied, but they sent the mug as a token of appreciation. Signed, “William Pona tawa sina.”

I had no idea who the holy hell this was. I did not remember writing that letter years ago, and I didn’t know a William who made pottery. I visited the website and found out that’s a luxury mug. The clues clicked into place. It wasn’t the potter, it was one of my college roommates, Will. He lives in Missouri. I sent him an essay I’d written about him two years ago, and I’d never heard back.

I figured it out, but I didn’t figure it out in time to stop me from sending a polite email to the potter thanking him for the gift and expressing joy that my words touched him so much, as if I knew him.

That squared away, I had one last detail to attend to. What the hell is “Pona tawa sina”? I looked it up, only raising more questions. Pona tawa sina is from a language called Toki Pona, which was invented in 2001 and bridges the gap between all languages. Kind of like Esperanto, only less baffling. Pona tawa sina literally means “goodness toward you.” It’s a way of saying goodbye or thank you.

That was before work. When I arrived, there was a surprise waiting.

One of the many, many perks of my job is that we get stretch breaks lunchtime Wednesday and Thursday. When I started eating at my desk a year ago, the stretch instructor was Katja, a young, slim, petite, cute-as-a-button person with a pink pixie cut and a lot of energy. Katja was recently replaced with Hali, a young, slim, petite, cute-as-a-button person with a pink pixie cut and a lot of energy.

I hang drawings of Newcastle, Oscar, myself, and other pictures I’ve done, practically daring people to ask me about it. Hali took my dare, and I found out they were a bit of an artist themselves. They’re just learning about watercolors and painting around town, so the next day, I brought them my retired brushes, the cool travel set I’d purchased in Doha. There’s nothing wrong with them, I’ve just traded up. They’ve been occupying a small space in my art drawer, and I wasn’t going to throw them away. Now they have a loving home.

There was a thank you card on my desk when I got to work this morning. Hali wanted to tell me how important those brushes were to them, and they could not wait to take them out for a spin. They have an Etsy store, and I bought some stickers.

I’ve become such a hermit, it’s hard to imagine that I am having any sort of impact in this world. And yet today, the first thing that happened to me today was someone making sure I understood I had affected them, twice. Maybe I was wrong about my impact.

Trapped in Amber

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I’ve been thinking lately about perfect moments. There those events in your history that aren’t weighed down by the stresses of life. You can start your day anxious and cranky, and you could end your day depressed and disappointed, but in the middle, time stands still, and everything is as it should be. I’m almost fifty, and I have so many.

I can remember with clarity my first kiss (in the back of a GATE van, fist-bump), even if I can’t remember the reason we were in Albuquerque, or the fact that I figured out shortly after that I didn’t even like this person. I can recall what she was wearing, and the fact that she had to make the first move before I noticed.

I remember walking by a canal in Florida with my parents, who were married forty-four years by this point and were still holding hands. I recall the yellow-green of the grass, the fence to the left, and trees in the near distance.

I remember Newcastle chasing me through the apartment until I jumped onto the bed, and he joined me, and we snuggled together on the green sheets.

There’s so many.

I have a favorite. It’s stuck with me for over twenty years because it was perfect. It’s an unremarkable moment, and I feel safe in assuming that all of my friends, including Facebook friends, experience this. There was something about this time, though, that didn’t fade.

In January or February, 2003, I had spent the night at my girlfriend’s apartment. We had known each other as long as we’d lived in New York, but we were still in our honeymoon period. Work beckoned us, so we bundled up and walked to my subway station in the cold and snow, surrounded by drifts of dirty ice. She lived on 210th Street, so the trains were all elevated, so we hid from the precipitation under the tracks, with the painted girders. Casually, she kissed me goodbye before heading off to her own train.

And that’s it. That is the moment that sticks out to me the most. I remember the black belt of her black coat and her debutante gloves. I remember the leopard print lining of her hat. I remember her hand on my heart, a gesture she made a lot with me. I remember that it was the most natural thing in the world.

She had kissed me goodbye before, but something had changed. This time I felt like I was an important part of her life, not just some guy. She seemed a little more relaxed. And for the first time, I felt like I was good enough for her. She and I had dated twice before this, and we felt hopeful that the third time would be a charm. There was a lot of hope in that kiss. We were really good friends, even before we started dating (again), so there was comfort.

The third time was not a charm. A few months later, I had a depressive episode and broke up with her over the phone. We stayed friends, though not as close as before, and then we became really close again long-distance. Unfortunately, I was cut off from most of my friends during my marriage, so we drifted apart, and our current lives are about as opposite they can get. I don’t expect she even remembers this because it was so mundane. It was my moment.

Why is this my favorite memory? I think it was the intimacy of it.

So many lifetimes later, I will always have that moment, that kiss in the snow, when everything was perfect.

Crock Plot

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I turned on a movie while I was working, as I always do. It took a few minutes to realize this was a Lifetime movie. The thing about Lifetime movies is that they’re engaging, but they’re really goofy. My favorite part about Lifetime movies is describing them.

This one is about a woman who wakes up in a strange bed with no memory of the night before, and the other person is dead. He is Elon Musk, only he doesn’t look like he ate a statue of John Barrowman made of butter.

Her best friend is a lawyer, who is going to represent her, and her other friend is a good-looking guy who looks exactly like the dead billionaire. I’d say this was by design, but every male in this movie looks like the dead billionaire, including the grizzled cop who’s tracking her down.

She stays with her male friend, but they get attacked by people in hoodies. The cop figures out she’s their suspect, but when she calls the station from a burner phone, he believes she’s innocent. Later, the good-looking friend takes an axe to the face.

Spoiler alert! The lawyer and the dead billionaire’s ex-wife framed the main character. The lawyer because the main character once slept with the lawyer’s ex-boyfriend, the recently axed friend. The ex-wife did it because the main character slept with the billionaire. The cop shows up, there is a scuffle, and everybody believes the main character, even though all the (fake) evidence points at her.

Lifetime!

Jeremiah Murphy and the Journey into Darkness

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9:57

The decision is made, after I have educated myself on the finer points of crochet, to enter that vast, unforgiving hellscape on my quest for that sacred nectar, which is Half & Half. Maybe some of that Creamed Ice.

10:01

After crossing vast, unforgiving swaths of the Apartment Complex of Totten, during which I crossed the threshold of the Door of Fire, I was forced to endure an Endless Staircase to the ground floor, to the Sidewalk of Riggs Road, next to the entrance of that wretched pit where the reasonable dare not tread. The sign over the door was in a language that is not my native tongue. The English translation is “Abandon All Hope Ye Who Enter Here.” In Elvish, it reads “Walmart.”

10:02

I encounter my first obstacle before stepping foot into this dark place. It is a vast, unforgiving sea of shopping carts, clustered in the entrance. Had they only queued properly, there would not be this barricade, but they all insisted rolling into the terrifying visage of Capitalism before all others, and even the extra-wide doors could not accommodate them. Madness has me in its grip, and I’m not even inside yet.

10:08

I have found freedom from the crush of acolytes to this terrible shrine, and now I will cross this vast, unforgiving wilderness retrieve the elixir. The dilemma weighs mightily on my heart: the Creamed Ice is located in a Frost Machine near the front door, but if I put it in my grasp first, it runs the risk of melting. I determine the time it takes to walk quickly to the Aisle of the Dairy and walk back to the Frost Machines would be negligible.

10:12

I have been anticipating an eternal wait in the vast, unforgiving wilderness of the line for the Checkout of Personal Agency, but I could not see the length of it until I was in that place. I feared those ahead of me in the aisle were also going to be waiting in line, and yes, my prophecy was fulfilled when the gentleman with the cart steered for the blind area which prevented the line from spilling all over the store. I stood behind him and waited.

10:17

I have been deceived. My worst fears have been realized. I have been smitten by the Sword of Irony as I discover that the line holding me prisoner did not exist. Indeed the real line was a vast, unforgiving wilderness, twice as long as the one I’d deluded myself into standing in. I resigned myself to my fate and took my place behind the Monk of Small Stature, who crippled me with his Gaze of Stink-Eye.

10:26

When I finally emerge from the meandering queue, weaving in and out of clothing departments, I see the Checkout of Personal Agency. Of the seven machines displaying banners with the Checkout of Personal Agency’s motto, “15 Items or Less,” three of the machines have been struck dead, and the life of a fourth drained from it as I watched. The Monk of Small Stature needed to apprentice himself with an employee until he could operate the machine. He is half my age. There is a vast, unforgiving wilderness ahead of me. Morale is low.

10:29

I swipe my two items through the red light, and one of them freezes the machine. A denizen must unlock it, and one does, after a fashion. It happens again. Finally, I allow the machine to suck upon my credit card. The exit is blocked by lost souls who needed their receipts checked, so I wait. When I am free, I ride the elevator to my floor and walk across the vast, unforgiving wilderness to my home.

10:35

I am greeted by my faithful ward, who tells me, “Mew!” He has been alone for the past thirty-eight minutes, the poor wretch. Was this dark, harrowing journey into the vast, unforgiving wilderness of the underworld worth it? I think of the sweet nectar as I put it in my Device of Refrigeration. Yes, it is worth it.

With a Single Step

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I have a lot of vestigial dates on my calendar. For example, September 13 will always be the birthday of my ex, Andrea. I make a note of it every year, despite that she will never speak to me again. May 7, the day after my dad’s birthday, belongs to a high school best friend who grew up to be odious. These are people I no longer have a relationship with. But that’s the past. On the rare occasion I make a new friend, I can’t remember when they were born.

Other dates that have no relevance for me are April 30, which is my wedding anniversary. December 13 is when she served me divorce papers. Her birthday is March 23, but I can safely say that I haven’t noticed it the last five times that day has passed. August 22 (today!) is the twentieth anniversary of when I left New York.

In 2004, I was miserable a good half-to-two-thirds of the time. This was mostly because of my untreated, undiagnosed mental illness, and also, I was really lonely. Kate was the solution to this because she was, at the time, my soul mate, and she was opening her home to me. The resulting adventure was epic.

Was it a good decision? Well, Kate treated me like her property. She convinced me that all my friends were insane and that the only ones I could trust were hers, all of whom turned their backs on me following the split. (Some of them pretended to be “neutral” while actually being Team Kate. These are the people I think the least of.). She convinced my doctors and me that I was incompetent and couldn’t take care of myself. She tried to create a rift between myself and my family.

On the other hand, she was the biggest cheerleader of my art. She bought me supplies I still use and encouraged me to start my own art business. (She wanted to make greeting cards, which I did not enjoy.) She hired me a personal trainer, and for five years, I was in great shape. (You can’t tell by looking at me now that I used to run 5Ks for fun.) Most importantly, she was a champion of my mental health, and the only reason I can function at all is because of her.

In addition, she turned me into a Mac person, she expanded my flavor palette, she took me around the world, she taught me to be more financially responsible. She brought Newcastle and me together. I dressed better when I was married. I feel like I was more of an adult back then, even compared to now.

I honestly think that leaving New York twenty years ago was the best decision I could have made at that point of my life. It was when I took the first step to being an adult. It was when I packed up and chased true love. It was when I was brave. That’s why I remember August 22 every year.

Subedit

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My novel was accepted by the publisher almost two years ago. I read the contract very carefully, looking for tricks and traps, but it was straightforward and very generous. The cover looks great, and they were very responsive to my concerns about fonts. Because the title is a Navajo word, they were able to accommodate the unique accenting of the language. The layouts went well. Everyone has been extraordinarily professional. But that’s not why this is taking so long.

I received the first edits fifteen months ago, and they were really bad. When I realized the editor had caused a lot of problems, I asked Production to fix it. They rejected all the changes and brought in a new team. They were just as bad. So was the third edit. The fourth edit was a vast improvement, though it wasn’t until a later round that they stopped changing “Oxen’s Razor,” which was the term used by a teenager trying to sound smart, to “Occam’s Razor,” not getting the joke.

I’ve been going back and forth with them for fifteen months, during which I’ve reread my novel nine times. I’m getting kind of sick of it.

(To be clear, I’m really proud of this book, and I think it’s some of my best writing.)

Now that they’re only sending me the final proofs, I have to edit my own book. Because of my attention span, I can’t catch all of the errors on a pass, so I have to go through it again and again, stripping out the errors. On the ninth pass, I saw that I had misspelled Jennifer once, and I didn’t notice the other eight times I read it. Also, I’m catching some continuity mistakes, like who gave the main character his pickup. These things should have been spotted by an editor.

To be clear, I’ve liked working with them so far. I just can’t figure out how this one department can be so unskilled and unprofessional. And I can’t figure out why the publisher isn’t taking this more seriously. When I self-published three years ago, my novels went up covered in typos. I reread them at least three times, and I still missed a lot. And that’s embarrassing. How am I able to hold up a book proudly and brag about it if it looks self-published? This looks bad for the publisher too. So I just returned the latest round of proofs. I will spend another fifteen months doing this if it’s what it takes to make this perfect. I painted this picture of Aaron and Jen, the main characters of the novel, Hanììbààz Rising because it was on my mind again.

The Giving Tree

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Prior to Sunday, Oscar and I were living in Nicole’s apartment, formerly our apartment. I stayed there for two weeks, and Oscar stayed a week longer than that. The problem is, Henry has been really depressed and crying all night since Newcastle and I moved out, so she was thinking of getting him a kitten. But she wanted to practice with someone old enough to defend himself.

Oscar and Henry did not get along. When the former first showed up at the latter’s, there were some really bad fights, so Nicole’s boyfriend cobbled together a gate to keep them apart, but they could get used to each other. They called it the DMZ. Oscar could jump on top of it without much effort. They could be in the same room together, and on my first night, they snuggled up on opposite sides of my lower legs and we all slept together.

His last week there, Oscar finally had the Surgery That Dare Not Speak Its Name, and I walked him to the vet in a backpack. I couldn’t watch his reaction, but he was quiet, and I think that’s a good sign.

But now we’re home. Nicole’s apartment is 850 square feet, mine is 435. I’d love to take him for a walk, but on the rare occasions I don’t pass out from blood loss and get him into the harness, his feet stop working. His motto is “Death from above!”; but he doesn’t have a lot of heights to aspire to.

I don’t want Oscar to get bored. I play with him a few minutes periodically. I talk to him, I let him sniff whatever’s in my hand, I scratch him behind the ears whenever I see him, I open my window in the middle of a heat wave. I don’t want him to get bored. I bought him a new cat tree and backpack. The tree arrived today, it took me over an hour to assemble it. It’s the perfect height to loaf out in front of the window. On the lower tier, there’s a ledge that’s perfect for hanging out with Dyad while he’s working.

Unfortunately, I have to get rid of the old one. Until January, I’ve never lived alone in my life, especially when it came to Newcastle. I’d never made a big purchase for my cat, the love of my life. It came from our joint account when I was married, and Nicole and I split expenses for the cat. So the first thing I bought was a tree for Newcastle. It was not a tall one, for an old man, but he never used it anyway.

Newcastle only lived alone with me for six weeks, and he never used it. Sometimes he’d get into the hammock that was the same height as my desk. Even if I wasn’t looking, I knew he was there. He was my anchor. Since then, Oscar enjoyed the hammock a lot whenever I was working.

I hated throwing the tree away because it’s the last monument I had to him. But I got a new kid, and I’m buying presents for him now.

* Oscar is in this picture.

Frisky Business

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As you may know, I’m ace, or asexual. Some may find this hard to believe because I’ve had my fair share of sex in my life, but there is a pattern. I tend to be more randy when I’m manic, and when I’m baseline or depressed, I’m not interested. I’m still drawn to sexiness, but I don’t want to have sex. Asexuality is a scale, and I fit on it somewhere.

Anyway, that’s my way of saying that I’m apparently going through a manic period. This means delusions of grandeur, snap decision-making, irresponsible spending, a really short, hot temper, and I start remembering sex fondly again. As a result, I started getting a little frisky with some of my drawings. I’m still seeing all the errors, but I’m happy with most of these.