NEW BLOG!

Okay, so, FINALLY I have figured out the blogging stuff. It took forever, but now it is much more organized and is under my new e-mail address and is over at:

naomirthompson.blogspot.com

It will have such things as:

 AND

I will slowly be making my way around the blog-o-sphere to re-introduce myself and to spend time again with all you lovelies. I miss this part of my life and I don't want to give it up. So. I'm a gonna' try and do this.

Peace. ~

Changes to the Blog & Growing Up

Hey LamNams!

I thought I should let you know I'm making a bit of a change:

• My blog is now: naomiruthwrites
• My e-mail is now: naomirthompson(at)gmail(dot)com [more or less - I'm still in the midst of changing that nonsense]

I'm trying to grow up a little bit and:

• Be a tad more professional
• Learn how to write better
• Learn how to represent myself better

I shall keep you updated on any other changes! I'm looking forward to see what happens for the rest of this year. There's so many possibilities!

What about you? Any changes happening this year? Any new possibilities you're looking forward to?

Have a good week, LamNams.

WriteOnCon and Stuff I Learn About Myself

So I've been running around WriteOnCon when I have time - because they are doing a PitchFest and it's super exciting. I'm working on my pitch for WhiteWashed.

And I realized how much I miss being part of the writerly world and posting in here and all I could think of was, "Dude, why did I stop?" and I realized:

Something happened. Something mysterious and I don't know what. BUT.

I didn't think I had anything important to say. It's like someone took a vacuum hose and stuck it down my throat and sucked out all of my confidence and worth as an individual self.

I don't even know. It's so not like me. I've always been fairly confident in who I am and that I have something important to say and share.

But. Something happened and all of that disappeared and I would pull up this blog - you have NO IDEA how many times I pulled up this blog - and I would stare at the empty screen waiting for me to burp words up onto and I would just think: there is nothing I can say. Everything has already been said. People have BETTER things to say than I do.

What is my life?

What if I'm just an object interacting with other objects that have the power to produce within me the feelings of a personality and really this "I" does not refer to anything at all?

But I have an amazing friend and she e-mailed me the other day and reminded me that: I can say things that are worth saying.

So. Will I blog more? I have no idea. My laptop died and won't turn back on. I don't have a job. I have no idea what I'm doing this summer. I'm taking 22 credits part of which is writing a thesis part of which is a heavy book reading independent study... And you know what. I'll tell you more about that later. Because. I can do that.

I can write in here when I want to about THINGS and about BORING THINGS and about EXCITING THINGS and I can have a sense of humor and I can not be depressed all of the time and I can not hold myself up to some weird kind of I don't know what that keeps me from doing anything and this has become one very long sentence of longness.

Now.

I'm going to go make pasta. I might tell you about it later. Because pasta is awesome.

And life is awesome.

And here is a picture of Norway:

Let's go, guys.

The Labels We Hide

I have a lot of crazy characters. And I'm not just saying that. I have a lot of mentally deranged, unstable, people. I have characters with emotional problems. I have characters that could be labeled all kinds of disorders.

Why?

Because one, I think they're interesting. But two, I think we hide our labels. We  hide our instability. We pretend we're okay and we smile and we go to class. I have multiple friends who are depressed and on meds. And they don't tell people. I had a serious emotional/mental problem last semester with anxiety and panic and depression.

But shh! Don't tell.

Our society likes to cover up crazy. Take your pills and shut up and pretend. It makes the world uncomfortable. It makes us feel like we're no in control. It's messy and it hurts and we aren't going to talk about it.

But who doesn't have some sort of problem some time?

Why do we need to hide who we are all of the time? I hate it. It's something that I truly loathe. The hiding. The fearing judgement. The fact that people either ignore that you have a problem or they treat you differently.

Why?

We're just people. We're all just people.

I haven't been blogging much. I blame it on the fact that I don't have time, or I don't have anything to blog about, or blah, blah, blah, excuse, excuse, excuse. The reason why I don't blog much, the reason why I don't read blogs like I used to, has nothing to do with that. The truth is sometimes I don't want to get out of bed in the morning. The truth is sometimes I sit all day and stare out of the window and look at trees. The truth is life is a struggle and it's hard and sometimes your brain explodes and you spiral out of control and you pick up the pieces and have to start setting up new patterns.

And it costs you. Having your brain malfunction and your mood go paddywack crazy costs you. You don't find internships on time. You don't have readership up on your blog. No one knows who you are. No one comments. And you think about how this makes you look, and you wonder what you can do, and there's all of these things that make you feel so alone in the world.

But don't talk about it.

Don't blog about it.

Pretend you're okay, find a way around it, repress it and hide it and hope it goes away.

I'm getting better. I'm making lists. I'm finishing books. I'm writing more regularly. I'm blogging a tiny bit more (not much). I'm getting back into the blog world (so slowly) and I'm preparing for my second to last semester and hoping I can still find an internship and work toward a life after graduation.

So. My characters are going to be crazy. They are going to have mental problems. They are going to be psychotic, and abused, and sick, and sometimes maybe they won't be, but most of the time they will. Because that is what I am. That is what I know. And I'm tired of it being something that is not okay to talk about.

Get over yourself, world. Face your imperfections and accept it and move on with your life.

Me and Animals and How Life Taunts Me

Me: I don't really like animals.

Life: Really? You really don't like animals?

Me: Meh. Not really.

Life: *laughing evilly* So you don't like this? *sticks a wombat in my face*

Me: AWWWW. It's so cute! I want one!

Life: *bunts the wombat back to Australia* No! Wombats are not domesticated. Wombats can dig through concrete. Wombats could eat your face off and tear you limb from limb. You cannot have a wombat.

Me: Fine. I still don't like animalS. I just like A animal.

Life: Really?

Me: Yes.

Life: *laughs evilly* *pulls a quokka from behind its back* What about this?

Me: AWWWW. It's so cute I want one!

Life: *laughs manically and bunts quokka back to Australia* No! You can't have one! They're not domesticated. They are dying off and being eaten by cats and dogs and those other animals you disregard. You cannot have a quokka!

Me: *sobbing* Why Australia? Why? Why do you have such cute animals? I hate you forever!

Life: *runs off laughing in nefarious glee*

Me: *shakes fist* Oh, life, how I hate thee sometimes.

Car Trouble

She was drinking coffee. Bad idea. But she knew if she didn't she would go find alcohol - and for an alcohol intolerant person that was even worse of an idea. So the coffee worked as a distraction. For a few moments. Then it would all come back and she would reach for another marshmallow. The bag was almost half-empty already. She would eat one - or five - every time it came back. Every time she remembered.

She kept telling herself it wasn't that bad. Nothing had actually happened. She was fine and she was safe. But that refrain kept coming into her head and parading like a demented mechanical chicken. My car was on fire. I could have died.

She had taken a long bath and had bought new clothes (well, they were used, but still, new to her) to put distance between herself and what had happened. Also, to get away from the burnt car smell that clung to her like a needy boyfriend.

The car ride had started out well enough, except for the delay. She had taken a wrong turn and ended up in Pittsburgh. But she had pulled out her map and been able to find her way back to 79 South. It had been about an hour out of the way, but it could have been worse, and she had been able to figure it out all on her own without a GPS. Just an old beat up atlas.

That's when her car started acting funny. She had gone to the nearest gas station, just to be sure. Everything looked fine. All fluids where they needed to be, no leaking, tires good.

I should have called my dad. But she hadn't. It had driven without problem for about an hour. That's when the smoke started. And then the panic. She dialed home. No answer. Her dad. Still no answer. Mom? Yes. She was driving but would call back. She hung up.

It smelled like smoke. Like a lot of smoke. She was just thinking of getting out of the car when someone pulled over in front of her. A small white car. A man jumped out and ran to her, so she rolled down her window.

"Yours car is on fire. You need to get out."

The panic. The waiting. The continual phone calls. Fire fighters pulling stuff out of the back of her car and tossing it aside while they tried to cool the car down. It was too hot. There was so much smoke. This isn't real. This doesn't happen in real life. But it was happening. Later, car dropped off at a shop, waiting for her dad to pick her up, she walked through the dollar store and felt nothing. She was walking. She was standing. Her eyes were open. But no sense data was coming through. There was nothing. Just a floating body of white noise. So she got a hotel room and took a bath and put on her new clothes and called her grandmother.

That's when the shaking started. Maybe it wouldn't be so bad if worse things had happened to her. Maybe it wouldn't be so bad it she knew she could afford a new car. Or if she wasn't alone in West Virginia.

She took another sip of the coffee she wasn't supposed to be drinking and reached for another marshmallow. She waited for her dad to come and for the shaking to stop.

Back to College

Well, hello my lovely LamNams. I have not been around in forever.

I do sometimes post over here at Booksellers Without Borders NY. I'm supposed to be posting on Thursdays about Middle Grade books. I miss this past Thursday because I was in RA training all day. And all week. And I'm still in RA training. Fortunately we have the weekend off to kind of decompress and chill our faces off. It's been kinda' intense at times. Mostly just time-consuming.

SO, what have I been doing all of this time? I was working again at a small Playhouse (a musical theatre) in the Box Office. It was basically working in a shack in the middle of the woods while answering phone calls from old people. It was fun though. I worked like, 10-12 hr shifts though, so... I didn't really exist enough to be able to spend time over here.

This is My Little Box I Lived in This Summer

ALSO, I was trying to get together with ALL THE FRIENDS. I did get to run down and see my roommate (I think I will always call her that, even though she is transferring out to a state far away from mine, and we aren't technically roommates anymore because I am an RA and I have a room all to myself but... where was this thought going? I think I'm supposed to have stopped this parenthesis thought by now.) which was awesome.

Except the part where I got pulled over

AND, we had our giant family birthday, since since about five of us all have birthdays between the end of July and mid September.

WHAT ELSE: I went to BEA (did I already tell you about that? I don't know.) and so have been trying to keep up on my reading of ARCs and so forth.

This is just a small portion... The ones I brought with me to school

OH! I started painting again and I'm hoping to turn that into a small business, which I shall tell you about more at a later point.

SO FAR this is an extremely dull post but as I am - at times- and extremely dull person that is quite alright.

I AM going to be super busy this year with classes, and RAing (which means I am a resident assistant, and have to make sure all the Residents on my hall obey the rules and are taking care of themselves physically and emotionally, and whatnot.) annnnnd doing everything else that I always try to do.

From Hyperbole and a Half

I WILL TRY and write a post every weekend (Friday, Saturday, or Sunday) just to try and keep in contact with this side of the world, because I KNOW I've been losing touch all over the place and that makes me sad inside.

I HOPE to be around more often, HOWEVER, I am realistic and realize that PROBABLY won't happen. Because I'm a bum.

ANYWAY, I hope y'all had a good summer, and continue to have a good rest of the summer, AND I hope to see you all soon. I give hugs to all of you, unless you are creepy, in which case I give you a friendly handshake instead.

Only a Hand Shake for You. If That.

The World Keeps Going On and On

And I keep trying to think of things to post about

And I keep thinking about how much I miss you all. So many of you.

And I keep trying to involve myself in other projects.

And I forget why I started this blog in the first place

(Why did I start this blog in the first place?)

And I met someone who keeps saying that I will be published, and I realize

How much I started to believe

That wasn't possible

And I realized

How much I don't want a back up plan

I don't want to have to create a career based on the fact that I might not succeed and I might be a failure and I might not get published and I might not be okay and I might have to work in awful retail jobs for the next ten years of my life because of the college debt I'm in

And the fact is

I don't care if I have to work in retail for the next twenty years of my life

I don't care if I have to struggle and if it's awful

Because I know I want to be an author

That's why I've been writing since I was able to hold a crayon

Why I've been telling stories since I was able to string syllables together into coherent sounds

The World keeps going around and around and I'm going to keep spinning with it but I don't want to have to have a back-up plan anymore. If I decide to go into the publishing world I want to do it because I love it, not because I need a safety net.

This college thing... Being here, in a different state away from home for really the first time. My first try at college doesn't count, since I went home on the weekends. Being in a completely different environment. I'm learning a whole lot about myself, and I've been so busy figuring out who I am, it's been hard to figure out who my characters are, and my writing life had been precarious at best, and my absence here has been out of necessity, but I don't want to stay here. I want to write more this year. Edit more. Actually be the person I'm realizing I am.

Because I miss you.

I miss the world of writing.

I miss my characters.

I even miss creeping on agents a little bit. Finding out which agents publish which books, which publishing houses publish which of my favorite authors. I miss that whole world.

I don't really know how to end this so...

Reminisces for the New Year

Sometimes.

Sometimes life doesn't go quite as you thought it would.

Or quite as you planned.

I had originally planned to go to college near where I lived, graduate as an English major, maybe find a godly man along the way and get married, though that was never a necessity. Hopefully get published and live happily ever after.

This year hasn't exactly followed that plan. There's been a whole lot of... Disruptings going on.

You see, life is kind of like a Choose Your Own Adventure Book.

I wish this were a real book

I would totes read it

(laughingsquid)

All the chapters are there. All of the possibilities. So sometimes you can choose between two pages. Each page will lead you somewhere else, to a different ending, to different beginnings.

1) Instead of going to a college near my home I moved 8 hours away to a completely different state.

2) Instead of being an English major I'm currently a Classics Major, learning about Latin, amphoras, and Roman mosaics (and Italian pastiglias - which are gorgeous but torturous to write about)

3) Instead of being single I ended up in a relationship a little while ago

4) Instead of being friendless like I feared I would be, I ended up with a group of friends I love. We support each other, and encourage each other, and debate with each other. We also watch Disney movies together, which is an absolute must. Disney movies are great things to bond over, I so declare.

5) Instead of doing horrible in my classes like I feared I would, I got good grades and learned to respect different teaching styles. I ended up with wonderful professors that I am proud of to have as my teachers.

6) Instead of only ever being in one relationship like I had hoped, I ended up breaking up with someone. And I was fine. But he wasn't.

7) Instead of losing touch with my friends and family back home, I ended up closer than ever with them. Thanks not only to Skype but Facebook, and cell phones, and all kinds of wonders of technology

8) Instead of living quietly in a dorm, I ended up friends with almost my entire hall. And though my roommate and I didn't work out, the rest of my hall and I did. So. It ended up being okay.

8) Instead of getting published I learned more about the industry, and was able to go to BEA again, and I understand more about the craft, and I'm getting over my fear of failure.

9) Instead of staying with Borders, my favorite job I have ever had, I had to leave and watch the company break down. But I was part of a family of co-workers that I will treasure forever (In fact, a group of us have banded together to start up a blog about books, also something I hadn't expected)

10) Instead of only reading YA and middle grade I learned how to red non-fiction, and learned how to love non-fiction, and I discovered an increasing love for children's picture books

11) Instead of letting life happen around me, I'm starting to learn how to wake up and be a part of this magnificent world. To hold onto the relationships that will last. To try things even if it may not work out, and even if I will fail, and even if I may end up looking stupid.

12) Instead of being who I've always been, I'm discovering things about myself I never knew before. Some good, some... Not so much. But at least I understand more about who I am, and who I could possibly be some day.

So instead of starting this New Year with a shrug and a desperate need for sleep, I hope to start this New Year on a new page of my Choose My Own Adventure, with a blank page, and a ready pen in my hand. Prepared for the fact that I don't know where the pages will take me, but confident that the God I believe in, trust in, and place hope in, will bring me to a new chapter that will defy my expectations. And some of that will be good, and some not so much, but that's okay. Because I have awesome friends, and because I have an awesome family, and because I really love the taste of ravioli. And even if random parts of the South do not have round ravioli, they still have square ones, so life will be okay in the end. Because of ravioli. ;)

Mmmmm...

Have a good New Year's my lamnams. I pray your last year had it's beautiful moments that you will be able to cherish forever. And I hope you had moments to laugh, because I know I did (Corrugated sighs! <-- Don't ask)

The Seduction of a Wall

Vale. (<-- Latin for farewell. Not like an English vale)

This:

Not This:

Happy New Year!! :)

Life = Interesting

There is something I have come to realize about life. Life doesn't really make sense most of the time. For example, some girls go to college with this mindset:

And instead of finding even one boy, they end up finding a whole lot of homework and wonderful friends instead.

Then you have other people, who are more like this:

And they are the ones who end up meeting someone before classes even officially start.

And this can sometimes seem unfair. But I think it all works out. Because those who were just looking for boys end up finding themselves. Or really good friends. Or they learn how to make pottery and they become beautiful cat people who find beautiful cat men later in life.

And the one who was against boyfriends ends up learning more about who they are, and that it's okay to trust people.
So in the end, I think life works itself out. Maybe not all of the time, but I think it happens a lot more often than we realize.