I’ve been working on “The Story” for over 20 years, passively now, and maybe 6 years of it actively? Video watchers will have seen that I did the research to figure out that it’s been one month, for me, shy of 7 years. Having written “Novel 01” in a blast, then taking time to brainstorm “Novel 02” has led to a 81-item backlog of brainstorming. Not every item there is significantly noteworthy, some are “no brainstorming,” but, it’s all work.

Major spoilers after the jump.

The past few weeks, for me, have been difficult.

The new job that I accepted ended up not working out for me and I needed to quit to preserve my sobriety, sanity, mental health, and all other factors. This is a convenient excuse, of course, but I know my limitations, and I know the feelings of sobriety wanting to break so thoroughly that I must live and die by my decisions already, so I must accept the consequences of needing to self-preserve, even if it seems illogical to give up a job. The best I can say about this is that, as I explained in the video portion that meandered before writing this essay during this video, I can use some of the experiences to amplify the daydreamed brainstorming I have related to “Novel 02.”

Are these my experiences filtered through Sammohini’s?

Or are they Sammohini’s experiences that I can take inspiration from my reality to write more vividly? This question is the central question of all of my fiction writing: Is this fiction? Or is Sammohini a component of myself that I use to write about my life? I prefer to consider Sammohini to be her own entity, and that I am the vessel through which I write about her life, but, I accept that there are many elements that are similar to my own life, so, how we cut that depends on how we perceive fiction in general. I would prefer to have myself be different than Sammohini, but, when I go out looking for neckties and I see ones that catch my eye, I can’t help but think about this from Sammohini’s perspective, especially when I’m at a thrift store, pass by a dress that looks particularly interesting from the same interest perspective as I look at some of these wild, fancy, and otherwise gnarly ties that I wouldn’t have approached months ago – were it not for the job interview that ended up ruining my contract, where, as a contractor, I saw a cartoon drawn by a full-time employee showing a full-timer wearing a tie, which got me all kinds of inspired – just like how Sammohini might approach some fancier dresses that she wouldn’t have considered, were it not for her medical event changing her perspective on wearing clothes not just for the utilitarian purpose of what looks nice enough for work, but, what wears well elsewhere?

What are nice evening or weekend clothes?

We don’t always need to work to live, which is the hyper-bourgeois approach to propagandizing the proletariat on social media and reality. There is plenty of that sort of propaganda convincing all of us to sacrifice areas of ourselves in order to appease the overlords of our paychecks. That isn’t necessary or required, even under capitalism, and I present that as a sort of juxtaposition from myself and Sammohini. I understand this thoroughly, and I wear neckties as a rebellion against this notion, because I find pleasure in doing things not because it’s popular, but because I enjoy it, and, sometimes, customers appreciate the necktie as well. Sammohini, on the other hand, isn’t that self-aware, so she just acts in ways that seems nice or feels nice, and doesn’t really think of the big picture of wanting to escape this situation. She’s happy with working at Eville Medical for the entirety of her career, whereas for me, I won’t accept the worst that any employer throws at me after I accept a job offer. I know when to quit, and when the going gets bad. It won’t, probably, be that bad for Sammohini at Eville Medical, but that’s only because I’m not as sadistic as most of Corporate America, and I’m not as willing to make her into the example of a sacrificed character at the altar of capitalism.

That tangent just goes to show the difference between myself and Sammohini.

To bring it back, briefly, for a conclusion, I feel like I want to say that I won’t be throwing significant amounts of time into brainstorming “Novel 02” both during my unemployment time now and once I find new employment. I feel like there’s a balance between recreation, avocation, and vocation that should be balanced almost equally for the sake of one’s overall health. Part of my recreation can be funneled into thinking “what would Sammohini do in this situation?” as well as my vocation, but, I shouldn’t overdo it.

“Novel 02” is, after all, a cautionary tale about overworking one’s self, perhaps…