Sometimes stuff comes up in life that is completely out of your hands and you have to just slow the fuck down, even if you don’t want to. Even if slowing down is not your natural inclination, and you have demand avoidance, and the “no” from your circumstances makes the back of your teeth grind and your feet want to kick things.

I might be talking about myself again.

My partner Afton wrote a very good post about forced slow-downs recently on their blog, which I highly encourage you to check out. As you might be able to guess, recent illness has forced us both to slow down (and quarantine together) for a while. The brain fog is very, very real. My focus, always a difficult creature to engage with at best, is now absolutely feral. Writing this post is like wandering through a mall; everything is screaming for my attention at once. I’ll do my best.

I recently celebrated two years on testosterone. I’m really proud of how far I’ve come. I’ve fought for myself over the past two years a lot: I’ve had to advocate for my own healthcare and medication time and again. It hasn’t always been easy, and I’m really lucky that I’ve had the support of my partners to help get through the hard days. Medical transition might not be for everyone, but it’s definitely changed my life for the better in innumerable ways, and I’m grateful to be able to access it.

I’m not working on too many new things right now while I’m foggy, but I can announce some of the stuff I’ve got floating out in the public ether. MovieJawn recently published my essay about Hollywood’s fear of loneliness in their Summer 2024 issue, which is absolutely gorgeous because they do such a good job printing and selecting paper and designing their layouts. Every copy is seriously baseline stunning. I also have essays in MovieJawn’s Fall 2023 and Spring 2024 issues – the Fall 2023 looks like it’s no longer available for sale – make sure you pick up the copies you’re interested in before they’re gone for good! I really love writing for MovieJawn – the editors there are always open to creative pitches, and the articles that come out are clearly written because folks there love writing about film criticism. “Jawn” is apparently a Pennsylvanian colloquialism that means “thingy”, which I didn’t know before writing for MJ, but now do, and so do you. Please support them and help keep indie publications like MovieJawn afloat! We love to see independent presses thriving.

I also have a short story included in Apex’s new anthology, Strange Locations, which collects original new fiction that’s “dark travel guide” themed. There’s some really exciting indie authors included in this collection, so I hope you check it out (I spied Sarena Ulibarri and Avra Margariti in the book, along with other great writers!). My story is about tragic queer love because of course it is.

When the brain fog lifts, I can tell you all some more about the big creative projects that I’m working on, and other fun behind-the-scenes stuff that’s afoot, including a cool new jawn for VoidCon 2024. But until then, I’m going slow. Healing. Waiting for circumstances to change so the big slow-down can end.