IT’S BEEN A WEIRD YEAR

A few weeks ago I was at a party. There were a lot of people I hadn’t seen in a while and one of them asked “what have you been up to?”

I honestly didn’t even know how to respond. Its been a weird year, man. It may actually have been the strangest year of my life, which… is saying something. I’ve led a pretty odd existence.

I started off 2023 dealing with a vicious depression, carried over from the previous year. That lasted another month, finally ending after I took a huge vacation with some friends.

I slowly got better after that.

I ended up doing a lot of traveling this year. My buddy Travis and I went to Chicago in March. Chicago hosts one of the biggest comic book conventions in the United States, C2E2.

He was going for work and I decided to tag along. I’d never been to Chicago before and I have to say, it’s amazing. It’s a much more appealing city than New York. And the food… man, I ate good.

A few months later, Travis and I went to another convention. This time we went to Phoenix. I hadn’t planned to go. I really didn’t need to spend the money.

But then I found out he would be there.

If I were to make a Mount Rushmore of my idols, J. Michael Straczynski would be my George Washington. I waited my whole life to meet him. Last June, I got my chance. And I didn’t cry. Well, not in front of him.

Meeting JMS was kind of serendipitous. After a decade of silence, I’d been slowly getting back into writing. He inspired me to commit to it fully. More on that in a moment.

I went to Arizona for two reasons, actually. In 2003, I lived in Northern Arizona in small college town in the mountains called Flagstaff. Twenty years later, I rented a car and drove North from Phoenix. I spent a day in Sedona, which is one of my favorite places on Earth. I wanted to visit Flagstaff as well, but I was out of time and money.

I also took a weekend trip to Nashville to hang out with my non-biological brother.

My writing took precedence this year. I spent most of this year working on a book that I’ve been struggling to finish for 15 years. After all that time, its finally done.

Earning My Ears: My Adventures in the Disney College Program should be out in the next couple of weeks. It’s the true story of my time working and living in Walt Disney World. I’m very proud of my work here. Honestly, I don’t think there’s anything I’ve ever been this proud of. It’s honest, it’s brutal and… most importantly, it’s funny. I hope people read it. And I hope they like it.

It has been a lifelong dream of mine to publish a book. 2023 is the year it happens. I’ll be putting it out as both an e-book and through print-on-demand. But it isn’t stopping there.

In 2024, I will be releasing two books.

One will be a book of my short stories. Lies We Tell Ourselves is an anthology covering a wide range of genres and subjects. Some are romantic, some are clever and some are brutal.

It is a combination of re-written old stories and newly conceived ones. Most of them are fiction, but a few are true stories. Though I won’t be telling which ones.

I’m really proud of this one as well.

But maybe not as proud as I am of the other book. Remy and Heart of Gold is a children’s book I wrote. It’s dedicated to my nephew.

I never imagined myself writing a children’s book. But I wanted to do something for him. This was something I could do.

Unfortunately, while my writing has flourished this year, my photography has stalled a bit.

I’ve had hardly any client shoots this year. There were a few leads, but most fell through. That said, I did some volunteer to work for a local Down Syndrome charity. I’ll be continuing on with that moving forward.

I also had multiple chances to work with Jason Lanier, whom I consider my photography mentor. That was a unique, rewarding experience that I hope to talk more about in the future.

Mostly, this year I decided I would be shooting for myself. I won’t become a great photographer by doing what other people want me to do. In photography, as in life, I need to be me.

This all sounds really good, right?

And yeah. If that was all I had to say, then this would have been a banner year.

Unfortunately I was also laid off this past Summer. I was out of work for months. I almost slipped back into a depression as a result. Honestly, it was touch and go there. But I kept busy. I started exercising again and lost about thirty pounds. And all that time off afforded me some unique opportunities this year.

I can’t say it was all for the best, but I think I made the best out of a bad situation.

And while things haven’t been perfect, they were leagues better than what I went through in the previous two years.

I’m still not sure how to feel about everything. I feel like I’m in the eye of a tempest, waiting to see where I am when everything settles down.

It’s been a wild ride though.