And so the New Year is upon us! With all sorts of chills and spills, trepidations and worries, possible revelations lurking in every shadow...there seems to be a new Cold War brewing, which is of course irritating, and then there's burbling about fresh conflict over the Falklands. Politicians are still corrupt and the entire fabric of our reality is being revealed as a byproduct of the oil industry. I am a mere writer, a spinner of notions, but for heaven's sake and land's end there seems to be some silliness pervading our watering hole!
But then that isn't new. There's plenty to anticipate in 2015 - the Year of the Sheep, or at least it will be after February 19th. I've been hammering away at the mass of primeval forces that is taking shape as The Quest of the Aleph; reading Robert Anton Wilson and Michael Moorcock (managed to squeeze in four more Moorcock books before the end of the year); there was snow here several days past, along with some truly astonishing atmospheric phenomena that manifested as mutating mist-dragons raging along the bowl of the Mesilla valley. It was nice to have a true taste of winter; a crust of snow yet lingers on the shadowed side of the trailer. But the forecast is for sunny days without limit, so I must savor the brief upwelling of my Nordic blood and let it slide.
I have been watching the slow, ponderous growth of The Mask of Tamrel across the internet; like a creeping but potent fungus, if one chooses to favor Lovecraftian imagery. I was delighted to put it up for free on most formats (Amazon was supposed to price-match, but they haven't yet), and even more delighted when it started materializing on pirate sites. There seems to be a gradually growing interest, though it's difficult to gauge such things. At the moment I am content that my work is out there in the world, no matter how sporadically.
(Spore. Fungus. I love it when puns materialize from the aether.)
As for promotion, I admit I let myself go slightly over the holidays, which were very hearty and merry and laden with good cheer. I need to be setting up further promotions, submitting to more journals etc, and that work begins now. Progress was also hampered by an ill (or perhaps serendipitously) timed coffee spill on my keyboard, which has since thankfully been remedied. I hint at serendipity because the scene I was hacking through was not manifesting properly, and it was only later that I was able to write it to my satisfaction. It's the ol' zen parable, about the horse trampling the farmer's fields (how terrible! We'll see, says the farmer) only to return and become the best draft horse the farmer's ever had (how wonderful! We'll see, says the farmer). Then the horse dies and brings plague to the village, and it's damn unfortunate...then fortunate, and onwards ad infinitum. First there is a mountain then there's not then there is.
All Donovan reverence aside, I feel very blessed at the beginning of this new unplumbed year. Perhaps this post started off on a too-overtly negative message, but then it could simply be viewed as a venting of the humours. There is much darkness in the world, all of our own harebrained manufacture; there is much stupidity in the world, fostered by the masters of war and media. But in the midst of it all we can escape, slip through the confining nets of complacency, transcend our conditioning and have new unimagined visions. They are all around us, preserved in the hallowed spectrum of art; the past and the future and worlds beyond the petty confines of dimension wait for us to merely open a book or concoct a story or listen to a song or see or movie or speak to another human being. It's an arch-blessing and doom-laden curse to be human; thankfully we need not be confined to ourselves, but can transport OUT, beyond the mortal woes of the Form Destroyer (Thank you Philip K. Dick)!
So that is that and this is this. I hope the New Year brings an ever-increasing expansion of human sensation. I hope to read many more delicious books and interact with many incredible people. I hope that my friends and loved ones and allies across the paltry limits of space-time advance, live, create, and experience. This is life, my friends and foes. Let's swallow it all until we drown (and yes, that's a James Blunt quote). Peace.
