2021 was an absolute trainwreck, in multiple ways. I lost the first four months of it—no work at all—and had a major routine change halfway through it when my commute went from seven minutes to thirty-five, and I went from being home 99% of the day to being out 99% of the day. The kinds of work you can do in a coffee shop are very different from the kinds of work you can do at home with a stationary set-up, so the disruption basically went “major disruption, nothing done—a few months where you’re getting your feet under you—major disruption, trying to get things done—try to make up for that in the last quarter of the year.”

It amazes me I got anything done at all. But let’s talk about what I managed despite the upheaval.

WRITING

Writing remains my bread-and-butter, the consistent money-maker. I published four books in 2021, three novels and one collection:
• Dragons’ Fealty
• Scions’ Flight
• Coracle 1
• To Discover and Preserve

I also wrote one standalone short, “Silver and Gold,” which will end up in next year’s holiday collection.

I did a lot of writing in 2021, though, that isn’t done yet—this is good! This means I’m going into 2022 with projects I can complete. In particular, I wrote nearly a novel’s worth of work while rewriting Zafiil, I nearly finished the next Alysha series book (my next target, hoping for Jan 2022), continued working on Coracle 2, started a gamelit novel, and a holiday novella which will probably get wrapped up next year.

This was the first year I did dedicated “planning” work. Usually I don’t bother to outline stories unless they need the development, and I’m about to start on them… but in 2021, I wrote dedicated outlines for future projects. I also wrote out a detailed plan for the unicorn (Le’enle) collection I want to Kickstarter next year, if I have time.

• Planned Le’enle collection + KS.
• Outlined KH5
• Outlined Qora novel

This was the first year I was asked to do more than one guest post, so… I did! One on blurbing for the Mad Genius Club, and one on ATH.

I feel pretty good about where I am, writing-wise, going into 2022. And since “publish at least four books a year” is my standing goal, I’m satisfied that I managed.

ART
My art process (I have discovered) is the most vulnerable to change. Having a big workspace, with a camera set-up and all the tools I need nearby, isn’t necessary for me to draw, but it makes a big difference in how often I do and what I finish. I can haul things with me to paint in coffee shops, but the projects are going to be smaller and more tactical—“I need this for this book” rather than “this would be a fun thing to work on while chatting with people on Twitch.” I also had a pretty cool plan worked out with the school about doing art on-campus which fell through for various reasons… big disappointment there.

Nevertheless, I managed to do some streaming, and oddly, being out frequently tumbled me into a gallery showing at the coffee shop, where I sold 7 out of 9 of the posters I hung. That was successful enough that I’m thinking of investigating new show options in 2022.

I finished three large paintings and a handful of smaller pieces, filled two normal sketchbooks (and the usual run of smaller journals, used for making lists/taking notes). And I designed a new badge for patrons, this one for my book backers. I’ve been wanting to do that one for a while so I’m glad I finally got to it.

I also doodled in five books for a giveaway I participated in, and I sold two doodled-in books. Both to Sheltie. Hi, Sheltie. XD

OTHER BUSINESS STUFF
In bullet form!

• Talks: I had a lot of talks planned for 2021 that got canceled, but I did zoom-run a couple of panels for Anthrocon.
• Crowdfunding: I ran one (very successful!) Kickstarter in late November, which I should finish up fulfilling in January.
• Patron platforms: I’m still maintaining Patreon, and added Locals to my portfolio. I’m not sure how I want to handle patronage in the future; multiple platforms feel cumbersome, but I’d like to have options for people who prefer to use one platform over another. My plan for 2022 is to continue with the two I’ve got and evaluate at the end of the year whether the community seems more robust on one or the other.
• Social Media: I continue to feel like social media has a lot of pitfalls for me personally, but I did return to Twitter and I feel like that experiment has gone all right. I don’t know that I want to branch out from that, though.
• Website: In 2021 I did some experimentation with running my own ecommerce site but the tax laws are too irritating for a single proprietor (or at least, this sole proprietor). So I am back on Etsy for now. I also re-did my wordpress theme, twice. I still don’t like it, but I don’t think I’m going to like any of it. I miss my old site.
• Wiki: When I couldn’t think of anything to do (or when I needed a way to ease into writing), I updated the wiki. Enormously helpful resource. I don’t know if anyone else uses it, but I’m glad I have it. It now has 941 content pages and 461 images…! And the statistics page also tells me there have been almost 16,000 edits since the wiki was set up. 48 people have registered—thank you, 48 people, for the help you’ve given me.
• Discord: Early in 2021 I shut down my Patreon Discord server, which I think was a good decision because it allowed me to examine my relationship with realtime chat (and to consider, at length, how I interact parasocially). After nearly a year, I feel like I understand better what messes me up about chat and what boundaries I need to put on it in order to feel safe and not consumed by it. My household wifi blocks Discord, so when I started experimenting with it again at the end of the year, I could only use it for a few hours a day, and that worked better than I expected. I will probably start a small server in the new year, but it won’t be the big production it was when it was for-pay, and I won’t be on it constantly, the way I was before. We’ll see how that experiment goes.

PERSONAL
Finally, I feel it would be appropriate to mention a few personal items relating to 2021.

Discovering that nearly all covid deaths in the non-elderly are related to metabolic syndrome was a personal wake-up call. I do not want to be that person. Since January, I’ve lost 15 pounds through intermittent fasting (I’m at 18/6, for those of you who will ask), and got off the only medication I was on. I feel much better, and I fit into my old jeans from my college days… which… I guess was a great pay-off for never throwing them away? Past Me’s optimism was warranted after all!

Controlling when I ate took care of a lot of my weight issues, but since I’d like to lose maybe another five I’m going to start looking at what I’m eating and see if I can adjust my diet to something a little less “I’m missing an internal organ so I default to eating easy-to-digest things” and a little more “I don’t run on carbs.” I’ve also started walking daily, once on weekends and twice on weekdays. I don’t think of this as exercise. More like ‘move and think’ time, because moving helps me think.

Related to ‘helping me think,’ I spent a lot of 2021 examining my relationship with technology and realtime. I wake up early (around 5 am) and spend at least half an hour quietly doing non-technology things: I go for my first walk, I practice handwriting, I read the Bible, or a classic book, or I read a little of one of my language textbooks and practice some of the exercises in it. When I’m out, I try to be mindful of how much I’m using my phone; I make conscious choices not to whip it out when I’m waiting in line, or when I’m bored, and instead try to participate more fully in whatever’s around me, and whatever I’m feeling (even if it’s boredom). I’ve felt like technology is slowly overtaking the pauses in my life that I used to need so my subconscious could churn away on whatever it needed to work on, so my goal was to reclaim those pauses. Doing this has taught me that technology inspires a freneticism that uses up a lot of energy and cope. At first, slowing down made me anxious—what was I missing, why was I not getting as much done? But now that I’ve been working at this for a year, I’ve discovered I only felt like I was getting things done, and the things I was missing weren’t necessary.

The only thing I miss is talking with people.

To deal with that, I decided to interact more completely with human beings in front of me, which has led me to have lots of odd and interesting revelations. The most bizarre and repeatable is that if you are fully present during a random interaction with a stranger, it always goes better than if you’re not. You don’t even have to be smiley and enthusiastic for this to work, 9 times out of 10. If your energy level is “I am here and paying attention to you, and only you” then you get a very different response from “I am wrapped up in my own head.” It is bizarre how much free stuff people give me when I am present in their moment with them, and how much better they treat me.

“Put down the phone/tablet/etc. when someone is talking to you” is a good way to start on this path if you want to try it. If you do it enough times, you will begin to notice how infrequently other people do it, and realize how rude it is.

So that was 2021. I feel I rescued it from the wreckage, but it was not my best year (sales were particularly abysmal). 2022 is going to be better.

How did yours go? And what would you like to see from me in 2022?