Well, even though it's a bit early to summarize the calendar year 2013, I will try doing just that here in a short post. The dark year started with my continuing unemployment at its start, barely surviving by the merest threads provided by Divine Providence's Hand from sources I neither expected nor asked assistance from by the end of 2012. Getting a job in February, I struggled through another work environment where to some extent I was required to be the salesman (in terms of urging strangers' cooperation with voluntary various telephone opinion surveys) and project a friendly and polite facade not natural to my character at all times even after being saved in 1997. Starting in May the struggles to make enough money accelerated, my job not always reliable in providing the funds I needed from one month to the next, but each attempt I made to find more suitable employment ended in rejection or failure as during the final months of 2012. I was stuck in many ways, but at least the writing career was still flourishing as a glorified hobby. I released my only book in 2013, a short story collection I'd entitled The Orphaned Stories of John X. Grey, which sold very few copies in early May and then sank into the obscurity of self-published works its creator could not overcome, lacking great name recognition or famous persons' endorsements or even marketing savvy to make it more successful. I'm grateful it sold a few copies, but had hoped for better performance, and it did get one review at Amazon.com. Then in July disaster unexpectedly struck with my laptop computer's hard drive failure on July 5th, apparently due to damage with the recording arm from recent abrupt manual shutdowns that did not allow the machine to shut down on its own (entirely my fault due to some impatient moments in late June - early July). I did not get my computer back in working order until mid-October due to a precarious financial status from one month to the next. Needless to say, it was hellish on me for two reasons. First I could not continue writing fiction during that three-month languishing period. Second, I had not backed up my files since late June 2012, meaning several ongoing unfinished projects were lost (some irretrievably even now). It would cost hundreds of dollars to get a professional data retrieval service' efforts at cracking that damaged hard drive (after the computer store failed to retrieve anything off it) and I don't have such funds to spare. Then in November I had a second inexplicable hard drive failure, fixed in November and still working so far, but again lost a few projects that were heartbreaking I had not backed up. The reason I got the computer fixed in October was being offered a chance for one of my stories to appear in a new anthology next year (entitled At the Stroke of Thirteen) being edited by a famous comic book writer and to be unveiled next year at ComicCon. I could not pass that opportunity up and submitted my favorite Jack Petrov ("The Vampire Hunter's Requiem" originally appearing in Pill Hill Press' Leather, Denim and Silver: Legends of the Monster Hunter edited by Miles Boothe and to reappear in an omnibus edition at Emby Press by Christmas). My back rent debt, cable TV service leftover debt, life insurance loan premium and debts, and 2012 medical debts have not gotten much or any smaller lately and amount to a few thousand dollars I don't posses to clear those obligations entirely. With some faint hope of being declared officially nuts and possibly eligible for Supplemental Security Income from a mental disability (more than a few people over the years here and elsewhere have called me crazy, insane, nuts, disturbed, etc.) called Asperger's Syndrome that I've probably had all my life but only recently realized, I might have a better monthly income stream as a struggling artist few appreciate for his work in fiction. One good thing is some of my missing stories lost to the hard drive failure (mostly at Static Movement imprint where they've been accepted) should see publication next year from the print queue at that press. Maybe the name of John X. Grey will receive greater exposure if everything planned comes to fruition (or maybe not).
I just hope 2014 isn't as dark and depressing for me personally.
I just hope 2014 isn't as dark and depressing for me personally.