Lately I’ve been doing a rather poor job of keeping up with my social media stuff. I’ve had emails piling up, I’ve been ignoring my Facebook notifications, neglecting to post on Instagram and Twitter, even these weekly blog posts have seemed like more trouble than they’re worth. It’s not like I’ve had a lot going on or anything; I’m still not back to my actual job. The thing is, every once in a while, I get really disillusioned with the whole social media experience. I don’t

You know how there are those people who focus everything on their careers? People who spend all of their time at work, and never take vacations, and don’t spend enough time with their friends or family, and think about work when they’re at home? I feel like I was meant to be one of those people. This is frequently thought of as a bad thing, or at least an unhealthy thing. These people end up neglecting their spouses and their kids, they lose their friends, they never really r

I actually got the first half of my tattoo last week. I’m really pleased with the way it’s looking, though it’s obviously not healed yet, and I still have to go back for the second half. I explained, in a previous post, why I felt the need to get a tattoo, but I didn’t explain the particular one that I was getting. The half that I got is a quote from the Hellblazer comics, and possibly my favorite quote of all time. “Reality’s just a story that’s taken on a life of its own.”

I do a lot of things in my life that really don’t make much sense. I mean, in my mind, I can justify all of them; I can give perfectly logical answers for why I do them, offer up reasons why they do make sense. The truth is though, they just don’t, and I know it. I can offer up as many explanations as I want, but I’ll always know that they’re mostly bullshit. One of the most glaring examples of this is the amount of effort I put into my appearance. This is especially true whe

A few months ago, I did a tarot reading for myself. I asked for guidance in regard to what I should do with my life, I guess specifically I wanted to know if I should even bother with this whole writing thing. Overall, the reading seemed pretty promising, at least to me. I mean, it wasn’t great; the last card, which is supposed to be the overall outcome, basically said, “You’re going to end up totally overwhelmed and feel like you are doing everything by yourself.” Still, I t

So, on Yule, I was on my way to my mom’s house, and I saw something in the road. It was kind of an off-white color, fairly small and sort of round, and it was just sitting in the center of my lane. I thought it was a fast-food bag. Food bags and beer cans are an expected sighting, on or along the road, every few feet, from my house to the main road. So I thought nothing of it. As I got close, it moved, and I realized it was something living. I hit my breaks, but knew I was to

This post is semi-related to my last post. You see, while thinking about how much I needed to get a new tattoo, I also started thinking about other things I wanted to do. The thing is, I’m kind of over the whole idea of being a human. I used to make some minimal effort to be attractive to other people but, now that I’ve realized that I have no desire to ever date again, I don’t actually give a shit about that anymore. Now I just want to look the way I want to look. The things

I’ve been getting kind of antsy lately. I’m sure it’s partly for the same reason that everyone else is; that we still can’t really go anywhere, or do anything, or see people. Then again, I never really did those things much in the first place. This is just a thing that happens to me, periodically. I get all anxious and feel like I need to do something. By do something, I usually mean, alter myself in some way. I’m pretty much always sort of “working on myself” anyway; learnin

I’m considering trying something a little different, with my blog posts, in the future. I told myself, when I started this blog, that I was going to be totally honest. I was going to, at least some of the time, talk about personal stuff, and do so in a way that was open, and not toned-down, for the sake of my own comfort. I feel like I have done that, to some extent, but that, even when I’m writing about deeply personal stuff, I tend to do so in a kind of formal and detached

Since I finished my series of posts about Farm Sanctuary, I figured I might as well share another poem. This is one that I wrote back in college, and found in a notebook a few years ago. So, fair warning, it's pretty dark (no pun intended). Walking. Walking through darkness. Darkness so deep I can feel it on my skin. Things move in the darkness. I can’t see them. I tell myself they’re not there. They want to destroy me. If I stop they’ll get me. So I keep moving, always movin

This is going to be my last post about Farm Sanctuary, for a while. I will probably do another series of posts, about my internship at the Acton Shelter, at a later date. You can find the rest of the posts in the series here (1,2,3,4,5,6,7). I want to end my story about my time at Watkins Glen by telling you about an experience I had, while I was there, that I think may have changed the whole direction of my life. At the time, it was the most terrifying thing that has ever ha

You can find the previous posts in this series here (1,2,3,4,5,6). Truthfully, I think every animal I encountered during my internship, at the Watkins Glen shelter, had an impact on my life, but some certainly had a deeper effect than others. I have talked about most of the more profound ones already, but there are a few more who are a bit harder to explain. It wasn’t so much anything they did, that touched me, it was just the way they made me feel. I’m not sure that I will b

This is a continuation of my story about my internship, at Farm Sanctuary’s Watkins Glen shelter. Previous posts in this series can be found here (1,2,3,4,5). Last week I talked about Dean-O; this week I would like to tell you about another kindhearted rooster, and the blind turkey he cared for. There were some residents at the shelter who I felt a deep connection with, despite them not being particularly fond of interacting with humans. Some of these animals had such a deep

This post is part of a series of stories about my internship at Farm Sanctuary’s Watkins Glen shelter. You can find the previous instalments here (1,2,3,4). Another resident of the Watkins Glen shelter who had a huge impact on me was a rooster named Dean-O. Fun fact, I dedicated my book, Myths and Music, to him, because of the truly unique insights he gave me into his species. I can still hear his sweet, cheery voice inside my head, and it inspired the chicken in my book, who

This is a continuation of my previous Farm Sanctuary posts (1,2,3). In addition to Riley and Petunia, there were many other residents at the Watkins Glen shelter who made a lasting impact on my life. Over the course of the two months I spent there, I got to know many of the animals personally, and developed a close relationship with them. The first of these beautiful creatures was a cow named Ms. Foreman. I met her on my first ever trip to Farm Sanctuary, long before my inter

During my time at Watkins Glen, I met so many amazing animals. The entire experience was totally eye-opening. The residents at Farm Sanctuary, at least the ones who have been there for a while, have a sense of comfort and safety and are therefore able to let their guards down and show their true personalities. I think it would be impossible for anyone to work at a farm animal sanctuary, to see these creatures as they truly are, when they’re happy and cared for, and not think