Hogmanay

"Divine Grace" - by Rassouli

Because the Scottish term for New Year's Eve is much cooler. 

Damn. Wasn't it just New Year's Eve already? I can remember going downstairs trying to watch the peach or ball drop, but my parents were watching some other thing, and I missed it, and I kept thinking: "Jesus, it's 2012 - the year we've all been waiting for." 

And now it's gone... until you remember that we, as humans, put too much value in the concept of time.

2012 was probably the best year I've had yet (they seem to get better and better), full of interesting experiences, meetings, dreams, chats, and inspirations. I had a traditional "goal" list like I do every year, but when I dug it up the other day, I realized I had only completed about 5 items on it, and decided I wouldn't make goal lists anymore. I will just be, and accept all experiences as they come, continuing to work on my passions, working from the heart, with no regard to how people will respond or react. As astrologers keep saying, 2013 is the year for Pisces to really shine. I will ensure that I do.

The final draw - which concludes the Sacred Days of Yule - is for Hogmanay, or New Year's Eve, and represents the best way to release the old and bring in the new. I picked Three of Earth - Plant Life, which is a sweet little "ending" card because it's all about blooming... blooming with beauty, with new life, with new creativity and abundance. Seems to be a common theme with my cards/readings these days. It's true, though... I feel like I have the potential to really be something, but I have all these factors holding me back (mainly family). So 2013 will be a year of blooming for me. I'll make sure of that. Traditionally, though, this card is about working together with people to produce something wonderful, but I don't get that from this card at all, so I'm ditching that interpretation.

(Jeez. At this rate, I really will get my Druid Craft deck after my brother leaves. Still out of stock... hm.)

I had another intensely productive world-building day yesterday, thanks to my parents & brother going to see Django. I'm at 12,600 words, or 31 pages of how society, magic, government, customs, etc., work in this world. At first, it was a bit painful, because I just want to get to the story already, and I found myself thinking too hard - not letting it flow. But now that I'm 12,600 words in, I'm finding the world really coming together, which means it'll be a lot easier to describe when I actually begin writing the first draft. I'm excited.

But I still don't know whether it's worth it - or wise - to post information about this story on the internet for all to see. I wrote a thread asking about this on the dA forum yesterday, but no one has bothered to respond. So now I'm not sure who to ask other than actual artist-writers who do this, and most of them are busy and popular which means they have lots of questions coming in daily. Hmm. 

That brings me to my next thought: I really want to try this drawing-a-day challenge. I wanted a blog to keep track of this stuff, but I encountered the problem of: do I make it under P.R.? Do I relate it to my personal projects? Or must I will myself to draw things completely unrelated to my projects? 

I was thinking that I could be very discreet about it, and instead of saying "this is so-and-so character from this story," I could just say: "character from personal project." That way, I can acquire interested peeps, but not reveal too much about the story that would either A.) affect publishing outcomes or B.) be stolen by thieves. Because I'm much more interested in producing art for my writing than I am in producing art for other reasons (not that I would be disinclined, but I do favor the art that goes into visually describing a world). 

We'll see, I guess. I need to make a quick decision, though, what with tomorrow being the first day.

In other news, I finally caved and downloaded Guild Wars 2 to try, at my brother's ceaseless insistence. He does have a point - there's no harm in trying. Plus, from what I've seen, GW2 may provide plenty of inspiration for my personal writing, especially for Winterspell. So in some ways, I'm kind of hoping I do enjoy it, or can at least work up to enjoying it; that way, when I hit a block, I'll have new, fresh material to assist me. I did try GW before, and didn't care much for it, but according to my brother, GW2 is a totally different - and vastly improved - experience. I guess I'll see when he wakes up in a few hours. 

Like last year, I'm not doing anything special for NYE. It's traditional for me (and brother) to have a shrimp ring to eat this day (don't ask) and to have some bubbles (for me, sparkling blueberry juice, for brother, champagne). But other than that, nothing special. 

Well... it seems that's that. I got a lot accomplished this year, and hope to accomplish even more for 2013. 

Happy New Year!