Right now, I just feel the need to write. I feel like I’ve become unfocused over the last six days. My Python training has stalled, likely because it’s self-paced and somewhat uncomfortable, drawing on my Math training. (Math is no longer my strength.) My family has essentially decided on relocating to Hawai’i to join my other family, though making it happen…that’s still up in the air. Since we’ve decided this, I’ve realized that I’ve got to work on a writing portfolio, if I want to become a freelance Writer — or any type of Writer at all, essentially.

As I did initially take my first job at a Library in hopes of encouraging myself to read more (even if I did not eventually become a Librarian), and thus to write more…it seems fitting that I could work in wordsmithing, as versus matching people to information resources.

As much as it’s clear in retrospect, people — meaning in this context, not authors, but patrons — were not my main focus in pursuing Librarianship. I also underestimated the difficulties in giving social performance in service of others.

I wanted to work with books. I’m not great at interfacing with the general public, which is a giant reason I’m even into books. My libraries had been my respite and haven from having to deal with toxic social situations; my way of interfacing with humanity without having to deal with humans.

In other words, I’m much better-suited to reading and writing than Librarianship, although reading itself will back me up if I ever do take another Library job.

For some reason, it had been very important to my family that I attain a Master’s degree. I can see this becoming a deficit, however: my own mother had attained a Master’s degree, and experienced subsequent employment rejections for being, “overqualified.”

I don’t know the reasoning behind that, unless the worker would be too powerful in the employee-employer relationship, and might choose to leave rather than tolerate mismanagement. That is, did the employers want a captive employee whom they wanted to convince, had no better option than to stay?

My experience in a County Library system has reflections of this, only I didn’t have my degree until about a year and a half before I was laid off. To say there was unrest, would be an understatement…but then, how could it be otherwise in such a class-stratified system? A system which was set up to be class-stratified?

In any case, over the last six days, I haven’t been as good at keeping track of what I’ve been doing, or at laying out tasks to do the next day. It’s…incredibly apparent, in my Planner. I know I’ve been doing a lot of reading. I finished The Left Hand of Darkness (which I’ll hereafter refer to as LHoD) by Ursula K. Le Guin on June 12, which ended abruptly in the last two chapters.

I know I’ve been dealing with some stuff as regards subscriptions to multiple magazines on Writing. I had started Neuromancer by William Gibson (in which the term, cyberspace, was coined — I wouldn’t have gotten it, otherwise)…but I’m getting some vibes of Cowboy Bebop off of it (if not Ghost in the Shell as well), and am wondering whether I really…want to go there.

Neuromancer is another Hugo and Nebula Award winner, like LHoD. I’m having trouble getting past the idea that all the new words and disorienting details are props — and wonder whether in Science Fiction and Fantasy, the stories can stand on their own without those factors, or how far they would go without them, at least. (That’s probably a question deriving from my training in Literature, even though — if I had the chance — I would have taken classes in Science Fiction and Fantasy.)

Of course, at least in LHoD, the story would not have been possible without the alien terrain and civilization and different culture and biology of the Gethenians. I’m kind of surprised the book didn’t come with a map, though, as the terrain, orbital path, and resultant weather of Gethen is intricately tied in to the story. This is the first book employing worldbuilding that I can recall reading at any recent time, the earliest being the Dragonriders of Pern series by Anne McCaffrey (which I read in Middle School).

And no, before you ask, I have never gotten into Lord of the Rings, though I’ve looked curiously at The Hobbit. (The Hobbit is classed as juvenile fiction, did you know that? The rest of the series is in the Adult section…)

Having gotten to the point where I realize that LHoD was an exploration of humanity more than gender-liberatory fiction, I can accept the book — even if I question its quick and convenient ending. Well, I question its middle, as well — let’s say that. It reminds me of the times I’ve gotten frustrated with other people God-modding in text-based RPGs, and started to play multiple characters who would interact with each other (and sometimes save each other from the other players’ God-modding).

Otherwise…what I can say is that my weight has held steady over the past week (which in itself is an accomplishment), my sleep is getting better, and my metabolism is getting better. I’ve been making a priority of exercise and hygiene, which is a change. I am glad that I don’t have a job to go to right now, or I wouldn’t be able to handle this waking up in the early morning, and falling asleep at midmorning, thing. I’m hoping it’s a transitory stage.

As I write this now (the second day of working on this post), I’ve just gotten through an intake appointment. I’ve also just come to the point of attempting to plan out what I actually want to be doing for the next several months.

If you would ask me, “do you actually want to be studying Python,” I’d have a hard time answering in the affirmative. It is interesting, once you get into it — and having some kind of knowledge of computer programming is becoming important for Cataloging career paths. Do I really want to be a Cataloger, though?

Of that, I’m not sure. I know I want to be a Cataloger, more than I want to be a Reference Librarian. I want to be a Cataloger more than I want to be a Customer Service Representative, or a Social Services provider, or a Janitor, or a Policeman…or a Teacher, unless it was as a teacher of literature at a postsecondary institution.

But you’ve heard me go into this, before…sans the little bit about teaching. A regular “Librarian” job would include many of the skills of the above.

What I want to be doing is writing, and reading, and learning Japanese language, and making art; not interfacing with the public to eventuate social change. It also probably wouldn’t hurt to try and develop feasible friendships with people who respect me (and whom I can respect). The last, hasn’t happened for a…very, long time.

After I finish with the edits on this, I’m probably going to go draw…or read. The intake appointment — though it felt very safe — was also tiring, and I can feel it now. I have a lot of trauma going on in my history, apparently; and having to go back through it so that I can get help on it…is a bit uncomfortable, to say the least.