A life update, and an excerpt

Here's what's going on in my life lately:

The Exam

So for my industry, heating, ventilation, and air conditioning, it’s recommended to take the Fundamentals of Engineering (FE) exam. This test is on everything I did in my undergrad, and some I didn’t. It’s six hours and 110 questions. I had to get patted down and have my palm scanned to enter the testing facility.

Many people have asked me what I get from taking this exam, and the true answer is almost nothing. It doesn’t confer me more money or responsibility. It is just a prerequisite for the Professional Engineer (PE) exam. That license is valuable since it lets me be liable for the own work I produce. Anyways, I spent about five months studying for that exam before work every day, instead of writing like I normally do. This was a huge lift, but luckily I passed, and so I don’t have to worry about it ever again. So I’m back to writing. It’s hard to get back into the routine, but I’m hoping that I’ll be done with the book sometime this year.

DnD

I have started to play Dungeons and Dragons! My path to this was not through YouTube or podcasts, like a lot of people, but in fact my friends. I have a few friends who are very active players, so I’ve been passively aware of it for a while. Recently, a friend of mine asked me to run a game for her and her friends. So I sat down and read all of the books and learned how to play and run the game.

I have found it very unique compared to other forms of entertainment. You are supposed to be kind of telling a story with your friends, but the Dungeon Master is kind of a naturally adversarial figure. You are rooting for your friends to succeed, but at the same time throwing obstacles in their way that you hope will stop (or almost stop) them. There is also kind of an expansive and easy space for worldbuilding–ordinarily if you make up a guy, you’d have to get people to read your book to get people to care about him. In DnD, you can just introduce your guy to your players and tell them to interact with him.

Opinion writing

I started writing a weekly column in my local paper. Working with an editor and a copyeditor at a very tight frequency–I need to have a conversation with both every week–is unusual for me and is unlike writing fiction. However, during the exam study period where I was not writing or editing actively, having a weekly writing cadence has helped me stay sharp, I think. They also are pretty strict with my writing “bad habits” in a way that an editor who sees a completed draft may not be able to be.

I try to add flair, make use of metaphors and allusions, in general approach opinion and humor writing the way I would approach fiction, because I think newspapers might need more of that. It’s also interesting receiving direct reader feedback in the form of emails and social media. That is really interesting, even though it’s not always positive. I also have tried to really make use of my writing skills to be pointed and critical about institutions and people I see as worthy of criticism. I both think that writing is a serious thing (in that one should deploy the best writing possible to argue a point, even if it includes overly dramatic or clever language), and that the writer is not serious (in that by arguing a position I’m not claiming to be righteous, an authority, or that I truly think things are as “deep” as the writing conveys). That is probably a view that is personal to me, and not a lot of people share.

Blood of Agave

The cover for this is done. I'm not sharing it until I've gotten the marketing engine back up and started. Which I'm procrastinating on doing.

An excerpt, in honor of The Odyssey:

“Who are you?” a man’s stern voice shouted. He walked around the corner with his gun drawn. He was massive, even from a distance. Three others, all wearing cowboy hats, followed behind him.

“Nobody! I’m nobody,” she said, raising her hands in the air. Her heart slowed. “I’m lost.”

“Okay, ‘Nobody’”, he said. “Take her phone.” He kept the gun pointed at her chest. He nodded to one of his comrades, who searched her pockets and removed the phone.

“It’s dead,” Brooklyn said. She tossed the phone on the ground in front of her. “I’m lost, I don’t even know how I got here. I swear.”

The man, who was taller than her, almost impossibly so, stepped towards her. He looked down at her. The sun blazed a white burning ring around his black cowboy hat. His long dark coat, as clean as the day it was made, swayed slowly above his knees. “Who do you work for? I’ve had enough of this. Not a day goes by without our lives being in danger. Now they send a woman after me? Why?”

He stepped with one foot and then another, until the muzzle of his rifle was inches from her face. She didn’t blink. She stared into the man’s eyes, which were as brown as an old wooden desk. As she exhaled, she realized she did not feel any measure of fear, despite the gun to her head. She only felt focused—like her entire being, her focus, her will, was bent around this moment. Around staying alive.