So… Anything new happen since I’ve been away? *Cue laugh track*

I’ll be honest — I always expected my updates to be sporadic, and in that sense, I’m happy to see I’ve been true to form. Living up to my own underwhelming expectations! Truly, the gift that keeps on giving.

Snark aside, a lot has happened in the world in the past few months, and I’ll also be honest in saying that some of it has weighed heavily on yours truly. It’s been tough to sit down and write about myself when there’s so many other things happening way bigger than my quaint, little life. Raindrop in the ocean has never felt a more appropriate comparison.

Look, I’m not here to legislate for anyone’s political views, but for me, it was, uh, interesting to have my worldview more or less completely shattered. Some of that was this unique capacity for naivety I seem to have that I think very few children are capable of, let alone a thirty-something. That said, I retain a singular hope that despite how chaotic things have been, maybe this will end up being a good thing in the long run…

…Or maybe I’ve still got some of this naivety clinging on that I can’t seem to shake off. I’m telling you, it’s like a ketchup stain, man. Shit just doesn’t come out.

In other news, I became a Dad a month ago. Like, literally, one month ago. Jesus, I can’t believe it’s already been a month. But yes, she is precious and wonderful and in spite of an absolutely agonizing labor (which I didn’t even have to actually physically go through, so imagine how my wife feels about it), I couldn’t be more overjoyed to have joined the new parents club. I want to sit down and write something about it, but the time doesn’t feel right. Not yet, anyway.

Book stuff! That’s why some of you are here, I presume. You others must be the masochists here for the sheer pain of reading this nonsense (to wit, you’re very welcome). And so, big book news… Well, there is none. Let this be a lesson about getting your hopes up. I’m hard at work on something a little different than The Ferryman Institute but still related, and I hope that one day it will see the light of day. But that is, quite literally, a story for another time.

Finally, I feel like I’ve more or less adjusted to the concept of having an actual book in the world. I’ve gotten pretty good at it, on the whole, I think. I don’t sob uncontrollably every time I go to my Goodreads page anymore, for example. Does it still sting when someone tags the book on Goodreads with “not-going-to-finish-because-it-suck” [sic] or when a reviewer on Amazon says “I’d give the book zero stars but amazon has a minimum of one”? I mean, I went out of my way to quote those here, so clearly it does. But at this point, I’ve learned to live with it. Que sera, sera. It’s forced me to examine my writing style, which I’ve tried to tighten up, and it’s also made me look at how I treat characters in a different light. So maybe there’ll be some good out of this yet.

See? I found the silver lining. It’s cold and smells vaguely musty and I sort of wish I hadn’t gone looking for it so actively, but hey, I did it.

So that’s it for this adventure of “what’s going on in the life of Colin”. Tune in next time, where I reveal the secret of life*.

* It’s “Be sure to drink your Ovaltine”.