Category: Creativity

Posted in Creativity, Entertainment, My Writing

Post-publishing Crash

Posted on by rsfahrudeen

I finished typing up my book and putting it up on AO3. And I got the final comment on the final chapter. I don’t expect anyone else to be interested or to get more kudos or even get any more comments later on, and I’m starting to feel incredibly depressed. It’s such a let-down knowing there’ll be no more praise, no more people identifying and appreciating my work. I just want to curl up in bed and lay there. This is kind of depressing. It’s like I’m going through withdrawal or something.

I’m working on the sequel but it’s hard for me to feel too enthusiastic about it now. I had an average of ten people reading the book I was posting. I don’t know if any of them will go on to the next one. I put up a chapter and no one’s interested yet. I don’t know if anyone will be. I feel anxious and scared and depressed. I want to eat donuts, but that could be being on a diet as much as anything else.

What do I do now? I still crave that validation and connection with somebody. Especially over something so personal to me as my original work. I don’t know. Maybe there’s just something wrong with me.

Posted in Behavior, Creativity, Mental Health, Random Thoughts

A Hard Question

Posted on by rsfahrudeen

       So I’ve been having more and more energy back lately. I’ve been eating less sweets, cooking more actual food and taking probiotics which helps alot. The problem with this is that it leaves me with more energy than things to do with it. That’s not to say that I don’t have things to do, but it’s hard to decide what to do. Its elven harder to decide to do what I need to do.

      I’ve generally accepted that along with depression and anxiety, I have some pretty serious executive dysfunction. Just thinking about tasks make me feel heavy and pinned down and restless at the same time. That’s said, there’s not often much that needs to be done. Scheduling never works great for me so I decided to try something different this time. Instead of making a Todo list exactly, I ask myself what do I want out of today, and answer that and then try to do it.

    But it’s getting harder and harder to answer. Increasingly I don’t know what I want out of the day except not to be bored and make it through the day without going crazy. There isn’t anything I want or need to do most of the time. What then? How do I organize my time then? How do I think of things to do?

     I saw a TED talk on someone who randomized their life by making algorithms to randomly chose what they would do eat or even live. My first thought was, well that’s great, but what about someone who’s fucking poor and disabled and can’t go anywhere or spend any money? The second thought was, could I do that with all the stuff I have to do at home? Get a random generator and fill it up with options and then just randomly choose? Probably. I already downloaded the random list generator.

    I guess it’d be interesting to try. Maybe to just force myself to do what is suggested. I dunno. Its not as if I don’t have options. I have all sorts of crafty things. Beads embroidery coloring books yarn, crochet, etc. I’m even getting some old college textbooks in the mail soon to study on nutrition, psychology, Spanish, and… And something else, I can’t remember. But I suppose when I’m bored it can’t be any worse of a way to find something to do than just waiting until I think of something.

Of course now I have to fill out the lists. Uggghhhhhh. Well making myself do things I only sort of feel like doing is good for me. Builds character and all that. Man part of me wants to just run or wiggle or do something. I feel like I’m going stir crazy. I wish I had a basketball hoop in the yard. And a basket ball. And something to keep the basketball from running all the way down to the road. I dunno. Maybe a soccer ball. Agghh I want to MOVE! I’ll have to add some physical activities to the lists too. Or make a list of physical activities.

Well, I guess I’ll get to it. I’ll let you know how it goes.

Posted in Behavior, Creativity, psychology, Uncategorized

Psychology and Principles of Learning: Readiness

Posted on by rsfahrudeen

I’ve always liked the idea of learning styles, not the least because my particular learning style of reading and writing is what most of the school system uses to measure intelligence. It explains why I did so well in school generally but failed at pretty much everything else in life. Of course now I know it’s because I’m an empathetic person repeatedly scarred by life and my own poor, ill informed decisions, but it gave me hope that if I could find a job that uses those same skills that school does, I’d be set.

I even started doing research on learning styles to see if tailoring the DBT skills and exercises to my learning styles would help me use and absorb the information better. Unfortunately all I see is that the idea of learning styles is largely debunked. Apparently it only shows which way students prefer to learn, not necessarily how they learn best. It also brought me to the theory of multiple intelligences. That theory implies that learning styles only lets us know what we’re already good at. That makes sense because i personally prefer doing the things I’m good at. I tend to enjoy it more. But I also tend to get better at things I enjoy doing. And I think that’s where people are starting to miss the point of identifying your strengths/ learning styles/ intelligences for use in education.

By doing what you’re good at, the way you enjoy it most, you’re feeding the very first principle of learning- Readiness. Readiness is when you are physically, mentally, and emotionally ready to learn. If you teach someone in a way they prefer, and a way they’re good at, they’re more motivated to participate and apply themselves. I’m not going to debate using this is a school setting, but for self-direct studying adults like me every little bit helps.

My life is full of stressors. I have poor coping skills, get easily frustrated. Having the strength physically, mentally, and emotionally to learn things I’m bad at, as well as unlearning things bad for me, is often an issue. The things that I need to unlearn are especially problematic for instance, part of me thinks that trying to make things easier for me is a cop out, or laziness. I can’t help but wonder if I’m not acting spoiled and expecting to be catered to by the world, or to have things just handed to me. You know, all that crap people say about millenials who want to be treated better.

But then again this is therapy and my own individual re-education, not a classfull of dozens of students to one teacher.  Having the content personalized and tailored to me is the whole point. Those feelings though are a huge part of my problems. The idea that I have to do everything exactly the way everyone else has to do it, even though I’m no where near well enough equipped to do it that particular way, I’d really harmful. It’s an enormous stumbling block and barrier to my treatment at times, it’s hard to remind myself that what’s important is the results, not that I get them in a certain way.

I think that anything that helps you get off your butt and work on things is worth pursuing. They tell you to exercise in a way you enjoy to increase the likelihood you’ll do it.  Why not learn things about yourself and your mental health the way you enjoy because it increases the likelihood that you’ll actually do it. Why not learn things about yourself and your mental health, or anything else you want to learn in the way you enjoy it the most and feel the most confident about? Why not tear down the barrier keeping you where you are one when you can, even if it’s one piece at a time? Even if it’s not the best way, or the fastest way to learn it, getting through it is the important thing.

This isn’t school. We don’t have to measure ourselves with tests and essays unless that’s what we want to do. Our results are measure by how we feel, how we function, how we think and our quality of life. There’s no standardized test for that or even standardized answers despite how much society  despite how much society pushes us to believe it. There’s no one right standardized way to improve your own mental health either. The most important thing is that you’re ready to learn and change. If using a learning style/ a preffered approach/ or your intellectual strengths to do so helps motivate you and feel better prepared and stick to it, then isn’t that what’s important?

Posted in Behavior, Creativity, Mental Health, My Writing, Uncategorized

Muses and Mental Health

Posted on by rsfahrudeen

Things are really starting to look up. After a couple days of missed morning meds thanks to staff, I’m finally going to be allowed to pack my meds for Sunday and Monday. Which not only means no more chasing down staff, but  I’ll be able to go and see my boys and stay overnight with them again. I still feel leftover frustration but in general, I’m fairly happy about this. I’ve missed them a lot. Plus I can’t wait to bring over the cub scout manual I found in the thrift store. I bought some soap at dollar tree so we can learn the wood carving stuff. You use soap and a nail instead of wood and a knife. That’ll be fun.

I’m also feeling a bit better about my writing. When I started copying over files from Word to Docs I started with the first book I wrote and had rewritten several times. I’d catch glimpses of it and cringe because it was just so horribly terribly bad. But as I’ve gotten further along copying later books, I’ve started to get caught up in the stories again. I can still see clearly the places I need to improve and spots to rewrite entirely, but it’s not nearly as bad and I feel so much better about the progress I’ve been making as a writer.

I’ve missed working on my own original series. And In case I’m not ready to immerse myself back in that world again and neglect my vampire series, I even found a completed stand alone book that I did that needs to be rewritten in the third person at the very least. I’ve just finished the fan fiction series that I got sucked into for a few years and I don’t really want to go that route again. Not when I’m working on getting another book ready to be sent out to publishers.

I am getting so much done with my laptop. I’ll probably be gushing about this thing for weeks. I really enjoy the fact that I’m keeping myself busy without watching tv or playing games as much. The fact that I’m also being productive is a huge plus. It feels so good. Editing’s not even as hard and painful as it used to be. For one I have less to edit and secondly I have a full sized keyboard and a touch pad to work with. Secondly I have much less to have to fix. My spelling is much better than it used to be, and so is my grammar.

I’m still a bit nervous about the thought of trying to get anything published, but at least I’ll always have something writing related to do. I’ve been trying new kinds of writing, got a lot of practice writing in the third person and I’ve gotten a lot better with description. Another benefit of my mindfulness exercises. It’s hard to focus my mind without the written word, so I just use that instead of closed eyes and silent thinking for most of them. It gets me in that zen place so much easier.

It’s actually kind of funny how blissed out I feel today. I kind of hope it lasts. I’m just happy and content about every thing and a little excited in the bargain. That’s partly because of the weather. It’s absolutely beautiful out today, cool, gray, rainy with the green just popping out and the lines for everything all crisp and clear. I know not many people wax poetic about rainy days, at least not with hope and positivity, but I simply love rainy days.

Rainy days make me feel calm and relaxed and green is so much greener when the sky is gray. I read that the negative ionization in the air actually positively affect people with depression. I forget why but I thought it was interesting. Aside from Green being at it’s greenest, the sound of falling rain is absolutely beautiful, too. It helps block out all the other noise around the house and just gives the background of your life such a nice steady beat.

To be honest, I’m wishing I had some coffee. Rainy days also make me feel a little drowsy, too. I have so much sleep debt. I’ll probably get a credit card again before I get a good nights sleep. I’m starting to feel a little tired. But I still feel good. I’ve been waking up a lot at night. Partly because I’ve been having such vivid dreams lately. Entertaining, frightening, but interesting.

Last night I was a rich family living on a mountain side beneath a zoo/ adventure theme park that was always having problems. Animals got loose, and hid in our house. There were mud slides and over flowing rivers coming down from the top when the park was hit by an earth quake. This one baby leopard wouldn’t leave our house and the house was finally melted by lava.

We just treated each disaster like a game until the lava. We very unrealistically survived that by hunching down in the house while the roof sagged under the weight of the flow. Even in the dream I was like, no way could we survive this in this way. The heat alone would have killed us even if the lava did not melt through the house to swallow us alive. I don’t remember if that pesky leopard cub survived but it probably did.

All my dreams are like that, with plots and subplots. This one had two subplots, one about a theme park ride that went all around the world and got you a free dinner at the theme park restaurant if you reached the end. The other was my ex trying to control and kill me and use my children to punish me. I forget how that ended. I think the lion cub was involved. They’re very involved dreams, and there’s little that makes real sense but they’re always fairly exciting.

A lot of my earlier books and short stories were actually inspired by and started out as dreams I had. Decent way to get a prompt right? A lot of them were terrible but it sparked a lot of good stuff in directly and got my train of thought going. I’m not exactly short on ideas now though and my dreams aren’t usually in the genre I write now, so they’re just.. noctural entertainment now.

I’ve missed writing my books and my worlds and characters. But I’ve been afraid to write them too. Now I’m kind of looking forwards to it about as much as I’m afraid. I’m still not sure I’m ready to rewrite that horrible first one, but I was thinking of redoing them in chronological order and not the order in which they were written. That way by the time I get to the terrible ones, I’ll be more immersed in the world and characters again.

Of course part of me wants to work on and finish the vampire series first so I don’t loose my grove. I don’t know. I always just used to flit from book to book as the mood took me. Now thanks to writing fan fiction I know that I can focus and make myself work on one book until it’s done and still do a decent job and even get my groove back. Granted I kept burning out on that series quicker and quicker the longer I worked on it, too and took as long to finish the last book as it took me to write the first four.

It’s hard figuring out how to approach these things. Maybe the muse can be indulged a bit. Strict plans are never good for me and burn me out fairly quickly. But trying to do without any sort of organization or structure doesn’t so me any good either. And my muse is so fickle and easily sparked especially with things I haven’t worked on in a while.

For instance right now I’m editing ‘Bite Me’ and also copying over files this month, but I keep getting pulled towards the books I’m copying over, and my imagination keeps getting sparked and captured and everything is all set in motion to take off, until the next one. The idea of writing short stories to keep the creative juices flowing but not able to overtake me is starting to feel boring and tense. Short stories are not my thing anymore than poetry is, but I can write a few good ones when the muse inspires me.

That’s how it is with most of my hobbies. I get the inspiration to do something creating and unique and either do it or do it until I get distracted or burnt out and switch to something else. So many things come easy to me. I mean I’m a gifted beginner in almost anything I start to learn, but I rarely have a solid reason or the ability to just push through the block and frustration you get when you find a place you can’t just breeze through. But that’s something that you have to do in order to really excel or succeed at anything, really.

I need to get better at pushing myself through getting past those points, and doing difficult things just in general. I especially need that for writing because I want to excell at it. I want more creative muscle to flex. Once I do get published and if I do become a successful author, I’ll have deadlines and things like that. You can’t indulge the muse and meet deadlines consistantly. I need to prepare for the best. Which includes keeping healthy and working on my anxiety and depression so I can push through. I’m already good at channeling those negative feelings into my work, but

 

 

 

Posted in Affirmations, Behavior, Creativity, Family, My Writing, Uncategorized

37

Posted on by rsfahrudeen

It’s been a pretty decent day today. I woke up and my roommate made me cinnamon buns for breakfast. I had three except for the bottoms because they were a little burnt. She didn’t quite get to cook them a shorter time when using a dark pan. But it was pretty good and I didn’t have to cook. I talked to my mom. I got work done on my computer. I talked to my dad and let him know that my boys can come up with me to Connecticut for Christmas. Yay!

I was able to do this because they surprised me today by showing up unannounced while I was hanging out with my friend Ashley to take me to Chuck E. Cheese’s for my birthday, which it is today. Yay! Which let me talk to their dad about Christmas and he said yes. Which we’re all thrilled about. I was insanely happy because it’s the first time I’ve gotten to see them since I got out of the hospital. They were adorable and I ended up letting them take my old unused phone (minus my sim card with my music) and my new tiny tablet to play Pokemon on. I’ll get both back next time because they’re going to bring their new tablets with them so I can help them download games. I’m such a pushover.

I also had several root beer floats and some spice cake with cream cheese frosting because it’s my birthday and I’m taking a day off trying not to eat terribly. I read a short story to my roommate this morning and she loved it so much she kept interrupting me to tell me how good it was all amazed and genuinely excited by that. You see my roommate knows I’m a good writer. And she knows it the same way most of the people at my program know I’m a good because they see me writing almost all the time. Not because they’ve ever read anything I wrote, but because they see me writing.  That makes ‘ you’re such a good writer’ kind of a hollow compliment. So it was nice finding that she enjoyed hearing my actual story.

My parents gave me a joint combination birthday and Christmas present, a purple HP Stream. It has been years since I’ve had an actual laptop with an actual full sized keyboard and it is just the greatest thing in the whole wide world.  I know I’m turning 37 but I was absolutely giddy waiting to get it and have been working on it a lot since. Windows 10 is crap for games. At least compared to Android. But that’s good because it helps keep this computer just for work and studying and things like that. I’ve been spending too much time playing games anyways, which is part of why I let the boys borrow my old phone and tablet.

I’ve also found that Office 365 can take all the old impossible to open word and text files I have on an old usb and actually open them. some of them around ten years old. Thus dozens of already typed books and chapters I’ve been working on are saved. Yay! The unfortunate thing is that after a 30 day free trial it costs $99 a year to use. BOOOO!! Granted it’d be worth it, if I had the money, but I don’t so I have to take all those files, open them, copy them and paste them into Doc files by the end of the month. I also have to remember to go cancel the office 365 subscription. that or pull together a hundred dollars. So I’m doing one book folder of documents a day to get it all done in time. It’s not difficult, but it is tedious and I’m already onto the tedious parts of book writing.

I’m going to be editing the book I just finished and working on sending it out. This is going to be hard and tedious and I want to keep doing the fun stuff, aka actually writing a story, but without getting caught up in another novels fictional world,  so I decided I’m going to write a short story every day I work on a chapter. I have an app for story prompts on my phone, the old phone, the one I lent to the boys. Crap. But I can download it onto my new phone too, it’s small. I’m also going to try to rewrite some old crappy short stories I’d done before and maybe write new ones. I’m also writing up my Blog posts by hand and typing them up on the computer now, getting a better less type and misspelling ridden post up. I promise nothing about the grammar.

The one thing I will be trying to buy next is a printer, with ink.  I’m going to be sending out short stories to contests and possible publications everywhere to try and get a good background in published work. That’ll help me in getting a novel published and give me a name for other publishers and stuff. I might have to mail it, but I think a lot of it is done by email now so it’ll save me on postage. I have no idea how to do a good gripping cover letters yet or compelling summaries or thorough outlines or what to choose for an excerpt. I have no idea how to sell myself and my book or which one to focus on selling.  And I can’t really afford workshops, not by a long shot. The whole thing is a little nerve wracking.

I added an affirmation to my list (Which I will post eventually, I promise) and have been using it almost every day. ‘You’re not a real writer unless you’ve gotten at least fifty rejection letters. Because famous authors really did tend to get rejected alot. And not all of them gracefully, either. I read about one big one who was overstaying his welcome at another authors house who threw himself to the ground sobbing at another rejection letter. I forget who he was. Hans Christian Anderson? I don’t know. It’s like everybody knew each other back then.   But it helps, even when I’m too anxious to really believe it.

I’m also repeating the affirmation about failure being a part of success  learning and curiosity. And then there’s the one I’ve just been doing every day because I’ve been kind of nervous and anxious about life in general; ‘I am a creative, resourceful, intelligent woman capable of solving every problem that comes her way’ I don’t have any serious problems right now other than my anxiety in general but it’s kind of true and really needs to be reinforced in my thoughts even on the rare days when I’m not feeling nervous or insecure about anything.  Actively intentionally pursuing my writing as a career is kind of nerve wracking if I’m honest with myself. Really nerve wracking.

But 37’s not really too late. I do feel old to have gotten nothing accomplished, really, and to have made no real headway on my craft except for just writing a whole lot all the time.  That is something I guess. It’s really hard not to assess your life on your birthday. I’m trying desperately hard not to. But it’s just so difficult. I’m not where I want to be.  Not even close to it, really. Maybe next year. After all I’m going to be doing a hell of alot of work this years. It’s got to pay off somehow, eventually.

Maybe I just need to work on my gratitude for a little bit. I’m not where I want to be but where I am isn’t so bad.

I’m grateful for getting my apartment through mosaic, because I could never afford one on my own in a place this nice.

I’m grateful for my new computer because it means no more excuses or headaches or the desire to throw my phone at the wall when trying to edit things on it.

I’m grateful for my roommate because she does nice things for me sometimes and we get along really really well.

I’m grateful for college ruled notebooks because I just can’t write on wide ruled anymore

I’m grateful for Office 365 free trial period because I could never afford the whole thing and I’d end up losing all my old files.

I’m grateful for my adorable children because they are sweet kind loving and precious as all hell.

I’m grateful for my parents because I can talk to them, and they’re always there to help me out whatever way they can.

I’m grateful for Mosaic because lets be honest I need someone to check in on me every now and then

And I’m grateful for my friends because flaws and all  it’s nice spending time with them or just having them around.

Okay. I feel better and less nervous. so I’m ready to go enjoy the last few hours of my birthday before I go to bed. I hope you all had a good day, too.

Posted in Creativity, Money

RSFsCraftyStuff

Posted on by rsfahrudeen

Okay so I finally bit the bullet, pulled myself together and put up my Etsy store RSFsCraftyStuff. It feels weird charging for stuff you made, charging for labor costs. But the truth is everyone’s labor is worth something, even my own. So go me! But still it’s taken me since Thanksgiving to actually push through the doubts and anxiety to actually post and finish this. Every setback feels like an anchor around my neck or a sign that it’s a bad idea. But I did it and it’s done, so Go Me.

It was surprising the addittional costs though. I’m providing free shipping so thats $3 added to the coat and then Etsy takes a percentage of each sale and .20 for each listing. And then getting the packaging and running down to the post office to ship it, it’s more expensive to sell things than I thought it would be. But I’m kind of excited.

So as a shameless plug, check out my little draw-string bags on etsy at my online store RSFsCraftyStuff. If you know anyone who likes little draw string bags either as purse organizers, small handheld bags, or even to use for baggies while walking your dog, send them my way? And of course if you or anyone you know likes the thought of spending a little more on pretty little bags in order to help a disabled woman earn a living that works too.

Posted in Creativity

Adventures in Hairstyling Pt 2- The Importance Of Sharper Scissors.

Posted on by rsfahrudeen

So, once again, I had gotten frustrated with my hair and had no money for a barber. This time it was too long and it was annoying me to no end becayse it was summer and too hot for this. Not that there was alot, enough to put in a decent ponytail that still ticked my neck, but still I prefer low maintenence hair. So I had an idea.

What if I put my hair up in a pony tail and then just cut the pony tail off? In the right place it would give me layers and shorten my hair and I could just trim the edges after that. Just a quick snip. Well, I never got to figure that out because my scissors were not sharp enough to cut through a ponytail in one cut. If any scissors or knives ever could be. And the cut it did make was not an even one. The pony tail shifted and I was left with a complete and utter disaster.

I snipped and tried to even things out which was much harder and more complicated than just shortening the edges. But finally I managed to make it so that of I just slicked it back like some evil german spy lady in a 90’s movie, that it looked okay. But not in any other way and it had to stay in place ALL DAY.

So I got some mousse. And my goal of a brush and go hairstyle was denied me. Every morning I had to put mousse on my hair and carefully brush it back or else look like I had my hair cut by a weed whacker. Not the highest maintenance I admit but still not quite brush and go.

That was my last attempt. It’s been a couple months now, so my disaster of hair is longer and not really able to be slicked anymore. So half the time I wake up with anime hair and other half its oddly fluffy and wavy and almost nice (at least on one side of my head). I once woke and it was a huge five point star shape, making me wonder what that says about anime characters. Maybe they’re do it yourselfers thst stumbled into an accidentally cool do and dedicated themselves to frequently making that same mistake repeatedly. Or maybe they just went to a compeydnt barber saying ‘ I have no idea how this happened but I like it so keep it going.’

I can usually brush it into something presentable. But my roots are growing out now and I need to do something about that, though I don’t feel like dying my hair anymore. Or at least not for a while. Maybe when I reach my breaking point again I’ll have money for a real haircut. If not I suppose I can always roll the dice again. After all nothing can be as bad as when I shaved my head. But thats a story for another day

Posted in Creativity

Adventures in Hairstyling Pt. 1

Posted on by rsfahrudeen

So being broke all the time has lead me to be incredibly frugal about alot of things. I love store brands, generics, yard sales, dollar stores, lot stores and thrift stores and reduced racks. Of course being easily bored frustrated and desiring a change has led me to experimenting with things I probably shouldnt be experimenting with. Like my head, or more specifically what’s on it.

I was so lucky when I was growing up. I had a father who could trim my hair in a basic not hideous way, and a grandmother who was a beautician who could actually give my hair an actual haircut for frew whenever we went to visit in a little beauty salon she had on top of her garage attatched to the house. This continued far into my adult hood. Being a girl I could easily get away with going for a year or two between haircuts. And so I’d always get it cut very short. But i’d still get bored and wanted a change, so on my own I would dye my hair various colors with the cheapest hair dye I could find. Eventually that cheapest dye came from dollar tree.

Now, dollar tree hair dye was not bad hair dye. Sure it stained your skin and you needed a few days and scrubs to get it off. Byt it dyed my hair one of four colors, blonde, red, brunette, black. (I think i’ll try vaseline under my hairline next time, see if that helps) That’s not bad for a dollar. This particular adventure starts with the very bad decision to go from black dyed hair to lighter using the blonde dye. I’m sure many of you who are smarter than I was in that moment are cringing and know what happened. I waited my half an hour, and then some because I got distracted, rinsed out the dye, stepped out, looked in the mirror to see black hair with three inches of blonde down the center of my head that looked almost exactly like a weird bald spot.

Oh My God! I could not have looked more horrifying. It was even worse than the time I shaved my head. (Will tell later, I promise). My roommate no it looks okay you don’t look so bad, forever cementing her place on my ‘people who’s stated opinions on my appearance I should never trust’ list.

So there I was with nughtmare hair, having spent my last dollar for the next two weeks on that blonde dye and absolutely no hats or scarves to save myself with. I just stared into the mirror thinking. There was enough blonde hair to turn into a short even cut but I couldn’t afford a hair cut and didn’t know anyone who could nearby.

After a few more minutes of staring, and I decided to maybe I could do it myself. It was a Hail Mary, to be sure, but what else could I do? After all there was a vary clear line between shades. All I had to do was cut off all the black parts. That’s not so hard, right? And it can’t possibly look worse than it did at the moment. Besides if it did, I could always just shave my head again.

I was of course very wrong. It was extremely hard. I had no idea how to cut off all the black tips evenly and ended up with small sections of blonde hair with dark tips on the front and up and down the sides. Then I was faced with the fact that I cannot see the back of my own head and did not own a hand mirror and even if I did, I can’t hold a mirror and cut my hair at the same time. I’d have to go in blind. And hope I saw enough in the bathroom mirror while turning my head at an angle and feeling my way. It was a desperate venture and when it was over I had a head of wet hair with little stripes made of very dark tips that didn’t look quite as bad as it did before but still terrible. I wanted to cry. But it was late and I was tired so I just went to bed instead.

The next morning a miracle had occurred. My hair had dried overnight. It was fluffier and the dark tips were lighter with a slow gradiation of color from black to brown to blonde. With a good brushing my hair was even and uniform enough to pass and it was absolutely gorgeous in a way I never could have done intentionally. I sent up a prayer of thanks to the angel of creative thinking because there is no way it ended up that good without some serious divine intervention. And swore to myself never to do such a stupid thing as following cheap black hair dye with cheap blonde hair dye again.

While this was neither the first nor the last of my adventures in hairstyling, it was ultimately the most sucessful.