May 5, 2020

Stephen Walt writes that arguments against U.S. offshore balancing misunderstand history. The strategy that worked against the Soviet Union can work against China.

May 6, 2020

Nathaniel Moir reviews Maxwell Taylor's Cold War: From Berlin to Vietnam by Ingo Trauschweizer.

May 7, 2020

History is replete with irony, but rarely more poignantly than in the summer of 2016 when, on 23 June, the UK voted to leave the European Union and the next day, 24 June, the EU published its Global Strategy document asserting its ambition of “strategic autonomy.” Whither Franco-British defense cooperation in such chaotic circumstances? This paper attempts to provide the outline of an answer to that question.

Mar 24, 2020

The 2018 National Defense Strategy (NDS) is predicated on a single organizing principle: America’s military pre-eminence is rapidly eroding. This is not a new concept. For years, experts have warned that the economic and technological advancements of U.S. adversaries, coupled with the 2008 financial crisis and America’s focus on peripheral conflicts, have caused a decline in America’s military dominance. 

In this context, the advances of near-peer competitors such as China and Russia have created plausible “theories of victory” in potential conflicts across Eastern Europe and East Asia. Competitors’ unaddressed improvements in strategic innovation, economic investment, and dual-use technology increases the risk of conflict and strains the U.S. alliance system. It is urgent that the United States reestablish and maintain credible deterrents against these near-peer competitors. After decades of focusing on post-Cold War ‘shaping’ operations, the American military needs to reinvigorate for full spectrum great power competition.

This report is intended as a blueprint on how to begin that process from graduate students at the Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs at Harvard University. Contained inside are 12 memorandums. Each provides a high-level overview and specific recommendations on a key issue of American defense policy. 

Mar 25, 2020

Joseph S. Nye: U.S. and China Need a More Cooperative Security Stance

Mar 26, 2020

If nothing else, the long-running Huawei situation shows the importance of considering the supply chain when it comes to cybersecurity. Huawei being the Chinese telecommunications equipment maker basically banned by the federal government. Bruce Schneier joins Host Tom Temin on Federal Drive.

Mar 26, 2020

Joseph Nye writes that while trade wars have set back economic globalization,  the environmental globalization represented by pandemics and climate change is unstoppable. Borders are becoming more porous to everything from drugs to infectious diseases to cyber terrorism, and the United States must use its soft power of attraction to develop networks and institutions that address these new threats.

Apr 1, 2020

Bruce Schneier discusses current security technology concerns with The Politic's Eric Wallach.

Apr 3, 2020

Calder Walton describes four ways how intelligence services are certain to contribute to defeating COVID-19 and why pandemic intelligence will become a central part of future U.S. national security.

Apr 16, 2020

Joseph Nye advises skepticism toward claims that the pandemic changes everything. China won't benefit, and the United States will remain preeminent.

Apr 17, 2020

This episode of Horns of a Dilemma touches on whether the failure to properly anticipate and warn about the novel coronavirus constitutes an intelligence failure, what changes might be required in the intelligence community in the wake of the pandemic, and what type of investigation or inquiry might be appropriate in order to learn lessons and incorporate changes for both the intelligence community and the whole of government moving forward.

Apr 21, 2020

Stephen Walt argues that as democracies falter, it's worth considering whether the United States made the right call in attempting to create a liberal world order.

Apr 24, 2020

In his new book, Do Morals Matter? Presidents and Foreign Policy from FDR to Trump, Joseph S. Nye developed a scorecard to determine how U.S. presidents since 1945 factored questions of ethics and morality into their foreign policy. In an interview, Henry Farrell asked him a few questions to get to the heart of his findings.

Apr 24, 2020

Nathaniel L. Moir recounts the events of 1968: The war in Vietnam and extensive civil unrest in the United States — and yet another big problem that made life harder. In 1968, the H3N2 pandemic killed more individuals in the United States than the combined total number of American fatalities during both the Vietnam and Korean Wars.

Apr 26, 2020

The secretary of state is preparing an argument that the U.S. remains a participant in the Obama-era nuclear deal, with the goal of extending an arms embargo or destroying the accord.

Apr 27, 2020

The authors conducted a study which highlights how the U.S. public as a whole and various demographic groups view President Donald Trump's positions on nuclear weapons.

Apr 28, 2020

 Gen. Mark. A. Milley’s job is to provide sound military advice to the president. But at a deeper level, his responsibility is to safeguard the independence and integrity of the armed forces. The last thing the country needs is a military leadership that’s trying to curry favor with any commander in chief, particularly one who’s hungry for affirmation.

Apr 28, 2020

Stephen Walt writes that even though Bernie Sanders is out of the presidential race, the time has come for many of the policies that he promoted: Universal Healthcare; Democratic Socialism; Income Redistribution; and Foreign Policy.

Apr 29, 2020

The world is on the cusp of a geopolitical reset. The global pandemic could well undermine international institutions, reinforce nationalism and spur de-globalization. But far-sighted leadership could also rekindle cooperation, glimmers of which appeared in the G-20’s offer of debt relief for some of the world’s poorest countries, a joint plea from more than 200 former national leaders for a more coordinated pandemic response and an unprecedented multinational pact to arrest the crash in oil markets.  

May 3, 2020

Rachel Esplin Odell argues for a wiser and more conservative strategy that resists the temptation to exaggerate the challenge posed by China.

May 5, 2020

Stephen Walt writes that arguments against U.S. offshore balancing misunderstand history. The strategy that worked against the Soviet Union can work against China.

May 6, 2020

Nathaniel Moir reviews Maxwell Taylor's Cold War: From Berlin to Vietnam by Ingo Trauschweizer.

May 7, 2020

History is replete with irony, but rarely more poignantly than in the summer of 2016 when, on 23 June, the UK voted to leave the European Union and the next day, 24 June, the EU published its Global Strategy document asserting its ambition of “strategic autonomy.” Whither Franco-British defense cooperation in such chaotic circumstances? This paper attempts to provide the outline of an answer to that question.

Today, inspired by a loved-one who did it first, I'm sending a thank you note to Josh Shapiro, the Attorney General of Pennsylvania, to thank him and his team for the 1000+ page report listing 300 predator priests in Pennsylvania and detailing decades of illegal coverups and lies. This report changed my life; it was a step toward justice, validating the reality of so many people, not just in Pennsylvania. I'm sharing this thank you idea with you all, because it didn't even occur to me to write a thank you note until someone else showed me hers. Maybe you're like me. If so, you too could send a grateful red monster to the Attorney General of PA.

Here's the mailing address:

Pennsylvania Office of Attorney General
Strawberry Square
Harrisburg, PA 17120

 (Oh and I got my cute thank you cards from this Etsy shop.)

Those promised adventure pics are coming very soon. Until then, be well, everyone.

Look what just arrived in the mail. My UK/Australia/NZ tenth anniversary edition, from Gollancz, is ready to release on September 20! I knew about the new colors and classic look, but I didn't know about the hint of map in the background, or that was it was going to be a hardcover. I'm so pleased. Happy birthday, Katsa!

We set out very early...

and drove through the fog.

The sun rose before us.

I was wearing pretty great socks.

Our destination was Quechee, Vermont.

It was pretty foggy there too.

Oh look! It's Kevin's sister, Heather! And something interesting in the background...

What's that guy doing?

Dude, weird basket.

Did you know that when a hot air balloon is being inflated, you can walk inside it?

In fact, it's like a stained-glass cathedral in there. (Without the patriarchy! ^_^)

Reader, I married him.

Happy siblings.

Happy married-for-ten-minutes-so-far people.

Of course, that's not all, right?

But it was still awfully foggy...

and hot air balloons aren't safe in fog...

unless they're on a tether!

We did a tethered ride, safely attached to the ground.

Afterwards, our fabulous pilot, Chris Ritland, toasted us with the balloonist's blessing...

I cut the amazing orange cake Heather had made...

And as is traditional, the married couple fed wedding cake to their hot air balloon pilot. Of course, one thing was missing from our day. So, about two weeks later, we went back to Quechee...

On an unfoggy, perfect-weather, untethered-ride day.

And we flew.

Trees look amazing from this distance, and at this speed.

That dot in the river is the reflection of our balloon!

When I told my friend Judy Blundell about our hot air balloon elopement, she said, "Marriage is an untethered ride."

We're ready.

Today I handed in a draft of a new book to my editor. Feels good.

Next thing on my agenda: Prepping for my artist residency on a tall ship in the Arctic! I leave next week. Here's the situation:

No problem, right? I'll pack this weekend and have a few days next week for the last-minute scramble as I suddenly remember a whole slew of things I need to do before I fly to Svalbard. While I'm aboard the ship, I won't be able to blog, but I'll be storing up pictures and stories to share for when I get back. And that's the news from here. Oh, also, this blog post is dedicated to the Cleveland Browns. :o)

Dear Readers,

Just wanted to report that I'm back in Oslo, after 2+ spectacular weeks of sailing around the western and northwestern coast of Spitsbergen, Svalbard, in the tall ship Antigua, with a group of wonderful artists, guides, and crew. I have many, many pictures to post and stories to tell, but I'm not home yet, and it'll be a few days until I get organized. Here are a couple just to start things off :o). I can't wait to share more!

xo,
Kristin

Kim Mirus, one of my sailing companions and an extraordinary weaver, took this photo. That's Antigua in the background.

And I took this panorama with my iPhone... it makes the ship look very bendy :o). Click to embiggen.

I've just gotten home and am going through my mail. It's a day for unpacking, organizing, trying to remember and reinstate my routines, and figuring out which way is up. I like days like this. They're cozy and slow, and I don't put a lot of pressure on myself. Especially since I handed in a draft right before I left, I have the added pleasure of deciding what I'm writing next. This thing that I probably should work on, or that thing that's knocking on my door, begging to be worked on? And, now that Arctic Trip Prep is no longer my biggest extracurricular activity, I finally get to dive into some other projects that have been on hold. You know your life has opened up a little when you're actually looking forward to tasks like choosing new health insurance now that you're married, and figuring out whether you need to keep paying for long-term disability insurance. Sigh.

This morning, I find myself spending some time with my favorite piece of mail -- the Spanish version of Jane, Unlimited, published for Mexico, Central and South America by V&R Editoras.

This edition contains some lovely design details! The designers, artists, and editors did some very clever and nice things with the umbrella metaphor -- closed umbrellas, open umbrellas, depending on what part of the book you're in. Here's the title page:


The table of contents:


The beginning of the first, "closed" part:


Here's the attractive design on the first page of each section:


Every single page of the book has an umbrella at the bottom! Be still my beating heart. And a key-like shape between parts:


Now we reach the end of the first section and enter the part of the book where the "umbrella opens" into all the different simultaneously-occurring stories:


More design as Jane decides:


The subsequent sections of the book are marked with an open umbrella:


And here are the parts of the umbrella at the end:


I am delighted. Thank you to my Spanish-edition team, which includes Marcela Luza, Marianela Acuña, Melisa Corbetto, Erika Wrede, Julián Balangero, Luis Tinoco, translator Graciela S. Romero, and many others whose names aren't listed inside the edition. I am so happy!

Arctic stuff soon :o). And actually, these pictures look a little foggy to me -- I may need to clean some salty, foggy, misty layers of grime from my iPhone. So much to do. Taking my time.

Be well, readers.

On a cold morning on the last day of September, we flew into Spitsbergen, the western-most island of the Arctic archipelago of Svalbard. We were having rare sunny weather, so the pilot changed course a bit to give those of us on the right side of the plane a beautiful Svalbardian view.

We landed in the town of Longyearbyen, which is one of the few permanently populated places in Svalbard.



The moon you can see, big in that sky, was a permanent fixture for the first week of our journey. It never set, it just circled the sky, always low and big against the horizon. Then, with the new moon, it set -- and never came back again.

Our time in Longyearbyen was brief, but I did manage to pop over to the library :o).


The next morning, with our suitcases in hand and a stomach full of nerves, we went to the pier to board our new home, the Antigua.


Personally, I thought she looked pretty small for 40+ people. And for two weeks on the Arctic Ocean. And for not puking the entire time. What was I thinking? I kept repeating to myself. How am I going to do this? Why did I think this was a good idea? Is it a bad sign that I already feel queasy? I'll be fine. I'll be fine. I'll be fine! I'm going to die! I open myself to this adventure, goddammit!

(At least I'm not kitesurfing on a freezing cold day in the Arctic Ocean, like that bozo!) 


It was a rough few hours on the ship. I was anxious; I felt seasick. I kept crashing into things and spilling things. It was SO COLD, especially after the sun set, but once we were moving, I needed to stay out on deck in order to keep from puking. Then I puked anyway. It was not fun. I was scared. What if this was how I was going to feel for the next two weeks?

I stumbled and bumbled down to my cabin, put my head on my rocking pillow, and took a long nap. When I woke up, around 10pm, I didn't know it at the time, but I woke to a new state of being. I never got sick on the trip again.

That night, feeling world's better, I went to the kitchen and begged some food. A kind person warmed some up for me and I carried it out on deck, where I ate under the stars, surrounded by the noise of moving water. A bit later, I saw the northern lights for the first time in my life. I went on to see them so many times, on so many nights, that I lost count. I saw them from the deck of the Antigua, this beautiful ship that I grew to adore, and loved to call my home.

I've decided to post pictures from my trip, divided into themes. I haven't chosen all my themes yet or gotten particularly organized. But over the next few weeks, come here to learn about a number of things, including

In the coming weeks, I want to blog about a typical day on board; tell little stories of routines and big stories of adventures, in pictures; introduce you to some of the characters from my journey; familiarize you with the beautiful Antigua; and talk a little about my writing work on board.

I want to start, though, with a simple series of landscape photos, just to give a sense of atmosphere. For two weeks, with the exception of one day when we docked at the research station in Ny-Ålesund, we were alone on both land and sea. At the beginning of our trip, on October 1, we had about 10 and a half hours of daylight. As the trip progressed, we began to lose daylight steeply, as much as 40 minutes per day, such that when we returned to Longyearbyen on October 15, we had about 6 and a half hours of daylight. Can you imagine such a change, over the course of two weeks?

It made for some dramatic and moody skies.

Notice, in these pictures, how often my camera would reach for the Antigua in the distance :o). While I took these pictures, I was cold, in a remote and vast place where wind and ice were the only sounds. Often I was on land, a Zodiac-ride away from the ship, for hours. The Antigua in the distance meant warmth and home.

I'll start with the map of our route around the western and northwestern coast of Spitsbergen. I won't be identifying locations in this post -- forgive me, but it would add a couple of hours to this posting, and I don't have that tonight -- but I do want you to have a general idea of where we were. Please do click on the pictures to embiggen and also see them in higher resolution/better quality. These pictures are insufficient to express the range of what we saw -- but I will fill that out more in coming posts!

Hopefully, if you embiggen this, you'll be able to make out our route, numbered along the black line.

A day of still waters.

One of many glaciers, glowing blue.

Artists dotting the landscape.

Sailing through sea ice in the north.

The sun was always low.

Ridges, glacier, ice, snow.

Sunset.

Color!

Clouds creating a matching formation with the peaks below.

Not much light, on one of the short days near the end of the trip.

The Antigua is tiny in this picture, can you find her?

More coming soon! :o)

You might be wondering what it was like to live inside a ship for two weeks as we explored western Spitsbergen. For a sense of our day-to-day inside lives, here are some pictures from inside the Antigua. Please keep in mind that it was HARD to take these particular shots, because all the spaces are small and strangely-shaped, no space on a ship is designed for easy photographing, and also, the ship is never, ever still. It's tricky to take in-focus pictures when the floor is moving!

Our food was delicious, warm, and plentiful at every single meal. Good thing, because we were spending hours outside every day -- sometimes 8-10 hours -- in below-freezing temperatures, so we were burning a lot of calories and needed a LOT of fuel. Here's some birthday cake.

I have another post of Arctic pics lined up, but I wanted to change to the subject for a moment to something closer to home. Here's something we received from some of my dear people at Penguin after we got married.

 Umbrellas, magical worlds, and joint adventures! My editor, Kathy Dawson, found the card, and my artist and mapmaker for Bitterblue and Jane, Unlimited, Ian Schoenherr, revised it :o). Jane, Unlimited readers will hopefully understand why.

My mouth fell open when I saw it, and I promptly burst into tears. Thank you to those involved -- you know who you are :o).

More soon!

Here is our trip log from Sunday, October 7:


Sunday 07.10 – Day 7

Lloyds Hotel – Lilliehöökbreen – North

-3/4°C Celsius, almost no wind in the morning, clear sky, beautiful sunrise. More wind in the evening going from WNW 2, to N 2-3 and later NW 4.

09:30 - Morning landing Lloyds hotel – Hike to Lilliehöökbreen.

11:15 – Anchor up Lloyds Hotel.

13:30 – Anchor down Lilliehöökbreen.

14:30 – Hikers back on board (Piet still smiling).

16:30 - Afternoon zodiac cruises Lilliehöökbreen.

19:00 - Going North.

Our leader, Sarah Gerats, kept this log for us throughout the trip… And October 7 was one of my favorite days. I woke that morning and, as happened most mornings, came out on deck to a view I'd never seen before.

If you take a close look at the middle of this picture — maybe click on it to make it bigger and more detailed — you might see an orange rectangle. This is a hut that's been decorated and painted orange. It's called Lloyds Hotel, and it is definitely the fanciest hut on Spitsbergen — though maybe more of a tourist destination then a destination for any anyone actually seeking shelter. You can read more about its history here.

We climbed aboard the zodiacs and crossed onto land to visit it.





I, for one, was less interested in the evidence of human activity inside the hut, and more interested in the COMPLETELY GINORMOUS polar bear prints outside the hut. They were fresh, for this was new snow.


This sight — evidence of a polar bear (or three or four) recently shuffling through — was quite common on our journey.




I think it's time to introduce you to our wonderful, kickass guides, who always knew how to read the prints in the snow. Emma, Sarah, Åshild, and Kristin were our guides and guards, our organizers, our friends, our helpers, and our protectors. Any time we went on land, they were there with rifles, ensuring our safety in the land of polar bears.They had so much to share about the landscape, the environment, the animals, the history. They were wonderful storytellers and guides! And of course, Nemo was very, um, helpful as well. :o)


After exploring Lloyd's Hotel, we split into two groups. Some stayed put, working or enjoying the scenery, then returning to the ship. The rest of us set off on an 8km (5 mi) hike across the base of the fjord where we'd landed. See the little arrow I drew on the map below? That shows where we hiked, in this northwestern section of Spitsbergen.

Click here to check this out on Google Maps and see more details about where we were.

As we moved away from shore, we saw the Antigua sail off — abandoning us! Not really. The ship was circling the fjord to pick us up on the other side. Even knowing that, though, it was strange to see her go.

We hiked through spectacular terrain. Click on any of these to make them bigger and more focused.


The snow was pretty deep, but also very, very dry. It made for easier hiking than a snow-free terrain, for we were on a rocky moraine of loose stones much of the time. The snow evened out the terrain for us.






At one point, Nemo was sorely tempted by this duck, who taunted him as he tried to walk out onto the thin ice and grab it. Sarah, Nemo's person, could not get him to desist. So we all took a little break and enjoyed resting, eating snacks, and watching the show :o). (The duck was fine. The duck was in charge the whole time really.)




I included the picture below because in the foreground, you can see what I mean about the terrain of loose stones. It's exactly the same backdrop as above, actually, but I'm standing at a higher point, so the sun is more visible.





And there below us was another fjord, a glacier, and, waiting for us, the Antigua. Such a beautiful sight on a freezing day, after a long walk. I stood and stared, breathing fresh air, for a long time. As I watched, I heard her anchor fall — a familiar metallic clicking that was SO much louder on our ridge, echoing around the fjord, than it ever was from inside the ship.


And that was our hike from Lloyds Hotel to Lilliehöökbreen! If you're curious about the place in the log where it says "Piet still smiling," well, you may remember from a previous post that Piet was our chef. And we got home very late for lunch :o). But he fed us a delicious feast anyway.

I'll post another adventure soon! Maybe those zodiac cruises mentioned in the log, or maybe an explanation of some of our exciting activities on deck.

Today Kevin’s game, Starcom: Nexus, releases in Early Access on Steam. It’s a thing of beauty, and also a lot of fun. If you like games that take you into outer space where you get to explore mysterious worlds, build a powerful ship, and explode bad guys, you should buy it, and play it, and let your gamer friends know about it. Yes, I’m biased, but reviewers and streamers  - who are not his spouse  - also love it :o). (FYI those last two links go to youtube streaming vids.)

***

Conversation at the dinner table:

Kevin: How was your day?

Me: Okay, I guess. I still can’t figure out how to get this girl to accidentally set her house on fire, then cause an explosion and get stuck in a window grille.

Kevin: I believe in you.

Me: Thank you. How was your day?

Kevin: Okay. When my enemy ships get within a certain distance of each other, they spontaneously explode.

Me: Oh!

Kevin: It’s not supposed to happen. It’s a bug.

Me: Oh.

Kevin: I can’t figure it out.

Me: I believe in you!

***


There are a lot of similarities between the work Kevin and I do. We both create complicated worlds with characters and plots. We’re both entertainers.

Meet your commander.

We have some processes in common: for example, we both study the books/games we love, then try to learn from them. We both think about the things we don’t like in other books/games, then try to come up with alternatives we prefer. We both know how to wear the creator hat; then switch to the reader/gamer hat, reading/playing our own project with a critical eye; then go back to the creator hat to fix what isn’t working. We’re both extremely familiar with the phenomenon wherein you change one little thing, then a ripple effect passes through the entire work, complicating/breaking things in ways you didn’t anticipate.

Meet the Ulooquo, an underwater alien race.

We can also get similarly overwhelmed by our own projects. I’ve talked a lot on the blog about how a book has many parts, and writing a book involves many jobs. Well, a game has SO many parts. It has music and art, visual effects, numerous interfaces, plot and character, mysteries and rewards. It must be able to support and absorb the choices of individual gamers, over which the creator has no control. It has SO many (literally) moving parts!



We also both work by ourselves for years on self-directed projects… then put our creations out into the world, hoping they’ll find the people who will love them.

These similarities are deep. They help us to understand each other’s frustrations and joys, and support each other meaningfully. This is awesome. However, I want to talk a little bit about the differences, which are many.

For example, in my writing career, I have an agent. She connects me to an editor who helps me craft the right words. Then, my editor works with my publisher to create a beautiful physical book, publicize and market that book, and sell that book for me.

An indie game developer, on the other hand, does everything himself, in an extremely saturated market with a lot of roadblocks. He can hire other people to help. Kevin hired a composer and an artist, to help him with his music and his characters (like the Commander and the Ulooquo above). He hired a marketing consultant to do a few things too. But he worked closely with those people, because he knew exactly what he wanted. And everything else has been the work of his own hands. He’s done SO much marketing and publicity work on his own that’s made me appreciate my own marketing and publicity departments even more than I did before. Self-promotion in a saturated market is really, really hard. It’s also stressful for a guy who happens to be humble and was raised with the good-old New England ethos of not bragging about himself :o).

Here’s another big difference: Kevin can release his game while it’s still in production, then use the feedback from early players to shape it and make it better. He can write code into the game that allows him to see how long players play; where they decide to drop out of the game; which options are being chosen more often than others. (He receives this information anonymously, in case you’re starting to worry that he can actually tell what you’re doing inside his game!) As a writer, I definitely don’t know where someone decides to abandon my book. Nor do I want to know, because once people are reading my book, it’s final! If everyone is bailing at a certain point, there’s nothing I can do about it. The words in my book are not going to change. Kevin’s game is more of a living, growing creature, even after it releases, and based on player reactions.

Another big difference is that while I am a wordsmith, Kevin is a programmer. A lot of the time, when I step into his office, he’s working with programming language on his many screens, and I don’t understand the smallest bit of it. My readers read my actual words. His gamers play a game built on a framework of programming that looks and feels very different from the actual game. He also works with a lot of complicated software (like, for 3D modeling) and does a lot of math. He uses trigonometry to [I just asked him to explain it and he said something about spaceships shooting at each other, vectors, and cosines. ???]. I can come home and tell him practically everything I struggled with at work that day. A lot of what he does is too technical for me to understand—though he is really good at creating analogies and explaining things to me when I ask (and when I'm not rushing to finish a blog post!).

Another difference is that he is a visual artist. For example, he created Entarq's Citadel below, which is one of the worlds his gamers get to explore.


Here's another.


Another difference:  I can do my work anywhere. All I need is my notebook and a pen. Kevin needs his fancy computer and his big monitors. So he works from home. Home office and self-employed means he’s working most of the time. Most mornings, he’s working by the time I get out of bed. By the time I leave for my office, he’s put hours in. I come home and he’s making me dinner; after dinner, he works for a few more hours. I go away on trips without him; he works while I’m gone! I always thought I worked really hard. I have a new standard now.

And now his work has created this beautiful, fun game that’s getting really positive attention from gamers and streamers :o). Today, you can buy it in Early Access, and become one of the players who contributes to what it will ultimately become.

And that's my little explanation of what it's like to live with an indie game developer. Check out the links if you’re interested! The trailer is below.

My title is disingenuous, because I didn't do any novel-writing in the Arctic. However, I thought and plotted and observed and learned with intensity, such that in the two months since my return, I've written an entire third of the new novel that was my primary Arctic project. This writing pace is unheard of for me. It's partly because I've had some clearheadedness lately, unrelated to the Arctic. But it's also largely because I got so much hands-on experience on the ship!

Since most of my work in the Arctic was happening in my head and my heart, it's not going to be possible to show the entire process in pictures. But I can share some of the experiences that helped me make progress.

My novel takes place partly on a tall ship, where my main character is learning a lot about the work the sailors are doing.

Therefore, it helped me to learn to haul lines, and to watch others do so. (On a ship, ropes are called lines. It takes 60-ish lines to operate the rigging on the Antigua!)

(The Antigua is a barquentine. That's a tall ship with three or more masts that has square sails on its foremast and fore-and-aft rigged sails [sails that stretch from front to back] on its other masts. This sail configuration gives it power and maneuverability, but also makes it possible to be operated by a small crew.)

On the occasions when we could turn the engine off and just sail... I was SO HAPPY. These were my favorite moments of the entire trip, which is saying an awful lot. It was silent, and graceful, and our movement felt so good in the water. It taught me a lot about my character and how she feels, too. 


The main character in my novel spends time lying inside a rowboat on deck, watching the sailors raise and lower the sails. So I did the same, curling up in one of the Zodiacs :o).

Photo by Dawn Jackson.

I did a lot of thinking and observing from that position. The masts swung back and forth above me as we moved through the waves and I got a lot of ideas! I also had the best views.




My main character also climbs the mast. So... in the picture below, our captain, Mario, gives me help and support as I make my first attempt.

John Hirsch took this picture, and the further-back one below, because I shoved my iPhone at him before I started :o)

Barbara Liles took this picture. As I climbed, the ship was moving through ice.

I'm on the right in this photo.

 Climbing was a thrill. Each time I tried it, I got up further. I knew it was safe, because I always wore a halter, but the ship was moving a lot and it was very, very cold up there, and sometimes slippery... and the places where your hands and feet went were not always intuitive... I learned a lot about my character's experience from that experience.

By the way, it's probably time for me to introduce our sailing crew -- our captain, Mario; first mate, Marijn, and second mate, Annet! I'll have more to say about them in future blog posts. They kept us safe, taught us so much, and were so patient whenever we "helped"!


That's it for today's Arctic chapter, but there's more to come. Hope you're all having a cozy December. :o)

This December, I discovered the Etsy shop Ever After Miniatures, which offers DIY printable miniature books. You buy the templates, print them out, then cut, fold, and paste the sweetest little openable books, which have readable pages inside.

Here are two vids. Watch them in order: Taylor Mali, then Melissa Lozada-Oliva. ♥

Dear Susan,

You were one of the caretakers of my life. The moment you saw me, you recognized me as one of yours and brought me under your wing. What a big wing it was—you brought so many people under there. I found some of my best friends under your wing, where you were sheltering them, as you sheltered me. We were all lovers of that “impractical” thing, children's literature. Until I came to Simmons and met you, I didn't know there was a place where people like us could go.

I think—I hope—I told you, before you died, that I have the best job in the world for me. It's not possible to be happier about one's daily work than I am about mine. Do you know who held the lantern and lit my way to this work? I would not be here without you. You changed my life, enormously. Do you have any idea how many women and men are thinking about you right now and saying to themselves, “She changed my life?”

You were so unique. You were a person who could never, ever be mistaken for anyone else. If faced with a line of your clones, it would’ve take me the briefest glance into your expressive, thoughtful face, the slightest sound of your careful grasping for the right words, for me to know which one was you. I would recognize your hug, too. I would certainly recognize your skirts and your earrings. I think I would recognize your perfume. After I got married last summer, you surprised me at tea. (Thank you, Cathie, for arranging that marvelous surprise.) You and Cathie gave me a bouquet that contained a beautiful flower and a beautiful umbrella (because you knew how much I love umbrellas). I brought them home to Kevin. As I showed the umbrella to him, trying so hard to express how much it meant to me, I exclaimed, “It smells like Susan!”

Last weekend, I was in Vermont by myself when I got the news that you’d died. I spent the day sitting on the porch of the cabin, looking out over the mountains, watching for hummingbirds, and reading a mystery novel by A. A. Milne. But really, I was thinking about you. I wondered if you knew that A. A. Milne wrote mysteries. I bet you did know that. I would've liked to talk to you about it. The story I read was just exactly the smart, funny (and annoyingly man-centered) sort of mystery you would expect A. A. Milne to have written, though Pooh is better. I wanted to know what you would have thought of it. You would’ve offered some perspective it wouldn’t have occurred to me to have. I would’ve gone to my friends, the ones I found under your wing, and told them, “Listen to what Susan said about this mystery by A. A. Milne.” And they would've laughed, delighted, then said, “That's so Susan.”

While I was thinking about you, a hummingbird landed on my foot. It's less surprising than it sounds; I was wearing pink and red socks with flowers on them. I thought to myself, “I hate that I can't show this gift to Susan. It would have delighted her.” Like Edna St. Vincent Millay in her poem “Dirge Without Music” that was read at your service yesterday, I am not resigned to your death, and I do not approve. The best was lost when you died. “More precious was the light in your eyes than all the roses in the world.”

And now I'm writing this letter because you are gone, and I don't know what else to do. How else can I express what you meant to me? I'm writing it to myself, and for all the people who loved you. I think—I hope—it helps to share grief, and to hear one's own gratitude expressed. There's no tidy way to wrap things up when someone dies, so I'm not going to try. I'll just say thank you, Susan, for that place under your wing. I love you, I miss you, and I'm not resigned. I will never, ever forget you.

Susan Parker Bloom, 1938-2019

For Susan.

Have you seen "I'm Gay," Eugene Lee Yang's music video/dance performance, dedicated to the LGBTQIA+ community? It is stunning.

Trigger warning: it contains representations of violence toward the LGBTQIA+ community.

There were over 245,000 people at this place on the day we were there. Kevin was more calm about this fact than I was.

You could probably take out your globe and figure it out from this picture. If you really wanted to :o).

Two dollars for all-you-can-drink milk. (Yuck!)

Fried pickles. (Fried everything else, too.)

This building is called Sheep. (Subtitle Dairy Goats.)

Standing is hard, guys!

In another building, displays of prize-winning flowers.

Kevin was extremely patient while I took pictures of basically every single flower. I LOVED the flowers!

Oooh!

Oooooo.

Have you guessed yet?

Where can one find prize-winning vegetables, and this veterinarian holding a piglet?

You guessed it. Kevin and I had lots of fun Sunday at the Minnesota State Fair.

Hi, my dear readers! I know I haven't been blogging lately, despite having a lot to share – including more Arctic pictures, from the trip that was almost a year ago at this point! These days, the amount I blog is inversely proportional to how intensely I'm working on the next book. This is good news for those of you waiting for my next book, but I am sorry about the lack of blogging :o). I've made a promise to myself to blog some pictures of Arctic critters soon. Stay tuned.

Nemo was the most important critter on our Arctic journey aboard the Antigua, of course. Here, he's closely tracking our progress through the Arctic seas.

Svalbard reindeer. In this picture, our guide, Kristin, is keeping very quiet and still, being careful not to spook them. In case anyone is getting the wrong idea, the rifle on her back is solely for the purpose of protecting us artists from polar bears.

This little seal was so curious about our Zodiac and kept swimming around us!

The white crescents in this picture are the backs of beluga whales.

We watched these walruses for a long time… And some of them slipped into the water to get a better look at us!

Oh hi.

Does lichen count as a critter? :o)

What about fossil imprints of long-gone critters?

More reindeer.

Good camouflage!

Here is something we encountered over and over and over again. Tracks of polar bears who'd passed through recently. The prints were shockingly gigantic.

It's tiring work being in charge.

We also saw a lot of animals that were impossible to photograph, in particular, an Arctic fox. The animal sightings were frequent and always special. Most of the time, I tried to take a few pictures, but then I reminded myself to put my camera down and enjoy. Consequently, this is only a hint of what we saw, but I hope it gives a nice sense of things.

If you're coming late to my report from my journey aboard a tall ship in the Arctic Circle last fall and want to see more, just search for "Arctic Circle" in the search box on my blog!

The Boston Festival of Independent Games, BostonFIG Fest, is on Saturday, at the Harvard Athletic Complex in Allston.

Local people, if you're interested in the best new indie games, whether tabletop or digital, you should come! And when you do, stop by Kevin's booth to visit Kevin and his indie game, Starcom: Nexus. I'll be there too, being Helpful. Come say hi! :o)

About a year ago, I finished knitting a blanket that was a gift for someone else and realized I missed its pieces piled up in my lap. I decided it was time to knit a blanket for myself :o). Wanting something cheerful for the cold, dark months, I chose this free pattern at Lion Brand.... and got started.

This blanket is knitted in three parts: the reds and oranges in one big triangular corner; the yellows and greens in a stripe across the center; and the blues and purples in another triangular corner.


The pieces are worked in intarsia colorwork. This means that most of the time, I was actively knitting with more than one color, which I admit can become a bit of a tangled headache. Below, I'm knitting the center stripe in three different greens and one yellow, and I have all four colors attached to my needle at the same time.




Below, I've knitted the red/orange triangle and the yellow/green center strip, and am just starting the  purple/blue triangle. All five of those purplish balls of yarn are attached to my needle as I work. Constant tangles! But pretty colors.


I had a bit of a hiccup at this point in the process, because after working for MONTHS, I discovered that I'd knitted my purple/blue corner piece much, more more tightly than my red/orange corner piece -- which meant it was far too small to fit with the other blanket pieces. Why did I do that? Because I was in the middle of a really difficult revision with a stressful deadline. When I'm relaxed, I knit loosely. When I'm stressed, I knit tightly. SIGH. I had to take it all out and start again. I was so depressed about this that I put the whole project aside for the entire summer!



 I attached them together, then, on the advice of several sages, chose yellow as the border color. All done!

I have, and have always had, the wildest, most vivid dreams when I'm sleeping. Some of them are hilarious in retrospect and I wake up laughing, then laugh at them all day long. Some of them are terrifying and horrible. I might share my dreams with a few people, but for the most part, I keep them to myself, because dream reports can be tedious.

BUT. I need to share the dream I had last night.

Last night, I had a dream that I had a dream that I had a very dramatic dream I somehow figured out how to record on my phone like a movie, then text to Kevin (my husband), so that he could see my dramatic dream.

Hang on. Let me start over. I'm going to start with the dream inside the dream inside the dream. (I think?)

And that was my dream. Later, when I tried to explain it to my sisters over text, I got confused and realized I needed a chart. I'm pretty sure this is the first dream I have ever had to chart.

I think I'm awake now? That shoveling I did this morning sure felt real…

Happy Monday, everyone :o)

Well, hi there, everyone.

It's hard to know where to begin, isn't it? I'm just going to dive in, because I want to reach out, share some pictures, be distracting for a few minutes, and hopefully make some of you feel less alone.

I am thinking of all of you, every one of you, and hoping you are okay. Knowing that a lot of you aren't, and wishing that weren't the case. I am okay. Or rather, in the words of the immortal Anne (of Green Gables), "I am well in body although considerably rumpled up in spirit." The people of my life are also okay. Tonight I am dashing off this blog post before disappearing into the kitchen to make some banana bread. Two weeks ago (it feels like months ago), Kevin and I were simultaneously hit with a dreadful and violent bout of food poisoning, and for a week afterwards, all I could eat was applesauce, rice, broth, and bananas. Then suddenly, my appetite returned, and since generally I am not a human who voluntarily eats a banana, a number of bananas have since been growing increasingly offensive in our kitchen. However, I do voluntarily eat banana bread! Unfortunately, the other morning when Kevin made some pancakes, he discovered that our baking powder expired in 2013 (How is this possible? Surely we have baked many times since 2013?). Though I found the pancakes to be perfect, he considered them to be less fluffy than he'd hoped. Knowing that I would be making banana bread sometime soon, I suggested he pick up some baking powder the next time he went to the store. Ha! So naive! Of course there was no baking powder to be had at the store. So I climbed onto a stool and shuffled determinedly through our cabinets. Success! I found some baking powder that expired in 2017. Banana bread is back on the menu. But I must begin it soon, because I no longer have the energy or the emotional fortitude to stay up until midnight.

There are a lot of ways in which Kevin and I are less impacted by this pandemic than other people. He's an indie game developer, self-employed, and was already working from home; my own writing deadlines aren't impacted by the pandemic, so I have work to keep me distracted. In fact, I've almost finished the final revision of my next book, soon to go into copyediting. I used to be excited for the day I got to tell you all about this book, but now I'm guessing it doesn't matter much. Though maybe, whenever I get the green light to talk about it, it will make some of you happy to know what I've been working on. I would like to be able to make someone happy right now.

I have an office outside the home where I can, in fact, self-isolate, but when the shelter-in-place order came down in Massachusetts, we moved me home. It involved lugging home a table; a chair; a computer; my fancy printer; every size, shape and color of pen, post-it note, and index card imaginable; many piles of crap; and many plants. Inconceivably, this was only two days ago! It feels like weeks ago.

And I try not to check the news every minute. And every morning, I plan my schedule for the day ahead with great strictness, because I have a lot of work to do, but it can be hard to focus. Incidentally, if you live somewhere other than the USA and you are looking at our country right now and thinking, "Wow, their government's handling of this crisis is a total shit show," you are correct. Then again, you are probably not surprised. Although one does occasionally think there should be limits to how badly a person can behave and how much he can screw everything up — shouldn't there? Alas. There are not.

Which reminds me that I also brought home my favorite decoration from the office:


This sublime Emily Dickinson line is from a letter Emily wrote to her friend Elizabeth Holland. The image is a greeting card painted by Pamela Zagarenski.

The smelly bananas are calling! My heart is with all of you, all over the world. Stay well, everyone, and don't forget: Being brave feels like being scared. Being strong feels like being too overwhelmed to cope. You are brave and strong.

Seen on my walk yesterday.

Hi again, everyone. This is really hard, isn't it?

First, I want to plug two services that are working harder than ever right now to save independent bookstores felled by the pandemic. As an alternative to Audible (which is owned by Amazon), please, please consider buying audiobooks from Libro.fm. And as an alternative to Amazon for hard copies of books, please, please check out Bookshop.

So, on the topic of coping. I thought I might describe what my days are like right now, the challenges that arise for me, and how I've been trying to meet them. As it happens, I have some special qualifications for meeting some of our current emotional challenges... because I've spent the last 25+ years living with and recovering from PTSD, which means that I have a lot of tools and perspectives that are helpful in traumatic times. All around us today, people are experiencing not just physical but emotional anguish that may be traumatic, whether directly from COVID-19 or from the effects it's had on our lives. And maybe something I say here will help you figure out a new way to cope, or to feel less alone.

I've never talked online before about the fact that I have PTSD. I don't think it'll be a huge surprise to many of you who've read my books, especially if your favorite of my books is Bitterblue. If the term "PTSD" makes you think, oh no, she's going to tell us a terrible story from her past and I can't deal with that right now — don't worry, I'm not. If it makes you think, oh no, she's going to start telling us what it's like to live with a terrible mental illness — don't worry, I'm not going to do that either :o). This post is simply about normalizing the struggles I, and maybe you, are facing right now. It's also about how we're more resilient than we feel. Because we are. Believe me. I know.

Okay, so. Here's a list of some of the challenges I've been dealing with recently — in most cases, not because I have PTSD, but simply because I'm a human being :o). Many of you may be experiencing them too.

Irritability. By which I mean my own irritability, which can flare at the slightest provocation. It's often followed by shame, even if my external behavior is blameless, because I hate discovering that I'm being unfair in my thoughts, and also sometimes it frightens me how close I come to lashing out. How's your equanimity recently? Do you notice your temper flaring? Have you been lashing out? Are you getting trapped in the cycle of irritability and shame?

The impossibility of having the correct amount of contact with literally anyone. Never being able to be truly alone.… Combined with missing friends… Combined with weirdly too much time interacting with people on my devices… Combined with not being able to bear small talk, or interactions with the millions of people who are always outside when I go for a walk. What's your version of this? Is it some complicated combination of loneliness and not enough solitude? Is it plain-old, too much loneliness and solitude? Is it too many parenting responsibilities? We all have different circumstances, and most of us are uncomfortable with them these days.

Periods of elevated anxiety. For me, I've noticed that this especially happens if I need to go into an enclosed public space, like the pharmacy or the post office. A few of my friends have said that wearing masks comforts them; well, it does not comfort me. Wearing a mask sometimes triggers some setting inside me that tells me that if I'm wearing a mask, it must be the apocalypse and I should be terrified. I don't know if this message is coming from my brain's twisted logic or from some physical signal that I'm not getting as much oxygen as usual, or both — but it's not fun. Do you find yourself spinning into anxiety these days? Have you figured out what your cues are? Pay attention. Notice when the switch turns on and you become convinced you're not safe. When does this happen for you?

Physical pain. For me, fear and anxiety manifest physically in my body and cause the world's tightest muscles. Usually, I have the privilege of receiving regular massages for pain, but of course that's not an option right now. I hurt all the time. How does your body feel right now? Where are you carrying your stress? Are you maybe more tired than it seems like you should be? Are you not sleeping? How is your appetite? In times like this, sometimes I confuse hunger with anxiety. I get hungry and some internal gauge inside me is like, Danger! Danger! This body is starving to death! I think the world is ending, but really, I just need a snack. What are your discomforts lately?

Emotional regression. In recent weeks, I've noticed insecurities — resentments — doubts — arising that I literally have not felt in years. Is this happening to you? Where are these long-lost bad feelings coming from? Maybe they're finding the cracks that are developing in our senses of self as we're repeatedly drubbed by worry and bad news.

Sadness and grief. This is just a reality right now. It's a reality for any of us touched directly by COVID-19 or its consequences on our lives and livelihoods, and it's a reality for anyone capable of compassion and empathy.

Brief and rare periods of epic, anxious meltdown, during which I can think of nothing but my fear, escalate it beyond anything rational, feel like my world is ending, and desperately scrabble to find solutions to protect myself. This is the one item on my list that I suspect is directly about my PTSD, because for me, this tends to happen when something in the news touches on my own personal PTSD triggers. For example, one of my personal triggers happens to be: Narcissists who deny reality because the truth doesn't suit them, subsequently harming the people around them. As you can imagine, this has been a difficult presidency for me, and unfortunately the BS has dialed up during the pandemic. Another of my triggers: The reminder that I live in a world in which a woman can be forced into a life circumstance that’s 100% wrong for her, especially one involving her own body. A couple weeks back, I had an epic meltdown when news started coming in about conservatives in Texas and Ohio using the pandemic as an excuse to deny abortions to pregnant women. I could not bear what was happening to those women. Another trigger: The fear of losing someone. I think most of us can relate to that fear these days. I hope you're not suffering from epic, anxious meltdowns. But if you are… you're not alone. Also, it's okay. You're going to be okay. An epic anxious meltdown is something that happens to humans sometimes when a real-life circumstance comes too close to our most fundamental fears. That's a fancy way of saying it sucks, but it's pretty normal.



So. Here are some of the tools I've been consciously using during this pandemic. A lot of them aren't going to sound very groundbreaking. But I've fought hard to learn some of these skills; I've battled against the demons of my past to internalize them and make them part of who I am, and some of them have changed my life. Maybe one of them will turn a light bulb on for you.

Every night, I write down a plan for the next day. It includes as much or as little minutiae as comforts me. It can include both tasks and emotional goals. Here's what I wrote for today's plan: "Walk. Laundry. Shower. Make more banana bread. Write blog post. Read. ACTUALLY REST. Stretch. Make a plan for tomorrow." The last item on my list is always, "Make a plan for tomorrow." My daily plan centers me and relaxes my mind.

I've established a policy of immediately mistrusting my own temper. In the past few weeks, there have been only a couple times when another person has injured me and I've been justifiably angry. In those cases, what I felt was good, clean anger, almost relieving in its clarity. Every other time my irritation has flared? That’s my sadness/worry/sense of powerlessness trying to find a vent. And there's nothing wrong with feeling angry! But acting on my anger when it's not justified makes me feel TERRIBLE, so I'm working really hard to catch my irritability in a net of compassionate suspicion first, then figure out what to do with it. I actually have a reminder that comes up on my phone every morning at 9 AM: "You are stressed out. Don't let it make you mean." Phone reminders help me.

I try to observe my emotional regression with compassion and without judgment. Now is the time for insecurities and resentments to come out and hassle us — that category of emotions that wait until our defenses are down, then attack. I think of these emotions as sad, pathetic visitors that need some attention. They need a hug from me, they need to know that they're welcome, but it's important that I resist believing them. A lot of times, these feelings make me laugh. If it's a feeling I haven't felt in years, it's a moment for me to appreciate how much progress I've made. I try to treat it as an old frenemy who's allowed to visit and hang out, but who isn't allowed to convince me of anything.

I process with friends and/or my diary. I'm a writer. Writing out what's going on makes me feel, if not better, clearer and more centered — whether or not anyone ever reads it.

I create the boundaries I need. The world outside my house is full of nice people who aren't doing anything wrong when they try to interact with me, but I'm very sorry, I cannot right now. When I'm walking, I need to be alone. So I put in my headphones and I don't make eye contact, even if it's only me and one other person on a long, empty street.

I find something to look forward to. It is really hard these days to have anything to look forward to. Every fun thing is canceled. I'm tired of my devices. It's hard to focus on reading. TV is too emotional. You know what's emotional in a good way? Eating banana bread. Every night, Kevin and I have some banana bread, and every few days I make more banana bread. Banana bread is my happy place right now. It's important to have some little thing to look forward to.

I do familiar things. When there isn't a pandemic, I have an office outside my house that's a mile away. My walk there and back is part of my daily routine. These days, I'm working from home, but I still take a daily walk. At first, when the pandemic started, I looked upon it as an opportunity to explore the neighborhoods around my house in other directions. And then I started to notice that my walks were most centering and anxiety-soothing when I took my regular, everyday walk, the one that goes by my office. So that's become my daily walk again. Too many things are new and unknown right now. When I can, I keep my routines familiar.

I take news breaks and/or curate my news intake. The problem with taking news breaks is that constantly checking the news gives you this frequent hit of adrenaline and (unfounded) hope, then when you stop checking the news, that hit goes away, and you realize how tired and sad you are. But tired and sad is the honest truth right now, and sometimes acknowledging the truth can be relieving. Especially since certain parts of the news are triggering to me. I have very limited capacity for the voice, face, and stupid, asinine announcements of our president. So I put myself on a news break fairly often — or limit myself to news that doesn't make things worse.

I pursue reasons to laugh. Do you know the newscaster, Andrew Cotter, who has no news to cast, therefore he's been tweeting newscasts of regular things happening in the world around him? When's the last time you laughed?

I call my doctor for pain, and I medicate. Even though there's a pandemic, if you have a medical problem, you get to call your doctor right now. I talked to mine for a few minutes the other day about my pain, and she prescribed me some muscle relaxants. I also have a benzodiazepine (antianxiety medication) that I use occasionally. Benzos can be habit-forming, so you need to be careful, but they are one of life's blessings on bad days. A note here that a lot of people think there's something shameful about medicating for anxiety or other psychological problems. In fact, I grew up in such a culture. As someone who's lived on both sides, I can promise you that this attitude is judgmental and unhelpful. Thoughtful use of medication is a form of self-care. Don't let anyone make you feel ashamed if medication is one of the tools in your toolbox.

I make Skype appointments with my therapist and I do not cancel them. Skype therapy leaves something to be desired; almost everything about social contact during a pandemic leaves something to be desired. But my marvelous therapist is an important part of my support team, and even if I'm tired, grouchy, hate my computer, and would rather pretend to myself that I'm fine, I am going to call on my support team right now.

I cry. Not everyone can cry when they want to, and not everyone finds crying helpful. But I've always been a crier; I've always known crying is a strength, not a weakness (as our society likes to make us think). Every few days, I've been having a good cry. Remember to hydrate if you're crying!

I notice/pay attention to anxieties that are new, and remind myself that I'll recover from them. I've noticed that my body has internalized the message that groups of people are dangerous. I am pretty sure that once this pandemic is over and we are allowed to go out in the world again, my body is going to be a little slow to catch on. I imagine Kevin and me driving to a party and having to pull the car over briefly because I'm panicking. I imagine needing to leave the party early. I imagine this happening a few times… until my body has been through it often enough that it can readjust to a new understanding of what is safe. I know from experience that bodies adjust. Until they adjust, it's uncomfortable, exhausting, painful — it can be awful. But if this is one of your current worries, please know that it doesn't have to be a permanent cage.

I follow my epic, anxious meltdown to its source. This is the most upsetting step on my list, because here's the thing: On the rare occasions I have a meltdown, it's largely because legitimately unjust and terrible things are happening. Yes, part of the reason the president, for example, can cause me a meltdown is because he's a lot like someone who hurt me a long time ago. This is one of the classic symptoms of PTSD: when shadows of your past trauma arise, the past trauma can come back to you full-force. So maybe this is at play a little bit when the president sends me into a tailspin. But the truth is, this particular symptom doesn't happen to me that much anymore. I've worked really hard to recover from my past, and I'm at a point in my healing where I'm pretty good at separating a present reality from my past. These days, shadows hardly ever cause me meltdowns.

The president is able to trigger me now because he is actually a traumatic human being. I flip out because he is actually dangerous and terrifying. I'm not flipping out about my past; I'm flipping out about him. And he has always been an agent of destruction and hate. He hurts the immigrants we're meant to be protecting; he incites racist violence; he makes sexually violent jokes about women. Well, now, in this pandemic, he has a whole new way to hurt people. A whole new topic about which to lie, posture, preen, behave like a toddler, make it about him, and not care whom it hurts. If my past experience is contributing in any way to my response to this person, it's by giving me a crystal-clear view of what he is, and an immediate, gut understanding of how much psychological damage he is capable of.

It's better to acknowledge the danger than pretend it's not happening. Unfortunately, here and now, that means acknowledging dark truths. People define trauma in a lot of different ways, and it's up to the affected person to decide whether they identify as being traumatized. But if you are finding yourself traumatized right now by the consequences of his decisions, that is 100% valid. If you are traumatized by his very existence — because how can someone so damaging be so powerful and be allowed to throw pain around without consequences to himself? — that's also 100% valid. I also suspect that some people who believe in him today will realize someday what he was and how much harm he caused. That realization — of how badly and how long they were fooled — may be traumatic to them.

The part of my response to him that's potentially irregular is the anxiety trap. Not everyone who sees a terrible evil is necessarily going to enter a state of physical anxiety so elevated, they can't figure out how to get out of it. But some people will. Honestly, it's hard for me to see it as irregular or irrational. Why shouldn't it be rational to shut down when something is horrifyingly unthinkable? But I do like to avoid a meltdown when I can, because it's too consuming while it's happening. Therapy has helped me with the process of learning to deal with this, tremendously. A pandemic is a great time to look into getting therapy :o). Therapy can be expensive; there may be resources near you that make it less so. In fact, one of my loved ones who's a mental health professional just informed me that some USA insurers are currently waiving co-pays for services including mental health — it might be worth contacting your insurer to see if they're doing so. In case it's helpful, here's a list, alphabetical by insurer, of policy changes during the pandemic.

I give myself a break. There are times during this pandemic when I just can't. Can't anything. I need to get under the covers and not think or talk or do anything. I'm privileged to be able to do this; I don't have children or other dependents, I'm not a healthcare worker on the front lines, if I get under the covers, nothing bad happens to anyone. But whenever you possibly can during this time, give yourself a break. Don't expect too much of yourself. Allow yourself to be unable to function. Allow yourself to be cheerless and hopeless, if that's how you feel. Forgive yourself.




I really, badly hope something there is helpful for someone.

One more things before I go. If this pandemic passes, but you notice that you or someone you care for is still struggling a lot... seek help. This situation is creating anxiety, PTSD, and other kinds of psychological suffering in people all around us. Here's some information about what causes PTSD and how to recognize it. Guardians and caretakers in particular — you can't prevent the stress of this time from negatively impacting your kids. It's not your fault if they are struggling with reality, and there's nothing to be ashamed of. But they are going to need you to see their reality, step up, meet their needs, and support them. And don't forget yourself! Get the care that you need too. Talk to your doctors and schools and look into therapy support around you. Therapy can be expensive, but there are organizations that try to make it affordable; maybe there's one near you.



Hang in there, everyone. You're exhausted, anxious, and sad because you try hard and you care. Until next time -- ♥ ♥ ♥

Future banana bread.