Why my pronouns are His Majesty / His Majesty’s

I am 90% certain that the views I am about to share are the reason that I was disinvited as a panelist from LTUE, Utah Valley’s local science fiction convention/symposium. LTUE used to be a fantastic convention, and I still have a lot of friends who are regulars there. But sadly, the convention has become increasingly woke in the past few years, and now appears to be entering the “go broke” phase of that process. It didn’t help that just a few weeks before the 2022 convention, they decided to require proof of vaccination from all attendees, and refused to offer refunds on memberships that had already been purchased.

I recognize that I probably wouldn’t have been disinvited from the convention if I’d just passively gone along with the preferred pronouns thing, staying in my lane and not making waves. But here’s the thing: because of my personal views on the issue, that would have been moral cowardice. And moral cowardice is, I believe, the root cause of much of the insanity happening in the world today. It’s the reason why those 19 kids in Uvalde, Texas are dead: because of the moral cowardice of the police who refused to do their damned jobs and stop the mass shooter. It’s the same moral cowardice that allows evil people in high places to silence their underlings, for fear of losing their pensions, or positions, or jobs, or whatever. It’s the same moral cowardice that allows groomers and radical ideologues to use social media to dominate the culture war, because good and reasonable people are afraid that if they say what they honestly believe, they will incur the wrath of an online mob and be canceled. I don’t agree 100% with Tim Pool on how to put this principle into practice, but I do agree that arguing “I have kids, I can’t afford to be canceled and lose my job” isn’t enough to absolve you of your moral cowardice. The only way to reverse the madness that our world is currently passing through is for a critical mass of us to stand up, be brave, and reject the moral cowardice that has gotten us into this mess in the first place. After all, it’s not like the nature of evil has changed in the last few years.

So I hope you’ll excuse the rant, but the things I’m about to say are things that would qualify me as a moral coward if I refused to say them. I believe them that firmly. And before anyone accuses me of “violence” (as we see so often from those who wrongly conflate speech for violence and violence for speech), I want you to know that there is no hatred or malice in my heart that is driving me to say these things: only a firm and unyielding conviction of the truth, as I understand it.

In the last few years, it has become fashionable for people to post their “preferred pronouns” on their online profiles, or to give their “preferred pronouns” when introducing themselves. The underlying idea is that it is wrong to assume a person’s gender, and that if someone considers themselves to be queer or transgender, we should all affirm their delusions. Indeed, calling transgenderism a delusion is enough to incur the wrath of the online hate mobs and get you canceled for being a “transphobe.” But here’s the thing:

I will not respect your pronouns.

I will never respect your pronouns.

“Preferred pronouns” are a form of controlled speech, and controlling people’s speech is how you control their minds. But I don’t want my mind to be controlled, especially not by people who I believe to be deluded at best, and malicious at worst. People who would like to see my views silenced and my person canceled.

You see, I reject the idea that gender and biological sex are separable. I believe that gender is innate, immutable, and biologically essential. Yes, I recognize that there are nuances to the biology of sex, like people who are born with XXY chromosomes or other intersex conditions. It doesn’t change my personal view that gender and biological sex are inseparably connected.

My views are rooted in my personal faith. In fact, my church’s teachings are very clear about the role of gender in our lives:

All human beings—male and female—are created in the image of God. Each is a beloved spirit son or daughter of heavenly parents, and, as such, each has a divine nature and destiny. Gender is an essential characteristic of individual premortal, mortal, and eternal identity and purpose.

So for me, the question of gender is not a small issue. It is central to my faith, which makes it a hill that I am absolutely willing to die on.

But here’s the thing: if you don’t share my religious views, I totally understand. I’m not trying to preach to you, or convert you, or force you to accept my views on this issue. We can agree to disagree and still get along just fine with each other, even if you believe in transgenderism and preferred pronouns.

I just want you to return the favor.

When you try to control my speech by insisting that I use your “preferred pronouns”–especially when you get all worked up about it–what I hear is “fuck your religion, fuck your faith, fuck your God, and fuck you. Bend the knee, you transphobic white supremacist, or I will put a target on your back and destroy you.”

No, thank you.

I’m not going to deny a central tenet of my faith. I’m not going to be cowed into affirming something that I believe to be wrong. I hold no malice toward those who disagree with me, but I refuse to live by lies or to bend the knee to the false gods of the woke regime.

And because of how important this issue is to me, I’m not going to be passive about it, either. That is why my “preferred pronouns” are His Majesty / His Majesty’s. I am 100% serious about that. And don’t forget the capitalization, you bigot.

“But Joe! How can you insist that people use your preferred pronouns when you refuse to use theirs? Doesn’t that make you a hypocrite?”

You need to familiarize yourself with Saul Alinsky’s Rules for Radicals, my friend. Rule 4: “Make the enemy live up to its own book of rules.” Also, rule 5: “Ridicule is man’s most potent weapon. There is no defense. It is almost impossible to counterattack ridicule. Also it infuriates the opposition, who then react to your advantage.”

When I started doing this, it was just a harmless joke. Intuitively, though, it just didn’t seem right to answer “what are your preferred pronouns?” with the blandly normal (and thus obviously discouraged) “he/him.” I didn’t go out of my way to make that joke, but in instances where I couldn’t avoid it, such as when the submission guidelines (or convention questionaires) required that I give my preferred pronouns, that was the answer I always gave.

And I sincerely believe that it is the right answer. I didn’t choose this ridiculous regime, but if you’re going to force me to live under it, then I’m going to make you live by your own rules, dammit. That’s what you get for trying to control my mind by controlling my speech. And if you’re going to blacklist me, or disinvite me, or call me a “transphobe,” or otherwise excommunicate me from your society, so be it. I will not bend the knee.

A man is an adult male human. Pronouns: he/him.

A woman is an adult female human. Pronouns: she/her.

They/them is typically used to indicate plural, but can be used in some circumstances to refer to an individual when it is not possible to determine their gender. However, no one’s gender is inherently such that “they/them” pronouns are requisite in all cases.

If that offends you, get over yourself. I say that with all of the love in my icy cold heart. Seriously, you will be happier, healthier, and more fulfilled if you change your life to conform to reality, rather than trying to change reality to conform with yourself.

But I’m not going to force your speech. If you want to post your “preferred pronouns” on your profile, or introduce yourself with them, I’m not going to be offended or try to stop you. I just won’t use them.

As for my “preferred pronouns,” how you respond to those tells me everything I need to know about you.

How I keep my reading journal

I am amazed at how many books I’ve read so far this year. Looking just at my resolution to read all of the Hugo and Nebula winning novels, I started with only 32 out of 110 read, and now I’m nearly at 100. Granted, for a lot of those I only read the first and last chapter, but I also read several dozen of them cover to cover—and I’ve also read a bunch of other books, too.

What was the thing that pushed me over the tipping point? I used to only read two or three books a month, if that. Then my wife and I started taking our reading time more seriously, taking our family to the library once a week and setting aside an hour each night to read before going to bed. She helped me to make a reading log to keep track of everything, and that certainly helped a lot. It also helped to have specific reading goals, like read all of the Hugo and Nebula winning books this year.

But the thing that really kicked my reading into high gear was to start keeping a reading journal. I used to have one back in high school, but all I really used it for was to save quotes, and I lost it sometime before I got married. But I remembered how that helped me to read more back in high school, so a couple of months ago I decided to start a new one.

The reading journal I keep now is handwritten in a composition notebook. I just prefer the feel of pen on paper, especially for something private like this. And it is a private journal, unlike the daily diary that I hope to share with my kids and grandkids someday. Maybe I’ll share it with close family, but for now, I’m keeping it only for myself.

If I weren’t an author, I might cross-post things from my reading journal to Goodreads and other social media sites, but since this is what I do for a living, I think it’s better to keep my reviews to myself. After all, I don’t want to give a book a bad review, only to find that several of my fans consider it their favorite book. I also want to avoid attracting the ire of any online outrage mobs, which is why I don’t post much of anything to Goodreads anymore. That’s also why I decided not to do BookTube. But if writing books wasn’t the main way I make my living, I might share some of this stuff (some of it) with my friends on social media.

So here’s what I include in my reading journal:

Monthly read/DNF lists

At the start of each month, I start a new page with two lists on it: one for all of the books that I read, and another for the ones that I DNF. Throughout the month, I add books to each list as I read/DNF them. This gives me a great way to look back at the end of the month and see, at a glance, how much progress I made.

For the books I’ve read, I also make a note in the margin if I think the book was good enough to acquire a physical copy. My long-term goal is to build a personal library of all the best books that I’ve read, so this is a way to advance that project.

Also, in the list of books I’ve DNFed, I make a note in the margins if it was a soft DNF and I may consider coming back to it at some point. I believe in DNFing early and often, but I also think that it’s good to occasionally revisit those DNFs and try them again.

Quotes that stood out

If a passage of something I’m reading stands out to me as particularly quoteworthy or memorable, I put a little post-it note on the page so that I can find it later, after I’m done reading for the day (or night). Then, I write it down in my reading journal, with the author, book title, and page number.

I’m not all that particular about collecting quotes, but if I’m really loving a book, pulling out a couple of memorable passages can enrich the reading experience and help me to remember what I’ve read. It’s also fun to share those quotes on my blog and social media, with friends who might not have read the book yet.

Books that I’ve loaned

One of the main reasons that I want to build a personal library of physical books is so that I can share them with my friends. Of course, it’s easy to lose track of which books I’ve loaned out already, and friends are prone to lose them if you don’t remind them about it from time to time.

So whenever I loan out a book, I make a note in my reading journal of that, including the name of the person I loaned it out to. And when they return it, I make a note of that too.

Ratings and reviews

I don’t really write “reviews” in my reading journal, because it’s a private journal that isn’t meant for public consumption. But I do include a few notes, generally no more than a page, for every book that I read or DNF. This usually includes my thoughts and impressions of the book, what made me DNF it if that was the case, and anything I liked or didn’t like about it.

In addition to those notes, I also give it a 1-5 star rating in the margin, using the following scale:

  • 1 Star: I thought this book was terrible.
  • 2 Star: I didn’t like this book, but it wasn’t terrible.
  • 3 Star: I thought this book was okay, but not great.
  • 4 Star: I thought this book was really good.
  • 5 Star: This is one of the best books that I’ve ever read.

Of course, it’s all very subjective, but that’s kind of the point. When I want to come back later and see what I thought of a particular book, I can see the star rating and read about what my thoughts and impressions were at the time, which give me a pretty good snapshot. If I decide to reread a book, I do the same thing for the second-read through so that I can judge the two experiences.

Anthologies and collections

If I decide to read a collection or anthology (or magazine issue, for that matter), I first list the title of every story in the book, with room on one side to mark the date that I read it, and on the other side (usually the margin) for what my 1-5 star rating was for that particular story, or whether I skipped or DNFed it.

I don’t bother writing out my thoughts and impressions for every story, but when I’m done with the collection/anthology, I do write down a few notes on it just like any other book.

Other things that I plan to include

At this point, my journal is pretty low-key, and it only takes a few minutes to update it whenever I do. However, as I get more into it, I will probably include things like proper journal entries, my thoughts on reading in general, things that I want to see in the genres that I read, and other ruminations like that. The format is really flexible, which is nice, because I’m sure I’ll be adapting it to all sorts of new things in the future.

Taken together, keeping a reading journal like this has really helped me to track my progress, not just in terms of numbers, but in terms of thoughts, impressions, and experiences. And I think that’s the key right there. Instead of each book being its own separate experience, I feel like it’s all a part of a much bigger whole, where each new book is part of a journey. What is the destination of that journey? I’m not entirely sure, but I think it’s helping me to be a better reader, writer, and person overall.

Reading Resolution Update: May

My 2022 reading resolution: Read or DNF every novel that has won a Hugo or a Nebula award, and acquire all the good ones.

When I first got the idea for this new year’s resolution six months ago, I was reading maybe 30-60 pages every other day, with no real goal or direction. My wife and I had already decided to change our routine so we could read in bed for an hour before going to sleep, but we weren’t very good at keeping to that routine.

I set this goal because I knew that I needed to read more books—specifically, books in my genre. So I decided: why not set my sights high and aim for the best of the best? Not that I still believe that the Hugos and Nebulas represent the best of SF&F, but at one point I did genuinely believe that, or acted as if I did, which amounts to the same thing. So why not aim to read them all?

I thought it would take a lot longer to get this far, but here it is, June already, and I’ve almost read them all. When I started, I’d read only 36 out of 110 books. I did find a few new-to-me books that were really fantastic, but most of them were books I didn’t like. However, in a weird sort of way that actually helped me to read more, because it helped me to better understand my own tastes. So when I hit a small reading slump in March-April, I was able to branch out and read some books that I did enjoy, which helped to keep the momentum strong.

Several things have helped me to read a lot more over the course of this challenge:

First, having a reading list really helped. It provided me with a long-term, measurable goal that I could use to keep track of my progress. For me, that was highly motivational.

Second, DNFing early and often, and skipping to the last chapter before marking it as DNF. Often, I would find confirmation in the last chapter that I had indeed made the right choice not to read the rest of it. This taught me to trust my own judgment and to better understand my own tastes, which reaped dividends later.

Third, learning how to read in a way that worked with my own ADHD, not against it. This helped me to turn a great weakness, which had foiled my previous resolutions to read more books, into an advantage. But it required developing a better accountability system, which brings us to…

Fourth, using a reading log to track my progress. I got this idea from my wife, who is very good with spreadsheets. I know it doesn’t work for everyone to track everything down to how many pages per day you need to read of each book you’re currently reading, but for me, it really worked. Finally…

Fifth, starting a reading journal to track my own progress and record my own thoughts and impressions about what I’m reading. This is a topic that deserves its own blog post, but I’ve been doing it for a couple of months now, and I find that it really helps me to get a lot more out of what I read, as well as motivating me to read more. Among other things, I keep track of which books I read and DNF each month, my impressions of each book after reading or DNFing it, and any quotes from what I’m reading that stand out as being particularly memorable.

At the rate that I’m going, I will probably achieve this resolution (or at least the reading part of it) before the end of June. It might take a little more time to finish the Uplift Trilogy if I don’t DNF it, but I’ll certainly have finished before the end of the year. Consequently, I’m already drawing up other reading lists for awards like the Dragons and Goodread’s Choice, but I’m still trying to figure out exactly how I want to proceed. Most likely, I will expand those lists to include nominees, but also pick and choose which ones to read.

In any case, here are all of the Hugo and Nebula award-winning books I read or DNFed in May:

Books that I read and plan to or have already aquired

  • The Speed of Dark by Elizabeth Moon (2004 Nebula)
  • Powers by Ursula K. Le Guin (2009 Nebula)
  • All Clear by Connie Willis (2011 Hugo and Nebula)
  • Blackout by Connie Willis (2011 Hugo and Nebula) (Technically I read this one in April and listed it under “Books that I read and don’t plan to acquire,” but after giving the sequel a chance I’ve decided to move it up here. Really, they should all be one book.)

Books that I read and don’t plan to acquire

  • The Terminal Experiment by Robert J. Sawyer (1996 Nebula)

Books that I did not finish

  • Timescape by Gregory Benford (1981 Nebula)
  • No Enemy but Time by Michael Bishop (1983 Nebula)
  • The Falling Woman by Pat Murphy (1988 Nebula)
  • Slow River by Nicola Griffith (1997 Nebula)
  • The Quantum Rose by Catherine Asaro (2002 Nebula)
  • Hominids by Robert J. Sawyer (2003 Hugo)
  • Paladin of Souls by Lois McMaster Bujold (2004 Hugo and 2005 Nebula)
  • Seeker by Jack McDevitt (2007 Nebula)
  • The Graveyard Book by Neil Gaiman (2009 Hugo)
  • Among Others by Jo Walton (2012 Hugo and Nebula)
  • Uprooted by Naomi Novik (2016 Nebula)

Total books remaining: 11 out of 111 (currently reading 5 and listening to 1).

Spring Shorts 2022 #4: The Freedom of Second Chances

I’m really happy with how this short story turned out. It pushes the edge in a lot of interesting ways, with the main character having to choose between duty and honor and doing what is right, and a forced abortion situation that puts the lie to the “women’s right to choose” insanity. It will probably get me blacklisted at a few more magazines, but at this point I really don’t care.

Once again, I used the Mythulu cards to come up with this story. Here are the ones I used:

  • CLONE: Many available forms, including: duplicate, twin, rebirth, alternative life path manifested, time traveler overlap, actor, understudy, etc. Can even mean a second chance or a relapse.
  • ABANDONED: Indicates a severe problem in the environment that prior ihabitants were unable to solve. Draw +1 Habitat.
    • COASTAL: Peaceful threshold where the ocean meets land. Known for caves, karsts, and dunes. Represents unsolvable relationship problems.
  • ERODED: Extensive, exponential deterioration of a foundation due to long-neglected defense.
  • MARRIAGE OF HONOR: A permanent relationship initiated to help someone else avoid shame or discredit.
  • TATTOO: Marked to identify, warn, or remember.
  • GUILTY: Responsible for the worst thing that has happened recently to everyone around them.
  • BODYGUARD: Primary purpose is to protect something else, at any cost.
  • VELVET: Labor-intensive weave of fabric that mimics the soft fur on a young buck’s antlers. Worn to inspire reverence or respect.
  • BLOOD: Represents the energy invested to keep something alive. The only element which affects the soul beyond mortality. Can taint or purify.
  • SLIPPERY: Wants freedom and is hard to hold onto. Often enjoys the chase.
  • BUREAUCRAT: Keeps others in bondage with words. Diverts enemies toward illusions to exhaust them into giving up.
  • CATALYST: Initiates or accelerates a chemical reaction without itself being affected. Gifted at getting things moving.
  • NECRO: Things that were once living, but no longer are. Draw again to decide what died. Draw +1 Habitat or Element.
    • PET: Healthy codependence with a clear heirarchy, usually between members of different species.
  • TORN: Forcibly separated parts, which often continue to exist separately. Indicates a lost privilege or reduction in status. Symbol of anger.
  • SIGIL: Symbols that have power to force or bind. Used in communities to rally groups together.

I’m going to keep going through until I’ve used all of the Mythulu cards in a story at least once. So far, they’ve proven to be an interesting way to not only generate story ideas, but to send my stories off in different and interesting directions. It usually takes me a little while (or sometimes a couple of different draws) to figure out how to fit everything into a coherent story, but I’m getting the hang of it, and the process is actually pretty fun.

As for the spring shorts challenge, it’s Memorial Day today, which means that the challenge is basically over. I only ended up writing four stories, which is a lot less than what I’d hoped to write, but I think these will turn out really well after I rework them a bit, so I’m counting it as a partial success.

For June, I plan to write two more short stories in order to fill up the buffer. My writing group meets once a month, so with two more stories to critique in June, that will give me a buffer of six months by the time July rolls around. I also plan to fix up all four of these spring shorts stories and put them on submission for the next few months, before I publish them as free singles.

I will try to do a new short story each month, in order to keep the buffer at six months, but I may do another short story nanowrimo this year if it turns out that I need more. As far as other WIPs are concerned, though, after I write these next two stories in June, I’m going to go back to novels. My plan right now is to write the first three chapters of The Sword Bearer and Captive of the Falconstar by the fourth of July, then decide whether to go on with one of those or to keep working on Children of the Starry Sea.

Refining my short story strategy

I’ve blogged several times about my short story strategy. To restate it briefly, I’ve found that it works best to self-publish all of my short story singles for free, and to take them down when I have enough of them (+40k words, usually about 10 stories) to bundle into a collection. I earn more this way than I do from selling the singles at 99¢, since all of the free stories help me to sell the collections. Also, I get better engagement from my fans and better discoverability with new readers, since when time is the only cost for reading a story, readers tend to prefer something short.

I’ve also found that with just a little bit of a marketing push, consisting mostly of my newsletter, reddit, free promotion sites, and group promotions such as Book Funnel and Story Origin, I can get my stories out to as many readers as most of the professional and semi-prozines. This was surprising to me, but when I compare my download numbers to the magazine circulation numbers published annually in Locus Magazine, there’s actually not much of a disparity. With a more aggressive marketing push, I can probably exceed those numbers.

Partly because of this, and partly because of how batshit crazy insane woke most of the traditional and award-winning SF&F short story markets have become, I no longer prioritize selling my short stories to the traditional markets, and am just fine self-publishing them first, even if that means forfeiting the couple hundred bucks they might have earned by selling them to a traditional market first. Many of my stories have languished on my hard drive for years while I was pursuing that path, and since time is money, I find it more worthwhile to publish them now. However, I do like to take at least a few months to submit them to the markets that aren’t insanely woke, and occasionally make a sale.

But still, I’ve been struggling lately with some of the finer details of this plan. How often should I publish my short story singles? How long should I keep them on submission before self-publishing them? Should I self-publish all of the stories that will eventually go in the next collection, or should I hold a few back so as to give my readers a reason to buy it? How long should each story be available as a free short story single?

From September 2021 through March 2022, I self-published at least two new titles every month. The purpose of the experiment was to see how this would impact overall sales. My sales did go up quite a bit by the end of this period, but that may have also been because of a few lucky BookBub Featured Deals that I got.

(It was a lot harder to get BBFDs back in 2021, largely because traditional publishing dumped all of the books that were in the production process when covid hit, so there was a lot more competition for spots. But now, it appears that there’s a bit of a drought of trad-published books, since all of the stuff coming out now was acquired during the time when they were still adjusting to all of the pandemic lockdown measures, and weren’t nearly as productive.)

However, the experiment was useful in demonstrating just how difficult it is to maintain such a rigorous self-publishing schedule for a lengthy period of time. I think that at least part of the reason I’m going through something of a creative slump right now is because of how much energy and mental space it took to publish 14 new titles in 7 consecutive months. Perhaps when I was still single, I could have kept up that pace indefinitely, but not with a wife and a baby daughter who deserve my attention. I can still occasionally publish more than one title per month, but not for multiple consecutive months without suffering some detrimental consequences.

At the same time, I do think there’s something to be said for consistency. For a long time in my early career, I would publish only intermittently, sometimes with several months going by before I put out another title. If instead, I’d spent the last ten years putting out a new free short story once a month, in the first week of the month, I’d probably not only have more fans right now, but more loyal fans.

So the plan from now on is to publish a new free short story each month, on the first Saturday of the month, and to publish it under my Joe Vasicek name (stories published under any of my pen names don’t count, even if they’re under an open pen name).

But at the same time, I don’t want to have more than six free short stories out at a time. Six, because 1. that’s how many stories appear at a time on the series carousel on Amazon, at least with a wide screen monitor, and 2. I don’t want to have more than half of the stories I plan to bundle together out at the same time. Since I’m never going to put less than ten stories in a collection, and one of the six free singles is always going to be “Paradox of Choice” (it’s published under a CC BY 4.0 license, so there’s no sense in ever unpublishing it), six is the magic number.

As for whether or not to hold some stories back, so long as no more than half of the stories in the next collection are available as free singles at the same time, I think it’s okay to put them all out there. My loyal fans will have already downloaded all of the stories when they were free, but they’re also my loyal fans, and that seems like a good way to reward their loyalty. Besides, some of them will probably go ahead and buy the collection anyway, both to support me and to get the author’s note.

What about putting stories on submission? How much of a buffer should I keep to ensure that each story gets sent out to all of the markets that I’m willing to sell it to?

I think a buffer of six months is enough. It might require doing some simultaneous submissions, but a lot more markets allow simultaneous submissions nowadays. And with a six month buffer, if I sell a couple of them, I won’t be scrambling to write new stories to fill up the next publishing slot—not unless all six of them sell within a few days of each other.

If a story sells to a traditional market, I’ll probably just put it straight in the next collection when the exclusivity period expires, rather than putting it on the schedule to publish as a free short story single. But it depends on what’s going on at the time, and whether it’s more important to get that collection out or to refill the buffer. I won’t put out the next collection until I have at least six other short stories to fill out the free singles.

So that’s the plan. Maybe it makes sense to you, maybe it’s clear as mud, but the important things are 1. I’m going to put out a new free short story each month on the first Saturday of the month, come hell or high water, and 2. I’m only going to have six free short stories available at a time. And all of the stories in my collections will appear first either as a free short story, or in one of the magazines/anthologies. Sometimes both.

Spring Shorts Story #3: Christopher Columbus, Wildcatter

Wow, has it really been almost three weeks since I finished another short story? I really need to get back into the game. Still, this was a fun one, and I’m really looking forward to turning it into something great.

As with the two previous stories, I used the Mythulu cards to come up with this one. Here’s what I drew:

  • STATISTIC: The face, pile, voice, or sacrifice that gives personal meaning to a problem previously encountered and ignored.
  • EXPLORER: Enchanted by novelty. Energized by challenge. Brave, joyful, and resilient. Worst thing that can happen is for life to become too predictable.
  • GHOST LIMB: When amputees receive nerve signals from non-existant limbs.
  • MINE: Gleaning useful or shiny resources from the earth. Runoff from mines causes ecologically devastating pollution.
  • DEBTOR: One who has received something they cannot yet repay. Leads to either accountability or slvaery. Not free to pursue their own heart until absolved.
  • WATER: Currency of life. Symbolizes connection. Breaks boundaries. Patient, responsive, nurturing.
  • VIBRATING: A gentle resonant sumble. Usually felt when some kind of energy is flowing freely, whether sound, electricity, or emotion.
  • RECOVERING: Half-healed from some kind of significant damage.
  • FUZZY: A soft, comforting layer associated with innocent living things.
  • ADORABLE: Too cute to be taken seriously. Cannot intimidate others, no matter how hard they try. Their boundaries are frequently ignored.
  • LOUD: Showy in a way that interrupts others. Uncomfortably irreverent, noisy, or insistent.
  • HUNGRY: Ravenous and/or so desperately poor that they cannot afford food.
  • TEMPLE: Home of the gods. Point of access where higher powers can be found and petitioned.
  • MONK: Offers total forgiveness. Able to see through deception, especially self-deception. Invites, but never forces.
  • THRESHOLD: A Doorway that leads to a new life. Once you cross a threshold, you cannot return the same.
  • WIND: Represents connection to the unknown. Responsible for storms, pollinations, erosion. Influences evolution, spread of disease, and pollution dispersal.

For most of these elements, I ignored the flavor text altogether. With “statistic,” for example, all I did was start the story off with a random statistic I heard somewhere. No idea if it’s actually true, but hey, it makes for a great story. And with “threshold,” I traded out the card I’d actually drawn with one that worked much better. Also, I’m not entirely sure how “wind” fits in with the rest of it, but it feels right.

I’m going to keep going through with these Mythulu-inspired stories until I’ve used all of the cards. That definitely won’t happen until after Memorial Day, which I’ve marked as the end of this Spring Shorts challenge, but I’ll keep track of which cards I’ve already used and continue to write short stories on the side. With luck, I’ll be able to write at least one more story here, and I may keep it up for a while in the summer just until I’ve filled up the buffer in my publishing schedule. But more about that in a later post.