What I have lost … and what I have gained.
On Pet Gain
The deeply personal stuff, lots of over-sharing.
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So long Twitter, and thanks for all the fish
The single most disappointing aspect of my experience using Twitter was wanting to discuss ideas with folks and realizing nothing short of a kick-ass dog pic or a shot of their unboxed book would yield acknowledgement.
On F$&king Up Careers
Can anyone guess the best way to derail a career in journalism?
Wait until after your pick up your English degree (minoring in Mass Communications ‘cause you were at the best damn journalism school one could hope for after all and just not showing up to class Freshman year at Georgia Tech, and initializing your collegiate transcript with a whopping 0.18 GPA, shouldn’t keep you out of Grady entirely)
Where was I … oh yeah … wait until after you graduate (the first time) to be diagnosed with dysthymia and ADHD.
I keep thinking of things to say, thinking I'm gonna post said thing, realizing what I'm thinking of saying is mostly noise pollution, and losing all interest in whatever TF it was I almost said. Almost feels like flailing. Human connection deficiencies are kinda fucked.
When you realize you could totally use one of those social-media-content-creator-subscription thingies to make bank by allowing folks to subscribe to your account for access to all your content… of your dog… … …for access to all your content of your dog. #FML
Derailment Classification: Existential
Trigger: Any fresh, seemingly beneficial, potentially rewarding, idea (the fulfillment of such ideas being the clay bricks out of which one builds a life of satisfaction)
Nature of Derailment: Fleeting question
Fleeting Question: What's the fucking point?
Raise UR hand if U feel like turning yourself in2 a hermit 4 the better part of a decade (social net., pop. 2) while living on a neural cocktail that takes 1 part #ADHD, 1 part #Dysthymia & a pinch of #OCD could trick UR counselor in2 thinking U register on the #spectrum.
The kind of email I still ignore 'cause I feel my illustrated essays are more significant (and that eventually y'all will read them).
Open Email to a Twitter Account Manager
Dear Austin,
Apologies for not acknowledging your email sooner. The most helpful thing you could do for me right now would be to get Twitter support to remove the age-restriction labels slapped retroactively onto every tweet with a link, photo, or video from shortly before 5/5/21 to whichever day my original account manager's support ticket was closed and the labels stopped appearing.
I think it turns out that my superpower is mental modeling (no worries y'all, #ADHD and #Dysthymia keep a lid on my power, less than a handful can even recognize it).
F$$&&&&k … when you realize that properly expanding on the argument you want to make in the essay you're rewriting could also fill a book (and it wouldn't even mention the bifurcated information ecosystem). #ADHD
Kills me to feel like I have the framework in my head of something that ought be discussed in universities and I can't garner enough engagement to negotiate its release from ADHD captivity. Probably why the one-liner likes inspire spite.
Spend three days paddling through the Okefenokee Swamp each year all throughout grade school and perhaps the first few years you're in college, you'll be seeing gator heads in dark water on into your mid-fourties, even in California … as it turns out.
With retrospective glance upon the last 300-some days, of course, were I to finally find a niche that both satisfied and at which I would excel … of course it would be genre-defying … which is like success-kryptonite for the self-structuring #ADHD individual.
Socially isolate yourself for eighteen years and you run the risk of sounding giddy as a school girl (or boy) when given any opportunity to chat with a friendly face in real life. Thought some of y'all may want to know.
D$cking around with technology keeps me engaged. Started last week with Palo Alto Fit. Nina takes regular InBody measurements to track progress. I love collecting sh$t (including health data) so I'm thinking of creating an iOS shortcut for entering results into Apple Health via shared PNG text-recognition.
This is me playing #BrainWars … and I've just learned that what I'm doing … is making the Stroop Effect my b$tch.
Imma toss out the most unique aspect of my #DualADHDBrain in a second … y'all can see if you have any better luck trying to figure out what to do with it than I have the last 44 years I'm still not sure what you call this but I just learned what it is I'm doing.
Cape Wind is for the Birds
Came across an old letter to the editor, written in February 2008 for Greenpeace supporting the now abandoned Cape Wind Project. Since it is some of the earliest creative nonfiction I've unearthed, figured I may as well share it. So, here it comes…
Pretty sure I just shut the door on autism … y'all gonna have to find another way to explain my brain.
Step one … pick up and play the godd@mn bass after years of ignoring it … f$&kin' ✓
My office (hashtag ADHD)
The one that changed me when I went back to college for the second degree.
The one that changed me in college.
The one that changed me in high school.
The more things change …
My grandfather's theater in Sparta, Tennessee (f$&k if I know when).
Wait … wait … I remember. It was Saturday.
Right around the time I started kickin’ a$$.
