I am humble enough to admit that I wasn't a great mother. I had all four sons before turning twentyone years old. No they didnt have different daddies, no I wasnt promiscuous, yes I had a good wholesome upbringing. One flaw, no father in my life to guide me in the ways of boys and men.

You know, I sacrificed so much for them, I loved them, and yes did I make mistakes, of course. After all there wasn't an instruction booklet.

My first son was a product of a date rape, understand here that I have never blamed my son, it was never his fault. He was sweet, and a beautitful boy and wonderful.

The younger three were from my ex, who also had a daughter a year older than my oldest son. She was two years old, her dad had custody, and I fell in love with her. I was in love with her dad, my ex, but he wasnt in love with me as I thought.

After spending four years together, my ex took the son he wanted to keep and left me pregnant with two little boys. His daughter went to visit his exwife, the two of them used her as a pawn in getting back at each other through the years. I did what I could to make her feel loved as much as my own, but later in her life it wasnt good enough, and it was all for naught.

I was encouraging throughout all of thier lives, when two sons came out as gay, I still loved them, supported them and never once told them they could not be what they wanted to be. I did tell them they had to wait untill they were adults before they made major life changing decisions....

Fastforward to the present.

The daughter I helped when she got pregnant out of wedlock at twenty, my husband I married when the kids were still little, we took her in and gave her a home and helped her with our grandbaby.

The boys were still in highschool, we all helped out.

Then, she got a house, a boyfriend and instead of celebrating getting married with the ones who supported her, she just got married.

I wanted to help pick out her dress or at least go to try outs.

I was completely cut out.

My oldest son as much as I exspressed my love and care for him, he was always in trouble, mixed up in drugs and with the wrong people. He married an addict and they have three children, I never get to see because I refuse to support thier drug habit, and they told his kids that I am dead. So I am dead.

My second son, the one my ex took with him when he left me, well it took me a month but I got him back. I was seven months pregnant with my youngest son.

So my second son was smart, a good baby, a good kid, everybody liked him and you could just tell he was going to be gay but I didnt care, I loved him no matter what.

I supported him, let him bring friends over, and yet, he still picked everyone elses moms over me because they had more money. They lived in fancier homes or nicer cars ect.

Fast forward to now:

Now he is married, we supported him because we wanted him to be happy, his in-laws live with him and his spouse AND he took thier family name.

So I handled that.

Then he talks down to me, and acts embarrassed that I am his mom. I noticed that on his social media all his pics are of his new family, the ones of me are from years ago.

Yes our political views are oposite, does that mean I dont love him of course not! It does for him though.

My third son has always been a middle child. Hes very good, easy going, and an introvert. Always has been. Kind and gentle he has a good head on his shoulders. We had a tiny bit of trouble when he was a teen, but he was just afraid of coming out. All is well now. He lives with his partner.

My youngest is on the spectrum but high functioning and keeps a job. When he was four months old he contracted spinal meningitis and it settled on his brain, as a result we spent two months in childrens hospital and in the end he had to have brain surgery. I was devastated. The doctors didnt know how well he would develop after, walking, talking ect. As it turned out he didnt talk until he was almost five. My older children said I favored him the most.

Maybe, but they never came so close to losing a child to death like I did, they never had to realize how precious that sweet child so sick with fever really is after everything you go through. You see in the end you love all your children no matter what. Period.

My youngest is married now, again, I was excluded from any of the planning or helping. I would have liked to be included but why start now?

My two youngest sons do keep in touch with me. The others have taken on the attitude that I should chase them around, call them all the time and bend over backwards so they will stay in touch. They want to hold the grand kids over my head.

So I give up. I cant do it. I cant be that kind of person so I'll just be dead. I never was disrespectful to my folks, and I took my children to see them every weekend.

So I'm disapointed that mine cant even wish me happy birthday, happy mothersday, happy thanksgiving, or happy holidays! Not one word or picture.

Yet I send them all those greetings.

Maybe I did everything wrong.

Maybe should have done what society today thinks is best by just taking the easy way out and murdering them before they were born.

All I know is that this generation is so

Dissapointing.

Hi!

I’m actually in a block right now but I have questions

if you’ve read my works, what type of writer do I seem like?

idk why something is ringing depressed writer in my head

And do you feel idea of stories should be made here?

like “oh I saw this butterfly today & it reminded me of summer” & you share it for 24 hours because it’s pretty

“Eight billion people in this world,” I said to the asshole pointing the gun in my face, “and you picked me to fuck with?” I shook my head as I stared down the gun barrel. “You made a really bad choice.”

This part of the story is one hundred percent true. Yes I, Ledlevee, Mike Monroe, the real life person writing this, beat the shit out of two guys who tried to rob me at gunpoint. They fucked with the wrong person on the wrong night. So this first entry is the true part. Everything after this entry is going to be what could have happened the next day and every day going forward if I’d done things just a little differently after this night. But back to the story. And let me rewind a bit now that I’ve got the first sentence hook out of the way.

I’ve had five really bad years. Like legendarily tragically all-time bad years. My dad died. My wife of eleven years told me she was gay and wanted a divorce. I moved out and was forced to pay for both households since she refuses to get a job, and all that with four kids. My mom has dementia and has been steadily getting worse and I was the person who had to help take care of her, call her every night to remind her to take her meds, to do mundane things most of us take for granted. And that’s on top of taking care of four kids and paying for two households. I never have any money because of this shitty situation. I started messing up at work because of the psychological toll of all of this. I have therapists, psychiatrists, more meds than you can shake a stick at. I’m bipolar. And I have PTSD. Plus I’ve been dealing with Crohn’s Disease most of my life. I’m not saying all this because I want a fucking pity party. I’m just giving some context.

But of all the shit, the one thing that stung the most, the thing that hurt more than anything ever has my entire life, was when the woman I love stabbed me through the heart. Metaphorically of course. We haven’t gotten to the violent vigilante part yet. Let’s call her Mary Jane. Because every super hero needs to have his Mary Jane.

So Mary Jane showed up right after my separation from my wife, though I’d known her most of my life. She helped me through one of the hardest things I’d ever been through which was the separation and pending divorce. She was really there for me. And as the couple of years or so went on, we grew closer and closer and started going on trips together and spending more time together. I started to realize how much we had in common. And though I didn’t realize it at the time, I fell in love with her.

Things got physical very briefly. And right before she took me on this wonderful birthday trip, she told me an ex had emailed her. She laughed it off and said the only reason she’d ever dated him was she didn’t want to end up falling in love with some ex convict. Made sense I guess. She’d convinced me that this guy was totally wrong for her and she had no interest in him whatsoever. And then she takes me on this wonderful all expenses paid trip and we have sex. And on the way back she was talking about introducing me to her sister and I’m like “Hmm, maybe this could end up being something.” A week later she emails me and tells me she’s getting back with her ex; you know, the one she supposedly didn’t give a fuck about. So you can guess how that made a guy who already has major self esteem issues feel.

Anyway, five months later things hadn’t gotten any better. I’d been fighting suicidal thoughts for months. I really didn’t give a fuck anymore. So I went to this sound bath and acupuncture therapy I’ve been going to. And afterwards, I was hanging out with my friend. We’ll call him John since I probably shouldn’t use real names in this thing. He says “Hey buddy. Sorry I have to go to work now, but you should go treat yourself. Do something nice for yourself.”

So I’m like, “Okay. It’s a nice night. I’ll go for a walk.”

I drove home and started walking up Harford Road. I’ll use real place names to help things seem more real. This all takes place in Baltimore, by the way. So here I am walking up Harford Road, and on my way back, this eighteen or twenty year old kid comes walking up next to me, dressed in all black. And he says “Give me your bread, dog.”

And I’m like, “My bread?”

“Yeah, your bread.”

Then I notice there’s another guy walking behind me who says, “Give it to him!”

I say, “Why don’t you go to the fucking grocery and get your own fucking bread.”

He says, “Give me your money.”

I say. “I don’t have any money.”

He says, “Yes you do.” I really didn’t, but I wouldn’t have given it to him if I did.

I smile while I’m walking. “Go fuck yourself.”

So these assholes jump me and start punching me in the head and face. I should mention I don’t feel pain and it takes a shit ton to knock me out. So their punches didn’t even hurt, though they did knock my glasses off and it was hard for me to see after that. But I started punching back. I should also mention that I’m strong as shit and I’ve been taking karate. It’s one of the things that’s been helping me survive the past few years. I was using it to get out my frustrations. I never thought it would literally save my life.

Anyway, I started punching back, and though their punches didn’t hurt me, mine definitely hurt them. I was taking out years of pent up rage on their unsuspecting assess. I went all Darth Vader on them. The guy in front of me realized they weren’t gonna take me out like that so he took a few steps back and drew the gun. The guy behind me was still behind me.

And that’s when I said, “Eight billion people in this world and you picked me to fuck with? You made a really bad choice.”

The guy behind me said, “He’s gonna kill you.”

I said “Great! Put me out of my misery.”

I remember the guy with the gun laughing. He must have thought that was hilarious. “Come on mother fucker,” I said. “Kill me. Put me out of my misery. Do it. Just make sure you don’t miss and turn me into a brain damaged vegetable or something.”

Then this car pulled up. Apparently we were blocking the intersection. I tried to wave at them but they just sat there. So the guy with the gun moved out of the way and they drove past like nothing was happening. I tried to flag down other cars that were driving by. It was almost comical at this point.

The guy with the gun said “Ain’t nobody helping you.”

I smiled and said, “I’m not the one who needs help. You are.”

At this point I figured he’d have shot me by now if he was gonna do it. And I was super pissed that he was too much of a pussy to pull the trigger. So I decided to take out all of my rage and frustration on these two assholes.

I knocked the guy’s gun away with a left handed middle inside block. Then I gave him a heavy hook to the jaw with my right hand. I back kicked the guy behind me and hit his crotch. I turned and took a few steps back, making sure I had them both in front of me, and I stepped closer to the guy with the gun to take away his range advantage.

Now a normal human would have probably ran at this point, but I was having too much fun. They weren’t apparently, because they looked at each other and ran across the street and into some dark trees.

While they were running I yelled “You fuckers are lucky you knocked my glasses off or you’d both be bleeding in the street right now!” Then I picked up my glasses and put them back on.

Walking home, I felt like a badass. I had a shit eating grin on my face. Two guys tried to rob me at gunpoint and I beat the crap out of them. But then I remembered my four kids. I can’t leave them alone with their mom. I have to be there for them. I can’t be doing stuff like that anymore. I have to be more careful.

That’s what my real life self said. But from here on, I’m going to turn this thing fictional. But based on reality. This is the story of what may have happened if I’d decided to become a real life superhero.

Ok, so recently I told one of my friends that I meditate every night. They opened up their eyes like hot air balloons and jumped up and down in excitement. "Wait, you meditate? How did I not know this? That is amazing!" They said, and immediately, I regretted mentioning anything. I don't meditate because I want people to think I'm cool. It isn't something I do to achieve my best life style or be "at peace with myself." Its something I do because I have no other choice. This is my way of stopping myself from obsessing over murdering some one as I go to bed. I learned breathing exercises so I could calm down at school instead of breaking down. I did all this because I have to. I did all this because I wanted a life that wasn't me convincing myself I still deserved to live. I do these things because they have proven to be the most effective measure against every horror the world has to offer. Reducing it to anything except that is just cruel. I didn't do it to please you. I didn't even do it to please myself. I did it because it brought me some peace. I did it because after years of drugs nothing seemed to work. I did it because there was no end to the madness in my head. I did it because I had no where else to turn. I do it still because it keeps me sane. I do it still because it taught me to focus my attention on a sound so annoying I can barely think. It taught me to make that sound my entire reality. The whirring of a machine becomes the vast intricacies of the cosmos. The ticking of a clock becomes the fabric of time, set in motion by mortal hands. Then, before I know it my head isn't spinning. My thoughts, if not whole, are just a little bit clearer than when I left and the everything makes sense. For one fucking second it makes sense.

The voices in my head keep talking. The conversations among my peers keep going. I look up and I am among yet distant. I am not outcast and yet I will never be a part of the group. I'm different. I spent years learning breathing techniques so I could survive a single day at school, only to go to bed at night and do everything I can to learn something more, something permanent. At the same time, I know I could never be happy with ordinary. No matter how many years I spend learning to fit in I will still be me. And, that will never be enough, not even for me. So I keep going, hoping that one day I will be ok with not being perfect, but simply existing and knowing, that that is enough.

I just use whatever comes to mind and feels right. I tend to follow my instinct for most things. And sometimes, the name I choose can become symbolic in itself later on. I once gave a character the middle name Hyacinth, finding out later that the meaning humans have given to the flower resonate with him quite well. I once named a character Emily and had the man she thought was her runaway, biological father call her by the full thing, "Emilia", because it was he that gave it to her before he left. I named two characters Adam and Steve because hey, gay. Devon and Trevor cos it sounded like it rhymed. Elozonam because I wanted to find an Igbo name without "chi" or "chukwu" meaning God in them, seeing as I'm not a Christian and neither was he. His name means "don't forget me". I'm rather fond of how pretty it is. Elozonam. I'm planning on a character nicknamed Lucifer for funzies, his real name Lucian or something, though he may never see the light of day. Many of my creations haven't, honestly. There's a girl called Nebula cos her mother loved the cosmos and quite a few with names that begin with Z because it's my favourite letter. Any character I have with a name that starts that way is almost certainly a self-insert.

I have many names for myself, too. Zee, Zedd, Icarus, Rainbow. A few other, less used Z-starting names. It's fun. Names are important. We use them over and over again. If I'm gonna make a character I'll love enough to flesh them out, I definitely need a name that melds with my mind to go with it.

And that's that.

I love looking for names, but pick ones as quickly as possible. Researching is fun and I get distracted. Also, I’m pretty geeky, like researching, and get distracted easily. But I guess how to apply which naming method to which story and the process speeds me up a little or shows new ways to find names. Being dyslexic, I have a lot of trouble with names and languages, but, unfortunately, enjoy working with them.

Every so often, I find a name that looks nice as a sequence of letters, then spend a long time learning to pronounce it. Or I try to write down a name that sounds nice in my head and can’t.

Some names fit characters well immediately. The characters need a name, but I don’t always have an opinion about whether or not the names fit. Theoretically, I might not develop the character enough or he might not show up enough to determine the suitability. On the other hand, the reader might have his own opinion about what name would suit a character in the situation. Some names probably grate against a reader who knows more about the character's situation than me.

Though I can overthink names, sometimes persnicketiness matters. And I can’t predict when to be picky. I think more about whether the names generally coordinate with the story. Most people don’t choose their own names, so I think about demographics, family customs, and naming conventions. When I’m familiar with a naming system, picking out names speeds up, so sometimes I spend a while developing the system. Reading about naming conventions in general helps me conlang names and it’s interesting. Symbolism and meaning matters to some characters’ backgrounds. A character’s name might sound better with her born surname better than her married name. A character might be opinionated in the story about which name to use when and why, though that can be shown instead of told.

In most stories written over the past year, I use lists of the most common names for a specific time or place, like from the Social Security website or genealogy sites. Plenty of baby-naming sites list the name’s popularity, usually into the 1800s. Finding a name’s popularity earlier is difficult. Most names in Wolftown came from the Social Security first name lists and a list of Wisconsin surnames, and I spend minimal time choosing them and really only pay attention to the balance of Germanic names and non-Germanic names.

Quite a few sites list thousands of names, even from archaeological finds. Linguists don’t necessarily know how to pronounce the names, so I fill in missing sounds from Anglicized words. English probably corrupted the pronunciation and I made it worse, but the words are writeable and readable in English. When naming characters from unfamiliar times, places, or social groups, I compare multiple name lists carefully. I might be looking at the wrong thing, the names might vary significantly depending on social or historical factors I don’t know, the compilers could have miscategorized them, and the lists may have other problems I can’t recognize.

Also, I have a list of interesting names, which I tend to save for characters predicted to be important. Reading name lists, and paying attention to credits and acknowledgments probably feeds the names into my brain.

I change names while writing (even in the same paragraph) and double-check the consistency while editing. I know the characters’ identities, and since nobody reads the early drafts, confusion about little details matters much less than the storytelling. Also, multiple characters might be combined into one, and it’s possible to waste time thinking about their names and other details. (Sometimes, figuring out details helps me combine characters. I guess which while writing.)

If stopping to name interferes with a writing flow, I’ll call the character, “the [noun]”, with the noun being the role, the relationship to a character, or another distinguishing word. Some never need a name or they are better known by the description.

Changing or finishing a name might be at the last minute, thanks to search-and-replace. Sometimes I have trouble keeping track of the names; I accidentally gave a Wolftown character two different names and had to correct it after publishing. I'm guessing that making a list of characters and aliases would prevent it.

For a minor character, a member of a large cast, or another if the name seems unimportant, I basically scribble a name tag and slap it on him. Occasionally the character becomes important and has to put up with a random name that stuck. If the character is important enough or I’m unfamiliar with his background, I spend more time on naming. If the names seem too familiar, I google them, and if the name is too distinctive and somebody already has it, I change it.

When trying not to interrupt a writing flow, I just stop for a few seconds and the name pops into my head. Then I try out a few ones, like filling in a crossword puzzle, sometimes by looking for similar names. I might have a name list open, or spending a couple minutes looking at one gives my brain a break while being productive.

Writing the character without permanently naming him can give me enough information to find his name. I might think of the name or know which keywords to use. Also, figuring out the name occasionally leads me to useful details or somebody else’s name. Sometimes I need to spend time focusing on the character’s name. I try to search for names outside composing time, but sometimes I have to figure out the name. An unnamed character might be hard to write, maybe because finding a name digs up details about the character or story.

While looking for names, sometimes I list choices, which identify similarities and differences between names, the language, and the story, like finding a flavor or a clash. I try to limit the choices to two or three, but some characters have several options.

To conlang, I combine syllables or sounds randomly with each other, leaving off endings and the like until I have time to figure them out. I change existing names slightly if the language relies heavily on an existing language. For example, Elissa became Alisha. Unaltered names might fit, but for a current work-in-progress, I’ve been checking the names’ origins and replacing names when the characters wouldn’t be involved with the origin cultures. Breaking real words into prefixes, stems, and suffixes, and recombining them works well for me. The meaning might matter or they just need to sound good together. I had this idea because, as a Latin and Greek teacher, my dad could predict the effects of J. K. Rowling’s spells and her character’s identities.

Aliens are a nightmare to conlang and it’s because I assume alien vocal tracts and human vocal tracts are very different. So far, I’ve experimented with giving aliens Human names, approximating the aliens’ sounds to the human vocal cords, and translating alien words into a human language, although the translated thing might just vaguely look alike on Earth and the alien’s planet. “Coral” on Earth is an animal, but a planet’s “coral” might legitimately be a rock; I’m not sure. If aliens use robotic translators, I still have to write the sounds down somehow.

One story has particularly finicky names. The main character’s name is Charles Morgan; the antagonists make sure they have the right Charles Morgan. The antagonists and probably other people triple-check that they have the right Charles Morgan. The time travelers regularly alter their names to suit different historical periods or to keep their identities separate. The royalty tend to have long names and pick them carefully, based on tradition. I spent months calling one character her nickname, Classics, before figuring out her real name, Persephone, chosen because of her family’s interest in mythology. But only Charles may call her Classics; he invented it from a button on her bag. Other characters in the same work rely on codenames, and if they decide to use usernames, at least Charles has a strong urge to yell at them. An important character picked out the codename Macmillan. He wanted to be called Macmorris from Henry V, but I thought Macmorris’ name was Macmillan. By the time I noticed, Macmillan stuck—Macmorris was wrong. Macmillan and Persephone argue about which name Shakespeare used, everybody calls him Macmillan, and I’m not convinced anybody bothered looking up the answer. (Persephone argued for MacMorris.) Calling Mr. Tambling-Goggin anything else feels wrong, though characters use other names. He needed a British-sounding slightly odd name, which probably came from a list of rare British names. I can’t exactly remember its origin, but when it showed up, it was perfect. (This paragraph sounds like the elements should not go together, but they do, at least to me.)

Some of my works are actually…... written on the spot

Crazy

I just write here on prose without even looking for an inspiration

It scares me sometimes but it’s nice some other times

Because I see a like & I end up smiling the whole day

I hope what I’m saying is not crazy talk though

Personally, I can't stand it when Authors make their characters have Contrived names. Or burden their protagonists with Oppressive symbolism or metaphorical Meanings that only the writer ever knows of... I like good wholesome Common names that you find on any street. Bob is good. Everybody can related. Who hasn't had a dozen Bob's in his or her life?