Month: September 2012

F-O-C-U-S Spells…Ah, Fuck It.

Stefanie Snider

I’m in one hell of a slump.

I don’t know if it’s the general blue feeling I’ve been experiencing lately, or my propensity to take on WAY more than I can actually handle, but…I’m frozen. I feel like I can’t get anything done. I have a million projects on the go, and rather than focusing on one at a time and seeing it through to completion, I find myself dancing around sticking my fingers into all of them and finishing nothing.

I like to think I’m driven. I like to think I can master this whole discipline thing. But frankly, discipline isn’t all that much fun. It’s easier to waste time on the internet. It’s easier to wait until the perfect moment comes along. It’s easier to blame my lack of productivity on those absent douchebag Muses (who, by the way, are not getting the raise they requested).

But really? It’s me. Of course it is. I’m the one finding excuses. I’m the one wasting time on things that don’t matter. I feel scattered and overwhelmed right now and I’m having a hard time digging myself out of this hole. (Yes, I know I’m being whiny. And yes, I know I don’t have patience for whiners. But I’m not perfect, and it is what it is.)

I know, in my heart of hearts, that the only thing that will fix this is — you guessed it — focus. I need to pick the one thing that’s more important than all those other things and pummel it until it cracks and something wonderful falls out.

Now if I could only figure out what that thing is…

Excerpt from “You Only Live Once”, a Horror Story by Stefanie N Snider

Stefanie Snider

“What they don’t tell you is what it feels like not to die.

They don’t tell you that the casket isn’t actually padded; that there’s only a bit of cushion under your head and shoulders, and that’s for your family to feel better, not you. You’re supposed to be dead.

They don’t tell you that the backs of your clothes will be cut away, and that you’re not so much wearing them as being covered by them, like lying under a quilt whose pieces are unattached. No one worries about decency, or dignity for that matter, when it comes to dead guys.

There’s no such thing as comfort, when you’re supposed to be dead. Take me: my left leg is broken just under the knee, because by the time they found my body it had stiffened oddly to the side. It’s all in how you fall, see, and it’s hard to worry about the convenient alignment of your body when you’re trying not to die in the first place. They cracked the bone to make it lie neatly in the casket, in case an inquisitive relative (nosey, they said, because they didn’t know I was listening) should happen to peep under the closed end of the box. They want you to look like you’re just resting, like even if you were able to get out, you’d still be there because it’s just so damned comfy.

No one sleeps like this: body ramrod straight, arms on chest, hands twined together. When you go to bed tonight, try it, then tell me if it’s how you’d want to spend eternity.

God, I hope I wink out before eternity.

At least now they’ve stopped fussing at me. I wouldn’t have thought myself a prudish person in life, but somehow when you know that you’re being stripped out of your soiled clothes and laid out, naked, to be washed by strangers, you develop sudden surprising shynesses. You try to remember whether you showered the morning she killed you, and whether or not you wore clean socks. It becomes paramount that the rubber-gloved attendant now seeing to your final needs not be embarrassed or disgusted on your behalf.

That’s not how you’d be remembered, if you could have a say. If they could hear you.”

– from You Only Live Once, a short horror story by Stefanie N Snider.
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Halloween Food: Make a Meat Head

Stefanie Snider

This would be a fantastic centerpiece for a Halloween party*. You’ve got a month left to harvest I mean, purchase a skull…

Get the recipe at The Rogue Cookie. (Photo by EmergencyFan2000 on flickr.)

*For extra credit, set it nonchalantly on the table at a regular party and wait for the screams!

Moments in Writing: Know When to Give Up

Stefanie Snider

I took on a writing commission months ago. The brief was to write a dozen children’s stories for someone’s niece and nephew, working in details of the kids’ lives to make a keepsake for Christmas. I was given a deposit and let loose.

I can’t do it.

It’s not for lack of trying. I’ve tried, and tried, and tried. But I just can’t wrap my mind around writing for children. C says it would be easier to fake it if I were a fantasy writer…“Kids like that kind of stuff.”

True, but I’m not elves-and-magic-beans. I’m murder-you-and-feed-you-to-pigs. I don’t have kids. I don’t know the first thing about age-appropriate stories. I didn’t even read kids’ books when I was one.

I think part of growing your artistic career is setting limits and knowing yourself. So as much as I’d love for those kids to get my stories under their tree, I’m going to have to refund that deposit.

I thought I would feel guilty. But instead I feel proud. Proud of myself for moving forward with my career the way I want, not the way other people expect. It feels good.

I Ate a Severed Thumb

Stefanie Snider

I went camping last week with a couple friends from high school. Both are vegetarians, so tofu hotdogs were on the menu. “No problem,” says I, “I don’t mind veggie dogs.”

Cue the package being opened and the dogs being doled out. I had threaded mine onto a coat hanger classy upscale roasting implement when I noticed something odd.

It looked a little…grotesque. The package must have been sealed too tightly, squishing the hotdogs together, and resulting in a strange discoloration.

Either that, or some dude at the factory lost his thumb and no one noticed.

I ate it anyway. It was delicious.