Flash Fiction Month 2021
It's that time again.
This year, I'm going to try to complete 31 days of flash fiction writing madness, and I'm taking on an additional challenge posted by The-Inkling on the FFM Discord server:
Every day, I will use a different (randomly selected) archetype from this list as a springboard to create my story's protagonist: https://screencraft.org/2018/07/09/99-archetypes-and-stock-characters-screenwriters-can-mold/
I'm gonna list them below, numbered, to make things easier for me; the linked article has descriptions of each archetype. As they're used, I will also add links to the relevant stories.
I also recognize that some of these archetypes are often used in problematic ways (e.g., Blind Seer, Mentally or Socially Disabled). If I draw them, I'll see about doing something to subvert the tropes that come with them.
Some of them are also explicitly *not* protagonists, usually, so it'll be fun to work with those if they come up. I have some ideas from going down the list, but we'll see what the mighty Hydra inspires with their prompts and challenges.
Happy FFM! VIVA! 
Here's the list:
Absent-Minded Professor
All Loving Hero
Anti-Hero
Anthropomorphic Personification
Audience Surrogate
Bad Boy
Big Fun
Black Knight
Blind Seer
Boss
Boy Next Door
Career Criminal
Champion
Child
Chosen One
Chooser of the Chosen One
Conscience
Contender
Corrupter
20. Damsel in Distress
21. Dark Lord
22. Dumb Muscle
23. Elderly Master
24. Egomaniac
25. Fall Guy
26. Father Figure
27. Femme Fatale
28. Ferryman
29. Final girl
30. Gentle Giant
31. Gentleman Thief
32. Girl Next Door
33. God or Goddess
34. Good King - 7/2, The Choice
35. Grande Dame
36. Grotesque
37. Harlequin
38. Herald
39. Hero
40. Hotshot
41. Hunter of Monsters
42. Ingenue
43. Imposter/Pretender
44. Jester
45. Jock
46. Kirk
47. Knight-errant
48. Loner
49. Loser
50. Lovable Rogue
51. Lovers
52. Loyalist
53. Mad Scientist
54. Magician or Shaman
55. Maiden
56. Manic Pixie Dream Girl
57. McCoy
58. Mentally or Socially Disabled
59. Mentor
60. Monster
61. Mother Figure
62. Mother's Boy
63. Nemesis/Challenger
64. Nerd
65. Noble Savage
66. Observer
67. Outlaw
68. Peacemaker
69. Pessimist
70. Psychopath
71. Rebel
72. Redshirt - 7/1, A Rousing Fire
73. Reluctant Monster
74. Rightful King
75. Seeker
76. Shrew
77. Side Kick
78. Sociopath
79. Southern Belle
80. Spock
81. Straight Man
82. Storyteller
83. Superhero
84. Super Soldier
85. Supervillain
86. Swashbuckler
87. Tomboy
88. Tortured Artist
89. Town Drunk
90. Tragic Hero
91. Trickster
92. Troubled Teen
93. Turncoat
94. Village Idiot
95. Villain
96. Whiskey Priest
97. Wise Fool
98. Wise Old Man
99. Yokel
I'm BACK holy shit!
Y'all. Y'ALL. If anyone still watches this account. I know a lot of folks have moved on. I lost access for a while and finally got it back (huge, huge, thanks to dA's help desk). I'd been posting a bit on @mxtress. Head over there if you want to see some recent lit by me. I'll be figuring out what to do about having two accounts now, how to merge and such, and spring cleaning this account.
ANYWAYS I HAVE SO MANY LIFE UPDATES SO BUCKLE UP.
I got a divorce, which I have a lot of feelings about, but that was a few years ago and I'm on to bigger and better things so I don't wanna focus on it, except as general writing fodder on occasion.
I came out--I'm nonbinary, and my pronouns are they/them, and I'm GAY and that probably doesn't surprise many people at all, it was kind of obvious in retrospect. HAPPY FREAKING PRIDE.
I finished college, which I had just started when I last posted! I have a B.S. in Psychology, a B.A. in Modern Language & Culture, and a minor in Latin American/Latinx Studies. I studied abroad TWICE and did so much psychology and interdisciplinary research. I graduated magna cum laude and got outstanding student awards from both my major departments. I paid for all of it on my own, with student loans (urgh). I'm still doing research and am the lab manager for one of my mentors.
I'm polyamorous now and I have THREE amazing partners! All of us are trans and it's glorious! One is a very dear old friend I wound up falling in love with, the other two I met at events and clicked with since then. And my nesting partner and I are getting married next year.
I've been working full-time since I finished my degrees and am planning on going to grad school. I'm going to be a professor. My interests are still widespread, but it feels SO AMAZING to have decided on a direction.
I've been in therapy with a therapist who doesn't suck and is actually quite amazing for about three years now and have made sense of so much about myself and my life. I haven't been formally diagnosed for reasons but I'm pretty sure I have C-PTSD.
My fiancée and I adopted an extremely cute mixed breed dog. She's a brat, but she's our brat.
WHAT HAVE YOU ALL BEEN UP TO I MISSED YOU SO MUCH
Hiiii, guys and gals! I'm not dead.
It's been over a year since my last post, and I just wanted to reach out and see if anyone is still here. I miss my friends from this site, although I'm in touch with a couple of you via Facebook. If you want to talk, hit me up. And if you're reading this post, I want you to link me to one of your favorite things from the last year that you've submitted. Writing, photography, a drawing, a particularly poignant journal post, whatever. There's no way in hell I can catch up on absolutely everything, but I really want to see a little of everything I've missed.
My depression has been better overall (but it's still there, and I still have really bad days, so I'm in therapy again), and I've been a lot more active offline. I'm returning to college next month after three years away (different college, of course, you couldn't pay me to go back to the old one!). I've started hanging out with an old friend a lot and made a bunch of new ones, and we all do a weekly tabletop game group (Dungeons & Dragons and the like). I'm writing a campaign for D&D right now and reading a lot and setting up my very own office because we've moved into a HUGE house (renting). It's the first time I've had my very own space in 5 years, and it feels amazing. If this doesn't turn out to be a quick single post then disappear for another year thing, I'll show y'all a picture when it's a little more done. Right now there's one more bookcase to assemble, and walls to paint, and BOOKS TO ORGANIZE.
I also have internet for the first time in over a year. Yep. You read that correctly. The apartment we were in kind of screwed us on that front, so we just didn't get an internet package and survived on mobile data hot spots. It wasn't fun.
It's weird trying to sum up the last year of my life in a couple of paragraphs, but there you go. That's pretty much it.
Hope you're all doing well!
Love,
Kae
Life's a Lazy River
As of right now, I have had very little desire to write anything I could post here. I have a few pieces planned for Flash Fiction Month, but that isn't until July. I'm trying to work on a book, and I swear, no matter how much uplifting advice I read on it, I don't feel any more confident in my ability to get it done. I'm pretty sure George R. R. Martin writes faster than I do. Well, maybe not. Point is, I'm moving at a glacial pace. My interest in poetry has pretty much gone away for now. I tend to go through phases where I mostly write either poetry or prose for a year or more at a time, and I guess right now I'm just in a prose stage. I've considered writing memoir-ish things--maybe a bunch of short pieces that fit together. I've been doing a lot of reflecting on my life so far and feeling like I need to put it into words, even if I don't end up showing it to very many people.
I'm moving into my new apartment on Wednesday and I'm really excited about it. The town seems really nice (it's a smaller town, just a little bit further from Atlanta than where I grew up). The people I've encountered there so far are really friendly and laid back. It feels right for the pace at which I find myself moving through time right now. I'm dressing more simply. I'm eating more slowly. I'm finding it easy to do one thing for hours at a time for the first time since... maybe high school, before I got depressed the last time. (Has it really been that long?) I'm getting rid of things and adopting a more minimalist lifestyle. I'm sleeping a lot more, and not feeling guilty about sleeping in so late (I wake up around noon, because John's work schedule is 1:00 pm until midnight, and he usually has to stay a bit longer than that so by the time he gets home and we've gotten everything done that needs to get done, it's at least 3 in the morning, though getting to bed around 5 isn't uncommon). I'm finding the idea of living in a Tiny House or an RV ridiculously appealing these days. We're seriously considering it as a possibility for a year or two down the road. We're spending this lease saving up as much money as possible, so we will no longer be living practically paycheck to paycheck. We're expecting to come out ahead at the end of this month, which is... a first.
I keep feeling guilty about neglecting DeviantART and my friends here, though I talk to many of you elsewhere (especially those I've known for a long time). I know I shouldn't, but I do. I've known so many people who have moved on from this community, and I fear my time might be approaching, but I'm not ready to let go just yet. This place has been a part of my life on and off for eight years, and it's still the easiest way I've found to explore new art and get feedback on my own. Yet I feel like the part of my journey as a writer I'm at is the buckle-down-and-spend-eight-hours-a-day-on-this-thing-you-want-to-do-no-excuses-it's-your-job part. I need to spend hours writing my stories and reading other ones. I need to not let myself get distracted by things that don't matter. I need to stop feeling bad that nothing is done and ready to publish, because really, there aren't even that many things I've posted here that I consider "done" that I'd even dream of sending off to be published somewhere they'd maybe pay me for it.
It's complicated, I guess. I really appreciate all the friends I've made here for bearing with me. I love you guys.
