That Smell?
The smell we knew from Grandma's Place?
That was just the smell of summer and spring
Of green and growing things.

I’ve been so quiet. 2025 curled around me like a storm and just went inward. Trying to not let life pull me. I centered on doing small, enjoyable things and pushed the sadness out–out there. Beyond the chaos.

2026 came and put together a plan. Back to videos, writing, art, a start at comic. Life, always seems to have other plans. One more thing I have to get done first. One more sickness. (breathing is hard again) One more if I don’t shove my entire life in a corner and do the adult things, it won’t matter.

Maybe I can’t commit. Maybe I am giving up.

I won’t. I won’t. I just need to account for my moments. I am trying, but I am so very tired.

It wasn’t a surprise. My grandmother had tired of life. So she ended it. For the past year after her last hospitalization, the bad one; the one my sister, and mother and I dropped everything for, was preparation for this. The last holiday. The final act. A last wish that was so crazy, it left me with a reminder of it every time I leave my house, and a story that hurts to tell but just wants to be told. To finally, one last get-together, one that I had to cut short for my daughter. Meaning, painfully, that I might never see most of the family again.

A month later, I started to feel the freedom again. Memories from apps still bring up pictures, and I want to cry. Sometimes I do. I’m starting to pick up the routines when I can. Hindered by a mysterious shoulder injury and my anxiety, I’m trying to put out feelers. Trying to see if find my people.

I’m trying to write more, art more. Be more. Crawling out of the quagmire of work, pushing through the pain of rejection.

Last year, I thought I found my tribe. It felt right, I was letting my light out, and then suddenly, it turned out it was the very wrong place, that I wasn’t wanted, that I had intruded. I joined a local art group, a paint & sip. It was lively, eclectic and it was so cool art and talk about art. But it turned out it was just friend group of one man, one man who yelled at me for talking one day.

When I found the group, I had been told it was open and inclusive. But it turned out it was by invite only, and I had invited myself. The man told me I was rude, took up too much space, that everyone agreed that I had to leave.. and oh, btw, I stank.

wat?

I heard later from others that this wasn’t true, or might be true, but not to the extent he said. Either way, he then blocked me from the group after telling me to never come back. Sometimes I see them advertising as a free group, welcome to all and know that’s not true.

Now every art event that shows up, I stop, and look and think. What if it is the same group? What if they tell me to leave? I loved the little cafe that it was held at, but I can’t go back unless they are not there because it is so small that they take up the whole space.

So I don’t.

And I’m trying to go out more, do things. Find people. Nothing feels right. There are good groups that I wouldn’t mind going back to after the year of work hell, then the year of mourning. Now I just have to step outside.

And I find that the hardest of all.

Life narrowed down in a funnel to one moment.

A moment you have to crawl out of…

but. it. is. so. easy.

to slip back in.

I started this post in … April? I had a hard winter, for lots of reasons, mostly health but I started to get back into the swing of things, posting videos, painting, writing. I thought after living in WA for over a year I was finding my grove.

Then Google changed some internet rules and work got insane. In my line of work, internet rules matter a lot, and I was working late hours to keep up. I didn’t have much mental or physical energy left, so most of the “me” time I got went to my dogs or me just shutting down in a video game.

Finally, work cooled off and I started coming out of it… only to have family stuff, political stuff… and the world came at me with a hammer.

Figuratively.

I’m trying hard to get things done. And that’s what this post doing. The start of my out-of-funk.

Where Am I?

The fragmentation of the internet is here and it’s not pretty. What once was an interconnected ecosystem of meaning, meanness, and discovery, has become an epic dick-measuring contest. I can’t be everywhere at once so I have had to make some choices. My socials are listed at the top of my page. At least the ones I try to keep up with. The further down the list they go, the less likely I’m updating them. At least directly. You’ll notice Twitter is at the bottom. Yes, I know the name was changed to satisfy a toddler’s whim from the 90’s. I don’t care.

So where do I reside on the webs these days? Forums have mostly moved to Discord. I don’t have my own. Maybe I will at some point. My footprint seems too small but I’ll get to that.

This post is gonna skip around but please be patient I have a lot to get too.

Instagram

Look. I know they have skeevy practices with your content. However, it’s still where I can post and hit the most places, and have the most views. It’s usually the first place I post because it’s still an image-first platform. It will also post to my Facebook page and my Threads account so I don’t have to. Though sometimes Threads will post back to Instagram… and well, it’s a thing. I can’t afford to look at everything but I do scan for comments here. Or a try too.

YouTube

I have a channel. I’ve had one for years. I’m trying to get back to one video a week, but right now I’m managing one every two weeks. Unfortunately, I don’t have enough followers or views to make any money off it but I enjoy making the videos so much. Lots of painting, some writing, some pagan and tarot content. Last week I put up my review and speed paint of Arteza Gouache. It’s really become about my art journey. This annoyingly has been helpful when someone accuses me of using AI because I can point to my videos and say, “See, you can watch me paint it!” Please come watch!

Ko-Fi

Those pink buttons and little coffee cups are links to Ko-Fi, an alternative to Patreon. Here, if you would like to support me, you can sen a few dollars or even sign up for a few dollars a month. Month subscriptions right now will get you mention in my videos and streams, as well as other content. This also where I plan to sell art prints from because unlike Etsy & Patreon, Ko-Fi doesn’t take huge fees from the purchaser or the artist. I don’t get money from YouTube, Twitch, or any sponsors.

BlueSky

Now that Twitter is just a black hole for Musk’s echo chamber, finding a new place to settle has been difficult. However BlueSky became that place both because of it’s familiarity and because most of who I follow wandered there. After Instagram, this is the first place I post.

Cara

While the newest, is place is just for artists or people who want to follow artists. It’s great for sharing your art and saving a portfolio. Only my art posts go there though…it’s not really for anything else. But it’s nice, the internet has really be lacking an art community for artists for awhile.

Twitch

I haven’t steamed since the beginning of the year. Mostly because I burned out hard. I think I liked doing the art and writing streams better than gaming ones. Mostly because when I lose myself in a game, I don’t want to talk. I plan to do more streams, but they are going to be art & writing focused… if I can get my act together. Streams usually get posted afterwards to YouTube.

Tumblr, Mastadon, Threads and the Rest

Links are at the top but I don’t frequent these much. When I remember I try to post to these, Threads gets posts from Instagram…and mabye Facebook. Not sure. I only go there where someone says something interesting. Twitter is now the last place I post, if I remember at all. Why bother. Unless you pay you see nothing and no one sees your post.

Blog, and World Anvil

I’ve been pretty bad about post in here and in news in World Anvil. I do try. And now that I have a working website again, I plan to post more. My world building is all on World Anvil though and that gets updated everytime I write.

I wish I could post to all the these places at once. I miss being able to do that.

The Future

So thats how to find me. I’m trying hard to make this art thing work. This writing thing work. Please consider supporting me. Subscirbe, Like, and maybe check out Ko-Fi.

Happy Friday all.

I have a neat calendar. I set timers, alarms, etc but just getting out a video every week is so hard. I want to do it but I also just want to melt away.

Like my motivation has.

Every time I’ve been successful, in anything from cleaning to creating, it has been because I have people to do it with me. I don’t have that for most things. No one to make go, or talk to while I clean. No one to read my work, or check my painting.

I’m not giving up. I’m not. But I have to acknowledge that I’m having trouble. I have no solutions. Only the hope that maybe I can find some way past this block.

I’ve found a new writing group. They only do one story/chapter a week, but I’ve thrown my name in. A deadline is important.

Otherwise, I’m trying. I will have a video done today. I just need to add the music. Everything else is edited. I will paint this weekend. I have no excuse not to.

I will do this.

I’m reading through the rest of Terry Pratchett’s books that I haven’t read yet. I need something I know will be good. I don’t feel like searching at the moment and this seems like a good idea. I’ve read Pratchett on and off through the years. So I decided to fill in the gaps I have on Discworld, starting with Equal Rites.

It helps that people want to do things. I will get out. I have two groups that expect me to be there. And I’ve promised myself to do at least one other out-of-the-house thing. Either one I have joined previously or something new.

I will keep trying.

I will.

At the beginning of 2023, I was still hip-deep in unpacking from my move. Honestly, I was overwhelmed, and while I tried to enter the Portland/Vancouver scene, I found my spoons low. With the looming deadline of July for when my house had to be put together when my family would descend upon my house to make sure I was not homeless, I decided to run an upgrade on my website that I had been putting off.

Yes, I know. Procrastination.

And so I set up to run my updates. Look, the site is old. Started in the 90s on free servers and moved through several blog suites until settling on a very early version of WordPress. Sure, I’ve been doing the updates, but this was a big one.

A catastrophic one.

I cannot describe what it is like to see something you have worked on for over 20 years melt before your eyes. The conflicts cascaded and destroyed my installations.

Building WordPress sites is part of my professional toolset. I took deep breaths, broke some bones in video games, and got to work. I decided to abandon Elementor for Gutenberg and set to rebuild and redesign the site.

I managed to get unpacked, and between work, travel, painting, and trying to be a successful adult, I managed a new design, a backend rebuild, and a new database. I carefully migrated content and hit new on Post.

Then BlueHost lost it’s fucking mind.

They sent out letters to all current customers that they would be downgrading our plans, and start deleting random files from our websites, as well as limiting traffic and possibly taking away the ability to park domains starting Nov 1st, unless we forked over 1000$. I had just renewed and they refused to let me cancel my account or get a refund. I could delete over half my files even though I was under the new limits or just lose them.

Fuck.

I scrambled to find a new host that wasn’t owned by Bluehost’s parent company and finally settled on Green Geeks. Then began the several months job of moving the sites I hosted.

And finally, I finished.

And 2023 was such a year.

Year In Review: 2023

It took me 9 months to unpack my house. I never thought I’d buy a house again. Never. And yet now I have a cute little town home with room for a studio. I had a deadline though. Friends and family were coming to visit starting in July and I had to be done enough for that. A new place, alone, and I had to spend the first 9 months unpacking. I did get out. I’ve found a few writer groups to join. There is a great year round farmers market here, and the sea, and the rivers, and mountains.

This far west it doesn’t really snow. And that’s been actually great. It rains all winter, and we may get half an inch of snow once or twice but that’s it. There are always flowers, and green grass. I live in a city in a forest.

Now that I have a studio, it’s become much easier to paint. It took a lot of setup and I still need to set up all the electronics so that I can do my Twitch stream from there. I’m filming all my YouTube videos there as well. Paiting has been such a gift. I love it. The paint, the time. I wish I could have done this years ago, but it does cost quite a bit of money. I still love digital painting. But I need to find a way to run a cables to my couch.

I post most of my paintings on Instagram. And I set up a little Ko-Fi but no members yet. I think I even have a painting I might want to turn into a print.

I was streaming video games but it was becoming too much. I wasn’t enjoying playing and talking by myself. I’d rather spend that time creating and painting. I want to write more. I want to paint. So I have to make time for that.

Games are not gone. I’ve been very heavily back into Final Fantasy 14. It’s been so much fun to play. Worst writing of of almost any FF game, but the people and the play is fun, even though they are dumbing it down consistantly.

The dogs are good. Quibble had to have a tooth operation in July but he did well. Mochi is terror. Gir is just Gir.

Healthwise it was a bad year. I had a spot growing on my face and it turned out to be Melonoma… and then it wasn’t… then it was. Rather than risk it I made the surgeon take it off. So now I have a scar from my eye to my ear. Worth it.

And that’s been my year. Trying to find my place in a new location. 2024 isn’t off to the best start. I’ve been depressed and not writing or painting. I’m gettng back to it but lost two months. I have been submitting stories at least.

That’s not fully true. My dogs are here. I talk with and visit friends all the time. Life is just a quiet stillness for me. And realizations.

Realizations that I am happy. I don’t need anyone to make me happy.

Dating has not gone well. At this age who is left but those who would drag me down? Now I put things where I want them. Make the food I want to eat. Do the things I enjoy.

Why change that for someone else?

I went on a date last Friday. It was all things I hated. The little things. Things that build up over time. I had to conform to where they had to go. Fit into their schedule. Wait for them. Oops, they decided to do something else before and after. It cut into our time. Oops. Just wait, and leave early. Wait some more.

No.

I don’t want to compromise everything. I don’t want to make others feel comfortable. What about my comfort?

Selfish.

Motherfucker, I earned selfish.

Not to say I don’t want to help. I will help, I will enjoy.

I won’t break my back to do everything for you when you do nothing for me.

It’s a whole thing and reminds me of when my kid was little.

Hold up. Three dogs?

Yes, well Mochi entered my life a few months ago. So now with Quibble and Gir, I now have a (at the time of this writing) 6-month-old puppy. And that’s not even the end of what happened in the latter half of 2022.

I moved to Washington. At first, it was, I need to find a new place to live. Then it was maybe I should move out of Idaho. Then they brought guns to the farmer’s market to protect from Antifa and yep, it’s time to leave Idaho.

So I started looking for an apartment. But then Mochi happened, and now I needed to find a private renter, cause three dogs is a no go from a corporate landlord. So I’m looking and find a rent-to-own company. A legit one. Even better, I qualify with them. I start talking to realtors and one sends me their mortgage guy… just in case.

Screw rent-to-own. I just bought a townhome.

Through this, I’m off to NWTS, where I get to meet all kinds of tarot people, including Benebell Wen. I’m painting, making videos, streaming writing and then I move.

It all kind of came crashing down because now I have to unpack. And it’s been slow. I still can’t find the clip for my monitors. I haven’t even started the studio room. My socks are missing. I keep getting sick (everything but covid). The dogs are undecided about the backyard.

But.

I love it here.

My streams are canceled this week due to sickness, but please head over to Youtube and my channel at: https://www.youtube.com/c/MichelleNorton and check out the videos there. Right now it’s mostly video games as for my sanity, PS5 got set up first. I hope to have something setup soon but a new painting video will be up tomorrow as well.

Tuesday: Trying to learn Apex. I’m having a hard time wrapping my head around it. I don’t have a background in Java so this is new territory. I’ll get there. Tarot was quiet today. Wrote 730 words.

Wednesday: Huge medication mix up with the pharmacy. They are trying to fix it. Got some painting done, screwed up the live stream, but still got a lot done. Strangers of Paradise is a lot of fun.

Thursday: Played No Man’s Sky. Got to a black hole. Sold stuff. Nearly got eaten.

Friday: Painting. So much painting. But it’s going well.

Saturday: Summer Solstice Festival. Went well. long day.

Sunday: Sleep, with small boughts of gaming and TV watching.

I’m not planning a game system, languages or anything of that type. I’m reverse engineering a world which I’ve had a clear picture in my mind for twenty years. And it’s hard. It’s so easy to just write and let your world get away from you.

But I’m not good at remembering what I did. I tell the story of the Left Turn, in which, my characters turned left for 100 pages. Oops.

I’ve spent much of the last few years just trying to scrape up the energy to create, so this is my starting point. On Wednesdays, I stream part of the process on Twitch. If you’re interested you can see the work I’m doing here: Eidmaharia.