In the Interests of Closure · 6:57pm Jan 8th, 2021
...I've published the long-standing "ghost notes" for FOE: New Pegas. Some last-minute clarifications and editing has been done as of today, but all of these entries are from the original project which I started a decade ago. They were the "working notes" segments which I would reference and update as necessary during the project, which has effectively ended at the closure of Arc One after 21 chapters.
A 22nd chapter, still unfinished and unreleased, remains unpublished, as there is no point to starting Arc Two only to have it be stillborn.
EDIT: screw it, Ch22 is now published plus the notes for it, FWIW. Let the chips fall...
I once said that I was keeping this story open in "unfinished" status, not only because it is, but because I might one day return to working on it "even if that's a decade from now". Well, it's been almost a decade since I started New Pegas back in 2011. So this book deserves to be officially closed, just as the show itself ended on the closing of a book.
"It's like poetry, it rhymes" - some schmuck who did some movies people used to like
PERSONAL NOTE: I wasn't aware of it when I began in 2011, but in November 2014 the Veterans' Administration diagnosed me as suffering from PTSD dating back to the Gulf War era. A number of weird traumatic experiences in Iraq had apparently taken their toll, but because I had also endured an exceptionally traumatic childhood, I had not noticed my own mental decline. It was not until I had what I thought was a heart attack, and reported myself to the VA for treatment, that the truth unfurled: I was having panic attacks, set off by the stress of having done IT support for twenty years.
Basically, I had "just dealt with it" for all those years. Now I was unable to, and I still am unable to. I have borderline-autistic levels of analysis (which lent itself to my IT work), a need to rationalize everything (which lent itself to endless headcanonizing), and an inability to tolerate injustice (which has led to building anger at my inability to "fix everything" in real life). This project was, in retrospect, an outgrowth of all that need to self-express which does not otherwise exist for me. It's why I'm writing this even now, even if no one reads it. It's not about finding a shoulder to sob on; it's about facing my internal self in a more concrete way (typing) than normal (talking/railing to myself).
Medication doesn't help. The VA just threw literally random pills and dosages at me, flatly telling me to my face they were experimenting. When I told them I was experiencing weird reactions (such as the impossible sensation of "feeling" a section of brain cells rotate 90 degrees), they just said it was impossible with no explanation or concern and threw another set of pills/dosages at me. So I stopped taking pills altogether. There was no therapy, just a checklist which literally asked me to self-diagnose so they could then assign the "correct" doctor for that.
According to the VA, my mental disability sums up as "bipolar". That's it. One word on a computer screen. Nothing attached to it, not even what KIND of bipolar disorder. When I'm up on the flip side, I have boundless energy and creativity, when I'm down it's like living in a vat of mental molasses. And that latter state is where I've been these past several years.
So that's why I never finished the story. Sorry if it's TMI. Just had to get it out of my system, so to speak.
Have a good one.
Hope you have a better one dude.
5431565
Thanks. I'll try. -:)
Huh, updated. Gonna read it soon.
Hi, I was linked your story in a server on discord. While I will read it, I just want to say that as a person who has had early onset bipolar for over a decade or so now, it sounds like you are having mixed episodes. If you need some help with shaping your writing process around it or general advice, I can try and help in PM.
5432285
I appreciate the offer, but I'm not really looking at doing any new writing. I'm a little surprised I actually threw myself into polishing up these old notes instead of just clicking the "publish" button and walking away...
5432364
I was presuming that you might not be doing pony writing, but not writing is okay too!
I think. I haven’t tried it before.