Category Archives: General Posts

Sports, relationships, parenting, literature, education, and more. If it catches my interest that day, I’ll write about it.

General Posts

About Time

July 30, 2016 D.A. Adams 1 Comment

I fully admit and accept that it’s rather cliche for someone who has been incarcerated to wax poetic about time, but in my experience on this earth, nothing brings it into such sharp focus quite so well. There is our measurement of time–the seconds, minutes, hours, days, months, and years we use to mark its passage. This artificial system, though imperfect and dynamic according to the laws of physics, serves it purpose of keeping our minds grounded in the present while still allowing us to consider the past and future. We need this system, else many of us would slip into madness as time flowed forever onward. But the system is not the thing itself, merely our tool for counting it.

Then, there is our perception of time, an inconstant and capricious master that drives our every waking moment. During joyful moments, time seems to fly as the old saying goes, while during the difficult experiences it can seem nearly to stop. In jail, one single night can feel like a veritable lifetime as the seconds crawl along. Much more so than our system for measuring it, our perception of time is dynamic and pliable to the whims of circumstance. But still, our perception is not the thing itself.

Time itself flows forward, inexorable and implacable as it goes. Time cares nothing for circumstance or systems of measurement. It merely is, and whether we like it or not, whether we accept it or not, time moves in one direction, only in that direction, and only at a constant rate. You cannot recapture yesterday, and you cannot fast forward to tomorrow. If you are alive on this planet, you must endure the relentless flow of time one moment to the next. Learning and accepting this fact can be the most important thing you ever do for yourself.

Regardless of my circumstances or what I choose to do, today will slip away. If I’m mired in an unpleasant situation, I can choose to sit by passively and wait for it to pass, and it will, though what about my circumstances have really changed? Have I learned anything? Grown as a person? Changed my perception? Or am I merely allowing time to flow by as I hope for something positive to happen?

If time is going to pass regardless, then I will use my moments to pursue actively those things I desire. Do I really want to lose weight? I can find 30 minutes in each day to walk if I choose to. Do I truly want to improve my vocabulary? There is time if I take advantage of the moments. Am I stuck in a suffocating relationship? What will change if I don’t utilize time to my advantage and find a way out of those circumstances? Whatever it is, the time is going to pass whether I take action or not, so I am much better off using time to improve something about myself, and if I make small incremental changes every single day, over the course of weeks and months, I will see the benefits of those choices.

That is what I’ve learned about time.

General Posts

A New Direction

July 23, 2016 D.A. Adams 11 Comments

When I first started this blog back in 2009, I did so for the primary purpose of having a medium to keep my writing skills sharp during the academic year when I didn’t have time to work on a book or stories. The secondary purpose was to reach my readers on a more direct level so that we could interact. From the outset, I approached this blog with the simple guideline that I wrote about whatever I wanted on any given day. Any subject was fair game. I feel like I wrote some pretty strong pieces through this medium, and for the most part I have no regrets about the blog itself.

However, times have changed, as have my circumstances. During my incarceration, I thought long and hard about what I would like to do here once I got out. At heart, in addition to being a writer (I will always consider myself a writer first and foremost), I am an educator, someone who thrives on helping others expand their own skills and improve their lives, but when I left the system in 2014, I left permanently because of the soul-crushing bureaucracy and the insane for-profit business model overtaking higher education. Now, with the stigma associated with my current situation, I couldn’t return to the profession if I wanted to. But that doesn’t mean I cannot still teach on my own terms.

To that end, I am going to turn my blog into an online classroom of sorts. I will have at least four new weekly segments dedicated to the craft of writing. First and foremost, there will be a video lecture series in which I share some of what I know. Each video will be roughly 10 minutes in length and will cover mostly the material I used to share in the classroom. Second, there will be a day dedicated to vocabulary. Each week I will share 20 or so new words with definitions, usages, and etymologies. Third, one day a week, I will open up the blog for questions on the subject of writing and will offer the best feedback I can. PLEASE NOTE: I will not read and critique manuscripts. I do not have the time or energy for that. Last, I will also share a weekly book review of a novel I feel is worthy of study by aspiring writers. These reviews will be done solely at my discretion and will be limited to books already published (and usually fairly successful and/or acclaimed). These four segments will be the meat of my new blog, and if popularity warrants, I will continue for as long as possible. I may still have a fifth segment where I have a weekly Rambling on some topic of my choosing, but I’m not certain of that yet.

There are two primary reasons why I want to make these changes at this time. For starters, as I said, I am still at heart an educator, and as such I still feel a burning passion to share my knowledge with others. I love language–the sound of words; the power of a well-constructed sentence; the ability to evoke emotions, challenge assumptions, and affect persuasion. I want other to partake in this great dance and find their own voices to add to the chorus. The second reason for these changes is more selfish. I feel like this new format will help me reach a broader audience, not just for this blog but also for my own writings. Only time will tell if that proves true.

I will continue to write and publish my own works. Book five of The Brotherhood of Dwarves series is already in progress. In addition to that, I intend to write more Sam Skeen novellas. I also have a futuristic urban fantasy series that I will begin as soon as I finish book five. Finally, I have decided to revisit some of my older writings and see if anything can be salvaged from that scrapheap. If people like it, I will continue to develop those ideas; if not, I’ll march forward with the other three series.

There is much work to be done–on the blog, with books, around my home, and in my personal life. It may take another week or do to get the new format launched, but it is coming soon. I want to have the first couple of videos finished and ready to upload to YouTube before giving this site its makeover. Please, stay tuned for all that’s coming, for the future feels promising to me for the first time in many years. Finally, thank you for all of the love and support you have shown me over the last week. My heart is full and I am blessed beyond measure by all of the messages and comments I’ve received. With you behind me, there is no limit to how far I can go.

General Posts

Yet Another Venting

March 23, 2015 D.A. Adams 8 Comments

I don’t want this post to come across as self-pity because I don’t mean it as such. I’m simply trying to sort through my circumstances and make a little sense out of my life as it currently stands. Right now, the only word that comes to mind is disenfranchised. I feel completely and utterly powerless to impact my own future. With this illness, I can’t fend for myself, and our disability system is a travesty. Civilized societies wouldn’t treat sick pets as poorly as we treat our disabled. Our elected officials are worthless except for photo ops, sound bytes, and empty promises they have no intention of ever fulfilling, and the entire system seems rigged against people like me.

I’m sick of conservatives and their hypocritical phrases like class warfare and entitlements. I’m sick of their willful ignorance of science and reason, their disdain for intellectual progress, and their active defense of overt racism. Their perverse need to punish underprivileged people is a huge part of why I’ve been left with no healthcare and virtually no income for eight months, a timeframe that could’ve allowed me to already be on the road to full recovery and a return to productivity. Instead, I’ve needlessly suffered through months of spasms, fatigue, pain, and shame.

Not that liberals are any better. I’m just as sick of their perverse need to punish me for being a white, heterosexual male, as if my very existence is to blame for the world’s problems. Because of some imaginary privilege I’ve supposedly enjoyed my entire life, my circumstances aren’t worthy of note. My suffering isn’t as real as some other group’s. That dehumanizing way of thinking is the root of most ill done in society, and I’m sick of being made to feel as if my voice and my life are insignificant.

This shame and embarrassment I feel for what my life has become weighs on me every second of every day. I was a good teacher, but the stress and toll of that career is a big part of why I’m broken down now. My writings currently have 98 five-star reviews on Amazon (out of 166 total reviews), but I can’t sell more because I don’t have the money to advertise enough to reach a wider audience. All of my hard work feels like failure because I’ve been reduced to begging for help from family, friends, and even strangers. I would not wish this situation on my worst enemy, and I’m trying to get through it with a shred of sanity and dignity left, but every single day, my hope for tomorrow dims a little more.

I’m tired of feeling disenfranchised, of feeling worthless, of feeling insignificant. A person’s life shouldn’t be reduced to this sorry state. The part of me that put myself through school and juggled two and three jobs over the years wants to fight my way out of this predicament, but my body simply won’t allow it. And I’m not even going to get into how badly I miss my sons and how badly my pride as a father has been damaged by my inability to be active in their lives. That part is simply too painful to discuss. For now, all I can do is try to hang on for another day, but the view from down here is mighty bleak.