Category: Personal

The Evolution and Extinction of Ellie Rose Writing Services

Posted on by Ellie Rose McKee

As I’m sure many of you reading this blog will know, I used to offer a range of writing-related services as a business. That business started in 2013 and, as of last month, has now ended.

It took me a long time to see it, but I was overstretching myself, and my mental health was paying the price.

Going forward, I’m feeling confident that I have a clear idea of where I’m headed and how to get there.

I’m still self-employed and that still consists of client work, but it is exclusively for writers and writing based organisations, now. The work is going to be carried out under the simple business banner of ‘Ellie Rose McKee, Author’ because, this time around, I’m not going to lose focus of the main strand of my career, which is writing for myself.

My main client at the minute is the John O’Connor Writing School, and I’ve just accepted the post of Project Support Officer with Women Aloud NI.

So, even though Ellie Rose Writing Services is no more, this is not a sad blog post for me to write. I was updating my CV just before writing this, looking over the testimonials I have received, and I’m damn proud of myself and everything I’ve achieved.

Onward and upward, as they say!

Dyspraxic Life

Posted on by Ellie Rose McKee

So, I was in the middle of writing some fan fiction towards my Camp NaNoWriMo goal, mug in hand, when I accidentally tipped the mug too much the wrong way and spilt a good portion of the contents over myself.

Ouch.

I know that’s not particularly noteworthy – especially when you’re me, a person who does such things several times a day. But what happened next was that I went online to complain about my clumsy self to Twitter, using the hashtag ‘Dyspraxic Life’ – I had to actually google the word Dyspraxic to remember how to spell it.

Having had the affliction for quite some time (or, I suppose, having had it for my entire life, and being aware that it had a name for a good few years), I’ve researched it before. I know the basic symptoms (particularly the clumsiness), so I wasn’t intending to actually find out about the disorder in my searching for it.

I did stumble upon a link, however. This here piece about Dyspraxia in Adults. I clicked it out of curiosity and, wow. I’m actually sat here stunned.

Never before have I seen such an extensive list of symptoms, and never before have I been summed up so accurately in a single document. It says at the bottom that “not even the most severe case will have all the above characteristics” but there are literally only one or two on the list that don’t personally apply.

I had no idea that my disorder affected me in so many ways. To those who know me, I really recommend reading the list. It’s a startling insight into my inner self.

On Pride

Posted on by Ellie Rose McKee

June is pride month – a month-long celebration of everything LGBT – and today is exactly one year from when I came out.

I thought I would reflect on that but, here’s the thing… I’m not sure I’m properly “out” – if there even is such a state of being. (I’ve heard other LGBTQA+ people talk about how you don’t come out just once, but lots of times, as you meet and interact with new people.)

My “coming out” was in the form of the blog post I linked above. It’s a disjointed, rambly thing that I hope got my point across, but I’m not 100% convinced that it did.

At the time, I was incredibly nervous to post it. It felt monumental for me, and it was (purely for the fact of how I felt about it), but looking back at it now, I’m not sure it was clear enough. The detail I go into about my religious upbringing accounts for that.

Putting the “I’m pansexual” declaration up on my blog was, as well as being terrifying, a very liberating experience for myself. Perhaps only for myself, though. Outside of people who have read it, I’m not sure anyone knows about my sexual orientation. I’m fairly certain my family don’t, hence me wondering if I am indeed truly out.

Part of me feels like it doesn’t matter if people know or not – in a sense, it does, while in other ways it doesn’t matter at all. Like, why should who I find attractive matter to anyone? Especially since I’m in a secure, monogamous relationship. Relatively speaking, it’s a small part of who I am.

Yet I know the importance of representation. I’m sure there are young (and old!) gay and lesbian people out there who haven’t been able to tell people about their identity, who find heart in stories of other’s bravery. And I think it’s important to stand up and be counted as a member of the community. It’s important for the people who run the country to be aware of how vast the community is so they’re better able to represent it.

Regardless of who knows and who doesn’t and whether that matters or not, I can only speak of my own personal experience and feelings on the matter. One thing I can say objectively is that, no less than two years ago, the idea of attending a pride parade filled me with a sense of dread, whereas now I actually know what it means to have pride in that aspect of myself. For me, love won.

Writing Through the Night

Posted on by Ellie Rose McKee

It’s 6.27am. I haven’t slept yet and, at this point, it’s unlikely that I will sleep before I head out to my last creative writing class for the [academic] year. I’m considering walking into the city centre instead of taking a bus. It’s the kind of mood I’m in.

One of the reasons I’m still up, aside from being an insomniac/nocturnal and having a criminally early class, is that I was writing a short story that’s been playing on my mind/heart for a while. It’s inspired by a conversation that happened in my aforementioned writing class. And it’s a story that, I think, could be developed further. It’s one that I’m tempted to turn into a short stage play. One that I’m considering having sequels to. I don’t know yet, and that’s okay. It’s not the point of the blog post.

I just wanted to say that, in times like these when I don’t have the time or energy to write much, writing is still what I come back to. It’s still what I love.

Perhaps it’s cliche, but I feel like there are so many stories in me. I want to write them all. And not even in the way of overworking myself that I’ve previously written about. I just mean that I am certain that telling stories – whether by poems, or plays, or novels – is what I want to devote my life to, ultimately. (Well, that and love, but that’s a different blog post.)

It is one of my sincerest goals to be considered prolific – to get as much down on paper in my lifetime as humanly possible. I don’t know if I’ve said that before or not, but it’s 6.38am and that’s what I’m thinking about.

The Thing About Buffy

Posted on by Ellie Rose McKee

When I was in my formative years – fourteen, fifteen, sixteen; probably before that, if I could remember – I was a lot of things: frustrated, depressed, creative, hopeful, and incredibly, incredibly lonely.

High School was hell, home was… not a place I would actually define as a ‘home.’ But I found that music helped, some, and the creativity and hope kept me thinking that if I could just make it to eighteen I could go wherever I wanted and be and do anything.

The day to day, though… that was tough. I’m not going to go into it and I’m not going to try and pretend that I had it hardest. But it was still tough. Hardness was my reality.

I closed myself off, repressed the pre-teen years, and become someone who, frankly, wasn’t very nice in return. Someone who literally didn’t understand what being nice meant. Again, I’m not saying I was a bully who tortured small animals and wished death upon children, but life was hard and so was I.

And then there was Buffy – this innocuous little TV show about teenagers living on a Hellmouth. A TV show that had layers, and pain, character development that was mind blowing and just so many things that, amongst all the vampires and demons, were just so damn real.

The show dealt with sex and relationships, domestic abuse, betrayal and, yes, death. Everything in between. The scary and the funny and the dramatic and the exciting and the gross.

And the thing is, it made me – broken teenager on the verge of suicide me – it made me feel things. It made me feel all of the things I’ve already mentioned and a million besides. It connected with me, and I was obsessed. I was mocked for it – still am, sometimes (screw you, Steph!) – but I didn’t care. I’d found my thing and it mattered to me more than anything.

That thing is now twenty years old and still touching lives. How freaking crazy is that? THAT is what I aim for in my art. And that is what I am forever thankful to Joss Whedon for.

Catching Up

Posted on by Ellie Rose McKee

Taking a break from things can be great – it has been for me, the past few weeks (now that I’ve actually got a handle on resting!) – but there is the unfortunate side-effect of life carrying on without you while you’re gone, meaning there’s plenty of new things to come back to. There’s also the thing about everything taking much longer than you expect (it’s not just me who experiences this phenomenon, right?).

Point is, I’m only now starting to get back on track with things after my honeymoon. Catching up with reading, writing, client work, housework (god, does the housework EVER end?!), trying to maintain a social life, making lists… things like that (can you tell my brain’s already feeling fried?). *insert cliche joke about needing a holiday to recover from your holiday*

Anyway, that’s pretty much where I’m at: catching up. At the end of this month (March) I’ll probably put together a mega-post about everything I’ve been writing and reading since the start of the year (no, I haven’t forgotten and yes, I have still been keeping notes).

Going forward, there are a lot of events coming up that I’m taking part in (details here), so please check that out.

Peace and love!

P.S. As of February, I have now been blogging for ten years. How cool is that? Happy blog birthday to me!

A Mental Health Issue

Posted on by Ellie Rose McKee

After I wrote my previous blog post, I decided to cut myself off from social media – cold turkey. The theory was that it was a distraction holding me back from writing. Not a crazy theory, really. But in the few days that I’ve been offline, have I managed any more time for writing? No. No, I have not. Pretty much the first thing I did was have a major energy crash. Then I was hit with some stressful personal stuff, and then I had to pick myself up and get back on with life – housework, business stuff, wedding stuff.

I’ve said before that I do a lot, and that I’m really hard on myself, but I think I’ve come to realize just how bad that is. I am getting married in a week, I should not be stressing about my novel. The last thing I need is more pressure.

I mean, yes, it has been frustrating me for a very long time how long it’s taking me to get this novel down and out into the world, but novels take time. It’s a fact of life.

For some people they take more time, and for some people they take less time, but for everyone they take time. Why should I expect myself to be one of the people who can power through a first draft in a week? It’s nuts, and it’s not helpful. I think, actually, it’s the opposite of helpful.

That’s a thing that has been more clear to others than myself, it seems, as I’ve been told to consider coaching, counseling, and – y’know – taking an actual break.

I’ve just had so much going on in my head, and my life (did I mention I’m sick on top of all this?), I was too busy to stop and really take in what I was hearing. Maybe being away from Facebook and Twitter has helped me with that if nothing else. But I’m listening now. I’m breathing.

I still want to focus on my writing, but mostly I am breathing.

I’m going to enjoy my wedding and my honeymoon. I have it on good authority that the world will not end if I do. My book will be waiting for me when I get back.

Over the past month I’ve gone from up to down to round and round and back up down and round again. Maybe it’s winter getting to me again. I realized in Autumn 2016 that the lack of sunlight affects me a lot more than I’d previously realized. And, outside of that, I’ve always been very… ‘moody’ isn’t the best way to describe it. It’s more like a minor case of bi-polar disorder, truth be told. There are highs where I think I can do everything, but there are mostly lows in which I beat myself up about not meeting the ridiculous standards I set for myself while I was on top of the world.

I’m sorry if documenting that journey here and across Facebook and Twitter has made anyone else’s head spin and/or made you worried about me. My partner has been very good at talking me through so much of this. And I’d like to say I have it all figured out and am all better now, but no one is ever all better for good.

I’m okay for now, though, and that’s enough.

Still writing, still breathing. Also taking breaks.

Glow!

Posted on by Ellie Rose McKee

Meet Glo.

Glo is an artist. Or she would be, if she ever got started.

She has all the inspiration.

All the plans.

 

Glo gets caught up in doing lots of little, unimportant things.

Glo frustrates the f*ck out of her friends.

They can see everything she’s got to give, but all they hear are her excuses.

–

—

I’m gonna stop being like Glo.

 

My name means light. I have a coaster somewhere that says that. It also says that I have so much potential, I can’t be pinned down, and I never get anything finished. Well SCREW THAT!

From here, every time I get pissed at people like Glo, I’m gonna use that energy to go out and hit my targets and stop being such a damn hypocrite.

Yes, I love art. And photography. And animals. And precisely six-point-two-five million other things.

I know logically I can’t become an expert in all of them, so the logical thing is to stop and focus on one thing, maybe dabbling in other things along the way, and maybe giving something else my full energy and attention when I’m done making it as a writer. But I’m gonna be a writer first.

Now begins the season of quality over quantity.

Glo’s gonna keep me right.

End of Year Reading and Writing Audit 2016

Posted on by Ellie Rose McKee

Before I let myself get too carried away with excitement for the new year, I thought I should wrap up the one that’s coming to a close. For context and comparison, here is my ‘year in review’ post from 2015.

Earlier in 2016, you might remember I carried out what I called a “literary audit.” Since then, I’ve been keeping much better track of what I write. It’s been good to look back and it certainly makes posts like this a heck of a lot easier! Anyway, without further ado…

This month I wrote 4,000 words. During the entire year, I wrote over 100,000 – can’t say exactly because, like I said, I only started taking note part way through the year (it was 95,000 words total, April – December). I do know I wrote 55,000 words of fanfic (January – December) and a hell of a lot of poetry.

December saw me devouring four audiobooks, a Kindle short, and a novel-length fanfic, leaving my books read for the year at 54 (off a goal of 45). Goodreads have laid all my stats out in a handy chart, here.

Personal Highlights for Twenty Sixteen:

Finally, 2017 Goals:

  • Get married
  • Read 50 books
  • Join the Society of Authors
  • Get a literary agent
  • and a cat
  • Take an official proofreading course

Also: In a bid to catch up on my ‘to be read’ pile, I’ve decided to not buy any new books for the first six months of 2017. I can still loan out books from the library, however, and I’m allowing myself to continue getting one audiobook a month during this time.

I am so excited for this!

On having difficulty relaxing

Posted on by Ellie Rose McKee

“A poem is never finished only abandoned.” – Paul Valéry

I’ve really enjoyed yesterday and today, spending Christmas with my partner’s parents, and tomorrow we’re off to see my parents. I already announced that in my last blog post, when I said I was logging off. The thing is, I’m not sure I really know how to have down time. Not properly, and definitely not for an extended period of time.

Now, I’m quite hard on myself. I know that logically, but it still doesn’t stop me doing it. I can spend whole days being busy – doing lots of really small things, spanning client work, housework, taking care of myself, and/or my partner – but when it comes to the end of those days, I feel like I’ve achieved nothing.

Productivity very much ties into my self-worth (again, this is despite knowing logically that there’s no point). If I don’t feel like I’ve done enough, I feel bad. Simple as that.

But where does relaxing come into this? Continue reading →