An Unhindered Eventuality

Juls Macdonell

Juls Macdonell

— 2 min read
Golden hour light on a corner of a black bookcase with stacked books, with lush green vining plants tangled atop it.
Golden hour in the cave.

The title that appears on my Animal Crossing: New Horizons passport also works for my existence on the internet.

It took a while, but after spending more time on Bluesky, I finally stumbled across a post about Substack alternatives. It was this one, by Maia Kobabe. At the time, I was just happy to have organically found someone talking about the whole Substack And Nazis thing, because when I left Substack years ago for that exact reason, it seemed like few people were doing the same. Maybe I was just trawling the wrong corner of the internet, or maybe it's because it's only gotten worse.

Either way, Maia's alternatives list ended up being doubly useful, since I needed a passion project idea for a media production class this term (hi!). My writer's website, up until now, has been a little Carrd site with a single page, a picture of a cat, and brief life updates whenever I remember to post them. But I missed my short-lived newsletter on Substack. Ghost having the options of static pages AND a newsletter was an instant win, so here we are. Never mind the ongoing enshittification of the internet and social media foretelling a return to the decentralized, "this is where I exist online, and can I email you?"

A screenshot of a "Lupe" Neopets pet page, with various cartoon pictures of a wolf-like animal; one where it's a werewolf, one with a Chia in the background, and one with a key, running from danger. The text is black on a purple background and difficult to read and is all just copy about Lupes. There is a pixel graphic of a Lupe running, a rainbow divider bar, and "Welcome!" in what looks like red, animated, WordArt-esque text.
I used to categorize my online presence into various Neopets pet pages, which would still be a preferable social media to X.

Calling this a "writer's website" is more technical and optimistic than anything. Yes, I write, and yes, I've published - some stuff - but I haven't published a book. I don't have an agent. The farthest I've gotten is agents asking to see my manuscripts. Then I send it to them and wait 1 week to 9 months for them to say no. But I'm only on my second query, and my fourth book. There's still time.

And I'm stubborn.

If you were around for my original Substack, you know all about the pipe dream that sent me returning to academia to study writing and, for a bit, English. I won't go on about why I'm doing what I'm doing. Maybe in another post. I just wanted to introduce myself as someone who's out there trudging along like anyone else, writing, sending their work out, getting raving testimonials in return, and trudging some more.

So please, stick around if you want to hear me talk about all the shit that's in my head these days. Lately it's looked like learning about entropy and the heat death of the universe, wondering about the words "unnatural" and "inhuman" and their technical impossibility, finally reading Earthsea because people called my writing "too literary" and I'm leaning into it, and watching the pretty lights on the walls when the sun hits the suncatcher just right.

And hoping my gay garden book gets picked by an editor of #RevPit. You can watch me flail around on Bluesky if you're curious about that.

Later days,

Juls