Day One of New Year!

Good Morning My Confidants!

And HAPPY NEW YEAR!!!

Welcome to my new blog! I hope you will find something here of interest for you. I am going to assume that if you are here, then you know something about who and what I am, otherwise you wouldn’t be here. But just in case you don’t, here is just a brief something-something.

My name is Ben and roughly ten years ago, I took my heart into my hands and sent in my first story submission after a lifetime of saying that I wanted to be a writer—and never submitting.

There was a call for submissions from a publisher that really appealed to me—especially since it was gay romance—and I did my best to come up with a story that fit their parameters and hoped for the best. Almost instantly, I got an email saying, essentially, “Don’t call us, we’ll call you.” Although to be fair, publishers get zillions of submissions, and it takes time to read them all (I found that out when I co-edited the anthology “A Taste of Honey.”) What the email, in fact, said was for me not to contact them for six weeks, but after that, I was free to do so.

Well, to my utter joy, I had my first ever contract only four days later. Four days. I had done exactly what I intended to do, write something that fit their guidelines, but do something that not one other person had done! My story was called Baiu en Sāhuf or Soul of the Mummy. And I was thrilled!

And over the next decade +, I’ve accumulated twelve published novels, a number of novellas, and a good handful of short stories. I was living the life I had always wanted to live. Writing what I wanted to write. Back in the nineties, I wrote some “adult” fiction but was infuriated that the publishers had complete control over everything, and that they often edited out a lot of the story, which usually meant everything preceding the sex. For me, a big part of what makes the sex hot is the lead-up, the getting to know each other, even the cat-and-mouse game. Otherwise, you could just go out there and find a generic sex scene and change the names, and probably even the original writer wouldn’t know the difference. Well, now I was writing gay fiction the way I wanted to. So that you could believe that this was two real and actual gay men falling for each other. Or at least realistically getting in each other’s pants and then falling in love. I wanted to write gay fiction with a Happily Ever After ending. I have lived through the AIDS crisis. I have watched many, many, many of my gay friends die. And that isn’t even counting bashings and murders and more. It upset me that so much gay fiction—even that written by gay men, in fact most of it—had horrible endings, usually with one dying of AIDS. I had lived through all that. I wanted escapism!

Something important for me to say is that I am a strong believer in the life philosophy and spirituality that “What we think about, we bring about.” I believe it in every single way. I believe in it in a pure psychological manner, which only makes sense. If I constantly think about doom and gloom, however am I supposed to feel good? It can’t happen. But if I think good thoughts, I’m healthier. It’s been proven scientifically!

But for a long, long time I have come to believe—because of what I have witnessed with my own two eyes—that literally and truly what we focus on can be manifested in our lives. It can happen. I was convinced of this long before I found out there was a whole school of thought devoted to this idea….

For instance, many years ago, I was in a destructive abusive relationship with a man who I thought—at one time—was my everything. I hurt every single day. Deep. In my very heart. My heart ached every day and night. And then, at the age of 38, while I was in excellent physical health, I had a heart attack. The doctors were amazed. My cholesterol levels were mind-bogglingly good, and yet I had an 80% blockage in my heart, and when they tried to stent it, my heart reacted in such a way that they were afraid to completely finish. Stents were far newer in those days. Funny (sadly?), on the ride home from the hospital days later, my husband at the time wondered aloud if he had caused the heart attack. Not so much a pity-party thing for himself as much as a wondering aloud the very thing I was wondering.

Had all that deep pain in my heart and soul caused me to manifest a heart attack? Afterall, I worked for cancer doctors and we clearly saw that every patient who kept their spirits up and were positive, would beat the most unbeatable cancers and had a much better chance of survival. I am not saying all patients. Only that the data was uncontestable. The percentages for positive people surviving vs negative people was astounding. Sadly, that was over twenty years ago and I no longer have access to the data, but wow! If thinking positive could (sometimes) reverse a cancer that only had a 98% survival rate, couldn’t being in constant pain and anguish manifest as a heart attack?

I think so.

No, I know so.

Absolutely.

And I believe that what we think about—and what’s more thank about—we bring about.

For the last year that is what I did. I decided that I had to focus on what I wanted and NOT what I was experiencing. I did one to two posts a day focusing on what I was grateful for and claiming goodness. And bit by slow bit, like the trickling that formed the Grand Canyon, I have seen it at work.  I am doing much better than I was this time a year ago today.

But that isn’t enough. Now that I clearly see the light at the end of the tunnel—and I know it isn’t a train coming, you negative nellies!—the work must continue into the physical.

I am 63 years old and over the last ten years and more, I have seen friends and relatives dying at a young age. A friend from childhood who did triathlons died in her sleep at 58. No known cause. She simply never woke up. Another wonderful friend of mine, ex-marine and in incredible shape, had the same thing happen and I don’t think he was even forty.

At this time in my life—confessing here for all to see—I am around a hundred pounds overweight. All the positive thinking in the world isn’t going to make that go away. When I used to post my weight once a week, so that I was accountable on my Facebook page for all to see, I dropped 50 pounds. When I stopped, it all came back. So, this blog will also be a place where I discuss my weight and health. I am at a place in my life where things are good. Now is not that time to die!

I have also been in a writing slump that was triggered in part, but not exclusively, by Covid. I am a social butterfly and the inability to be with people had a devastating effect on me. Those people who don’t really like people and who go to bed every night at 8:30—even if they are in Sri Lanka or Bali or at some kind of event that is a rare opportunity—probably can’t hear me. But I love people and community and touch. I couldn’t do those things. Masks prevented me from even see people’s faces when we were out. I understood its importance! I am not an anti-masker by any means. You should see my crazy, fun, and hilarious collection of masks. But my health needed something else. It needed my fellow humans. To see their smile, to watch their lips when the talked. And mayhap to get a kiss on the cheek.

Well finally, after a host of wonderful things that have happened in the last year, I am finally being lifted out of the slump and the Other People in my head are demanding more and more for their stories to be told, to be brought to life.

And so here we are, the first day of my new blog of ramblings about coffee, romance, dogs, dolls, men, gay men, life, being positive, New Thought, writing, people, and so much more!

This will also be my place to tell you about my writing and my novels and whatever is coming next. So, if you aren’t a fan of philosophy and such, but you are a fan of my gay romance novels and writings, this is how you can know what is going on.

Something else I did almost every single day in 2023 was a post called 365 Days of Silver. I found something—something!—to be positive about every day for a whole year. Some days it was easy-peasy, other days it was a little harder. But I did it! But soon I found out that my first-thing-in-the-morning post about life, the Universe, and everything (which I called Good Morning My Confidants), seemed to be in many ways what I talked about in my 365 Days posts. So that last two months I would get thrown off thinking I had done my 365 post, only to realize I hadn’t, because I had in fact talked about something positive first thing that morning in my “Good Morning My Confidants” post!

SO….

For those of you who really followed the latter, know that this essay you’re reading right now IS my official “365 Days of Silver” for 2024 + my normal morning ramblings about coffee, romance, dogs, dolls, life, the Universe, and everything. Both essays and heartfelt writings combined! I hope you will enjoy and find something that will make you smile or think or laugh or go, “Hmmm….”

Now here is a little side note. This morning I was checking out my Lunar Calendar Zodiac predictions and this is what I saw!

"The Year of the Wood Dragon (2024) is a favorable and festive year for the Rat (I’m a rat). The Rat will enjoy going out more often and meeting influential people. The Rat will also have great opportunities to advance their career or business by improving their skills and networking. The Rat's money luck is generally positive, but it will depend on their personal situation and effort." *Whoa! I like that! It is what I needed to hear! And yes, there are 12 Lunar astrological signs and with 8.01 billion people on the Earth, that means this prediction is also about 667,500,000 other people. Yes! I know. But, for all you Sheldon Coopers who laugh at such things, you can keep it to yourself! LOL! I BELIEVE that what we think about, and thank about, we bring about. I am going to bring about going out more often (I miss that so much) and meeting influential people and finding great opportunities to advance my writing career. And I'll take some of that “generally positive” money luck as well.

Now one last thing! I am going to add some more here as well! There will be places for writers to talk about their new books. I’ll interview people. I have one lined up with a fabulous and talented gay musician with six albums and who has allowed me to use some of his lyrics in my novels. I’ll be talking to artists as well. And just about anyone else that I think will be of interest, especially if what they have to say in some way helps GLBTQ+ people. Know right now that this is a safe place for the Queer community and if you have a problem with any of that, you might just want to move along.

I will also be talking about dolls, who I have madly and completely fallen in love with in the past year. It was January 2023 that I got my first dolls—after a lifetime of wanting to collect them but being told that dolls are for girls—and I no sooner took them out of the box than they began to tell me their stories. There will be a lot about that!

So, if you are looking for a safe place to be, a positive place, and place that is welcoming to all to believe in love—or at least want to believe in love—then this is the place. I will write all of this for me, it will be what is on my mind and heart and soul. And hopefully it will help someone else along the line.

I am also open for comments and contact. Tell me what you like and what you don’t like. I hope you’ll focus on the first. But know this.

I am open to change! If I write something that strikes you wrong, if I say something offensive, and you politely engage me in conversation, you won’t believe how often I change my mind. If you yell at me, I am human and my fight-or-flight instinct will likely engage and I will slam the doors. But if you speak to me person-to-person, I am extremely likely to listen, to think about it, and possibly change my way of thinking about something.

And I will profess in openly for all to hear—most often with an apology.

I hope that all this appeals to you and you are along for the ride.

I think we could have a lot of fun!

Namasté

(the Divine in me sees and honors the Divine in you)

BG “Gentle Ben” Thomas

(I’ll explain that soon, I promise)

Jan 1, 2024, Entry #001

PS: This blog happened because of my wonderful husband Noah. It wouldn't have happened without him. He did a lot of hard work for the last month making sure it was just what I wanted and needed. Thank you, my sweet love! What would I do without you?

* Rat: Your 2024 Chinese Horoscope, written by Alison: https://www.free-horoscope.com/chinese-horoscopes/annual-2024/rat.htm#google_vignette