This is Finish Your Monsters, a weekly blogletter about the creative process. I'm sharing adventures in art and life as well as setting CLIFFHANGER goals for myself, so--

DID I MAKE MY GOAL?

My goal for last week was to gather all info needed to make a decision on a key Dead Media screening.

And the goal was accomplished! Mostly by my friend who’s helping me with some Dead Media promotion work.

So we were on the cusp of making a decision about our next screening. But then a good thing happened! (What a strange thing to type these days.) An organization reached out with some interest in Dead Media and we want to let that conversation play out for just a bit first.

I’m finding setting goals challenging right now. Partially because of the general chaos of the world. Partially because I’m juggling a bunch of different things. But also because I keep wrestling with this question: My overall goals are very large so how do I break them into weekly, bite-sized chunks that I have complete control over?

That said, I think that’s what makes them valuable. Because big things are accomplished by small steps, small tasks, small contributions. Both in our personal lives and careers and the larger social and political struggles going on in the world.

A constant, valuable question to ask: What can I reasonably do, that’s under my control, to move things forward?

Just now, I moved my phone to the other side of the room from my computer so I can finish this blog without interrupting myself with doomscrolling. Little victories!

A NICE THING THAT HAPPENED THIS WEEK

I was lucky to have several nice things this week. I went to a party at a friend’s house and had actual friendly discourse about Star Wars. (Sadly, many in-person Star Wars conversations follow this pattern: “Oh, hey, you love Star Wars, too? I love it so much. Anyway, here are the parts I hate…”) But this one was good. Victory!

Sara and I also had a nice date night to see The Wicker Man at the Academy Museum and have a fun chat with the bartender about martini preferences. And absolutely zero abductions by a pagan cult. Another victory!

I had a very good California Burrito from a place called Guac Daddy. Yet another victory!

But my favorite nice thing of the week was tricking myself into making time to read. A friend hosts a great podcast called This Book Made Me that Sara and I were guests on. (Coming out in the next couple of weeks!)

Sara chose a book that she first encountered in the 5th grade and then convinced me to read back in 2021. For Sara, it was a coming of age book. For me, it was a coming of middle age book.

The book is The Unexpected Mrs Pollifax. The first in a series of 14 books about an older woman who needs purpose in her life after her husband dies and her children move away. So she makes the obvious choice: Become a spy.

The book certainly enjoys some jokes at the incongruity of a “nice grandma spy” but it does not pull its punches on the horrors of international espionage. It’s a funny, grounded, empathetic, and at times, violent book.

We recorded the podcast on Sunday afternoon which meant I needed to clear my schedule on Saturday afternoon to power re-read the book.

I’ve now read 13 of the 14 books in the series and have plans to read the final book this coming weekend when Sara and I are out of town.

So it was a perfect time to revisit the first book and think about it critically.

There are many things I like about the Mrs Pollifax series but the biggest one is that the books are dotted with philosophical bangers. Moments of wisdom and insight that Mrs Pollifax drops as she faces hardship, cruelty, death.

There have been moments reading these books that feel like some kind of cosmic time travel. I read something written in the 1960s, 70s, 80s, 90s (it was a long book series) that I needed to hear, right now, in the 21st Century.

This first book is about staying true to yourself. Believing in your own skills, instinct, inherent value regardless of how the world might perceive, denigrate, or box you. In short, the books have often helped me return to myself.

So my nice thing for this week was this quote that Mrs Pollifax thinks to herself in a moment of dire physical peril:

“Dear dear life, she reflected, and how tenaciously people held on to it and what things they did to remain alive!— that is, physically alive, she amended, for to remain alive inside was far more intricate and difficult and defeating.”

So many people I know are struggling right now. Particularly back home in Minnesota. There is physical danger. But there’s also the danger of losing our sense of self. Our resolve, that calm certainty when know you’re on the right path.

To be blunt, it’s hard to get out of bed in the morning. But this book, this story, this quote is a great reminder to keeping fighting for each other and for our own internal lives. Thanks, Mrs Pollifax.

LIGHT PLUGS

DEAD MEDIA’S FIRST FESTIVAL APPEARANCE: Our horror film will play twice at the NEVERMORE FILM FESTIVAL in Durham, North Carolina. I’ll be there at both screenings to do an intro and a post-film Q&A! Tickets and info here!

DEAD MEDIA MAILING LIST: We’ve got a mailing list for Dead Media. I’m only going to send out messages occasionally with concrete info and asks for help—screening dates, sales news, help getting the word out, etc. You can sign up here if you’re interested!

SHORT FILMS ON YOUTUBE: I’m still planning on releasing three of my short films on YouTube. I want to release one a week. I really want to promote these extensively on social media, but I keep wrestling with whether it feels right in this moment. But it would still be a huge help if you subscribed to my YouTube channel and hopefully it will feel right to put out the short films soon.

DONATIONS TO DEAD MEDIA: We need all the help we can get for film festival submission fees, advance money to book theaters, etc. Through Film North, you can make a one time tax deductible donation here. Thanks for all the help and support!

MY GOAL FOR THE WEEK--

I’m going BIG with two goals because I can’t decide. I’ve got some promo stuff for Dead Media and I’m making another short film. (One of my goals for 2026!) So for next week, my goals are to finish designing promo cards for Dead Media I can bring to film festivals and to start the script for the short film.

YOUR GOAL FOR THE WEEK--

I would absolutely LOVE to hear what you're working on this week in the comments below. What's your goal? How can I help you literally finish your monsters?

A LITTLE SKETCH--

This week’s sketch is thinking about Minnesota and a rising symbol of resistance. A few years back, Minnesota designed a new flag. It’s lovely and blue and as many people joked, it kind of looks like the state bird, the loon, was a kaiju blasting an energy beam from its mouth. In recent weeks, artists in Minnesota have combined the energy of the kaiju loon with the rebel symbol from Star Wars. Lots of delightful examples out there. (Some of the early ones were generated by AI so I’d advocate confirming a human artist created it before sharing any of the art or buying t-shirts, etc.) Anyway, I felt inspired to do a quick rough sketch of a defiant kaiju loon fighting for its neighbors. Thanks for reading and best of luck with your monsters this week!