it's been exactly a year since I've posted anything on this account. this page has basically become a memorial to Lance now. that cat deserves a giant, gilded statue but this journal will have to do. I still think about him every day, but life goes on. I have friends, a job, a life, things to keep me busy, things to keep me from my despair. but today, just for today, I spent the day reliving memories of Lance's life. I wrote a new poem for him, listened to sad music, and just cried. over the past year I've shared my memories of Lance with a few other people in the best possible way and it makes me glad to know that, in a way, he is still helping to make the world a better place, even after all this time. I hope I never miss him any less, I hope I respect how rare it is to have had such a good friend forever.

it was a year ago today that lance died and in those three hundred and sixty-five says I don't miss him any less than I did on day one. I've done my best to preserve his memory as best as I can but there are still pieces missing that I know I can never get back. I've spent that last few months in a crippling depression, my happiest memories all corrupted. before, whenever I felt down I would spend time with my kitten and all would be well, even if he wasn't there with me just the thought of him would make me smile. now I can't have a single happy thought about him without remembering the day that he died. I'll continue to miss him until one day, hopefully, I might see him again, until then, the world is a darker place without him in it

when we found Wilson at the shelter he had a brother who he was playing with. while we were there another family came in to look at cats and adopted Wilson's brother while we adopted Wilson. I think Wilson misses his brother, or at least he misses having someone to play with just like I miss Lance. I know that Wilson isn't Lance just like he knows that I'm not his brother. But last night I heard Wilson crying late in the night. I held him in my lap and eventually he stopped crying, but I didn't

It rained the other day. I always used to like the rain because Lance was so afraid of it. Whenever the lightning would flash and the thunder boom outside he would tremble in fear and when that happened he would jump into my lap and burry his face into my arm as I held him tightly to my chest and after a minute of reassuring him he would settle, he would stop trembling and I knew that he wasn't afraid anymore. I felt so important then. It's not just Lance's presence that I miss, it's everything about him. The way he sighed so contentedly when I gave him a belly rub, how he would scratch at my forelegs whenever he wanted attention in a way that would have certainly been painful if he still had his claw, as it was it was only ticklish. The way he rubbed his face so affectionately against literally anything he could. Most animals aren't very expressive but every time I ran my hand through his soft fur I swear I saw his face curl up into the biggest smile. My fondest memory of his was from I don't even know how many years ago when he was much younger and more energetic and playful. One summer's day as I was blowing soap bubbles Lance took a fascination to the shiny orbs, most likely imagining that they were some sort of prey. He spent all afternoon chasing after them and popping them as he pounce on them one by one. I giggled watching his playful antics and happily blowing more bubbles for him to chase occasionally joining him to help chase his quarry down. By the end of the day he was so tired out that he was panting just like a dog, I never knew cats could pant before then and I've never seen one do it since. It's been more than a month now since he died and I still cry almost every day just thinking about it, he still fills my every waking thought. There is no creature on the earth, cat, human, or otherwise that I wouldn't trade to have him back. I still find tufts of his fur around the house and it break my heart knowing that it's the only presence he'll have in our home anymore. In the past when I've been this depressed my thoughts would often turn to self harm, but not this time. I've resolved never to hate myself again because while Lance was alive he became a part of me, now that he's gone the only way I have left to love him is by loving myself
My brother's birthday was yesterday and the only thing he asked for was a new cat. I suppose it makes since for him to think that a new pet might replace the hole in our lives that Lance left but I wonder what Lance would think if he knew he were being replaced. And it's so soon, we still haven't decided what we should do with lance's body. We brought home a tiny, wide eyed kitten who we've named Wilson and I haven't decided yet whether I love him or hate him. What's not to love, he's adorable, affectionate, and doesn't seem to ever stop crying for attention, everything a cat should be. But he doesn't feel right, he's too small to fit into my lap just right, his fur is too short to be soft enough, but most importantly he's not Lance, nothing will ever be Lance again. There was only ever one cat for me and he's gone now. When we brought him home I watched him sniffing around and exploring his new home, a home that used to be Lance's kingdom, it broke my heart to Wilson using Lance's food dish, Lance's litter box, Lance's bed. I'm not certain I can ever love another cat that way again. What I am certain of is that one day Wilson will inevitably end as a lifeless husk just as Lance did, just as we all will and if I care for Wilson then as much as I care for Lance now then I'll just feel this miserable depression once again and I don't know if I can handle it. Although looking back on Lance's life, even knowing how terrible his death would be to face, I wouldn't have traded a single second spent with that kitten to stop that misery. Maybe, if I'm lucky, when Wilson's time comes I'll feel the same way about him.

I'm on twitter now. You can follow me MatthewBlick1

My cousin drove up from Texas to visit this weekend and I spent a lot of time with him. Unfortunately this meant I didn't have a lot of time to write. I hope you all understand and I'll be back next week with a new poem

I'm going to move my NSFW submissions to another account soon. I'm glad for everyone who has been enjoying the naughty stuff I write but I think I'd like to keep it separate from the clean stuff mostly because some people might only want to read one or the other kind of submissions that I post and I think that you should be able to choose the... no, actually it's because my mom is starting to poke around my account and I want to sweep everything under the rug before she figures out how to disable the filters. I've had a second account for a while now but I haven't actually used it for anything. you can find that account here
http://www.furaffinity.net/user/mstar2222/
I'm going to start posting stories over there starting this week but only the stuff that I don't want my family to see. If you're just reading the smut that I post you can still find all the old stories over there but I'm going to be deleting them all from this account soon.

For the last few weeks I have gotten into the habit of taking a short walk late every night after the world has gone to sleep. It's nice to have the world to myself for a short time. I usually use the time to think about what I'm going to write next. last weeks poem "tonight the streets are mine" was inspired by my walks and so will next weeks poem which I have already started working on. Something odd has just occurred tome about my walks though. I'm a fan of horror stories. I listen to stories that make me afraid of the dark even though I'm an adult. But for some reason I'm not afraid to walk alone by myself in a dark street late at night. At first I wondered why I wasn't scared, then I realized that it's because I'm not alone, the stars keep me company. <--- That was the corniest line you will ever hear anyone say outside of a movie or book, but I'm a poet so I get to say corny lines like that. Back on topic, last night I didn't go for my walk because it was raining, I thought I might do it anyways just because it's my tradition, but then I realized it would server no purpose. When I don't enjoy my traditions then they become chores, and when chore serve no purpose, I don't do them. And that's why I wont ever stop writing, because my writing serves a purpose. If you are reading this then I am writing for you.

I just hit 1000 page views, my first big milestone. I wanted to write this quick journal just to save the date. Amazingly I'm already at 1300, I got about 500 views in the last few hours. I've said before that I don't have to be famous to be happy and I stand by that but I still appreciate all of the support. That being said, I find it odd that I have had over 1000 people view my profile but my most popular piece (empty pages) has only been seen by 32 people and I have yet to receive even one common on any of my work. Not to complain, I'm just pointing out an anomaly.

I've never been very good at with paint and canvas or even pen and paper, I've been in a few school plays but I'm not much of an actor, and all I can remember from piano lessons is how to play scales. Writing is really the only art that I am any good at, especially poetry. I usually cant write very much more than a page on a single subject but that one page will say everything that there is to say. I love pouring my soul into a piece of art just like any good artist. and just like any good artist I'm always looking for ways to make my work better. Right now I'm concerned that my work is too structured, every poem I write has several 4-line stanzas and each line has the same tempo as every other poem I write. I hope I can overcome this and write something a little different but it will take practice and practice means screwing up. I'll take a shot at it the next time I write something and hopefully it won't be too bad. Right now though I have just finished a new poem called stars. It's just as structured as always but I hope everyone will like it anyways. I'll be uploading it tomorrow.

Thanks to a lot of encouragement from different people around the web I've decided to post some of my old poetry even though it isn't furry related. Hopefully I'll be able to write some furry poetry soon but in the meantime I hope that people will enjoy my work. most of my older poetry is from school assignments that I did years ago. I have several poems hiding in some dark corner of my apartment or maybe even at my parents house so I'll have to go looking for it but I'll post everything that I find as it turn up and I hope you like it

I've been a fan of anthropomorphism for as long as I can remember but only recently found out that there was a furry community. I got interested and started watching some of the YouTube videos of Kage and 2. eventually I got around to wondering if there were any cons I could go to. that's when I found out that RMFC was only a two hour drive from where I live and would be taking place in one week. the timing was amazing but I still wondered if I should go, then I learned that 2 would be there and that answered that question. I didn't even have an FA account yet and I still don't have a fursona but I hoped for the best. I went to RMFC wondering whether or not I would like it enough to come back the next year, then during one of the games I won a free admissions ticket for next year and that answered that question. I'm glad to be part of such a wonderful fandom and I intend to start making my own furry artwork soon