val - V.M. Ayala 🏳️‍🌈

suddenly it's tank top weather which is something in that I have been lifting (a teeny tiny amount of) weights and do not hate how my arms and shoulders look right now (mostly; I have... a lot of difficulty with my body and image sometimes). but wow that weather shift it's so warm todayyyy

ICYMI: I have a new short story out! it's a very personal one about belonging when you're biracial—and it's also my first magical realism piece!

it's one of the most vulnerable stories about my own self and identity I've ever written, and it means a lot folks have resonated with it 💜

Powerful story!

aaaa thank you so much for reading it, this one is very personal to me so it means a lot 💜

also the chronic pain life: I have TMJ that's mostly stress induced. some family drama + cavities combined into really bad pain over the weekend. I had the dentist double-check it wasn't my teeth and it wasn't, yay. she gently told me to stress less (she's a good, she knows it's not that simple) 😅

I survived the dentist and she was so proud of me for having only mild hypertension at her office this time rather than astronomically bad hypertension. yay for having my episodic hypertension largely under control. AND I am now two tiny cavities less, a win all around 😂

thank you so much for giving "La Sirena's Blessing of Belonging" a home 💜

This one is a gut punch, in the best possible way.

hrghgh thank youuuu 😭

aaaa thank you, I'm honestly so glad you enjoyed it and read it, this one means so much to me 😭

(well, every story means so much but you know, this one is just extremely personal!!)

Subscribe to The Sunday Morning Transport An amazing science fiction/fantasy short story each week. Click to read The Sunday Morning Transport, a Substack publication with thousands of subscribers.

It's partially paywalled—but!! The good folks over at SMT were kind enough to give me a way to allow folks to read the full story!

So if you want to read it, here's a 60-day free subscription to @morningtransport.bsky.social: www.sundaymorningtransport.com/smt2024

La Sirena’s Blessing of Belonging V.M.

I have a new short story out today!

"La Sirena's Blessing of Belonging" is about a girl making a wish to find where she belongs. It's a deeply personal piece about biracial identity—and also a contemporary (slightly futuristic) magical realism story rather than secondary world!

I hope you enjoy ✨

happening NOW!! please enjoy Morgan (they/them) and friends solve the Wing Beatz mystery. it's totally probably haunted. right? 👀

thank youuu!! 💜

I have not one but TWO short stories coming out sooooon, one this weekend and the other next month. re-reading them was nice, I always worry when I read my work again after a while that it secretly sucked or something—but no I love both these stories.

can't wait for y'all to read them!! SOOON!!! 🥺

kill the imposter syndrome in you head because not only is there someone out there doing it worse than you, they're also using chat gpt to do it

Anyways.

staying up til midnight to play pokopia and only making it one hour before I fall asleep, as is expected for a mid-thirties gremlin 😴

Illustration of Mosslax from Pokopia featuring Leafeon. Mosslax is a Snorlax that has been covered in moss. They are so mossy that they made eevee evolve. Colored used in the artwork consist of greens, blues and purple.

Mosslax from pokopia 🌱
#art #pokemon

OHOHO your power 🔥

friendly reminder, your creative efforts are worthy and they always have been. No one is immune to imposter syndrome and feeling bad about their work at times, but your worth isn't marked by productivity or amount of likes. And remember, you're so so cool and hot and capable of creating that art

that weird feeling of relief a doctor's appointment got moved but also frustration because you had already mentally prepped for that appointment 😂

the two phases of writing: (1) writing and (2) wandering aimlessly like an unmoored ghost and complaining about not writing

omg that's ridiculous. my spam email claimed to be from the silent book club (which is a real org! they have a whole spam email warning page, poor folks lol) and called my good ol' non-existent dusty door thought provoking on "queer identity belonging and transformation" with nary a comma in sight 😂

careful! a lot of dust on that dusty door if you go through it 😂😂😂

it would be the funniest since dust is one of my big allergies LOL it'd just be like "and they wheezed and wheezed and gave up trying to walk through all that dust the end"

then i'd get a spam email that refused to use commas on any of the descriptions of the dusty door, calling it brilliant 😂😂😂

bahaha yes this is perfect, you understand robot!val's queer and apparently dusty identitybelongingnocommas vision 🙂‍↕️

apparently the dusty door was full of "rich speculative imagination" and I wove "queer identity belonging and transformation" (no commas, no nothing) into "stirring and deeply reflective" prose 😂😂😂

it made me laugh SO hard I couldn't even share it with my fiancé for a good 5 minutes because I was just wheeze cackling 😂

KJAHSD IM CACKLING AT THIS thank you that made my day 😂

somehow 2023 was 3 years ago?!

I've learned so much about writing since "The Void Door", and I'm forever grateful to BCS for taking a chance on me and giving my work its first home 😭