I’m doing something a little different this year. I’m actually sitting down to write this retrospective on the very last day of the year instead of several days or weeks later. I haven’t done that before. (Edit: though, in the end, it did take me two days to finish this monster post 😛 But I did start it on New Years Eve)
Also: the title, at least as I have it right now, is in reference to the finale of the show Deep Space Nine, not necessarily to an actual THEME of this year, or specific things that I feel like I am or will leave behind…but then again, when turning a new page, we are always leaving the previous one behind, aren’t we?
I really don’t know what to think of 2018…it’s one of the harder years I’ve had in recent memory.
I started this year lost. Down a dark hole. Wondering if I’d be able to climb out.
This exact time last year, I had a deadline on a book that I knew deep in my gut I was going to miss. I had a manuscript I’d planned to edit some over the Christmas break, which didn’t happen, and a new plan to lock myself in my office for two weeks and emerge victorious, blinking in the sun, with something that ready to send off to my editors…whom I’d already pushed back my deadline on.
None of that happened.
I tried one day, and realized it wasn’t going to work. My writing process was broken. *I* felt broken. Every time I sat down to write, I started to feel panic. My heart would start slamming into my ribs, and my breath would become shallow, and all I wanted to do was sleep.
That, right there, is anxiety. 2018 was the year I realized how much I had it. I’ve always had it, and I never really had a specific plan to deal with it. 2018 was the year I made a plan.
I started meditating. I started planning just a bit less, and setting fewer goals for myself. I cancelled my editors, which hurt because it felt so unprofessional, and I cancelled my pre-order, which hurt even more because it felt like failure.
In a sense, 2018 *was* a failure: I’d planned for 2018 to be the year that I became, money-wise at least, a professional author. That didn’t happen. My second book isn’t done yet, nor is my third or fourth. My plans on how to become a full-time author money-wise hinged on releasing those books this past year…I failed at that.
But, man, the rest of 2018 has taught me that was the wrong goal to focus on. For real. I wasn’t ready for that goal yet. I couldn’t write books that fast yet. I couldn’t even write books that good yet. I didn’t know how. My process was broken because I didn’t have a process.
2018 was the year that I found my process.
OR…at least I found the focus on my process. I still don’t think that I have it down, but that recognition of what the ACTUAL next step was for me, and it wasn’t financial, has resurrected me. It pulled me out of the dark, broken hole I was in this time last year.
Everything takes longer than I think it will.
This is another thing I’ve learned this year. I know this now because I started (after two other failed attempts, mind you) tracking my actual writing productivity every day. And not because I wanted to go faster or hit some arbitrary, external, unfounded goal…but the exact opposite: I wanted to know how long stuff ACTUALLY took me. I wanted the data. I wanted REALITY.
2018 was the year I started tracking my writing.
It’s probably going to end up being the key to my future success. See…the vast majority of my anxiety, the same anxiety that was crippling me, comes from not knowing how long something is going to take me. I went through it most recently with my editing work for Study.com back in 2012 and most of 2013. I didn’t have a system. It was only once I did have a system, and I’d tracked how long the work took me to complete for about a year that I started to be able to improve, to speed up, and to plan/schedule my time. I’ve finally started doing the same with my writing.
I’m still in the middle of that, and I suppose that’s the other big takeaway I have from 2018: I still feel like I’m in the middle of the change. I haven’t arrived.
It would be silly to expect such a thing to happen on the earth’s clock as opposed to my own anyway, but he we are. I wish I could tell you that 2018 was the year I SOLVED my process, the year that I really nailed it down top to bottom, and the year I took off because of it…but it isn’t. I’m on my way there, but I still have much further to go. But at least I AM on the road there. Because I wasn’t for quite a long time.
So, what have I learned along the way?
I’ve learned that story structure is a bit of an obsession for me: I believe that the first, primary job of a story is to WORK, and there are a looooot of storytellers out there who don’t understand what that means (including me, still, by the way). I want to be one of the story tellers who does understand that.
I’ve learned that clearing my mind of anxious thoughts will help me get into the writing zone almost any time or anywhere. I can do this through meditation.
I’ve learned that I work best when I get out of the house, or when the house is quiet and I feel like I’m alone. Music helps with that, but closed doors don’t all that much, at least not the doors/curtains that I have for my current office. Going to “work” at somewhere like The Muse co-working space in NoHo, or using the Netflix offices that I’m working at right now is very, very effective.
I’ve learned that I often put too much on my plate…or perhaps I’ve simply been reminded that I do that. It’s an excuse to stay productive, even when I feel as though I’ve hit a wall on some other project and I want to avoid the work to bust through that wall.
I’ve learned that I am, despite my failings, failures, and avoidances, very very persistent. I will work on a problem until I reach a solution…at least when I can see a glimmer of the solution is there.
I’ve learned that I am addicted to my iPhone. Social Media in particular.
I’ve learned that I can reliably write about 1,500 words in an hour.
There are such large chunks of this past year that I feel like are black holes. How did I put so much time and effort into something–my novel comes to mind–and still have nothing to show for it? How much of that time was wasted this year? IS that the reality of 2018? Or is that simply my own negative, critical perception of it?
I have a record.
This blog.
I’m going to use it. Let’s do a round of “I remember.” Which will actually be completed tomorrow, because I’ve run out of time today…but I did good! Spent about an hour on it to this point, which is exactly what I wanted. Now…what do I remember?
2018 I remember…
…working so hard to get myself Star Wars: Despecialized, which I so wanted to watch because I knew it would fire my imagination and make me feel better about my writing.
…Joe and Maduri getting engaged, and being there with them at the Griffith Observatory when it happened. And now they’re getting MARRIED in a few days. Incredible.
…getting into, and like *really* into Breath of the Wild. Probably my second-favorite game ever, after Skyrim.
…getting the flu…and then Liz getting it, too. Ugh. I still remember sitting on the couch trying to play switch and my EYES aching.
…when Discovery went into the Mirror Universe and my eyes rolled completely into the back of my head.
…watching the Warriors, and how much they struggled…and still won the Finals.
…Disjointed dropping its season 2, us being too sick to go to Kathy Bate’s party to celebrate, and being so, so proud of my wife. I still am proud of you, bear. What an achievement.
…trying to talk to people on Facebook about political issues, and how draining it always was. I’ve stopped doing that…
…my team of Beta readers, people from my mailing list, who pledged to help me finish my second book by allowing me to send them chapters each week as I went along. Bless all of you. The book isn’t done YET, but it WILL be done soon because of you.
…taking about two weeks away from writing because I just couldn’t do it. I was having a panic attack every time I sat down. Oh, how I remember how hard that was.
…sitting on the chaise lounge and working and reworking a scene until it finally felt like they were talking about something real.
…trying to do too much. Always trying to do too much.
…losing my Uncle Tony, and the trip with Liz, Scott and Addie to attend his memorial, including lost cells phones, a camera-shy alpaca, and so much driving.
…watching Dark. So. Good. And how it helped me get into writing.
…watching Star Trek: The Motion Picture with Josh and just how big and cinematic that movie felt, and then how intense and powerful The Wrath of Khan was, and how fun and funny The Voyage Home was.
…getting food poisoning from Father’s Office.
…Disjointed getting canceled. Fuck.
…Liz booking a new pilot literally days after it was announced that Disjointed had been canceled. She’s amazing. You are amazing, bear.
…going to Austin for the Smarter Artists Summit and all the nice fellow authors I met there. I remember feeling so lost about my own process, but thinking that I just needed to keep going. To learn and keep going.
…playing Breath of the Wild with Kerry visiting, and getting my first horse.
…making vlogs for my email list whenever I was traveling
…deciding to go to Maui, and full-out. It was so exciting to look forward to that trip.
…all the attempts to build my work schedule. So many schedules. None of them worked…until I decided to write full-time AWAY from home at the co-working space (and then at Netflix before and after work)
…writing about when it rained in LA. Every. Time.
…hanging out with the Ho in Rancho Palos Verdes on her shoot. So fun. And the fruit tart we ordered with room service, dayaaaammm…
…learning to set a timer for writing, and how effective a technique it is to make sure the words come out.
…falling behind, so woefully behind on writing my movie reviews for the year. That was a mistake, deciding to write those reviews. Too much work. I enjoyed it, but it was too much work, obviously.
…discovering that I can do a lot of work whilst also LISTENING to something (like audio editing, podcasts, or audiobooks)…which means I can kill two birds with one stone.
…watching A Quiet Place and the pure joy of a movie well-made. Damn that movie was good.
…learning that “write every day” doesn’t mean write FULL TIME every day…it means just a little bit every day. Just to keep your project warm and close. Jesus, what a huge lesson.
…trying word count goals, trying story goals, trying time-frame goals, writing in morning, writing in the evening…and none of it working consistently.
…learning that I do actually have to do a lot of problem solving while I’m first drafting, because if I skimp on that, the prose comes out absolute drivel and it sucks the life out of me because I feel like I’m writing crap…and I am
…I cannot believe it took me till April 19th to start meditating before writing sessions. Jesus.
…Sean Manaea throwing a no-hitter against the Red Sox—who won the freaking WORLD SERIES this year, by the way—as the first real moment in a surprisingly excellent A’s season
…gradually letting go of the idea that every day should be top-productivity, and that down days were normal. They were part of the process. Trust the process…
…just keep writing, and trust the process.
…reading The Story Grid and feeling like there was someone else out there who spoke my language, and that they had things to TEACH me, things that would help me write this damn book.
…Maui. Oh, that magical wonderful place…what do I remember about Maui…
…poke and complimentary lemonades on the balcony of our ocean-facing room, with the sound of the waves…
…the breakfast buffet each day with its mocha waffles and liliquoi sauce and apple bananas…
…Liz booking her first starring role in a feature film while we were there…
…ordering the entire Star Trek movie series of artwork from Lee sitting on the beach…
…I am the doggo of the sea, and floating in the most perfect ocean water…
…the massage up in the mist that smelled like passion fruit, and almost scalded my feet at the end…and the song when they were done that made me cry into my towel…
…the sunset at Merriman’s that made Liz cry…
…writing in the Andaz lobby…
…snorkeling for the very first time…
…the day at the beach, then renewing our vows with Anna, Darren, and Ry-n, and dinner with them afterwards that felt like family, and saying Happy Birthday to Liz
…coming home to the pups
…holy crap, I wrote 4,000 words on vacation. Amazing.
…Westworld’s first truly excellent episode of television. So. Good.
…getting myself a new writing chair in my office because the one I had wasn’t super good for my feet, and because I found moving around the house helped me keep writing when I wanted to stop.
…when the building down the street from us that we were watching got broken into…while someone was home. Crazy.
…learning that Liz’s pilot didn’t get picked up, but she was already into preparing for her feature film.
…the time melatonin fucked me up for a day and I had lock-jaw and a headache after sleeping. So random. Never happened again.
…seeing the rose gardens in Portland with Nina and Amir…
…the travesty that is the Trump presidency, particularly when they started tearing apart families at our border…so much anxiety about my country. So much.
…how freaking GOOD “A Stitch in Time” by Andrew Robinson was. My lord. Inspiring.
…recording the very last episode of Two Guys One Trek
…when I was looking at my ballooning word count for Book 2 at 136,000 words and realizing I was, in fact, writing Books 2 *and* 3, and that I should split them accordingly
…putting together our submission for the Parsec awards. We didn’t win, but it doesn’t really matter to me. I *loved* putting that sample together.
…discovering the joys of Oxy-clean, bright white sheets chiefly among them
…sitting in beach chairs on our roof, watching the valley explode into flashes of color on July 4th
…when Dayna and Antoine moved away, and how we got to see Harry Potter together at the bowl before they did
…playing MarioKart with Kerry and Jessie on the day it was 113º in LA
…falling in love with the rewrite process, and realizing that it truly depends on the project how I feel about each phase. For Starstuff, it was the first draft that was bliss. For this second book, it’s been the rewrite. How strange.
…finally finishing the REAL first draft of Escape From Red Tower, which clocked in at 164,000 words.
…learning that my daily tap-out “limit” writing-wise is 6,000 words in very brief instances, nominally around 4,000 words, and that in a week of full productivity, I can do about 15,000 words. STILL learning what my rewrite output looks like. AND that a good schedule when I’m writing from home is 4K on Mon-Tues-Thurs-Fri’s with off days on Wed-Sat-Sun in which I make up any shortfalls from the larger work days.
…Bilc Raul aka Stereopole helping me to get my site https compatible AND so that all my old incredible links go to the right posts on ih.com — mvp. So grateful.
…that sometimes taking on a different project after finishing the major phase of another one (read: starting a novella after finishing a draft of Escape From Red Tower) is a necessary break…but sometimes it’s also resistance in disguise.
…pho fried chicken at Stephen and Thida’s
…how important it is to not be perfect with a schedule, to allow that extra make-up time for when I inevitably fall behind
…when I learned to not stress about the days in which I hit a wall, to just try my best that day and move on without looking back or trying to “catch up”
…learning that days outlining with a zero word count are necessary for the words that follow. It’s not wasted time.
…still struggling so much with writing on vacay. A nut I have yet to crack…
…when Coco stopped eating whimzees, her nighttime dental treat. We’re pretty sure it’s because her teeth hurt when she chews them.
…the first truly excellent episode of Castle, where Sissy Spasek travels through time…
…buying my very first brand-new car, cash, with Liz. Together. We bought it together. Still blows my mind.
…Lizderfer and Ali getting married in Sonoma, and hanging with the Disjointed crew.
…seeing Ryan and Lisa and meeting Penny for the first time. Coco loved her, too.
…14 years of pandaversary. Love you, bear.
…how powerful setting clear, specific goals for myself can be when I do it the night previous, and always START EARLY
…Eataly with Liz for my birthday, followed by watching Gold Finger and some of Thunderball together.
…going to Lost Spirits TWICE…or was it THREE times???…in the same year. Once with K-Bear and Arg right at the beginning of the year, once with Rob Z…and then another time with Mike and J???
…when the A’s got back to the postseason. Love this young team so, so much.
…seeing the A’s play their last series of the year down in Anaheim with Matt and Joe in the FRONT ROW. The best seats we’ve ever had.
…watching Maniac with Bear
…selling Liz’s Panda Mobile (and us getting tickets from Long Beach, which is where she now lives)
…when Cooper got Tabasco sauce in his eye because he was under the counter where the Ho was making her morning avocado toast. Poor little guy.
…getting sick right when my Miyazaki Blu-ray collection came in, and watching those movies with a fever.
…how much I struggled with consistency. I really need to go through and look at where my production when down, and what caused it to happen. I know late in the year, at the end of August, it was traveling. That crushed me.
…when the building exploded with work. Jesus. Three floods, three vacancies, and my own personal problems with the office. This was a *rough* year with the building.
…watching Deep Space Nine with Josh and recording our conversations because we just missed podcasting so much
…truly coming to terms with how much the building was a trigger for my anxiety, and how much writing I had lost because of it
…”live and eat pie!” sung to the Bond theme “Live and Let Die”
…finally finishing EfRT, the first draft of the new part 1 of that book, at the end of October.
…pie night at the Grove with the Canadas
…the last-minute trip up to Humboldt to celebrate my dad’s birthday. So glad I did that.
…finding beautiful clam shells on the beach out past the dunes in Humboldt, then going home and trying to figure out the parents’ blu-ray and surround sound system for literally two hours, lol
…having my first real, true Halloween costume in YEARS as Newt Scamander. Might do him again next year, and add some more props
…deciding to work away from home, to invest in a co-working space. GREAT idea…
…these goldmines, articulated on November 3rd after trying to do a 8,000-word day:
-The first hour of work for me is always very, very hard…and it is very, very crucial to my day as a whole. I didn’t manage to sit my butt in my chair on time this morning, and it made me feel like I was working from behind all day. That’s crushing when I’m feeling fragile…which is most of the time
I need to put some energy and create some systems that get me in my chair working when I’ve planned to do so. Adjusting my schedule for a late start doesn’t help.
-Distractions are deadly. If I’ve set up a block of time, I need to keep it. Distractions, both internal and external killed the second half of my day, and all the momentum I had from hours 2-4.
-Eating counts as a deadly distraction. At least using brainpower and TIME to eat.
-The flip of that is also true: hunger is equally deadly. I need to figure out a way to eat during my quick breaks between sprints. Keep my blood sugar up for a four-hour stretch in a healthy way. I also need to make sure that my meals are pre-made and ready for me to chow down.
-Naps are constructive…but with them comes a reset…meaning that first hour back is just as hard again as it was in the morning, and just as crucial to kicking off the second half of my day.
-The ability to push aside down time, for me any way, comes from “finishing energy,” and if that finish line is too far away, I struggle to get there. But, if I’m close, if I know I can reach out and cross it if I just work a little longer and a little harder…well, I actually have quite an excellent track record historically for finding that extra energy reserve and determination. So, that’s a valuable lesson, too. If I can get 2/3 or 3/4 of the way towards a goal in my scheduled time, or close to it, chances are I’ll hit that goal even if it means working later. But, if I’m stuck at halfway, or less than that, I usually fail to rally and succeed.
…I found, however, none of these to be a problem when working away from home
…these gems, too, from that same day on November 3rd:
1. Set out a specific schedule with specific hourly goals
2. Put a lot of focus and energy on those two first-hours of the day after breakfast and lunch to make sure I start work on time and hit my first couple half-hour goals
3. I didn’t talk about this yet, but 25 minute sprints definitely slow me down over an hour’s work…but they also feel SO MUCH less intimidating than 50 minute sprints. Try sticking with them
4. Meals need to be more than just pre-planned; they need to be ready to go. Especially lunch.
5. I need to have snacks to go to between each hour of work if I’m doing an 8-hour day so I keep my blood sugar up
6. I need to be somewhere distraction-free to get 8 full hours of work in
…going to 20Books Vegas, and actually knowing enough authors there to just hang out at night and not feel like I was an outsider. It was amazing. I always had someone to share a drink with, or a meal, or just a quick chat.
…and feeling like 20Books 2017 couldn’t possibly have been topped because it was NEW and SMALL and everyone was so optimistic and friendly…and 20Books Vegas 2018 blowing it out of the water. Amazing conference.
…getting my new iPad. I feel like I haven’t used it all that much yet, but I love it. So. Much. I love writing on it, and that’s the genius of it all.
…the great detergent bubble flood of our second bathroom. Good lord.
…Aaron and Marie getting hitched. So many weddings. Good. Lawd.
…going into work at The Muse Rooms in NoHo and *instantly* having the best writing day I’d ever had. It felt like the switch I’d been looking for.
…and almost the very next day getting a job offer from Netflix to come in and work for a few months
…meeting with my supervisor to talk about our relationship and me having an epiphany about that person, and how my expectations were unrealistic
…coming up with The Lost Tapes podcast with Josh as we were chilling and watching Deep Space Nine
…discovering what grimoires were, and finding the idea of an encyclopedia of demons to be faaaasssscccinnnaattting
…when Ali told Liz and I that we smelled good as we met him and Lizderfer for sushi 😛
…tomorrow I tackle. Tonight I sleep.
…feeding sea otters down in Long Beach and imagining them snapping off my fingers like baby carrots with their giant sharp teeth
…getting Liz’s dad a brand-new iPhone, and how excited he was about it
…working at Netflix, in the offices, wondering if I made the right decision back in 2017 to say “no” to joining that team…and realizing that it WAS the right decision. I wasn’t ready to work full time like that and write at the same time. It would have felt like giving up on my dream. But, now I was ready. I had the drive and the focus and the CONFIDENCE to do both. Thank god. I was ready. I am ready.
…the A’s announcing their plans for a stadium at Howard Terminal
…learning all over again that the many, many steps in the rewriting process that I use help me TREMENDOUSLY by breaking such a daunting task down into a hundred tiny little steps…and tiny steps aren’t so scary or impossible
…listening to the Story Grid podcast on my morning commute. Gonna continue that in 2019. Love. It.
…agonizing over whether to get Story Grid certified, and ultimately deciding that yes, it’s what I want to do.
…being so grumpy about going to Joe’s bachelor party, and not because of Joe at all, but because I’d been cruising so good with my writing, and I was worried it would derail me. It did, but only slightly, and the party was absolutely epic. I had suuuuuch a good time, and I’m so glad I went.
…when I learned (and learned again) that it’s not hitting a deadline that matters so much to me as just putting in a full-day’s worth of effort.
…starting Film School with Josh and *immediately* knowing in my gut that this was a good, gooooood idea. And we loved our first film!
…forgetting until literally the night that we were packing to leave that I’d had to throw away my 20-year-old big suitcase earlier in the year (after Maui?) because it had broken a wheel, and running out to Marhsall’s just before they closed to buy a new one. Oops.
…getting up to Portland and feeling like it was the holidays, and that I had actually done the work to earn this vacation. First time I’d felt that in…a long long time. I didn’t realize it at the time, but I do now. I didn’t feel like I was hiding from work. I felt like I’d earned myself the break.
…playing MarioKart with Scott. Tea tasting with Bear. Dinner at Bollywood.
…then, when everything changed because of a family emergency, and Christmas was moved down to the Bay Area instead.
…driving the entire state of Oregon and half of California in a rental car, and listening to the Story Grid and the Warriors, and a book on “finishing.” I actually loved the whole trip.
…coming home and getting Liz’s present, a playstation VR headset up and running…and it BLOWING OUR MINDS how fun it was. Beat Saber is so, sooo fun.
…wrapping up the finances just in time to find out that we didn’t have to file payroll this year, which was such a relief
…watching a Warriors game in VR and feeling like, for the very first time, I was watching a game in person at the arena. Magical.
Yeah, you guys, 2018 was a tough, TOUGH year…but fuck me, I learned SO MUCH from this year. Holy shit. Hooooolllyyy shit. I will keep the lessons I learned this year with me for the rest of my life, most notably, HOW TO BE A WRITER. How to survive the ups and downs, and still get stuff done.
So, truth time: it took me two full days to get through all those “I remembers.” I read through each and every blog post from the past year, and I wrote down the moments that struck a chord in my emotionally. I was telling Liz about it, and realizing that this kind of reflection is data. It’s analysis. It’s POWER. And in 2019, I want to do more of it. I was struck with the desire to plot out my mood and my writing productivity using my blog posts as a record, and to see more graphically where my ups and downs were, and see if I could figure out why they happened. And, I have ideas on how to do it even easier than that this year.
I’m overwhelmed, you guys. 2018 was an utterly overwhelming, uncomfortable, hard, grit-filled year. But as Josh and I were discussing yesterday, it is those uncomfortable, hard things that actually make us grow. It’s when things feel really hard and like we should just give up that we truly step forward.
I grew A LOT last year. It wasn’t the year that I wanted, but fuck me, it was the year that I *needed*.
Thank you for that, 2018. Thank you. I’ll never forget you for that.
Here’s to 2019.
2018 Book List:
- Six Wakes – Mur Lafferty 1/10
- Sandstorm – James Rollins 3/18
- Honeycomb Set 1 – Wren Cavanaugh & Junior Sokolov
- The Writer’s Guide to FAT Outlining I – Kat Lind 4/17
- The Story Grid by Shawn Coyne 5/13
- Star Nomad – Lindsay Buroker 5/19
- Star Cat: Origins – Andrew Mackay 5/21
- To catch a king – Mike Kraus (short story)
- Surviving the Fall – Mike Kraus
- A Stitch In Time – Andrew J Robinson 6/20
- How to write a sizzling synopsis – Bryan Cohen (6/25)
- Adweek Copywriting Handbook – Joseph Sugarman (7/8)
- Destiny Lost – MD Cooper (7/15)
- The Left Hand of Darkness – Ursula Le Guin (8/1)
- Writing Dynamite Story Hooks – Jackson Dean Chase (8/4)
- War Drums – Jon Vornholt (9/11)
- Fear – Bob Woodward (9/19)
- Getting Things Done (2nd Ed) – David Allen (9/22)
- Legionnaire – Jason Anspach & Nick Cole (10/4)
- Galactic Outlaws – Jason Anspach & Nick Cole (10/19)
- The Hero With a Thousand Faces (12/12)
- Finish: Give Yourself The Gift Of Done – Jon Acuff (12/26)
2018 Movie List:
- Assassin’s Creed (1/4)
- The Shape of Water (1/6)
- Hidden Figures (1/9)
- The Big Sick (1/10)
- 13th (2/9)
- Dunkirk (2/16)
- ***Black Panther (2/17)
- What We Do In The Shadows (2/18)
- Geostorm (2/23)
- Kingsman: The Golden Circle (2/28)
- Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri (3/3)
- Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Men Tell No Tales (3/8)
- ***A Wrinkle in Time (3/10)
- Banking on Bitcoin (3/11)
- Time Travelers (via MST3K) (3/24)
- ***Ready Player One (3/31)
- The Lost City of Z (4/1)
- Atomic Blonde (4/1)
- Maze Runner: The Scorch Trials (4/7)
- ***A Quiet Place (4/9)
- The Girl on the Train (4/10)
- Coco (4/21)
- ***Avengers: Infinity War (5/6)
- Lion (5/12)
- Jumanji: Welcome To The Jungle (5/13)
- ***Deadpool 2 (5/17)
- Baby Driver (5/18)
- Cars 3 (5/19)
- ***Solo: A Star Wars Story (5/25)
- The House (5/30)
- Speed Racer (6/1)
- Cargo (6/3)
- Justice League (6/5)
- ***Ocean’s Eight (6/11)
- The 5th Wave (6/12)
- ***Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom (6/22)
- 400 Days (6/23)
- The Cloverfield Paradox (6/23)
- Hannah Gladsby: Nanette (6/25)
- ***Incredibles 2 (6/26)
- Murder on the Orient Express (6/27)
- The girl with all the gifts (6/30)
- The Secret Life of Pets (6/30)
- ***Ant-man & Wasp (7/6)
- Annihilation (7/8)
- Pacific Rim: Uprising (7/11)
- ***Skyscraper (7/12)
- Diner (7/14)
- Tomb Raider (7/16)
- Flash Gordon (7/21)
- City of Gold (7/23)
- The Last Man on the Moon (7/27)
- The Bleeding Edge (8/4)
- It (8/5)
- ***The Meg (8/10)
- ***Mission Impossible: Fallout (8/15)
- Get Shorty (9/8)
- Lupin III: The Castle of Cagliostro (10/2)
- Kubo and the Two Strings (10/4)
- Nausicaä of the Valley of the Wind (10/7)
- Castle in the Sky (10/9)
- My Neighbor Totoro (10/11)
- Ghost in the Shell (10/12)
- Tag (10/25)
- Duplicity (10/27)
- Rampage (11/9)
- ***Halloween (2018) (11/12)
- Hereditary (11/16)
- Kiki’s Delivery Service (11/16)
- They’ll love me when I’m Dead (11/17)
- Ferrari: Race to Immortality (11/23)
- To All The Boys I’ve Loved Before (11/25)
- Isle of Dogs (11/27)
- Bird Box (12/28)
*** denotes I saw the movie in the theater 🙂