Hillora Lang
Bio
Hillora Lang feared running out of stuff to read, so she began writing just in case...
While her major loves are fantasy and history, Hillora will write just about anything, if inspiration strikes. If it doesn't strike, she'll nap, instead.
Stories (41/0)
The Writing Is on the Wall
I am blessed in many ways to be a writer, and right now, I feel especially privileged to be a writer of sci-fi/dystopian fiction. This has given me a level of insight into crisis survival that many people don’t possess. I am also blessed to be able to volunteer at a local organization that serves the ID/DD community (Intellectual Disability/Developmental Disability - I am an autistic person), working to stock and organize our Food Pantry, where clients come to “shop” for supplemental foodstuffs to stretch their food dollars and eat healthy meals. These two parts of my life have given me an edge, which I feel needs to be shared.
By Hillora Lang7 months ago in Feast
Collection
Nobody can hear a scream in the vacuum of space, or so they say. So humans say, anyway. Awareness returns slowly, one cell at a time. My extremities begin to tingle first. I wiggle fingers and toes, arms and legs, fighting to restore circulation to limbs deadened by immobility. Or is it whatever they injected me with that prevents movement, that steals perception and leaves blankness in its wake? I stretch out fingers and toes—bare toes—to feel the edges of reality.
By Hillora Lang8 months ago in Fiction
Of Mothers and Sisters and the End of a Life
I am autistic. I experience life and the world and relationships differently than neurotypical people. Sometimes I succeed in my life, at things large or small, and I go to sleep at night without regrets for missing the mark in some interaction or another. Sometimes I fail miserably and can’t sleep at all for the roiling mass of regrets at my mistakes, as if I’ve poured a vat of acid over my head and it’s eating away at me. Many people mistakenly believe that autistic people—because we don’t always show our emotions outwardly—are unempathetic or unfeeling.
By Hillora Lang8 months ago in Families
Dark Stars
Nobody can hear a scream in the vacuum of space, or so they say. Unluckily for me, the cargo bay didn’t exist in a vacuum. The Et'ealth breathed oxygen, just as humans did, so their cargo bay was not a void. It was entirely possible that my screams would be heard.
By Hillora Lang8 months ago in Fiction
Runaway Train
Rachel woke with a cramped neck and a pounding headache. That was nothing new. Since coming to Florida she had partied way too hard. Mornings often dawned with a price to be paid for her vacay indulgences. A pained smile curved her lips upwards before she even opened her eyes. It would all be worth it, when she was back home in Edinburgh with great stories to tell of her American trip.
By Hillora Lang8 months ago in Viva
The Fourth Of July Has Become a Day of Mourning
My Mayflower ancestors, illegal immigrants from England in 1620, invaded a country not their own. Those immigrants, including Isaac Allerton, Mary Norris, and their children including four-year-old daughter Mary Allerton, were Pilgrim Separatists, seeking religious freedom in a new place. They had been forced to flee their home in England in order to worship as they were called to do, and build a new life in a country far different from what they knew. It was worth giving up everything they had to start a new life, where they could worship as they chose. They stole the country of my Indigenous ancestors, and started a history of genocide, yes. They were seeking freedom, but their Christian religion was a martial one, so they did what they had been taught. Today, we know better. But are we doing better? I have my doubts.
By Hillora Lang9 months ago in The Swamp
To My Younger Sisters: If You Need to Go Camping at Any Time, I’m Here For You
I have a brain, and a heart, and a soul. I have a brain to reason with, to analyze facts and allow knowledge to grow. I have a heart to feel with, to form empathy with other people, to express my compassion for others.
By Hillora Lang9 months ago in Viva
A Letter to My Dad
My father felt a lot of regrets in his life. Maybe it was the way he was raised, or maybe he truly felt like he’d failed his kids by divorcing, remarrying, and losing touch for so many years. There was a period of nearly twenty years when he had moved from upstate New York to Florida, when I was working dead-end retail jobs and unable to afford either time off from work or the money to travel south to see him. We kept in touch by phone, but it wasn’t the same.
By Hillora Lang10 months ago in Families
Babes in the Woods
The cabin in the woods had been abandoned for years, but one night, a candle burned in the window. Celie had been coming back for years, in the dark of the moon. Never when the full moon made it as easy to find her way through the masses of fir and pine as in daylight. Never when the waning moon cast shadows clawing through the underbrush. Never when the waxing moon sparkled off the dew gathered upon drifts of fallen leaves.
By Hillora Lang10 months ago in Fiction
A.I. Is Over My Head
I am a writer. I wrangle words, attempting to force them to tell intriguing stories in interesting ways. Writing can be brain-exhaustifying, as I’m sure many of you know, so I am always looking for fun ways to untangle the neural pathways which serve me so well. And while data-whatsit-manipulatizing is totally NOT in my wheelhouse, there’s a new pastime I just came across, on the HuggingFace.co website.
By Hillora Lang10 months ago in 01
Sacandaga Stew
For the five of us kids crammed into the back of the wood-paneled Suburban station wagon, the first sign that we were approaching our destination came through our eager noses, lifted to take in the redolent scent of pine. The crisp fragrance wafted over us like the richest of perfumes, filling all of our senses as we watched the tree-lined mountain road unroll past the car windows. Sure, there were pine trees in other places along our journey from Hopewell Junction, NY to the Great Sacandaga Lake, just past the small town of Northville in the Adirondack Mountains. But the pines never smelled so invigorating as they did pulling into the campground where we would spend the summer.
By Hillora Lang10 months ago in Confessions
