Fandom Snowflake: day 2
The second challenge is as follows: In your own space, talk about your fannish history. Leave a comment in this post saying you did it. Include a link to your post if you feel comfortable doing so.
This is LONG.
My... well, start in fandom, as I mark it, was around 1983, with Duran Duran. Like, I so wanted to be part of that, that I wrote. And wrote. and wrote. It's really embarrassing. I think I cataloged it all, once, even, divided it into tries (less than two pages) and actual stories. I hand wrote it all, and I have one that was 124 pages and two words - I stopped there because it wasn’t going anywhere. Anyway, I had a friend and we read each other stories we'd written (little stars!), and... yeah. Years with Duran Duran. And then... Charlie Sexton. And... A-ha. And A few others.
My foray into heavy metal came with Def Leppard, when Rick Allen lost his arm. And they figured out a way for him to keep drumming. I was just... stunned. From Def Leppard, we wound up with Europe (and man, that was a ride), and Whitesnake, and a bunch of others. I mean... and then I dragged my boyfriend into it. Like, while I was in Austria on Study Abroad through college, we wrote letters, and we’d end up with around seven at the end - we’d write as the characters from the bands we liked. And yes, I wrote. For ever. I can't even name them all anymore, but they're all there, in the back of my head, happily retired.
In college - after a 18 month break from everything (I went on a mission to Austria) - I ran into... New Kids on the Block. Backstreet Boys. 'N Sync. Hanson came around after that, and that's where I found fandom online, and that computers weren't the waste of time I thought they were (that's a story in and of itself). I wrote a lot of BSB and 'N Sync, because there was so much there, so much with the friendships (and the videos, because that's where I got a lot of ideas), and just... the found family thing (I didn't get that until MUCH later, though). Um...
Somewhere in there, I refound Power Rangers, and that brought something fascinating - a lot of stories, and other people to get ideas from (and yes, I still watch it, the newest seasons and the movie, although none of them really grab me the way the first few teams did). I read this fascinating fic someone wrote, that took place at the end of the Space season, and I contacted them and asked if I could write something based on their idea. He said yes, and "I wonder what it's like to be a superhero - Real World, Matchbox 20" was born. It became just "Superhero" because I didn't think the entire title would fit in the box at ff.net, and I even won an award for that (years later) on Livejournal.
Then the Phantom Menace happened, and the Jedi Apprentice books. Those... those sparked something that I didn't think I'd ever actually do anything with, but man... The trilogy took me YEARS to do, but I have finally finished it. It started as one fic, and then I read this fabulous idea someone else had written, and I went... hey, I like that idea! I wish I could remember where it was, but that's over 18 years ago now, or I'd actually credit them. I did change it around enough so that it wasn't stolen, and didn't look stolen. It turned out, then, that I could actually tweak it some and fit it into the first one, and then I had to write the third to round out the whole thing.
I spent a couple of years at theforce.net, and I made some good friends, and I learned a LOT (and found the best beta ever). Problem Child actually won an award (the first of the trilogy), best portrayal of Obi-Wan for summer of 2002 - which was right before I got married. It was kind of heady!
My next fandom - that I didn't really get into, but I did write a lot for - was Final Fantasy VII: Advent Children. I kept seeing signs for it in front of a movie store in the mall, and I can't remember if I rented it or bought it. I knew it was based off a video game, but hoped... well, the first time I watched it, I was all ... this doesn't make sense, I don't understand - and then the sword came out, and the bike, and I was HOOKED. Like, hooked, because man, that sword....
About this time I ran across someone on ff.net that was posting something about fanfic100. On this place called Livejournal. Well, I went to investigate, made myself a journal, and boom. That was around 2006, when I had two little girls and one on the way. And LiveJournal was something else. Man, I can't... I know, most people came from there, and I miss it a lot. But that's where I started posting things. Not on my own journal at first, but still. And so I wrote 100 fics for Tifa and Cloud - some of which I am quite proud of.
At some point - and I'm not sure where - I stumbled across a manga in the library called "The Prince of Tennis." And while to this day I can't stand the titular character, the team around him was so fascinating, and then there were more teams that were even more fun, and... oh, it was lovely. Anyway, by now I had a few stories up on ff.net, and then they had this whole "we can't have real people on here" which meant I lost a couple of my favorite fics. Still... I didn't know anything else. The main problem, though, was that finding Prince of Tennis was impossible. Why? it was under Tennis no Ojisama - the Japanese name. Eventually something happened and I found some stuff, and I found another site that had these things called dream something or other (I don't remember what right now), where I could put in my name, and I was actually the main character.
I posted a story there, and it didn't go well - they said something about how I wasn't... oh, I didn't have the character down. Well, no, because I had only read so much of the manga, and there was this anime show, and I hadn't seen much of that, either, and... yeah. On LJ, I found there were role playing communities. And that... oh, that was the best fun ever! I actually did two more of the fanfic100 challenges, one focused on one of the characters (which a lot of people told me was one of the best things they’d ever read), and one based on one of the other teams, not the main one. Not to mention a bunch of other stuff. One comm was 30 letters or something? And I did a bunch of those, three of them exchanges with other friends - that was fun. A lot of fun. I do think Prince of Tennis is where I started my fascination with twins, too.
That opened up a bunch of things for me, too, though. One was Gravitation, which combined music and writing, and that was ME. THat was fun. One of those I'm not involved with the fandom, especially, but I did some writing with that.
I don't remember where I met my friends, which comm it was. I had these good friends I met, and we wrote PoT fics... and maybe it was just hakkais_shadow at first. He was a fun guy, and he said to me, one day when we were talking on AIM, that he had this group he wanted to introduce me to.
And so I met Arashi. I was back in the music, and my interest in Prince of Tennis faded pretty quickly. I definitely prefer real people over those who aren't. And down the rabbit hole I went. That was the first fandom I found incredibly stand-off-ish. I wrote a pretty lengthy fic (I have a thing about destroying found families and putting them back together) and posted it... and no one said anything, no one seemed to want to communicate with me, nothing. So I... left. It wasn't worth it, and I was happy with my writing where it was. Had a lot of fun with Arashi, including their movie (can I remember the name? No) and a couple of the tv shows one or two were in (Kimi wa Petto, Maou). Just lovely.
Hakkais_shadow struck again. Can I show you this other group? The song was called Rising Sun, and Purple Line, and I was HOOKED into kpop. So that was around...2006 (which I can say because it was when Purple Line came out), and I have not looked back since. One of the reasons I fell in love with DBSK (the artists of the above songs) was because they could sing, a capella, and it was incredibly beautiful (and that's why I about cried when they separated, and... no one has done that like they did. Oh man, they were amazing).
That rabbit hole has gone deeper and longer than any other fandom I've been in. And, granted, I could say that I have been in many fandoms over the years (for pete's sake, they have fan wars. It's WEIRD), one for each group I have followed and written about. DBSK, Super Junior, the list goes on and on. In 2012 I joined AO3, and that's currently where most of the longer fic resides. I've thought about putting everything over there, but we're talking three tables - more, four or five - of 100 prompts, plus various other prompt tables (I got really good at those!), and it's just... I don't think it's worth it. I might go through and find some of the better fics and move them over, I don't know. I'm still thinking about it.
Around 2016, everything stopped. I was having personal problems (like, depression and it was crappy all the way around), and my output just... stopped. I didn't actually post anything. I was barely writing. Nano - which I started the November after my oldest was born - was a chore, not even fun, and it was... nothing was happening.
I'm leaving a lot out - mostly because it's late as I write this, and it's long and no one is going to `read it. There was Coed School, and Speed (how I miss them), and B.A.P, and Myname, and U-Kiss, Block B (who I actually saw live, go me!) and Boyfriend, F.Cuz (pronounced Focus), Romeo's Midnight Theatre album (which I wrote a fic to - that was a challenge, too), and... last year, I found Ateez. Or, they found me, I'm not sure. It was kind of weird, I had a couple of people tell me I needed to watch these mvs, and so I did, and it... was okay. And then someone told me to watch "Say My Name." I have NEVER had someone reach out (not literally, obviously, because he couldn't do that through my computer screen) and grab my collar and say "hi. I'm your bias, and you don't really have a choice in this." And I'd just given up on rappers, too.
Anyway, that sparked something. Aside from the... stunning videos, amazing choreography, and hilarious personalities (not to mention one of the PRETTIES men I have ever seen - seriously, look up Sunghwa. He's stunning), there was just something that made me want to write again. And so I have started again, if not as much as some, but it's also made me write things I'm not going to post anywhere, or let anyone else read so much. I had forgotten how nice that was, to just... write and let it be. From Ateez came Oneus - because they were on the same variety show - and with Oneus came Onewe because twins, again, and then In2it with Poison, and... it's been nice, really, to have these groups I can write, and enjoy, and love, and squee over again.
That's it, pretty much. I mean there's a lot I didn't mention, obviously, but man... It has been a RIDE. An amazing, fun, enjoyable ride and I have found some of the most amazing fandoms along the way (Shout out to the Babylon 5 fandom on tumblr, man, you guys were awesome!), and made some friends I still hang out with now. So, yeah. I love fandom, and everything it brings with it.
This is LONG.
My... well, start in fandom, as I mark it, was around 1983, with Duran Duran. Like, I so wanted to be part of that, that I wrote. And wrote. and wrote. It's really embarrassing. I think I cataloged it all, once, even, divided it into tries (less than two pages) and actual stories. I hand wrote it all, and I have one that was 124 pages and two words - I stopped there because it wasn’t going anywhere. Anyway, I had a friend and we read each other stories we'd written (little stars!), and... yeah. Years with Duran Duran. And then... Charlie Sexton. And... A-ha. And A few others.
My foray into heavy metal came with Def Leppard, when Rick Allen lost his arm. And they figured out a way for him to keep drumming. I was just... stunned. From Def Leppard, we wound up with Europe (and man, that was a ride), and Whitesnake, and a bunch of others. I mean... and then I dragged my boyfriend into it. Like, while I was in Austria on Study Abroad through college, we wrote letters, and we’d end up with around seven at the end - we’d write as the characters from the bands we liked. And yes, I wrote. For ever. I can't even name them all anymore, but they're all there, in the back of my head, happily retired.
In college - after a 18 month break from everything (I went on a mission to Austria) - I ran into... New Kids on the Block. Backstreet Boys. 'N Sync. Hanson came around after that, and that's where I found fandom online, and that computers weren't the waste of time I thought they were (that's a story in and of itself). I wrote a lot of BSB and 'N Sync, because there was so much there, so much with the friendships (and the videos, because that's where I got a lot of ideas), and just... the found family thing (I didn't get that until MUCH later, though). Um...
Somewhere in there, I refound Power Rangers, and that brought something fascinating - a lot of stories, and other people to get ideas from (and yes, I still watch it, the newest seasons and the movie, although none of them really grab me the way the first few teams did). I read this fascinating fic someone wrote, that took place at the end of the Space season, and I contacted them and asked if I could write something based on their idea. He said yes, and "I wonder what it's like to be a superhero - Real World, Matchbox 20" was born. It became just "Superhero" because I didn't think the entire title would fit in the box at ff.net, and I even won an award for that (years later) on Livejournal.
Then the Phantom Menace happened, and the Jedi Apprentice books. Those... those sparked something that I didn't think I'd ever actually do anything with, but man... The trilogy took me YEARS to do, but I have finally finished it. It started as one fic, and then I read this fabulous idea someone else had written, and I went... hey, I like that idea! I wish I could remember where it was, but that's over 18 years ago now, or I'd actually credit them. I did change it around enough so that it wasn't stolen, and didn't look stolen. It turned out, then, that I could actually tweak it some and fit it into the first one, and then I had to write the third to round out the whole thing.
I spent a couple of years at theforce.net, and I made some good friends, and I learned a LOT (and found the best beta ever). Problem Child actually won an award (the first of the trilogy), best portrayal of Obi-Wan for summer of 2002 - which was right before I got married. It was kind of heady!
My next fandom - that I didn't really get into, but I did write a lot for - was Final Fantasy VII: Advent Children. I kept seeing signs for it in front of a movie store in the mall, and I can't remember if I rented it or bought it. I knew it was based off a video game, but hoped... well, the first time I watched it, I was all ... this doesn't make sense, I don't understand - and then the sword came out, and the bike, and I was HOOKED. Like, hooked, because man, that sword....
About this time I ran across someone on ff.net that was posting something about fanfic100. On this place called Livejournal. Well, I went to investigate, made myself a journal, and boom. That was around 2006, when I had two little girls and one on the way. And LiveJournal was something else. Man, I can't... I know, most people came from there, and I miss it a lot. But that's where I started posting things. Not on my own journal at first, but still. And so I wrote 100 fics for Tifa and Cloud - some of which I am quite proud of.
At some point - and I'm not sure where - I stumbled across a manga in the library called "The Prince of Tennis." And while to this day I can't stand the titular character, the team around him was so fascinating, and then there were more teams that were even more fun, and... oh, it was lovely. Anyway, by now I had a few stories up on ff.net, and then they had this whole "we can't have real people on here" which meant I lost a couple of my favorite fics. Still... I didn't know anything else. The main problem, though, was that finding Prince of Tennis was impossible. Why? it was under Tennis no Ojisama - the Japanese name. Eventually something happened and I found some stuff, and I found another site that had these things called dream something or other (I don't remember what right now), where I could put in my name, and I was actually the main character.
I posted a story there, and it didn't go well - they said something about how I wasn't... oh, I didn't have the character down. Well, no, because I had only read so much of the manga, and there was this anime show, and I hadn't seen much of that, either, and... yeah. On LJ, I found there were role playing communities. And that... oh, that was the best fun ever! I actually did two more of the fanfic100 challenges, one focused on one of the characters (which a lot of people told me was one of the best things they’d ever read), and one based on one of the other teams, not the main one. Not to mention a bunch of other stuff. One comm was 30 letters or something? And I did a bunch of those, three of them exchanges with other friends - that was fun. A lot of fun. I do think Prince of Tennis is where I started my fascination with twins, too.
That opened up a bunch of things for me, too, though. One was Gravitation, which combined music and writing, and that was ME. THat was fun. One of those I'm not involved with the fandom, especially, but I did some writing with that.
I don't remember where I met my friends, which comm it was. I had these good friends I met, and we wrote PoT fics... and maybe it was just hakkais_shadow at first. He was a fun guy, and he said to me, one day when we were talking on AIM, that he had this group he wanted to introduce me to.
And so I met Arashi. I was back in the music, and my interest in Prince of Tennis faded pretty quickly. I definitely prefer real people over those who aren't. And down the rabbit hole I went. That was the first fandom I found incredibly stand-off-ish. I wrote a pretty lengthy fic (I have a thing about destroying found families and putting them back together) and posted it... and no one said anything, no one seemed to want to communicate with me, nothing. So I... left. It wasn't worth it, and I was happy with my writing where it was. Had a lot of fun with Arashi, including their movie (can I remember the name? No) and a couple of the tv shows one or two were in (Kimi wa Petto, Maou). Just lovely.
Hakkais_shadow struck again. Can I show you this other group? The song was called Rising Sun, and Purple Line, and I was HOOKED into kpop. So that was around...2006 (which I can say because it was when Purple Line came out), and I have not looked back since. One of the reasons I fell in love with DBSK (the artists of the above songs) was because they could sing, a capella, and it was incredibly beautiful (and that's why I about cried when they separated, and... no one has done that like they did. Oh man, they were amazing).
That rabbit hole has gone deeper and longer than any other fandom I've been in. And, granted, I could say that I have been in many fandoms over the years (for pete's sake, they have fan wars. It's WEIRD), one for each group I have followed and written about. DBSK, Super Junior, the list goes on and on. In 2012 I joined AO3, and that's currently where most of the longer fic resides. I've thought about putting everything over there, but we're talking three tables - more, four or five - of 100 prompts, plus various other prompt tables (I got really good at those!), and it's just... I don't think it's worth it. I might go through and find some of the better fics and move them over, I don't know. I'm still thinking about it.
Around 2016, everything stopped. I was having personal problems (like, depression and it was crappy all the way around), and my output just... stopped. I didn't actually post anything. I was barely writing. Nano - which I started the November after my oldest was born - was a chore, not even fun, and it was... nothing was happening.
I'm leaving a lot out - mostly because it's late as I write this, and it's long and no one is going to `read it. There was Coed School, and Speed (how I miss them), and B.A.P, and Myname, and U-Kiss, Block B (who I actually saw live, go me!) and Boyfriend, F.Cuz (pronounced Focus), Romeo's Midnight Theatre album (which I wrote a fic to - that was a challenge, too), and... last year, I found Ateez. Or, they found me, I'm not sure. It was kind of weird, I had a couple of people tell me I needed to watch these mvs, and so I did, and it... was okay. And then someone told me to watch "Say My Name." I have NEVER had someone reach out (not literally, obviously, because he couldn't do that through my computer screen) and grab my collar and say "hi. I'm your bias, and you don't really have a choice in this." And I'd just given up on rappers, too.
Anyway, that sparked something. Aside from the... stunning videos, amazing choreography, and hilarious personalities (not to mention one of the PRETTIES men I have ever seen - seriously, look up Sunghwa. He's stunning), there was just something that made me want to write again. And so I have started again, if not as much as some, but it's also made me write things I'm not going to post anywhere, or let anyone else read so much. I had forgotten how nice that was, to just... write and let it be. From Ateez came Oneus - because they were on the same variety show - and with Oneus came Onewe because twins, again, and then In2it with Poison, and... it's been nice, really, to have these groups I can write, and enjoy, and love, and squee over again.
That's it, pretty much. I mean there's a lot I didn't mention, obviously, but man... It has been a RIDE. An amazing, fun, enjoyable ride and I have found some of the most amazing fandoms along the way (Shout out to the Babylon 5 fandom on tumblr, man, you guys were awesome!), and made some friends I still hang out with now. So, yeah. I love fandom, and everything it brings with it.