Admin: What to expect. PLEASE READ before friending.
And since this one is so long and in depth, I may just backdate this one at a later point.
I tend to write these each time I get new people on here because it just works better that way. (And sometimes shorter versions in between, but usually when peoples are added.) Everyone gets an updated “this is how my journal works”, new people can decide to run screaming while they still can, previously friended people can decide that they’ve had enough. Or, people can decide to stick around. I don’t so much like stickied posts because I really forget to update them. That’s actually why I hate profiles too, because I go “blah” at updating mine enough, buuut.
This is fairly long, but I suppose you can call this the local periodic admin post. Please read, especially if you are new, if you at all can brain it. If you don’t and your brains break from my journal, I’ll do my best to try and mend your brains…but I can’t be held responsible for you being surprised by what I write, because I’ve done my best to warn you and ultimately you walked into it ignoring the warnings.
Alrighty. So, what you’re walking into/have already walked into:
-The Woo Is Strong With This One. I am not in any way shape or form what you’d call mundane, and my journal can get Really Woo Heavy. I’m pagan, a mystic, a seer, god-owned, god-claimed, god-spoused, an animist, a shaman/ess/ist/insert suffix here, a walker between worlds, a magic-worker, an energy-worker, a “psychic” (gods I hate that term, please feel free to wtf at me if you like), a psychopomp, other kin (ie, I’m not human, despite running a human body) and chaotically inclined, and that doesn’t include the Really Weird Shit that doesn’t have fancy smart-people words. Or even normal-people words. For instance, the fact that I have a habit of being several places at once. I call it bilocating, because it’s easier to say than multi-locating, which would actually be a more fitting pre-fix. Some of the Really Weird Shit ™ I talk about, most of the stuff I can’t explain in ways that sound at least partially logical, even if the logic is way out there, doesn’t get written about. And actually, in many cases even the smart people words do not apply to me in ways that they usually tend to be expected to be applied. I can explain it all in ways that I’m told-by sane people, thanks!-make sense, and don’t sound that weird, so I suppose it can’t be all that bad, but it’s still totally with the weird hit. (Actually it makes me really uncomfortable sometimes, and I really wish I was a bit more normal, but I’m not, so uh.)
-An addendum onto the god-owned thing. Not all of my patrons, of which there are unnervingly (for me) many, own me-actually only a small number do, and I‘ve only one primary-but courtesy of my religious life being turned into scrambled eggs, in order to get things back on the road to straightened out with my religion, my spiritual life, and myself, I have two ongoing things happening at least through this year, likely closer to two: What I am snarkily calling Focus On The Patron (instead of Focus On The Family, get it? Hah. Haha. Hah.), and Temple Of The Twelve.
FotP ™ is, basically, cycling through focusing on each of my patrons in turn, owned by Them or not. I find out which patron I’ll be handed off to…whenever the patron at hand feels like telling me/having me choose. There’s no set schedule, the time is “as long as needed”. With Lucifer, the first, it was two weeks. Currently with Kushiel I’ve been told it will be “much longer”, I suspect at least four. I am not ignoring the rest of my patrons while focusing on the one, nor do They ignore me-and indeed, most of Them still cycle closeby, and in my downtime with my primary focus for the time I speak with Whomever I am aware wants my attention. Yes, some of Them I‘m doing better with than others, but They‘re all still there, to some degree or another. It’s just that my primary focus and work stays with the one I’m working with. And should that patron want my undivided attention, He or She has it. The work being done, for now, is mostly personal, with extra religious when it applies. Many of my patrons I have a much more personal relationship with, akin to sibling/sibling, or parent/child, or love-r-spouse/love-r-spouse, or what have you, than one of deity/mortal. Most of the actual work I do with Them is really not so religious in tone. Magic or skills training, is a very common focus, and some of Them allow enough connection to me to help me progress within myself. I try to do things for Them in return, but it’s not so much service as equal exchange, which is a concept I very strongly believe in.
So…most of the focus is with our relationships, not so much my religion. (Thus far, at least, I’m sure I’ll get a change of pace when I get to such patrons as, oh, say, the Hellenics, to whom I have a couple promises to fulfill.) And some of it’s not so happy, some of my histories with my patrons are really fucking rocky. Quite a bit of Them and I really have some road bumps to figure out, and some of Them, I‘m afraid we won‘t be able to.
Temple of the Twelve is, in a nutshell, basically working with twelve Colors-the Twelve-who in this paradigm are deities, to better one’self. In the books it’s to serve Them (which is usually done by exemplifying the Colors to the height of one’s capabilities in the best way possible, ie life a healthy and whatever-good-is-for-you life…with focuses on whichever Colors claim you, if any do, and there‘s a huge focus on community and family), but given what I just said on how They are best served…well, I mostly call it “guided self-work”. I resonate STRONGLY with this for several reasons. One, I do well with guided self work (and actually this is more of a kick in the pants plus support than an “I lead you” guide). Two, I have an enormous level of ease dealing with Colors as entities, although for me They’re not quite deities, and instead some sort of middle ground between archetype, deity, and spirit-guide. They wouldn’t be the first spirit-guides I’d’ve had, and I do very well with spirit-guides. The few that choose me, at least. Beings I connect to that I can touch, see, hear, feel…yes please. Three, I’ve always been someone with a huge depth of connection to color. I’m very vivid, very intense, very…well, full of color. The more I can soak up the better. I love the shit, and I have a habit of tapping into, feeling, absorbing them that I find gets me really really strange looks when I actually talk about it.
This system includes all three of those bullets. I found it through a friend on the DW access list, and really I’m grateful for it. It’s going to be a hell of a ride, but after the end of my first month I’m finding that it’s working marvelously already, difficult though it is, and I’m very pleased with my choice. My initial instinct is that I will be keeping up work with Them long term even after this, though we’ll have to see if that pans out.
These two things-the Focus On The Patron ™ and ToTT, are written about with a good degree of frequency, in addition to the rest of the Woo Is Strong stuff.
-I’m a vampire. No, not by subculture, although I do tend to be nocturnal, have annoying problems with insomnia (usually nightmare based), and am allergic to the sun (both in and out of body). The body is a psychic vampire, meaning that it needs to feed on the energy of other sources to get by. The energy of sentient beings is preferred as it’s pre-refined, but is not always possible to get. I myself am both a psychic and sanguine vampire. I am a psychic vampire thanks to a screwed up energetic system, and I am a sanguine vampire thanks to a weird-ass experience I had almost ten years ago, which I wrote about and linked to at the beginning of this paragraph. I also am required to hunt for form on a frequent basis. To put it delicately, it means I have to literally eat form and sentience. Ie, eat people. On normal days, I must feed on energy once to twice a day, on blood every two to three days, and I must hunt for form once a week. Being this ill, double that. There was a point where it was almost up to triple that and THAT sucked, but fortunately it’s slowly getting back to normal.
Lest people go OMGOMGOMG F333333R! like some do about vamps, I’ll say this: I’m very anal retentively picky about where I feed and hunt. If I say “feed” I’m talking energy or blood, if I say “hunt” I’m talking form. My feeding sources for energy are half sentient and half non-sentient (ie: elements, music, such like). When I feed on the energy of sentient beings, I have three options: ambient energy (energy that has been released from the people it previously belonged to and is floating around), sex (the most common), or willing “donors”, who as a rule are both in the family or are very close friends, or have excess that needs to be leveled off, making it a symbiotic exchange. Anyone I feed on during sex is aware and willing…although I don’t really have much of a choice in the matter, so it turns out that anyone I have sex with is ok with this. There are also a select few I deep-feed on, who are fully aware of what it means and willing to exchange that, and I must have some deep feeds-which need regular maintenance-to survive (I don’t know why, I just know that when I try to get around it I kind of shrivel like a prune and feel about as healthy). When I feed on blood, I also have options: executions, targets/people who are going to die by my hand anyway, vamps in the family that hunt for me (I can for whatever reason feed on vamps as well as I can on, uh, not-vamps, should they go hunting for me, which is usually only done when I’m too sick or injured to do it myself), or willing others in the family. When I hunt for form, the person dies. Therefore it’s almost always executions. (And when I say that I do a lot of executions, I mean “I am contracted by a variety of courts to do their executions”.) And I do so cleanly and in the least gruesome and most dignified way possible, thank you.
So, lest you give me strange looks or make the “oh shit“ face, I’m honorable to a fault: I insist on being anal retentively picky about where I feed and hunt. I don’t kill anyone for food who wouldn’t already be dead, and I don’t feed on just anyone.
-I am not human. While in this body I classify as Otherkin, but outside of the influence this body's culture has given me, and outside this body, I am not human, nor in a human body, and therefore am only what I am. I am a bit of a mutt, half Elf, half Fire Jotuness, with primary forms (or therio-types, if you wish) of cat (primarily Jaguar) and horse (primarily Arabian). This body itself is also Otherkin, being Elvan also. There are also a large number of otherkin in the Network-honestly, the humans are actually a distinct minority-which I may or may not speak of, if they're family. Being even half Fire Jotun in a human body is a challenge, and so while I don't really do the essay thing on being what I am, there is frequent mention of it-it's often on my mind, thanks to how much effort it takes for me to live as a human.
-I’m an assassin. I’m also a messenger. I am also an artist and a crafter and a seamstress. I‘m also a dancer. I also run four crossroads-Inns. All of these are business-y things I do (though some of them I make hobbies out of). Three of the five of these things are not done in-body. Two of the five are done both in body and out of, to different degrees. Those two would be the artistry and the dancing. Being an assassin is rather illegal in this world. *shrug* For those who have not figured this out, being an assassin means that I kill people for a living. However, despite being honorable to a fault I still get by with my honor intact with my career choice. But, remember that “I kill people for a living” thing? You can correctly infer that being suitable for that kind of a career means that I’m a sadistic woman who doesn’t at all have a problem with killing or enjoying it.
(For the record, murder, as in killing for no better reason than whim, I do not fancy. And battle as an assassin is different from battle as a warrior, for me. I‘m honorable to a fault but I‘m also a survivalist, so. Ask if you‘re curious, that could get long. But, I‘m not one of those “pro life violence and killing is bad!” people. No, no it‘s not, not when done properly, and that requires a balance and ethics, not the extremes that most love to apply to it.)
-I’m one of the co-mains of a multiple Network, with five systems. Or, a multiple system with five subsystems, take your pick. I wasn’t born here; I’m a walk-in. But I’m the primary one you’ll see out here. Thanks to my annoyingly strong tie with this body, which exists because walk-in or not I’ve been the primary fronter since before this body was in kindergarten and had no help at all until three years ago, no steady/functional help until about a year and a halfish ago, I’ve got the in-front half of the main duties. Brigh and Velvet split up the out of front main duties, with Brigh taking the brunt, and certainly the more body-aware portion. I’m pretty sure Velvet does a lot of the more discreet side detail. They both front, but they write rarely.
-I am not this body. Thanks to the fact that the little girl who was born in this body died, and I got stuck with whatever residue of her was left getting shloomped onto my spirit like one color of play dough being moshed onto another color of play dough, I have to deal with her memories and her trauma. It’s annoying, and it’s a pain in the ass. But I am not this body, nor is it mine in any way but to use it, run it, head the people who live in it. I was not born here, I am a walk-in, and I have pretty vivid memories of the life I had before this one. Please do not do me the discourtesy of assuming that because I’m stuck being the primary fronter and thus am the primary one running the bio-life, that I am one and the same with the little girl who was born here.
-The bio-name is Rachel. Before I figured out what my name was, I went by it, having no other name to go by. It’s not my name, never was, never will be. Ta’eris (phonetic tuh-AIR-iss, unless you wish not to pronounce the apostrophe, in which case it’s TARE-iss, the prior is more politically correct but either is acceptable) is the short form of my name, which is Elvish, as close as I can manage to translate out here. I don’t give out the long version to anyone but family, which means not publicly, and this is the only generic short form I’ve got. My Alfar-father has a pet form of it, but he’s the only one allowed to use it.
Actually, while I’m at it, please don’t call anyone in here Rachel and expect us to answer under anything but singlet mode. We don’t have any fronters named Rachel, the BODY is named Rachel, and so we will assume that if you use that name you’re referring to us as a singlet lump. If you want to call us by lump sum and acknowledge the multiplicity, call us Rhiannon (which, happily, there are no fronters named Rhiannon either). Rhiannon Network, Rhi-Net, Rhiannon to the mundane world. (Actually it is in the plans to, eventually, have the name changed to Rhiannon, so that I can get rid of the damn connotations of the name Rachel and have one single lump-sum name. >.>)
To call us Rachel and expect us to answer under multiple identity, as the individual fronter, is rather incredibly insulting and annoying, and really just comes across as a “fuck you, nyah nyah” refusal to accept our identity. (Only exception being if we’re directly interacting with people who we’re not clear on being uncloseted to; we don’t much care if people overhear in public so long as we‘re not actually expected to interact with anyone but whom we‘re speaking to.) The “fuck you” isn’t so much of an annoyance with the people who we don’t allow in on our semi-private personal space, screw them. But it’s insulting to increasing degrees that coordinate with closeness, with the people who we let in at all. In other words, if we’re going to bother to let you into our personal lives and uncloset, the least you can do is respect who the hell we are. This stands for all of us, including me on my journal, hence I’m writing it here. (Can you tell I and we have had major issues with this in the past?)
-I’m a writer. I have a habit of occasionally writing and posting memories as what I call “portal sketches”, having adopted the term from a prior friend and never really fancying dropping it because it works well. Currently I have three projects that I have on hold. One is a rather long portal sketch of a mission done with two of my husbands in the (much more militant) organization I was formerly a ranking assassin of, one is a long portal sketch I’m writing in chapters that I’ve called Rori’s Tale, one is a (very long) portal sketch that I SHOULD have done in chapters but didn’t, of some memories from a past life (which I will not post because it gets into NC-17 territory in part of it). I write my memories in fantasy format and not history format in part because some of the shit I do in my life simply doesn’t fit in histories, and in part because fantasies tend to engage the reader more, IME, and I do not want to bore with my writing, when I post it.
I also have a habit of essay-writing spasms, which are the most common when there’s meaty shit (with foci that are not emotional in base, even if they contain emotion, seeing as I rather detest talking specifically about my emotions in public, which my journal counts as) going on in my head and life. Such as now. Of course, then the essays/bits of writing that have foci aside from “life hai” take a hiatus while I recover from/digest the meaty shit going on in my life, but the cycle always repeats itself, and a gap of more than a couple days between a post is rare, and usually only thanks to rather severe depression.
-I’m bisexual, polyamorous (and married (to several spouses), with a coupleish more upcoming weddings, with (many) kids, all of whom I love fiercely but did not have on purpose, some of whom are grown and with kids of their own (wtf)! Remember that “I‘m not normal“ thing?), really geeky. This flies both in and out of body, although the “married with kids”, fortunately, is only in my life. Not this body’s. In here, I’ve got two significant others, and I‘m one of two fronters (Brigh being the other, and she‘s married to a headmate of one of the SO‘s) who is at all interested in a romantic life out here. One SO is magelvh77, the other isn’t on DW or LJ and is usually called simply “the fiancee” (who I have a really rocky relationship with and honestly will likely never marry at this point). In body, we’ve been pregnant three times, and lost an estimated five kids out of it. It gets more dangerous each time, and more painful, so really the thought of having kids in body has me running screaming. Yep. The geeking…ahahahaha. If you want a list of my geekeries, plz to ask. It r long. I generally don’t make a point of writing essays on these parts of my life, nor do I really include much at all of my sex life (it happens, but it’s REALLY RARE and usually quite brief), but they’re parts of my life.
-I’m a hedonist. I’m also a very visually and kinesthetically based person. I like stuff. I like comfort. I like luxury. I like indulgence, within reason. I’m a hedonist, not a materialist, and I’m also a pragmatist and a survivalist: I always have a good use for any indulgence and hedonism I take part in or surround myself in, and nothing sits around for no other reason than to look pretty or to simply own it. And I put as much if not more value in the non-materialistic things in life. But. I am still a hedonist.
-Why do I keep mentioning differences between me in this body and me distinct of it? Because I have my own life that I carry out without this body, which has about as much of an effect on me as the life I carry out in here. I don’t really call the life I lead in this body mine, because this body doesn’t really ping to me as “mine”. I guess you could say I lead a double life? Well, I talk about both, because I manage both my individual life (both in-Net/at home and not), and this body’s life.
-Expounding upon this, generally, when I’m writing about things, I’ll try to use subject line tags. “Bio-life” is used for what goes on in this world/in this body. “In-Net” is what happens in the Network, ie the headspace, ie “at home”. “Otherworld” is what happens outside this body, usually speaking of residences I have or work I do/employment I have on other worlds and/or planes. “Pwnd” is the tag I use for religious/spiritual type work (explanation for the tag: I am god-owned, and it’s a REALLY HUGE part of my religious practice, which is really eclectic and widely cross-cultural. I used “pwnd” as an affectionate short-form of that). “ToTT“ is for the Temple of the Twelve, which I mentioned earlier and which is distinct enough that it gets its own tag. “Canon“ is for canon-stuff, which is also filtered, and which I expound upon later on. “Innstuff” is for the rare posts that delve into Inn happenings, and usually (though not always) are posts announcing events, when I announce them. Sometimes things cross several areas at once, and if that’s the case, I’ll either just say screw it and nix the subject tags (which I also do when I don’t have a tag that fit’s the topic), or I’ll stick a lump of tags in there. If that happens, sorry if it’s confusing. English doesn’t work well for talking about this shit sometimes, and I’m probably having about as hard a time writing it understandably as you are understanding it.
-This body’s memory is horrible. Its time sense is worse. This might seem pretty callous, but to be honest this journal is in very large part for my own memories, so that I can remember when things happened and have a place to look back and get dates for things.
-Also, I rant. I have a temper. More of one than some people. Generally I try pretty damn hard to keep it under control in polite society, and I try to keep my bitching to snark, not so much whining, and in moderation-but I AM a bitchy, snarky, person, and when I need to rant, I need to rant. This is pretty much the only place I can do it and have a damned good chance at not burning people out. Why? Because cuts exist, I use them, and I put in rant warnings. If you disregard the warnings and click anyway, I really can’t control what happens. I am a temperamental, cynical, paranoid, mistrustful, bitchy, snarky, blunt, antisocial, often sadistic woman by nature, and it’ll show in my writings (even though I try to be nice to people, and when talking to and interacting with actual people, not a pixilated page or my keyboard, actually able to adapt to my surroundings and the people in them pretty decently).
-I’m also a healer. I’m pretty damned good at it too. I’m good at being a neutral sounding board, I’m good at listening, I’m good at being “compassionate shoulder”, I tend to feel good about myself when I can help. I have to be aware of the fact that it’s desired, otherwise I’ll epic!fail-espeeeecially in body, I’m generally scores better at averting disaster when I’m not using this thing-but, I am still pretty damned good at it on both levels. Conversely I’m pretty damned good at energetic and/or magical healing, and I’m decent at physical healing…to the point where I think, were this body not squeamish at blood/gore/needles, we’d’ve done damned well in the medical field. Geeeenerally given the attributes I just listed above (and given ones I’ll get into below), and given my choice of career (I keel tings), this is a rather amusing irony of a paradox, but it still applies. The balance works out to be that the closer I am to you and the more personally invested I am to you, the more healer-y I’ll be willing/able to be around you, and the less close/personally invested I am, the less willing/able I am to go all healer-y on you…and generally I’ll actually more just help you get to someone who IS willing to spend their energy healing you, instead of doing it myself.
Granted, there ARE weird exceptions where randomly I’ll go healer-mode with strange people, and generally I have this thing where I can’t really stomach just letting people take hits, die, or stay ill or injured untended so long as whatever I offer is not refused. I’m rather a protector/guardian/healer by nature, despite also being a warrior/sadist/“death/killing is just fine“ type of person. Unless the person is stupid, in which case I’ll let themselves get injured, and then if they end up healed by me, make sure they remember not to do that stupid again. I’m only a nice healer to the ones who aren’t stupid about the predicaments they get themselves in.
-I don’t like stupid. I don’t like drama. Because of this, generally I try to avoid writing it, despite the fact that my life is ever-full of active and…interesting…happenings, and if I must I cut it, and again-it’s usually only to either get it out of my head or to have it down for posterity. Life happens, and I understand this. I also understand that sometimes it gives curveballs, or a whole bucket of curveballs. This is ok. Life!drama, I understand. And besides, I don’t rule over anyone else’s journal, nor do I really want to. Write whatever the hell you want in your own space, it‘s your space. But do not bring extra stupid or extra drama into my journal.
-Please, do me a favor. Keep your life in your journal, and my life in my journal. This does not mean you can nevar evar evar talk about yourself. Every decent conversation tends to have a pretty balanced dose of each contributor’s POV/experiences/opinions, and that’s fine. What is not fine is making my experiences (especially if they’re more serious in tone) barely about me and mostly about you, thus undermining my own. If you feel you must comment but can’t think of anything useful to say and want to leave me some acknkowledgement anyway, leave an astricks. A friend of mine put this on her journal requirements list, I like it, so I am nipping it. :P (Partial exceptions: If the conversation ends up migrating to points that are partially/unrelated to the post on its own, which has happened awesomely on occasion and which tends to happen in conversations ANYWAY, or if you happen to be a person with whom I have a somewhat unique method of communication with courtesy of being friends for a while. Like, say, the SHC. Even then, I do not like stupid, I do not like drama, and I do not like my shit being undermined.)
-I’ve got an interesting personality. In addition to what I’ve already written, I could be called a bit of a headcase. Sort of. I’ve got some nasty trauma issues. I try not to use labels like “trauma” and “PTSD” with myself, because giving a name to something makes it much harder for me to work through/past it, but. Nasty PTSD. Yep. Often enough, I write about it when I’m trying to process it, although I do try not to do the trigger!spam thing. (If I ever do, you can be pretty sure it’s necessary, because rants are common but triggerspam is rare.) Honestly my rule of thumb is don’t worry about triggering me. I’ve learnt to be pretty decent about controlling my triggers, and really don‘t ever blame anyone for them going off (unless they‘re set off on purpose, which I don‘t assume is the case), and you guys are lucky: you’re online. It’s harder for me to manage triggers in person-but I still do it! Well enough to have kept a bio-job for two years, which only stopped because we moved. The stages of difficult are “email/comment/blog”, “IM”, “phone”, and “face to face”. From least to greatest. Most of you have the comfort of your interactions being safely in the first two spots, which means you really have nothing to worry about. If there’s something that needs changed, generally, I’ll say something. Yes, this is something that affects me (in different ways) both in this body, and separate from it. The body has it’s own trauma from its childhood, both before and after I got here. Some of it overlaps with mine, some of it doesn’t.
-Really this is only a new bullet because that last paragraph got long. Amongst what other shit my broken brain dumps on me, General Anxiety, Major Depressive Disorder, ADHD, and BPD are of the things on the list. The General Anxiety combined with the PTSD means that on occasion if I have just the right kind of panic attack I might hyperventilate into my keyboard. Again with the cuts and the “you’re generally not stuck reading this”. Major Depressive Disorder is part of what makes me a cynical bastard, mostly because being a snarky cynic amuses me, thus making my depression easier to deal with. It’s when I stop snarking and start actually sounding depressed that you can generally clue into the fact that it’s getting nasty. It can also lead to times of writing and commenting significantly less than normal, especially when you’re talking in the dark half of the year. I tend to get hibernative, seclusive, and a bit more pessimistic and/or emo that time of year. The ADHD, well…on occasion has me impish, hyper, and distractable. Fortunately that’s usually the worst it gets, although I’m sure my family can tell you that sometimes it can result in bruises on the forehead from beating heads against walls. Of the three things listed here, the depression is the one that’s actually worse out of body than in, though like the PTSD all three affect me on both levels in different ways.
-Oh look, you get another bullet because it got long. Again. The BPD, fortunately, doesn’t tend to flare much. Last time it did, I wrote a long rambly version of “I’m not a nice person, GTFOver it, if you don’t like it fuck off and leave”, except add extra viciouscruel. I lost a system for that. Geeeenerally I do not approve of behaving this way, and I’ve done a hellaton of work to get that training (thanks, bio mom) out of my brain. I’ve made it pretty damned far, but stupid shit like that still comes out of my mouth every once in a while. Fortunately “every once in a while” tends to be at most once or twice a year. If you’ve had bad experiences with that, I’m sorry in advance. Given that I’m doing what I can, a request there: If you can’t hack that existing at all, if you can’t even hack that once or twice a year, be it for triggery or other reasons, and if you’re going to drop me for it, please leave now. I can take being yelled at, I can take whatever lashes I need to take, and I do not at all blame the system who poofed for being upset with me, but I draw the line at abandonment when you’ve been duly warned. I make it sound all nice and sane now, with my pretty words, but trust me, when it happens, it gets really nasty. I’m an intense and extreme individual. Far beyond what anyone would really expect out of a human body. So please, take that into consideration if you decide to stick around. (Yes, this is something else that affects me on both levels in different ways. Yes, this means I can’t get rid of it by “being more me” in here.)
-If you drop me for any reason, no matter how benign or not-benign that is, drop me a PM and tell me why, whether it’s as simple as “I hate you die” or “Just stopped being interested”, or whether it’s a REALLY HUGELONGTHING. I do the same courtesy for anyone else I drop. (Unless they drop me without word first, in which case I will do the same courtesy and good riddance.)
-That being said, if there’s any issues that you have with me, please let me know. I’m not entirely a self-serving bitch, and I’m perfectly willing to talk shit over. Actually, I‘d really prefer that, because things like that have a way of stewing and rotting to become a lot worse than they initially would‘ve been if people just opened their traps. And as snarky as I am about it (can you tell I‘m used to people who don‘t know how to communicate problems and am sick of getting screwed for it?), really I try to make it as easy, neutral, and smooth as possible. (Hint: Lead-ins are nice. They give people time to prepare. People like me. Or like you, should I contact you first. You know what else they do? Make you think, so that you don‘t end up OMGRAEGing at me or kneejerk-reactioning me, or vice verse, which can really easily turn into situations of “BOOM“.)
Hooonestly if you’d like it to be kept between you and I then I’d suggest PMing me or emailing me (felinequinity at Gmail), because I cannot prevent others from adding in their two cents (no matter how rude I think it is to butt in like that). And generally I do not approve of commentwarz (actually, they piss me off and I will very swiftly put a hard stop to them should I see them starting), but unless it gets heated contacting me in comments is fine.
-I am not someone who will comment to everything. Often I won’t comment much at all, even if I‘m posting decently. This is not because I do not care, and it’s not because I’m not reading. I DO read. And I comment when I have something to say. And remember that antisocial thing? Sometimes I’m just not in a mood to deal with people. This stands both now and in times of good health.
Also, commenting requires a certain degree of energy out of me, which lately I don’t really have. Why? Because both I and the body are really damn ill. The body’s ill enough that while I’m trying to get us a part time job, we still have a hard time being on our feet long term. As in, longer than an hour or three on good days, longer than fifteen minutes on bad days. I myself am ill enough that I am not working my own jobs, excepting one place of employment which despite the fact that the official healers/doctors of the place are giving me the naughty finger for working ill, seems to have no understanding of medical leave…which I filed for five months ago. And, excepting my duties as co-main, and my artistry…which is part of what keeps me sane. Psychopomp or not I’ve been flirting with death’s door for a little while now, and while I’m hoping that both the body and I are healing up a bit, since at this point we’re strong enough to manage to stay on our feet long enough to manage the part time job, it’s really slow going. Therefore, I might not have energy to do more than write what I need to write to get it out of my head and “on paper” for posterity. Nor do I really expect people to reply to my journal in any more frequency than I do theirs.
That being said, I still try to comment with a degree of frequency, because no one likes writing to crickets. Comment every so often, enough so I know you’re still there, and we’re good. The crickets are honestly one of the main reasons why I left LJ, so no offense, if you disappear, I likely eventually will too.
-Remember that There Be Weirdshit Here warning? And remember that whole “I’m main of a multiple Network” thing? And that “I’m god-owned” thing? Well, there’s a bit of a twist on all of those.
One: I’m a hell of a lot older than this body. I‘m a mutt, but in my species, it would be considered something akin to the maturity of a toddler. Hell, in my species, if I were born in this body I would still be a child by the time it dies. I was alive for at least a millenia that I can put my finger on-quite possibly more-before I ended up here. No, I didn’t die and reincarnate. It’s a long story, but I was very much alive when I got here. That’s just the last life I led. I am rather more in touch with my past lives than most people. I’ve never been very connected to any body I’ve ever had-even this one, bound as I am to it, I can leave with a remarkable degree of ease, without even requiring trance for it unless I want an utter guarantee of HOMGVIVIDDOOMMEMORY-and my existence can be described as “cycling through bodies” far more than “living, dying, and reincarnating”. I’ve been in a few underworlds, but it was more like a visit to go “oh hai, wassup?”, stick around and chat it up for a while, and then get bored and go find and/or get plunked in another body. Not really true reincarnations as I (and at least a few others I know of, thanks!) see them, though I CAN see how some would call them as much. Therefore I’m more in touch with my past and the memories thereof than a lot of people (which is both a curse and a blessing), and though I hide it pretty well (especially in this body, hah, because it‘s twenty-fucking-two), I’m freaking OLD. And I really feel my age. A lot. On top of this, my soul has shattered into bits (which isn’t actually a death, for the record) a good handful of times through my existence. The personal UPG I have here is complicated (again, ask if you want), but basically means that because of this it’s been pattern that I’ve had several lives at once through several places at once. While there are some pieces of my soul which are at this point literally unable to integrate with me, this life I’ve been lucky (or unlucky, as the case may be) to get a pretty good number of chunks of my soul back in one place and smooshed quite thoroughly back into me, some of which seem to have been drawn to me upon my arrival here, some of which have happened over the course of the body’s life. So my memories get even more numerous and complicated.
Two: Now that I’ve included the “I have a rather complicated relationship with my past” bullets, I’ll stick that in there with the rest of the bullets that weave into this: thar be canons here. Fictives, canonfolk, whatever word you want to apply (except soul bond, that’s not allowed, because I don’t know of a single being in my Network who would really fit that definition), we have them. We have them in the Network (and some of them even front, or allow me to talk of them, gasp!), I’ve lived many lives in such worlds and to a select few still occasionally go by some of the names I had, my primary deity can be considered (in part) of a fictive world. Honestly, I’m still uncomfortable enough with much of what I write on the matter that I keep such posts filtered; it’s actually my only writing filter. And not even everyone who can claim to be what I call canonfolk is on there. As per my primary deity, I do not filter content written on Him. He’s forbidden that. So you’ll see it, unless you skip it.
Some of the talk meanders onto unfiltered posts, including names/lives of mine, and of others. I subscribe to the theory that these worlds exist, in more than simply imagination (although it gets much more complicated than that, if you want the fully fleshed out version ask), and if that’s a bit too nuts for you, sorry, but it’s ending up to be a significant part of my identity and family and thus life-and with the soul-searching I’ve been doing over the past few weeks/months and will be doing over the course of at least the next year it comes up often in my mind.
That’s in no specific order. If you got through that whole thing in one go, have a plate of your favorite cookies. If you have any questions (or if you people who’ve been around a while and know me a bit more can think of something I’ve forgotten), talk and I’ll answer.
This is what’s on my journal, and while I’m willing to flex one way or the other a bit, and as mentioned perfectly willing to talk over issues with people and find middle ground/compromises if at all possible, it’s not going to sway too much, not outside of natural-progression-of-me. I do not filter any content but the content specifically regarding canon, so while I definitely use cuts, if you’re not interested in reading this, you have two options: don’t click the cuts and skip the entries, or leave. Sorry if that sounds callous, but it’s how it is.
If you’re new and you can’t brain this, or if you’re not new and you can’t brain it, go ahead and poof now, no hard feelings-just drop me an FYI that you’ve done so and why. It’s under the long!cut, but I figured it beared repeating outside of long!cut.
*edit* I make it a point not to cut people off my journal because of what company they hold, so long as my privacy is maintained. I also make it a point not to name drop. However, there is a certain person who used to room with me, who happens to be a rather prominent figure in the Otherkin community. I found out the hard way that she is not someone to be trusted, and I cannot afford, for the protection of my Network and myself, to allow anyone on my journal who is in contact with her. She is the one exception to my general rule of objectivity. Please don't be afraid to add me or to ask to be added, despite this. I never have issue with requests. I apologize for the scrutiny but at this point it is for my own safety, and that of my people.
-Ta’eris
I tend to write these each time I get new people on here because it just works better that way. (And sometimes shorter versions in between, but usually when peoples are added.) Everyone gets an updated “this is how my journal works”, new people can decide to run screaming while they still can, previously friended people can decide that they’ve had enough. Or, people can decide to stick around. I don’t so much like stickied posts because I really forget to update them. That’s actually why I hate profiles too, because I go “blah” at updating mine enough, buuut.
This is fairly long, but I suppose you can call this the local periodic admin post. Please read, especially if you are new, if you at all can brain it. If you don’t and your brains break from my journal, I’ll do my best to try and mend your brains…but I can’t be held responsible for you being surprised by what I write, because I’ve done my best to warn you and ultimately you walked into it ignoring the warnings.
Alrighty. So, what you’re walking into/have already walked into:
-The Woo Is Strong With This One. I am not in any way shape or form what you’d call mundane, and my journal can get Really Woo Heavy. I’m pagan, a mystic, a seer, god-owned, god-claimed, god-spoused, an animist, a shaman/ess/ist/insert suffix here, a walker between worlds, a magic-worker, an energy-worker, a “psychic” (gods I hate that term, please feel free to wtf at me if you like), a psychopomp, other kin (ie, I’m not human, despite running a human body) and chaotically inclined, and that doesn’t include the Really Weird Shit that doesn’t have fancy smart-people words. Or even normal-people words. For instance, the fact that I have a habit of being several places at once. I call it bilocating, because it’s easier to say than multi-locating, which would actually be a more fitting pre-fix. Some of the Really Weird Shit ™ I talk about, most of the stuff I can’t explain in ways that sound at least partially logical, even if the logic is way out there, doesn’t get written about. And actually, in many cases even the smart people words do not apply to me in ways that they usually tend to be expected to be applied. I can explain it all in ways that I’m told-by sane people, thanks!-make sense, and don’t sound that weird, so I suppose it can’t be all that bad, but it’s still totally with the weird hit. (Actually it makes me really uncomfortable sometimes, and I really wish I was a bit more normal, but I’m not, so uh.)
-An addendum onto the god-owned thing. Not all of my patrons, of which there are unnervingly (for me) many, own me-actually only a small number do, and I‘ve only one primary-but courtesy of my religious life being turned into scrambled eggs, in order to get things back on the road to straightened out with my religion, my spiritual life, and myself, I have two ongoing things happening at least through this year, likely closer to two: What I am snarkily calling Focus On The Patron (instead of Focus On The Family, get it? Hah. Haha. Hah.), and Temple Of The Twelve.
FotP ™ is, basically, cycling through focusing on each of my patrons in turn, owned by Them or not. I find out which patron I’ll be handed off to…whenever the patron at hand feels like telling me/having me choose. There’s no set schedule, the time is “as long as needed”. With Lucifer, the first, it was two weeks. Currently with Kushiel I’ve been told it will be “much longer”, I suspect at least four. I am not ignoring the rest of my patrons while focusing on the one, nor do They ignore me-and indeed, most of Them still cycle closeby, and in my downtime with my primary focus for the time I speak with Whomever I am aware wants my attention. Yes, some of Them I‘m doing better with than others, but They‘re all still there, to some degree or another. It’s just that my primary focus and work stays with the one I’m working with. And should that patron want my undivided attention, He or She has it. The work being done, for now, is mostly personal, with extra religious when it applies. Many of my patrons I have a much more personal relationship with, akin to sibling/sibling, or parent/child, or love-r-spouse/love-r-spouse, or what have you, than one of deity/mortal. Most of the actual work I do with Them is really not so religious in tone. Magic or skills training, is a very common focus, and some of Them allow enough connection to me to help me progress within myself. I try to do things for Them in return, but it’s not so much service as equal exchange, which is a concept I very strongly believe in.
So…most of the focus is with our relationships, not so much my religion. (Thus far, at least, I’m sure I’ll get a change of pace when I get to such patrons as, oh, say, the Hellenics, to whom I have a couple promises to fulfill.) And some of it’s not so happy, some of my histories with my patrons are really fucking rocky. Quite a bit of Them and I really have some road bumps to figure out, and some of Them, I‘m afraid we won‘t be able to.
Temple of the Twelve is, in a nutshell, basically working with twelve Colors-the Twelve-who in this paradigm are deities, to better one’self. In the books it’s to serve Them (which is usually done by exemplifying the Colors to the height of one’s capabilities in the best way possible, ie life a healthy and whatever-good-is-for-you life…with focuses on whichever Colors claim you, if any do, and there‘s a huge focus on community and family), but given what I just said on how They are best served…well, I mostly call it “guided self-work”. I resonate STRONGLY with this for several reasons. One, I do well with guided self work (and actually this is more of a kick in the pants plus support than an “I lead you” guide). Two, I have an enormous level of ease dealing with Colors as entities, although for me They’re not quite deities, and instead some sort of middle ground between archetype, deity, and spirit-guide. They wouldn’t be the first spirit-guides I’d’ve had, and I do very well with spirit-guides. The few that choose me, at least. Beings I connect to that I can touch, see, hear, feel…yes please. Three, I’ve always been someone with a huge depth of connection to color. I’m very vivid, very intense, very…well, full of color. The more I can soak up the better. I love the shit, and I have a habit of tapping into, feeling, absorbing them that I find gets me really really strange looks when I actually talk about it.
This system includes all three of those bullets. I found it through a friend on the DW access list, and really I’m grateful for it. It’s going to be a hell of a ride, but after the end of my first month I’m finding that it’s working marvelously already, difficult though it is, and I’m very pleased with my choice. My initial instinct is that I will be keeping up work with Them long term even after this, though we’ll have to see if that pans out.
These two things-the Focus On The Patron ™ and ToTT, are written about with a good degree of frequency, in addition to the rest of the Woo Is Strong stuff.
-I’m a vampire. No, not by subculture, although I do tend to be nocturnal, have annoying problems with insomnia (usually nightmare based), and am allergic to the sun (both in and out of body). The body is a psychic vampire, meaning that it needs to feed on the energy of other sources to get by. The energy of sentient beings is preferred as it’s pre-refined, but is not always possible to get. I myself am both a psychic and sanguine vampire. I am a psychic vampire thanks to a screwed up energetic system, and I am a sanguine vampire thanks to a weird-ass experience I had almost ten years ago, which I wrote about and linked to at the beginning of this paragraph. I also am required to hunt for form on a frequent basis. To put it delicately, it means I have to literally eat form and sentience. Ie, eat people. On normal days, I must feed on energy once to twice a day, on blood every two to three days, and I must hunt for form once a week. Being this ill, double that. There was a point where it was almost up to triple that and THAT sucked, but fortunately it’s slowly getting back to normal.
Lest people go OMGOMGOMG F333333R! like some do about vamps, I’ll say this: I’m very anal retentively picky about where I feed and hunt. If I say “feed” I’m talking energy or blood, if I say “hunt” I’m talking form. My feeding sources for energy are half sentient and half non-sentient (ie: elements, music, such like). When I feed on the energy of sentient beings, I have three options: ambient energy (energy that has been released from the people it previously belonged to and is floating around), sex (the most common), or willing “donors”, who as a rule are both in the family or are very close friends, or have excess that needs to be leveled off, making it a symbiotic exchange. Anyone I feed on during sex is aware and willing…although I don’t really have much of a choice in the matter, so it turns out that anyone I have sex with is ok with this. There are also a select few I deep-feed on, who are fully aware of what it means and willing to exchange that, and I must have some deep feeds-which need regular maintenance-to survive (I don’t know why, I just know that when I try to get around it I kind of shrivel like a prune and feel about as healthy). When I feed on blood, I also have options: executions, targets/people who are going to die by my hand anyway, vamps in the family that hunt for me (I can for whatever reason feed on vamps as well as I can on, uh, not-vamps, should they go hunting for me, which is usually only done when I’m too sick or injured to do it myself), or willing others in the family. When I hunt for form, the person dies. Therefore it’s almost always executions. (And when I say that I do a lot of executions, I mean “I am contracted by a variety of courts to do their executions”.) And I do so cleanly and in the least gruesome and most dignified way possible, thank you.
So, lest you give me strange looks or make the “oh shit“ face, I’m honorable to a fault: I insist on being anal retentively picky about where I feed and hunt. I don’t kill anyone for food who wouldn’t already be dead, and I don’t feed on just anyone.
-I am not human. While in this body I classify as Otherkin, but outside of the influence this body's culture has given me, and outside this body, I am not human, nor in a human body, and therefore am only what I am. I am a bit of a mutt, half Elf, half Fire Jotuness, with primary forms (or therio-types, if you wish) of cat (primarily Jaguar) and horse (primarily Arabian). This body itself is also Otherkin, being Elvan also. There are also a large number of otherkin in the Network-honestly, the humans are actually a distinct minority-which I may or may not speak of, if they're family. Being even half Fire Jotun in a human body is a challenge, and so while I don't really do the essay thing on being what I am, there is frequent mention of it-it's often on my mind, thanks to how much effort it takes for me to live as a human.
-I’m an assassin. I’m also a messenger. I am also an artist and a crafter and a seamstress. I‘m also a dancer. I also run four crossroads-Inns. All of these are business-y things I do (though some of them I make hobbies out of). Three of the five of these things are not done in-body. Two of the five are done both in body and out of, to different degrees. Those two would be the artistry and the dancing. Being an assassin is rather illegal in this world. *shrug* For those who have not figured this out, being an assassin means that I kill people for a living. However, despite being honorable to a fault I still get by with my honor intact with my career choice. But, remember that “I kill people for a living” thing? You can correctly infer that being suitable for that kind of a career means that I’m a sadistic woman who doesn’t at all have a problem with killing or enjoying it.
(For the record, murder, as in killing for no better reason than whim, I do not fancy. And battle as an assassin is different from battle as a warrior, for me. I‘m honorable to a fault but I‘m also a survivalist, so. Ask if you‘re curious, that could get long. But, I‘m not one of those “pro life violence and killing is bad!” people. No, no it‘s not, not when done properly, and that requires a balance and ethics, not the extremes that most love to apply to it.)
-I’m one of the co-mains of a multiple Network, with five systems. Or, a multiple system with five subsystems, take your pick. I wasn’t born here; I’m a walk-in. But I’m the primary one you’ll see out here. Thanks to my annoyingly strong tie with this body, which exists because walk-in or not I’ve been the primary fronter since before this body was in kindergarten and had no help at all until three years ago, no steady/functional help until about a year and a halfish ago, I’ve got the in-front half of the main duties. Brigh and Velvet split up the out of front main duties, with Brigh taking the brunt, and certainly the more body-aware portion. I’m pretty sure Velvet does a lot of the more discreet side detail. They both front, but they write rarely.
-I am not this body. Thanks to the fact that the little girl who was born in this body died, and I got stuck with whatever residue of her was left getting shloomped onto my spirit like one color of play dough being moshed onto another color of play dough, I have to deal with her memories and her trauma. It’s annoying, and it’s a pain in the ass. But I am not this body, nor is it mine in any way but to use it, run it, head the people who live in it. I was not born here, I am a walk-in, and I have pretty vivid memories of the life I had before this one. Please do not do me the discourtesy of assuming that because I’m stuck being the primary fronter and thus am the primary one running the bio-life, that I am one and the same with the little girl who was born here.
-The bio-name is Rachel. Before I figured out what my name was, I went by it, having no other name to go by. It’s not my name, never was, never will be. Ta’eris (phonetic tuh-AIR-iss, unless you wish not to pronounce the apostrophe, in which case it’s TARE-iss, the prior is more politically correct but either is acceptable) is the short form of my name, which is Elvish, as close as I can manage to translate out here. I don’t give out the long version to anyone but family, which means not publicly, and this is the only generic short form I’ve got. My Alfar-father has a pet form of it, but he’s the only one allowed to use it.
Actually, while I’m at it, please don’t call anyone in here Rachel and expect us to answer under anything but singlet mode. We don’t have any fronters named Rachel, the BODY is named Rachel, and so we will assume that if you use that name you’re referring to us as a singlet lump. If you want to call us by lump sum and acknowledge the multiplicity, call us Rhiannon (which, happily, there are no fronters named Rhiannon either). Rhiannon Network, Rhi-Net, Rhiannon to the mundane world. (Actually it is in the plans to, eventually, have the name changed to Rhiannon, so that I can get rid of the damn connotations of the name Rachel and have one single lump-sum name. >.>)
To call us Rachel and expect us to answer under multiple identity, as the individual fronter, is rather incredibly insulting and annoying, and really just comes across as a “fuck you, nyah nyah” refusal to accept our identity. (Only exception being if we’re directly interacting with people who we’re not clear on being uncloseted to; we don’t much care if people overhear in public so long as we‘re not actually expected to interact with anyone but whom we‘re speaking to.) The “fuck you” isn’t so much of an annoyance with the people who we don’t allow in on our semi-private personal space, screw them. But it’s insulting to increasing degrees that coordinate with closeness, with the people who we let in at all. In other words, if we’re going to bother to let you into our personal lives and uncloset, the least you can do is respect who the hell we are. This stands for all of us, including me on my journal, hence I’m writing it here. (Can you tell I and we have had major issues with this in the past?)
-I’m a writer. I have a habit of occasionally writing and posting memories as what I call “portal sketches”, having adopted the term from a prior friend and never really fancying dropping it because it works well. Currently I have three projects that I have on hold. One is a rather long portal sketch of a mission done with two of my husbands in the (much more militant) organization I was formerly a ranking assassin of, one is a long portal sketch I’m writing in chapters that I’ve called Rori’s Tale, one is a (very long) portal sketch that I SHOULD have done in chapters but didn’t, of some memories from a past life (which I will not post because it gets into NC-17 territory in part of it). I write my memories in fantasy format and not history format in part because some of the shit I do in my life simply doesn’t fit in histories, and in part because fantasies tend to engage the reader more, IME, and I do not want to bore with my writing, when I post it.
I also have a habit of essay-writing spasms, which are the most common when there’s meaty shit (with foci that are not emotional in base, even if they contain emotion, seeing as I rather detest talking specifically about my emotions in public, which my journal counts as) going on in my head and life. Such as now. Of course, then the essays/bits of writing that have foci aside from “life hai” take a hiatus while I recover from/digest the meaty shit going on in my life, but the cycle always repeats itself, and a gap of more than a couple days between a post is rare, and usually only thanks to rather severe depression.
-I’m bisexual, polyamorous (and married (to several spouses), with a coupleish more upcoming weddings, with (many) kids, all of whom I love fiercely but did not have on purpose, some of whom are grown and with kids of their own (wtf)! Remember that “I‘m not normal“ thing?), really geeky. This flies both in and out of body, although the “married with kids”, fortunately, is only in my life. Not this body’s. In here, I’ve got two significant others, and I‘m one of two fronters (Brigh being the other, and she‘s married to a headmate of one of the SO‘s) who is at all interested in a romantic life out here. One SO is magelvh77, the other isn’t on DW or LJ and is usually called simply “the fiancee” (who I have a really rocky relationship with and honestly will likely never marry at this point). In body, we’ve been pregnant three times, and lost an estimated five kids out of it. It gets more dangerous each time, and more painful, so really the thought of having kids in body has me running screaming. Yep. The geeking…ahahahaha. If you want a list of my geekeries, plz to ask. It r long. I generally don’t make a point of writing essays on these parts of my life, nor do I really include much at all of my sex life (it happens, but it’s REALLY RARE and usually quite brief), but they’re parts of my life.
-I’m a hedonist. I’m also a very visually and kinesthetically based person. I like stuff. I like comfort. I like luxury. I like indulgence, within reason. I’m a hedonist, not a materialist, and I’m also a pragmatist and a survivalist: I always have a good use for any indulgence and hedonism I take part in or surround myself in, and nothing sits around for no other reason than to look pretty or to simply own it. And I put as much if not more value in the non-materialistic things in life. But. I am still a hedonist.
-Why do I keep mentioning differences between me in this body and me distinct of it? Because I have my own life that I carry out without this body, which has about as much of an effect on me as the life I carry out in here. I don’t really call the life I lead in this body mine, because this body doesn’t really ping to me as “mine”. I guess you could say I lead a double life? Well, I talk about both, because I manage both my individual life (both in-Net/at home and not), and this body’s life.
-Expounding upon this, generally, when I’m writing about things, I’ll try to use subject line tags. “Bio-life” is used for what goes on in this world/in this body. “In-Net” is what happens in the Network, ie the headspace, ie “at home”. “Otherworld” is what happens outside this body, usually speaking of residences I have or work I do/employment I have on other worlds and/or planes. “Pwnd” is the tag I use for religious/spiritual type work (explanation for the tag: I am god-owned, and it’s a REALLY HUGE part of my religious practice, which is really eclectic and widely cross-cultural. I used “pwnd” as an affectionate short-form of that). “ToTT“ is for the Temple of the Twelve, which I mentioned earlier and which is distinct enough that it gets its own tag. “Canon“ is for canon-stuff, which is also filtered, and which I expound upon later on. “Innstuff” is for the rare posts that delve into Inn happenings, and usually (though not always) are posts announcing events, when I announce them. Sometimes things cross several areas at once, and if that’s the case, I’ll either just say screw it and nix the subject tags (which I also do when I don’t have a tag that fit’s the topic), or I’ll stick a lump of tags in there. If that happens, sorry if it’s confusing. English doesn’t work well for talking about this shit sometimes, and I’m probably having about as hard a time writing it understandably as you are understanding it.
-This body’s memory is horrible. Its time sense is worse. This might seem pretty callous, but to be honest this journal is in very large part for my own memories, so that I can remember when things happened and have a place to look back and get dates for things.
-Also, I rant. I have a temper. More of one than some people. Generally I try pretty damn hard to keep it under control in polite society, and I try to keep my bitching to snark, not so much whining, and in moderation-but I AM a bitchy, snarky, person, and when I need to rant, I need to rant. This is pretty much the only place I can do it and have a damned good chance at not burning people out. Why? Because cuts exist, I use them, and I put in rant warnings. If you disregard the warnings and click anyway, I really can’t control what happens. I am a temperamental, cynical, paranoid, mistrustful, bitchy, snarky, blunt, antisocial, often sadistic woman by nature, and it’ll show in my writings (even though I try to be nice to people, and when talking to and interacting with actual people, not a pixilated page or my keyboard, actually able to adapt to my surroundings and the people in them pretty decently).
-I’m also a healer. I’m pretty damned good at it too. I’m good at being a neutral sounding board, I’m good at listening, I’m good at being “compassionate shoulder”, I tend to feel good about myself when I can help. I have to be aware of the fact that it’s desired, otherwise I’ll epic!fail-espeeeecially in body, I’m generally scores better at averting disaster when I’m not using this thing-but, I am still pretty damned good at it on both levels. Conversely I’m pretty damned good at energetic and/or magical healing, and I’m decent at physical healing…to the point where I think, were this body not squeamish at blood/gore/needles, we’d’ve done damned well in the medical field. Geeeenerally given the attributes I just listed above (and given ones I’ll get into below), and given my choice of career (I keel tings), this is a rather amusing irony of a paradox, but it still applies. The balance works out to be that the closer I am to you and the more personally invested I am to you, the more healer-y I’ll be willing/able to be around you, and the less close/personally invested I am, the less willing/able I am to go all healer-y on you…and generally I’ll actually more just help you get to someone who IS willing to spend their energy healing you, instead of doing it myself.
Granted, there ARE weird exceptions where randomly I’ll go healer-mode with strange people, and generally I have this thing where I can’t really stomach just letting people take hits, die, or stay ill or injured untended so long as whatever I offer is not refused. I’m rather a protector/guardian/healer by nature, despite also being a warrior/sadist/“death/killing is just fine“ type of person. Unless the person is stupid, in which case I’ll let themselves get injured, and then if they end up healed by me, make sure they remember not to do that stupid again. I’m only a nice healer to the ones who aren’t stupid about the predicaments they get themselves in.
-I don’t like stupid. I don’t like drama. Because of this, generally I try to avoid writing it, despite the fact that my life is ever-full of active and…interesting…happenings, and if I must I cut it, and again-it’s usually only to either get it out of my head or to have it down for posterity. Life happens, and I understand this. I also understand that sometimes it gives curveballs, or a whole bucket of curveballs. This is ok. Life!drama, I understand. And besides, I don’t rule over anyone else’s journal, nor do I really want to. Write whatever the hell you want in your own space, it‘s your space. But do not bring extra stupid or extra drama into my journal.
-Please, do me a favor. Keep your life in your journal, and my life in my journal. This does not mean you can nevar evar evar talk about yourself. Every decent conversation tends to have a pretty balanced dose of each contributor’s POV/experiences/opinions, and that’s fine. What is not fine is making my experiences (especially if they’re more serious in tone) barely about me and mostly about you, thus undermining my own. If you feel you must comment but can’t think of anything useful to say and want to leave me some acknkowledgement anyway, leave an astricks. A friend of mine put this on her journal requirements list, I like it, so I am nipping it. :P (Partial exceptions: If the conversation ends up migrating to points that are partially/unrelated to the post on its own, which has happened awesomely on occasion and which tends to happen in conversations ANYWAY, or if you happen to be a person with whom I have a somewhat unique method of communication with courtesy of being friends for a while. Like, say, the SHC. Even then, I do not like stupid, I do not like drama, and I do not like my shit being undermined.)
-I’ve got an interesting personality. In addition to what I’ve already written, I could be called a bit of a headcase. Sort of. I’ve got some nasty trauma issues. I try not to use labels like “trauma” and “PTSD” with myself, because giving a name to something makes it much harder for me to work through/past it, but. Nasty PTSD. Yep. Often enough, I write about it when I’m trying to process it, although I do try not to do the trigger!spam thing. (If I ever do, you can be pretty sure it’s necessary, because rants are common but triggerspam is rare.) Honestly my rule of thumb is don’t worry about triggering me. I’ve learnt to be pretty decent about controlling my triggers, and really don‘t ever blame anyone for them going off (unless they‘re set off on purpose, which I don‘t assume is the case), and you guys are lucky: you’re online. It’s harder for me to manage triggers in person-but I still do it! Well enough to have kept a bio-job for two years, which only stopped because we moved. The stages of difficult are “email/comment/blog”, “IM”, “phone”, and “face to face”. From least to greatest. Most of you have the comfort of your interactions being safely in the first two spots, which means you really have nothing to worry about. If there’s something that needs changed, generally, I’ll say something. Yes, this is something that affects me (in different ways) both in this body, and separate from it. The body has it’s own trauma from its childhood, both before and after I got here. Some of it overlaps with mine, some of it doesn’t.
-Really this is only a new bullet because that last paragraph got long. Amongst what other shit my broken brain dumps on me, General Anxiety, Major Depressive Disorder, ADHD, and BPD are of the things on the list. The General Anxiety combined with the PTSD means that on occasion if I have just the right kind of panic attack I might hyperventilate into my keyboard. Again with the cuts and the “you’re generally not stuck reading this”. Major Depressive Disorder is part of what makes me a cynical bastard, mostly because being a snarky cynic amuses me, thus making my depression easier to deal with. It’s when I stop snarking and start actually sounding depressed that you can generally clue into the fact that it’s getting nasty. It can also lead to times of writing and commenting significantly less than normal, especially when you’re talking in the dark half of the year. I tend to get hibernative, seclusive, and a bit more pessimistic and/or emo that time of year. The ADHD, well…on occasion has me impish, hyper, and distractable. Fortunately that’s usually the worst it gets, although I’m sure my family can tell you that sometimes it can result in bruises on the forehead from beating heads against walls. Of the three things listed here, the depression is the one that’s actually worse out of body than in, though like the PTSD all three affect me on both levels in different ways.
-Oh look, you get another bullet because it got long. Again. The BPD, fortunately, doesn’t tend to flare much. Last time it did, I wrote a long rambly version of “I’m not a nice person, GTFOver it, if you don’t like it fuck off and leave”, except add extra viciouscruel. I lost a system for that. Geeeenerally I do not approve of behaving this way, and I’ve done a hellaton of work to get that training (thanks, bio mom) out of my brain. I’ve made it pretty damned far, but stupid shit like that still comes out of my mouth every once in a while. Fortunately “every once in a while” tends to be at most once or twice a year. If you’ve had bad experiences with that, I’m sorry in advance. Given that I’m doing what I can, a request there: If you can’t hack that existing at all, if you can’t even hack that once or twice a year, be it for triggery or other reasons, and if you’re going to drop me for it, please leave now. I can take being yelled at, I can take whatever lashes I need to take, and I do not at all blame the system who poofed for being upset with me, but I draw the line at abandonment when you’ve been duly warned. I make it sound all nice and sane now, with my pretty words, but trust me, when it happens, it gets really nasty. I’m an intense and extreme individual. Far beyond what anyone would really expect out of a human body. So please, take that into consideration if you decide to stick around. (Yes, this is something else that affects me on both levels in different ways. Yes, this means I can’t get rid of it by “being more me” in here.)
-If you drop me for any reason, no matter how benign or not-benign that is, drop me a PM and tell me why, whether it’s as simple as “I hate you die” or “Just stopped being interested”, or whether it’s a REALLY HUGELONGTHING. I do the same courtesy for anyone else I drop. (Unless they drop me without word first, in which case I will do the same courtesy and good riddance.)
-That being said, if there’s any issues that you have with me, please let me know. I’m not entirely a self-serving bitch, and I’m perfectly willing to talk shit over. Actually, I‘d really prefer that, because things like that have a way of stewing and rotting to become a lot worse than they initially would‘ve been if people just opened their traps. And as snarky as I am about it (can you tell I‘m used to people who don‘t know how to communicate problems and am sick of getting screwed for it?), really I try to make it as easy, neutral, and smooth as possible. (Hint: Lead-ins are nice. They give people time to prepare. People like me. Or like you, should I contact you first. You know what else they do? Make you think, so that you don‘t end up OMGRAEGing at me or kneejerk-reactioning me, or vice verse, which can really easily turn into situations of “BOOM“.)
Hooonestly if you’d like it to be kept between you and I then I’d suggest PMing me or emailing me (felinequinity at Gmail), because I cannot prevent others from adding in their two cents (no matter how rude I think it is to butt in like that). And generally I do not approve of commentwarz (actually, they piss me off and I will very swiftly put a hard stop to them should I see them starting), but unless it gets heated contacting me in comments is fine.
-I am not someone who will comment to everything. Often I won’t comment much at all, even if I‘m posting decently. This is not because I do not care, and it’s not because I’m not reading. I DO read. And I comment when I have something to say. And remember that antisocial thing? Sometimes I’m just not in a mood to deal with people. This stands both now and in times of good health.
Also, commenting requires a certain degree of energy out of me, which lately I don’t really have. Why? Because both I and the body are really damn ill. The body’s ill enough that while I’m trying to get us a part time job, we still have a hard time being on our feet long term. As in, longer than an hour or three on good days, longer than fifteen minutes on bad days. I myself am ill enough that I am not working my own jobs, excepting one place of employment which despite the fact that the official healers/doctors of the place are giving me the naughty finger for working ill, seems to have no understanding of medical leave…which I filed for five months ago. And, excepting my duties as co-main, and my artistry…which is part of what keeps me sane. Psychopomp or not I’ve been flirting with death’s door for a little while now, and while I’m hoping that both the body and I are healing up a bit, since at this point we’re strong enough to manage to stay on our feet long enough to manage the part time job, it’s really slow going. Therefore, I might not have energy to do more than write what I need to write to get it out of my head and “on paper” for posterity. Nor do I really expect people to reply to my journal in any more frequency than I do theirs.
That being said, I still try to comment with a degree of frequency, because no one likes writing to crickets. Comment every so often, enough so I know you’re still there, and we’re good. The crickets are honestly one of the main reasons why I left LJ, so no offense, if you disappear, I likely eventually will too.
-Remember that There Be Weirdshit Here warning? And remember that whole “I’m main of a multiple Network” thing? And that “I’m god-owned” thing? Well, there’s a bit of a twist on all of those.
One: I’m a hell of a lot older than this body. I‘m a mutt, but in my species, it would be considered something akin to the maturity of a toddler. Hell, in my species, if I were born in this body I would still be a child by the time it dies. I was alive for at least a millenia that I can put my finger on-quite possibly more-before I ended up here. No, I didn’t die and reincarnate. It’s a long story, but I was very much alive when I got here. That’s just the last life I led. I am rather more in touch with my past lives than most people. I’ve never been very connected to any body I’ve ever had-even this one, bound as I am to it, I can leave with a remarkable degree of ease, without even requiring trance for it unless I want an utter guarantee of HOMGVIVIDDOOMMEMORY-and my existence can be described as “cycling through bodies” far more than “living, dying, and reincarnating”. I’ve been in a few underworlds, but it was more like a visit to go “oh hai, wassup?”, stick around and chat it up for a while, and then get bored and go find and/or get plunked in another body. Not really true reincarnations as I (and at least a few others I know of, thanks!) see them, though I CAN see how some would call them as much. Therefore I’m more in touch with my past and the memories thereof than a lot of people (which is both a curse and a blessing), and though I hide it pretty well (especially in this body, hah, because it‘s twenty-fucking-two), I’m freaking OLD. And I really feel my age. A lot. On top of this, my soul has shattered into bits (which isn’t actually a death, for the record) a good handful of times through my existence. The personal UPG I have here is complicated (again, ask if you want), but basically means that because of this it’s been pattern that I’ve had several lives at once through several places at once. While there are some pieces of my soul which are at this point literally unable to integrate with me, this life I’ve been lucky (or unlucky, as the case may be) to get a pretty good number of chunks of my soul back in one place and smooshed quite thoroughly back into me, some of which seem to have been drawn to me upon my arrival here, some of which have happened over the course of the body’s life. So my memories get even more numerous and complicated.
Two: Now that I’ve included the “I have a rather complicated relationship with my past” bullets, I’ll stick that in there with the rest of the bullets that weave into this: thar be canons here. Fictives, canonfolk, whatever word you want to apply (except soul bond, that’s not allowed, because I don’t know of a single being in my Network who would really fit that definition), we have them. We have them in the Network (and some of them even front, or allow me to talk of them, gasp!), I’ve lived many lives in such worlds and to a select few still occasionally go by some of the names I had, my primary deity can be considered (in part) of a fictive world. Honestly, I’m still uncomfortable enough with much of what I write on the matter that I keep such posts filtered; it’s actually my only writing filter. And not even everyone who can claim to be what I call canonfolk is on there. As per my primary deity, I do not filter content written on Him. He’s forbidden that. So you’ll see it, unless you skip it.
Some of the talk meanders onto unfiltered posts, including names/lives of mine, and of others. I subscribe to the theory that these worlds exist, in more than simply imagination (although it gets much more complicated than that, if you want the fully fleshed out version ask), and if that’s a bit too nuts for you, sorry, but it’s ending up to be a significant part of my identity and family and thus life-and with the soul-searching I’ve been doing over the past few weeks/months and will be doing over the course of at least the next year it comes up often in my mind.
That’s in no specific order. If you got through that whole thing in one go, have a plate of your favorite cookies. If you have any questions (or if you people who’ve been around a while and know me a bit more can think of something I’ve forgotten), talk and I’ll answer.
This is what’s on my journal, and while I’m willing to flex one way or the other a bit, and as mentioned perfectly willing to talk over issues with people and find middle ground/compromises if at all possible, it’s not going to sway too much, not outside of natural-progression-of-me. I do not filter any content but the content specifically regarding canon, so while I definitely use cuts, if you’re not interested in reading this, you have two options: don’t click the cuts and skip the entries, or leave. Sorry if that sounds callous, but it’s how it is.
If you’re new and you can’t brain this, or if you’re not new and you can’t brain it, go ahead and poof now, no hard feelings-just drop me an FYI that you’ve done so and why. It’s under the long!cut, but I figured it beared repeating outside of long!cut.
*edit* I make it a point not to cut people off my journal because of what company they hold, so long as my privacy is maintained. I also make it a point not to name drop. However, there is a certain person who used to room with me, who happens to be a rather prominent figure in the Otherkin community. I found out the hard way that she is not someone to be trusted, and I cannot afford, for the protection of my Network and myself, to allow anyone on my journal who is in contact with her. She is the one exception to my general rule of objectivity. Please don't be afraid to add me or to ask to be added, despite this. I never have issue with requests. I apologize for the scrutiny but at this point it is for my own safety, and that of my people.
-Ta’eris