December Meme: Family, Friends, & Internet Communities
Today's meme topic comes from
kith_koby It's a birthday request- happy birthday to a fellow ambitious Capricorn!
Family is not a topic that puts me in a very good mood. So I am not going to say very much about them because it's a topic that usually makes me feel pretty fucking depressed. They have not been supportive of my relationship with V, despite the fact we own a house together and have been together for almost 6 years. Things are not as bad as they were a few years ago, but they're still a far distant way off from good. I try to be patient, but there are days when that is very hard. I'm not really looking forward to driving 6 hours home to see them tomorrow, even if there are presents involved. In fact, I'd rather have genuine love and acceptance for Christmas, but since that seems to be forever out of stock, I guess I will settle for a Keurig coffee machine. Thankfully, there is always lots of free booze around and I plan on being too drunk to care.
Ahem.
Because I have the family that I have, I put a lot more stock into the families we make for ourselves than the families we are born into. I have always felt closer to my friends than to my family, even before I came out. I could not have gotten through the past few years without the support of loving friends, online and off. And many times, those friendships were the things I hung on to. I'm kind of a private person and I don't like to talk about the negativity in my life, but when times got tough, I did my best to focus on the positive and count the great number of friends I'd been blessed with. I wish I hadn't had to move around so much the past few years- from MI to VA and now to MD. My RL friends have been doing a lot of moving of their own- as people who are in grad school tend to do. I've been so busy this past semester, it's been hard to really develop friendships with my new colleagues. I know that will come in time and there are many great folks here. But I also think that as you get older, forming close friendships like you did in college is harder, just because everyone has so many other responsibilities- spouse, kids, job, etc.
Which I guess brings me to say that I've been very lucky to have been able to take my online fandom friends with me throughout these moves. Although I haven't met many of you in person (and certainly hope to meet more of you some day!) it's comforting to know that you are out there, interested to talk about and share ideas about fannish things. I don't share the fannish side of my personality in RL- mostly because I don't know very many openly fannish people and like I said before, I'm a private person. So it means a lot to have this space to share these things with you. And I know LJ/DW culture is dying or plateau-ing but I always welcome new fandom friends. So if you are shy or have been lurking, please feel free to friend me as I always friend back. This entry was originally posted at http://kmo.dreamwidth.org/ Comment here or there as the spirit moves you.
kith_koby It's a birthday request- happy birthday to a fellow ambitious Capricorn!
Family is not a topic that puts me in a very good mood. So I am not going to say very much about them because it's a topic that usually makes me feel pretty fucking depressed. They have not been supportive of my relationship with V, despite the fact we own a house together and have been together for almost 6 years. Things are not as bad as they were a few years ago, but they're still a far distant way off from good. I try to be patient, but there are days when that is very hard. I'm not really looking forward to driving 6 hours home to see them tomorrow, even if there are presents involved. In fact, I'd rather have genuine love and acceptance for Christmas, but since that seems to be forever out of stock, I guess I will settle for a Keurig coffee machine. Thankfully, there is always lots of free booze around and I plan on being too drunk to care.
Ahem.
Because I have the family that I have, I put a lot more stock into the families we make for ourselves than the families we are born into. I have always felt closer to my friends than to my family, even before I came out. I could not have gotten through the past few years without the support of loving friends, online and off. And many times, those friendships were the things I hung on to. I'm kind of a private person and I don't like to talk about the negativity in my life, but when times got tough, I did my best to focus on the positive and count the great number of friends I'd been blessed with. I wish I hadn't had to move around so much the past few years- from MI to VA and now to MD. My RL friends have been doing a lot of moving of their own- as people who are in grad school tend to do. I've been so busy this past semester, it's been hard to really develop friendships with my new colleagues. I know that will come in time and there are many great folks here. But I also think that as you get older, forming close friendships like you did in college is harder, just because everyone has so many other responsibilities- spouse, kids, job, etc.
Which I guess brings me to say that I've been very lucky to have been able to take my online fandom friends with me throughout these moves. Although I haven't met many of you in person (and certainly hope to meet more of you some day!) it's comforting to know that you are out there, interested to talk about and share ideas about fannish things. I don't share the fannish side of my personality in RL- mostly because I don't know very many openly fannish people and like I said before, I'm a private person. So it means a lot to have this space to share these things with you. And I know LJ/DW culture is dying or plateau-ing but I always welcome new fandom friends. So if you are shy or have been lurking, please feel free to friend me as I always friend back. This entry was originally posted at http://kmo.dreamwidth.org/ Comment here or there as the spirit moves you.