Nine Months Later · 5:43am May 21st, 2019
Kept you waiting, huh?
Why'd you leave? Wha Happun?
In chronological order:
- Stop me if you've heard this before: In mid-2017, I officially learned that mental and emotional health were real things that needed to be taken care of as opposed to simply repressing all internal negativity under "maintain total positivity/grow a thicker skin" (future reference for anyone reading this: if someone says the latter in particular to you, run far away... or, if you're close enough to them, maybe ask if they're all right; they might not be).
Folks in my community are taught to take everything "in stride" as much as possible, and never show weakness of resolve or attitude. Thus, due to my quite frankly pulling an All Bottled Up Starlight over the course of my entire life, things got bad enough that I outright needed to take a leap of faith, and in the end, got the assistance I very much needed. It's technically ongoing, but I'm night and day from where I was two years ago and need said assistance infinitely less than I originally did, especially the more I allow myself to unpack my life. I am to understand that this is a revelation that's happened to quite a few people in my generation and even on this site, especially those in any sort of public spotlight (yes, even "horsefame" counts. Sort of. ^^)
Take care of yourself. Mental and emotional health are as legitimate and important as the physical side of things, and to a large extent, they're all linked.
- Lost my job in mid-2018; think I talked about that. Joblessness lasted... quite some time, further eating away at the above health even in the midst of the whole self-care thing.
- Needed a vacation from MLP overall
- Far more needed a vacation from online MLP fandom overall
- Most imperatively, needed a vacation from Fimfiction like whoa.
- My opinions of the last two bulletpoints, post-2012, have always been mixed on the best of days, and I'm pretty sure this is no secret. As of late 2018, however, things got to the point where I could no longer handle their pervasive negatives in the name of basking in their positives. Drama and harassment have been a thing, not as much as I've seen hit some people, but they certainly didn't help in countering the notion that I should stick around. :P
These things piled up, and in the end, had to distance back super-hard. Cue me leaving to do my best to reverse all the things.
y u back?
- After a hard-fought journey (that had a mercifully short stop in a battery warehouse graveyard shift where I made and stuck on labels for eight hours straight) I'm a software engineer now, and am above the poverty line for the first time in... ::checks watch:: life holy crap I thought the other rungs of Maslow's Hierarchy were a myth
- This involved a complete career/industry shift, however, which was not without its growing pains, which I'm still technically going through but they are no longer utterly crushing me and thus I can think about writing again
- Vacation from MLP did its job. Watched some other shows, played some other games, wrote in some other fandoms, still am. More balance is happening, which is good. Also, when I allowed myself to watch it again I fell hard back in because the show I um er Jesus H. Pommel why is this show still KILLING IT after nine years LET ME GO ALREADY I WANT TO LIVE MY LIFE--
- Did my best to surround myself with mutual friends and just give my psyche a break. Plus, quite frankly, this last weekend at Everfree Northwest has proven to me that, fandom-wise, the remaining 10% is worth sticking around for. Probably. Maybe. Meh. We'll see.
- Learned a lot of things about myself. Specifically that I am not made for the spotlight, regardless of how much I love it. Going in hand with that, I've been doing my best to re-balance my involvement and minimize my contact with toxicity. Not just in the fandom but in all aspects of my life tbh. It's a work in progress, but I feel it's going pretty well.
- Thus, "back" is a bit of a misnomer. I'll still be slinging words, but I am not a Chatty Social Media Presence, nor henceforth will I try to be. I realize that there are blogs and twitterspheres and discord servers and readits and all the electric meeting places, but my xennial keister was outlcassed once Web 1.0 ended and always did better in meatspace anyway. So yeah, don't expect me to be jacked in too much.
y no can downvote Reverse Engineering?
Oh, right, I released a thing! I actually released it a few months ago in other places but
Anyway, one of the big things I learned about myself--or rather, learned to admit--is that the heat and feature system is one of the biggest problems I have with Fimfiction. Half because of the whole non-physical health thing stated way up there, and half just in principle as someone who's been writing fanfic since the mid-1990s and reading it since even earlier than that. After writing fanfic for so many years while obsessively worrying about improving my writing, I now do fanfic for fun while using stories to happily experiment with improving my writing if I feel like it.
Again, I have always held this viewpoint. Old-heads among you will remember that the feature box used to be on literally every single page you visited on the site. It was the worst thing ever, and nobody will change my mind. I also consider downvotes and most other forms of negativity to be dumb and always have. I press Back when I have a problem with 99% of fics tbh because wow if I tackled every single fic I had a problem with on this or any fanfic site by the horns I'd've been kicked off of all of them long ago. I also dislike most forms of competition when it comes to fannish creativity, but it was always unavoidable here due to the site's underlying scoring mechanics, and my artist friends who post on derpi tell me the same thing.
A lot of the creative web is like this, tbh; doesn't mean I gotta like it. We compare ourselves to each other due to human nature enough anyways without an algorithm spurring us on. Writing for me is fun, recreational, personally balancing, and sometimes work if I choose it to be. However, the acts of publishing and socializing on Fimfic is none of these things, in a way that is unique from every fandom publishing platform I've ever encountered.
Publishing on Fimfiction, in its untouched, unmodified state, is most of the prep work and emotional frustration of being a real indie author, but with none of the money that normally potentially comes with the endeavor (unless you feel like doing a patreon or something I guess but enjoy that additional maintenance workload for a relative pittance compared to what fanartists receive). The older G4 MLP fanbase, bless its ever-loving heart, has said heart in the right place when it comes to desiring and fostering "quality" and "standards", unfortunately, I've seen the execution of that that fervor, in myriad ways, crush countless peoples' enjoyment of engaging in something that was supposed to be bright and happy and healing and educational since 2012. I've long been against this, and will continue to be, even as someone who has, due to this fandom had my writing prowess increase significantly since I started writing fics for this show in 2010.
I'll use those skills now that I have them, but I don't consider them worth what I've gone through--some of which, admittedly, is my fault due to my drinking quite a bit of kool-aid in my more impressionable years. There are better ways to get these skills. Ones that are less nerve-wracking.
Anyway, I posted Reverse Engineering away from the ratings system to see whether or not I'd mentally and emotionally be able to handle posting on this site again. Fortunately, it seems to have worked. I'm no longer obsessively refreshing, I'm not exposing myself to the popular and heat lists, I'm not comparing myself to other authors, I'm not walking through digital sewage. It's great. I can (so far) post fiction on this site again, leave it at that, and just live life.
The view count goes up super-slowly since no featuring or even Popular List but that's fine. The stories that are coming are for me, and for my fans. I no longer consider Fimfic my main base of operations. However, I didn't want to cut it out completely because I have too many fans and friends here that I didn't want to just cut off entirely because they could subsist where I couldn't. I like having you here. Love it, even.
That said, this is kind of it. I'm in Uncancelled Mode here. This wasn't supposed to happen, but let's see where it goes. Don't blow it, world.
See you next crime.
~B
I missed you, bro. If you ever want to chat, hit me up.
Good to see you here again, hope you enjoy it!
Hey! I saw you floating around at EFNW this weekend, which I wasn't sure I would. But I'm glad I did.
I'm sorry to say, I don't think I managed to stop and shake your hand and say hi like I usually do - this one was so busy it there's a lot of blurring going on, especially now in the immediate aftermath while I'm still recovering. If I didn't, I'm sorry.
Anyway, I hope you had a good weekend and came back to both fandom and Real Life® recharged and more balanced in the ways you're looking for.
5061948
Thanks. I missed you too. I'm still working out how I'm going to do communication stuff. PM me your discord if you have one tho.
5061949
Thanks. I hope I do too. Not sarcasm--I genuinely want this to work.
5061955
We did say hi to each other once, but as usual, you were (I assume) busy helping to ensure the continued kick-ass-ness of EFNW's writing track, for which I will be forever grateful. Thanks to you and Xepher and the rest for all you do.
Welcome back!
I probably shouldn't have read this after waking up suddenly when I have to prepare for work in like three hoursYou've been through a hell of a lot from the sound of things, and I'm glad you're feeling/doing better!Mental vacations rock, amirite? =P
5061962
Quite.
Thanks, and sorry about the derail--go to work
I am so glad you’re healthier and happier. Seriously.
Also I love your writing and I’m glad you’re back. Hope there is no suckage this time.
Well, I'm glad to hear that things seem to be going pretty well for you!
Congratulations!
And welcome back!
~best Keith David impression~
Solid,
Welcome back, Bookish.
Good to see you again!
Whoo, ur baeck! :D
You should write a fic called Jesus H. Pommel, playing off the fact she can no longer be called 'Coco' anymore. :V
Yeah hey missed your smiling face B.
Glad to hear you're doing better! Good to see you about again.
Welcome back! Glad EFNW helped coax you back into the fold. It was great seeing you in person. Also glad to hear about the gainful employment.
Welcome back! It's great to see you again, and even better to hear you're doing so much better both money and mental health-wise.
Also, perfect use of Starlights there.
Nice to have you back. :)
I must confess, I was afraid your hiatus this time was permanent. This fandom just wouldn't be the same without good old Bookish.
...Though, now you've got me curious where your new main base of operations is. Or is that a secret?
Yes. Yes yes yes yes. It really is a feedback loop: Make a permanent positive change to one of those three, and the health of the others improves. Those of us who realize this are really quite lucky.
Oof. Yeah, mental and emotional health are definitely things, and I can certainly empathize. As fun as grad school is, it can really be a soul-sucker at times. Glad to hear you're feeling better now.
While I’d normally say something like “Welcome Home,” instead, I’ll say “Welcome back to the lighter side.” MLP is supposed to be good for the soul. I’m glad you stepped away, so you could come back and it could be that for you again.
And more than anything, I’m glad I got to have fun with you this weekend!
Glad to hear it's working out so far.
write more Rarijack it is adorable
It was great meeting and getting to chat with you a little at EFNW.
I definitely understand having to step away to deal with your own mental health, I've been fighting that all my life as well. I know how it is to have to step away from a community or some social forum because it's just getting too damaging to my own well-being. In my experience, the majority of the Brony fandom is decent people; but online fora have a tendency to draw all the trolls, encouraged to be even more toxic by anonymity (the online disinhibition effect). There's a lot of that out there, unfortunately.
Anyway, I hope that things continue to improve in your life, and folks here don't get so bad they drive you away again.
5061959 For sure. If you ever feel like, and literally, no pressure, you can always find me online if you'd like to talk shop or just life. Once more, welcome back.
5062058
I probably am going to address this fact
in a future story, even if only as a snide side comment >_<
5061956
Sent.
5062145
Yeah, I'd basically thrown it all away ahead of my previously planned end of year schedule, it'd gotten that bad. Even packed up and shelved all my pony merch.
... still have to figure how much "back in" I want to get. I really don't want to lose the love again.
I need you and Gary next EFNW, man. You were sorely missed this weekend
I'm on AO3 and FFN as the same names as here, with the former being my most "main" at this point.
I also totallydon'thave alts which will remain secret until I don't want them to be anymore :35062153
We had way too much fun and should do that again. Thanks for being there, for me and just in general.
I just want to say that I'm very glad to hear of your career change. For more than a year now I've been coming to the conclusion that creative industries, and the video game industry in particular, are especially damaging to their employees even by late stage capitalism standards. You deserve better than that.
5062327
I'll do my best, for sure!
And ooh--you've got me curious now.Glad to have met and blethered with you at EFNW, for all that the blethering was all-too-brief, and glad to hear you're doing well.
5062372
It's an honor to be there. And I mean it!
...and what's this "should" stuff? More like we "are" gonna do it all again!
5062169
It was great meeting you too.
If I'm being completely candid, my view of offline brony fandom is worlds higher than the online version. Meetups and cons have always been really, really great for me, fantastic even, barring the odd anomaly.
Online landscape, almost complete inverse. Post-2012, anyways.
5062557
Quality over quantity! Dude you were super-fun :D
5062434
Thanks. It's a shame, honestly--I constantly said I would have worked at the place(s) I did pretty much forever, if they'd only paid me and my friends a living wage and/or elevated us from contractor status. I enjoyed the "work" that much. Things might change in the next few years, though; momentum's shifting and all that.
5063502 Yeeeah... The impression I get is that enjoyment is what they're banking on. That sense of, "we want people who are passionate about these projects, and if you're passionate you'll put up with shit conditions out of love for the work," whereas nobody expects the IT staff at a bank to be really invested in the job beyond the paycheque, so they get treated more respectfully as a result. Ultimately, to the suits in charge, "do something you love and you'll never work a day in your life," translates out to, "well if you're not really working then it's fine for us to not really pay you~"
But, as you say, the momentum is shifting. The rumbles about unionising are only growing louder, so it might even go somewhere. Here's hoping!
Y'know I thought long and hard about what to say here; as you know I consider long Essay-style comments to be a sign of Respect for the works I leave them on and I always want to show that respect to the people I think deserve it, which you definitely do. But the more I thought about it the more I realized I was just finding fairly elaborate ways to say a lot of the same stuff I always say (because it is always true X3) and thus I wound up saying nothing. Which really isn't what I want! So instead I'll just say this as simply as I can (allowing for this rambling preamble 'cuz Goji's gotta Goji l3): I'm happy. That you're back, that you made it through the tough times OK, that we have more stuff to look forward to from you, and that you just sort of keep learning and growing and Getting Better on a lot of levels.
media1.tenor.com/images/2d9902a4de4ad000be9ca64c5abac9a1/tenor.gif?itemid=8766309
Welcome home (and yes my gif choice here is VERY deliberate X3)