so the relationship i was counting on to be stable while living in mpls exploded a bit. not gonna throw shit since its on both of our codependent asses but i did get cheated on so. good news is im gonna be way better off in the long run. in her own words im prettier and smarter and funnier and ive landed a well paying job so ill be moving out of her soon, but not soon enough. at least i have a vacation lined up soon.
being free from people pleasing is quite liberating honestly, having free time and money to spend on myself and people who'll appreciate it is fantastic. been getting out more on my own, watching the city go by from a bus window, and its been incredibly refreshing. i go where i want, do what i want, eat what i want, and flirt with whoever i want. shoutout to the baddest bitch violet <3
i was told many times how damaged and irreparable she thought she was, and i never believed it. id like to think its not impossible for two people in terrible circumstances with baggage to have a positive relationship, but i dont know. at the very least, its given me a lot more interest in how people work. its really good to know your own patterns, actually. especially how they collide with other people's patterns. it was naive of me to ever assume there is a such thing as a "simple relationship", we all carry around our own wierd ass motivations and traumas and no meeting of two humans can ever be described as "simple". the appearance of simplicity can hide any number of issues. what really matters is communication, and the trust that good communication is built on. oh well, what do i know, im only young and immature. we all learn this shit sometime, i suppose.
hope the next couple months of my life are a lot more boring.
hey, thanks. its been a while but thanks for thinking of me. i think i got this ask a couple months ago but never responded. i haven't ever explained my hiatus in detail. the long and short of why is i grew a little disillusioned with the state of tumblr and the online in general plus ive been making big life changes. that and i feel quite good doing things besides scrolling tumblr. i am not back, and prolly will never be 'back' in the way i was from 2019-2023 (which is good for me lmao). this blog won't be deleted either, so enjoy sickos.
if you want the full maddie story press on, brave one.
i don't want to say that the great ceo meltdown of 2024 directly caused me to get off tumblr, but it was definitely around that time i started to think harder about what i get out of this site, the effect it had on me and where its going. tumblr ultimately just sucked time out of my day and i don't miss it. i especially did not like the atmosphere around the start of this year, the place really started to get stanked up with discourse of the week and "reblog if u care about x" type shit that just... breeds inaction? social media often manages to supplant the concept of political action with the illusion that having an opinion publicly is the same as making change. more generally, i hope the concept of a Platform snaps in two. we put a PROFOUND amount of trust into these websites that absolutely do not reciprocate that trust. a Platform can go from a haven to a shithole with one single rules change and no warning. you can't build a "community" on top of that, no matter how hard you try.
and i'm still not signing up to communal open source vegan twitter alternatives because if you are into that shit you might be too far gone. there is no clone of twitter that is good because it repeats the negative incentives that lead to shitty interactions. if you feel compelled to these types of sites i think you need to rethink your priorities and what you consider a good use of your time. sorry. cutting tumblr out of my life genuinely made me feel better. it made me feel good to know that i can just, stop doing something. that i am not driven by simple retention models. i read a book instead. read a book please.
i considered migrating to neocities with a simple blog for long thoughts and writing, but really i don't know how much my every thought and opinion needs to be on the internet. i love bitching and criticism more than anything but i don't like the reinforcement loop it creates to post online. its said often that every day, social media has a main character and it is your goal not to be them, but i don't think thats accurate. every day on social media you are told a thousand times over that you are the main character, that you are special and your voice matters and don't stop posting. then you get your villain of the day, and a million main characters all descend upon them in a stark reminder of why people loved public executions.
that is probably more words than are justified on the subject of tumblr, but oh well. lets talk about other fun stuff. me and my girlfriend (whom i met on tumblr funnily enough) now live together in minneapolis, which has been a great joy and a great challenge. i've been quite sheltered in my upbringing and resistant to change thanks to undiagnosed autism but its been refreshing to be living my life in earnest. the biggest trouble so far has just been getting a source of income. i'm qualified in an in-demand field, but that doesn't make the job market any more forgiving. i'm considering busting my ass to make writing a career (through writing for journals, magazines, review sites and perhaps youtube) but i'm still scared of that one time i made myself in the sims, gave myself a writing job and proceeded to watch sim maddie spend 8 hours on the computer, get the draft rejected by her editor then get paid 0 dollars for all that work. or ill end up posting my ass for money. i suspect half of my followers or so arent here for my sexy opinions but oh well. if you know someone who knows someone with career connections in mpls, hit me up <3
the one thing i do miss from here is the people. or at least, the idea of the people i constructed based on what little i saw of them. i really regret not being sociable enough to introduce myself and hang out more. and the few times i have done so, i haven't always kept up. i'm sorry folks. if you've ever thought me to be an interesting lady, please please please dm me. i am not half as cool and unapproachable as you think i am. i am a shy little dork who just wants folks to talk shit about viddy games and guns with, esp if ur local :)
lets talk about writing again! i released anywhere but here at the end of 2023, mostly because if it went unfinished for another year id have gone a bit nuts. most of them were written in short bursts in 2022, while fairly miserable but lucid. they are lightly edited and frankly, not that good, but there are things i like about them. even if i dont feel like theyre representative of what i could do as a writer, i still released them, just to say they're finished. bone white beaches is the best of them i think, if only because i spent the most time on it. it's got a lot of atmosphere and heart, but lacks a lot of substance beyond the concept. bloodstream chromium is maybe the roughest of them all, but writing it was a very positive experience for me. i was stuck on the ending for a long time. the ending i wrote i think i wrote so that i would believe in it, for myself. and i quite like how the robots are written. stardiver is the first i wrote for the collection, and draws a lot on being in an LDR. if i spent the time to edit it, maybe it wouldnt be so jank, but oh well. i can't dislike it, really. lullaby is easily the most emotional of any of them, but i worry that makes it very hit or miss. irene loved it, which is enough for me.
what's next for m dragunova? well, i have a couple pieces of writing im sitting on that are sorta niche, reviewish type bitchfests that may hit the neocities eventually. if you like stalker mods or bitching about video essayists lmk if you wanna see those. otherwise, besides what was previously mentioned, ive been hard at work on a novel thats been gestating for over a year now, and where its ended up is quite satisfactory to me. its a dork ass ghost in the shell with magic type thing that ive come to love. it'll be released when it is done. i VERY much want to take the time to do this right and get it edited properly. i want to do it right, its a great concept i know people will love and i want to do it justice.
generally, i think i'm in a good place right now. theres a lot of uncertainty, but im confident things will turn out one way or another. you may hear from me again, but if you find yourself thinking of me, feel free to hit me up. until we meet again, tumblr
barbarossa is a meme license and im tired of acting like its not, people just want to be funny size 3 but barb is boring as fuck and sherman does everything barb does but better
romaincrisis
dededos
blakekathryn
germansingergirl
turnnoffyourmind
andulkaphoto
yousharknotpass
