#musing on muses

[pokimoko]

i love when people casually inspire you. like, they're just going about their day, doing what they love to do, and then somewhere, by chance and unexpectedly, within their words, their actions, their scribbles, their mindless humming, their impromptu dancing, their idle moments of existence, you find a spark for an idea. just the simple act of being around someone else can be so inspiring sometimes. 

[vividfizz]

One of these days I’m going to have to draw out Magpie’s father, too. Abraxas is his human name. Still stuck for a pony one. I’m thinking Abyssal Something. Abyssal Arcana. Abyssal Hex. Abyssal Shade. Abyssal Creed. 

[functionalechoes]

I will begin this mess of muse musings with the pair that are youngest of my muses: Jake and Marco of the Animorphs.

I have been a borderline obsessive Animorphs fan since around the time that book 2 came out. One of the very few non-traumatic memories I have prior to the accident that scrambled my memory is seeing the Scholastics Book Fair Flyer and instantly being enamored with the cover of a girl changing into a cat.

I had no idea I was about to jump headlong into a nearly 30 year (so far) love of child soldiers, guerilla warfare, and trauma as far as the eye can see.

I have a lot of feelings about those "teenagers with a deathwish" (twelve. someone calculated it out in a post I've long since lost and they're twelve at the start). I have a lot of thoughts about all of the characters but Marco and Jake have consumed my attention the most. Those are my boys. The boy general and his right hand. The tactician and his guiding light.

I have roleplayed as Marco for just about twenty years now. Jake hits twelve years this month, if I go by the old blog's first post. And this week I plan on writing about one or the other or the two of them together every day.

I'd apologize for the babble that is to come, but I'm not sorry. I am in fact quite gleeful about writing about them again. Maybe I'll even reblog some of the stuff on Jake's old blog. Marco's history goes back to livejournal and IRC/skype, so it's a bit harder to revive than Jake's.

[andsoshespins]

Musing about Muses

In going down the proverbial rabbit hole that is eight (!) years of my own Tumblr posts last night, I came across quite a few true writing posts I penned.  So much of them about desire.  In the absence of love and experience, I clung to this imagination, a vision, a burning desire that spelled the words in a fury.

In intermittent texting with one of my closest friends who knows my brain well, I mentioned how much writing I did in the past, and it was decent.  I jokingly mused that perhaps I need a muse.  And she “waggled her eyebrows agreeing” on this.  (I feel like there is a lot to unpack there: Was my partner for six years not enough of a muse?  Was he never worthy enough?  Do I need a current distraction of sorts to restore myself?  Do I need to return to a frame of mind I was missing for quite a bit of time?  But that is perhaps for another post.).

Today, while talking to my other two favorite brain partners, we talked about writing; and the topic of muses arose here, too.  (This is not entirely surprising as we met at our college literary magazine gatherings.).  One of my friends said something interesting about how so many muses throughout history were not the lovers or spouses of the artists but someone outside that realm.  And this saddened me to an extent.  Why wouldn’t the person you are choosing to spend (any part of) your life with be inspiring you to be expressive in your favorite ways?  Is there a humdrum routine that removes the original desire?  Is the expression of love in new ways replacing the need/desire to express with pen and paper?  If the latter, I somewhat understand.  Who wants to document and describe when living the loving is most important for a fulfilling life.  But I am not sure.

If you are a writer, for example, and you cease or slow down your writing when you are in a relationship with someone, are you not losing an integral part of yourself?  Look, it is a HUGE challenge to write about love.  I have tried many times on these digital pages, and nearly everything falls short, a cheap attempt at capturing something, a sham of your real experience if you can’t word it just right.  Very few people have been able to produce genuine love poems or expressions in prose.  (And then, of course, I tossed out that a true love poem has not been written since the 1600s because that’s when John Donne’s The Sun Rising emerged, and it is the only love poem worth reading.  Which I am only a tiny bit kidding about, because, good lord, that one gets me every time.)

I am not sure exactly where I wanted this post to end up.  But I am glad I wrote it. 

[illusionaryrules]

Muse Selection

The question is, what characters should this blog feature for RPs. And the only real, proper, true answer is ‘what do I want to write’. Unfortunately, this answer goes from ‘everyone’ to ‘nothing at all’ to ‘here’s a rotating notated list ordered in vague priorities and impulses, which also changes in the space between infinities’.

So it’s probably a good idea to gather some feedback. As I said in my intro post, the six fandoms I definitely know I’d dig getting into are, in no particular order of importance: Madokas, Dangans, Kantais, Touhous, Katawas, and Personae. It can be safely said that you can request characters from any of those for RPs and it would be strongly considered, although there’s a lot of other potentials as well.

As for things I’m pondering on my own, again in no particular order.

Byakuren from Touhou, because she’s a perfect beautiful saint of peace and also her body is unreasonable. She’s fluffy, soft, strong, can suplex a freight train, and leads a temple as a spiritual leader because doing otherwise would make her less perf.

Seaport Hime from Kantai Collection has already been requested once, and uh. In general, she’s pretty great in a game full of great characters I want to lift and use. Big, strong, but introverted and sharp with outsiders.

Shizune from Katawa Shoujo is a misunderstood perfect angel. Or at least, she deserves better than she got, and I love her, so well. Write what you love.

Hamuko/Minako (fem protagonist) from Persona 3 was always one of my personal favorites ever, she’s got a great style and attitude, a strong character, and all around, there’s a reason she’s incredibly popular to RP. I can’t deny the call.

Additionally, from other sources...

Tifa from Final Fantasy. Come on. Like, she’s one of the cornerstones of video gaming in general, as well as of one of the biggest series in all of gaming. A powerful bruiser who punches gigantic war machines of death, to death. With her metal fists. And is also a loving, nurturing personality, with deep inner kindness and strength. Literally perf.

Samus from Metroid. Again, this is another, like. She’s the strongest, most beautiful bounty-hunter, has single-handedly destroyed whole planets and species, and is badass. Like, above the normal level of fictional badass, in another special stratosphere of it.

*Hyun-ae and *Mute from Hate Plus never get enough attention, it’s such a niche thing, but I love them and they’re great. A small blonde firebrand with Conservative Upbringing and a loose tongue, and a black-haired aspiring engineer whose  hope for the future was, uh, well, she’s rescued now so hey. And of course it would be both, because screw the rules, protect korean AI trauma software brides.

Yang Wen-li from Legend of the Galactic Heroes is literally the best, especially if I do end up RPing with Kancolle blogs or something, just. He singlehandedly gave me a preference for the dark, dour, sit-on-the-table-and-brood-about-the-world type of leadership character. He’s more cheerful than that sounds, and one of the most brilliant admirals in any fictional work.

Also, the Vocaloids. Many of them. I did a Vocaloid thing in the past which involved, like, a setting where they were Chobits-style androids you ordered, and so people who wanted to RP would fill out an ‘order form’ of preferences, changes, alterations, etc. So even for the same character, the experience was always different, and the active involvement and upfront ‘this is what I like best’ really made it good. Plus the Vocaloids are just themselves good.

[lordofthegoldenflower]

Thinking about making a side blog for one of my OCs....

[savageleewriting]

If We Sing Together Then We're Never Alone

I want to sing to you.

My heart's full of broken notes, you know the sort. Bits of noise and dissonant rhythms. It's like a song you can't catch on your lips, but you're sure you heard it on the radio sometime before, maybe when you were just little and the world seems so much more fresh and alive than it does today.

Catch your breath. Catch mine too. Catch it, and throw it back to me so I can smell your scene and remember why I thought being with you would be better than being alone, any day of the week.

Any day of the weak is a day for me. Too weak to be strong, too lame to create, too broken to build. Sand slides through the cracks in my fingers, and time leaks out the holes in my heart. Everything slips away, turns grey, fades into ashes. An ashen touch to your lips. Like a sound, a whisper, and then it's gone and you've got a shadow cast across you.

I'm here I'm here I'm here, I shout and I shout all day. 

I dunno who hears me. Maybe you do. Maybe you don't. Maybe you do and you just don't care very much. 

But it could be worse. We could be all alone forever and ever without anywhere else to be.

Then again,

Maybe we are.