#rainrambles

[purpleprosey]

it's my birthday. what can i even think about, when i've come so far? years are impossible to summarize, and there's infinite little parts of me that will surely be lost to time forever. this body and brain of mine have lived endlessly and it doesn't feel like i have much to show for it.

another year of nominal "adulthood" for me, and it doesn't fit at all, the amount of responsibilities that i have to face crushes me little by little each day. i don't know what my life will be like in a year, much less a decade, because i still don't know who i am. my sense of self is faltering and my thoughts slip through a sieve no matter how much i try, and i don't think it was always like this.

no doubt i've broken in some way. my passion is barely there, and almost every day i'm longing after Past Me, Past Me who could write and ramble and feel joy in the things she loved. Past Me who got out of bed in five minutes and didn't have to worry about bills or housing or making choices of her own. Past Me who had a guilt complex over failing grades, who was too afraid to paint her nails, who never thought she'd make it past eighteen.

why do i idolize her, try to make myself her, when she'd be starstruck over the simple act of my continued existence? things were so much worse for her then, and although she seemed to possess more strength than i ever will i tell myself that's not true because i still have that strength in making it this far. yet i still miss those days. maybe i never got to grow up in the way i wanted and that's why i give the terrible memories of adolescence - that prison i needed to escape from - so much disproportionate value. maybe i buried it all then and the ramifications are only unearthing themselves now. that sounds about right.

i'm the happiest i've ever been, even if i'm recovering. there might be dreary days and soul crushing nights but the fact that i get to live through them at all, through the eyes of me even if it's only a semblance of me, is invaluable. today i can light my own candles and cut my own cake and make a day out of the trip. time elapsing in itself DOES warrant celebration, after all. i look at myself in the mirror as i see myself change and i smile having this knowledge nestled in my heart.

[purpleprosey]

Soon I’m going to take another step towards breaking free from the shell that’s encased me for so long. I’m going to start HRT. Truthfully, I wasn’t even sure about this myself until a few days ago. And yet I already know this was so, so, so worth it already. 

It wasn’t as hard as my mind made it out to be. This had been some insurmountable obstacle in the back of my mind, terrifyingly beautiful and imposing, whispering to me every time I looked at myself in the mirror. This isn’t you. This wasn’t who you were supposed to be. The possibility haunted me, followed me to the morning light piercing pouring out the windows. To the warm water of the shower as I huddled into my knees trying to cry. To the quiet space of my cocoon of blankets at 3 in the morning, music drifting from my headphones three feet away. It didn’t really leave me. I just distracted myself because I… didn’t believe I knew how it could feel to be me. But when I finally made the decision it didn’t take me long to get everything sorted out. In that way I’m lucky.

But listen: you don’t need to be fully confident in yourself to do this. You’re never going to be ready. There’s never going to be a perfect time. But you have to be kind to yourself. You have to give yourself the chance that she deserves. I know it’s really scary. But you can do this. I believe in you, wholeheartedly.

And if you’re not ready yet, or if you can’t afford to yet, or if you’re still questioning, that’s ok. See how it feels. For me the little changes were really everything. Shaving my legs and arms, trimming my brows, trying on makeup, and most of all painting my nails - all these little things have improved me in my mind significantly. You don’t have to do any of this to be a trans woman, to present feminine at all, but if you want to or you’re even just unsure you should try it out for a little. The most important thing? Love your own body, your expression, based on your own standards and no one else’s. Do what speaks to you and only you. 

Then maybe you’ll be able to find the girl nestled deep inside, buried underneath your chest in the layers of her prison of cold grey fog, and she’ll take a little peek through your eyes every day until she becomes you and you become her.

[purpleprosey]

Do you ever feel like your characters have more... depth than you do as an actual real human being? More meaning?

It's funny that as a writer, I like making characters with so many vast perspectives and so many emotions, and then in real life I'm... this awkward person who eats and sleeps and goes to school and doesn't contribute much. Seriously I don't have a single thought in my head. When someone asks me to explain something I'm so scatterbrained and can't really put it into words well

But as soon as I force myself to write, boom, there's so many ideas out there that I didn't even know I could understand. That I didn't know was even POSSIBLE for me to comprehend. My characters can wax poetic for paragraphs about the nature of suffering or anarchy or their trauma while in real life if someone asked me about any of those things I'd go "eh I don't know I'm not that thoughtful of a person." In real life I'm bad with expressing words and thoughts, and online I'm bad with expressing emotion.

But my characters aren't.

It's fun for me to visualize that they're spirits in the air being channeled through my body, possessing me through every single letter on the page. Spirits summoned forth in fleeting moments of inspiration before I go back to scrolling through my phone and doing nothing. Characters that have more capacity for thought and feeling than I ever will, because they aren't me.

...Except that they are. Of course. Maybe they're untapped little parts of my voice, yearning to be let out... I don't know. Probably. But it's why I like writing, because I get to feel like different people for a while and it's really, really freeing.

[purpleprosey]

I love how frequently I forget how to portray my own characters. like for a period of time they were possessing my brain, and now they aren’t, which leaves me unable to find their voices to capture.

then the only recourse I have is to pull up “their most memorable quotes” and stare at them repeatedly while panicking over making everyone OOC even though it’s my own writing. in this way my imagination is like fruit on a tree that I can never reach again in quite the same way…

[purpleprosey]

So not sure if this is just a little idiosyncrasy of mine or not but I find it very extremely hard not to use interjections like "hmm" or "oh" or "well" at the start of my sentences.

Otherwise showing emotion online is just so difficult. Big jump but do you ever feel like your personality is a fabrication, but you can't express yourself naturally either, so you're stuck typing every word over and over until it "fits you well enough?" And tone tags can help but still don't always convey things well or make your sentences sound less, I don't know, rigid and artificial

Is this normal? Because HELP I cannot speak informally at all sometimes. Like I'm forcing emotion onto myself when there's nothing. Is this like a common neurodivergent experience because I may have it to an extreme degree... alas

[purpleprosey]

me pledging to commit to a halloween horror movie marathon tonight, knowing full well that my brain can barely even handle two hours of film-watching without shutting off: if i'm scared enough i won't get bored. if i'm scared enough i'll be able to stay awake and watch movies until the sunrise

the monster under my bed eager to sneak out so she can torment some strangers for the night: personally i think you really need to be getting more sleep

[purpleprosey]

I love how 95% of this blog is me happily reblogging my favorite fandoms and blorbos

and the remaining 5% is introspective ramblings on mental health

ah... the duality of tumblr

[shewithoutrain-yugioh]

Late Again…..

We’re on the last leg for Chapter Six, guys, I swear. Final edits, beta approval, and then it’s all yours.