10 THOUSAND KISSES AND HUGS FROM ME TO YOU, MY LOVELY READERS!!!!
Get ready, people!!! This will be one incoherent, sappy, long ass post so take a deep breath and dive in.
I don't even know where to begin because my heart is so full right now!! I've just reached over 10K hits and over 250 kudos for The Real Sassenach and I'm beyond words ecstatic!!!!!! 🎇🎆🎇🎆🎇🎆🎇🎆🎇🎆🎉🎉🎉
Can I call myself a writer now? 😉😊 Please say I can, because that has been my one true dream since I was 14 and wrote my first love story. All I ever wanted to do was write because it gave me peace and safety that I didn't really have growing up. So I created this world of my own and it became my core and basically everything I am - one big mass of various emotions with hands and legs. 😁 My dad used to tell me that I carry around my head on my shoulders just to keep out the rain from falling directly into my stomach - that's how much emotions rule my actions - jump first, look down later.
I wrote for myself and didn't really let anyone see, maybe just my family and closest friends because I was shy, I guess. Or afraid that someone would read it and think it's crap or just stump all over my dream, basically, like they did with everything else I had an interest in.
So, 20 years ago I stopped writing. I let go of my dream and focused my creativity on my job (creatively writing emails to clients about car repairs - I'm a Claims broker, don't ask 😋😋😂😂). I've done wedding invitations for a while, basically for my own wedding and it just started from there; after that, I found joy in constantly redecorating our little apartment and then suddenly found common ground with baking so I thought yeah, I could do that for a while.
And then, as funny and weird as it may seem, one night after Netflix bullied me constantly with this certain show called Outlander, I've decided to give it ago, not being able to sleep and our local TV programs being crappy as usual. That was a year ago (more or less) and you can guess the rest. SC pulled me in, never in my life have I seen such ACTing and didn't buy it for a second. So I googled and found you guys. Had I have known what this side of the fandom would give me, I would have found you sooner, I swear!
Never before did I concern myself with two actors and their potential relationship. I just didn't care and never before was I a part of any fandom. But those 2 wouldn't let me be, and after reading everything posted about them here, a story started building in my head. My fingers started itching and I began to write. The biggest kicker of all, I began to write in a language that is not my native, that I hadn't spoken or written in years and I felt alive again.
Somehow I stumbled on a person that became my biggest support and, well, a friend and she gave me the incentive to go on and publish my work on AO3, which I was a part of because of all these talented ladies that wrote themselves. Before I give my thanks to that person, I just want to mention a few that are on my AO3 Bookmarks list - Sassenach_13, ThroughTime, @treasurethelittlethings, thistlesandherbs, @fromthevault, @clairefrasersfic, @courageousjs, @audramh - you ladies are amazing and it's such an honour to even be noticed next to your excellent writing. There are so many more and I'm so sorry if I forgot to mention some of you that I follow.
So, the before mentioned person that is responsible for my story to even see the light of day, my biggest support system and my muse and friend @liusaidh-writing - I don't think you'll ever fully grasp how much your support means to me and how much you've helped me to find ME again 💙💚 and you know that I'm totally fangilring each and every one of your stories.
When I posted the first few chapters of The real Sassenach, I had no clue if anyone would even read it, let alone like it and your comments and support blew me away. And the fact that I have been through a terrible personal experience in the midst of sharing this story and all of you stayed with me, sending messages of support, sending prayers and love in that horrible period, that just shook me so much. Thank you, all of you from the bottom of my heart!
There are not many things I'm proud of other than being good at my job (actually I'm freakin- awsome), but this one goes into my TOP 5 "Great you didn't fuck that up" list - my first published story and I'm doing it in English and you actually understand what it is that I want to say and what I'm trying to describe and envision for you. Just WOW!
The fact that you all responded to it in a way you did makes me so emotional, thankful, proud and my heart is just bursting right now.
So THANK YOU, THANK YOU, THANK YOU!!! Special thanks to all of my shipper/beliver sisters, the ones that share my story everytime (you know who you are) and to @annagoober - I'll never fully understand what magic you did to pick this story up so much, but I'm so grateful that you did.
The other story on my small but proud masterlist is Come to me and the reactions on this one, given the fact that I've uploaded only 4 chapters so far and being inspired by my own personal story, have also made me totally ecstatic and onCe again thankful from the bottom of my heart.
New updates for both are coming soon, by the end of this week at the latest, and I thank you for loving them so much.
I could go on and on as to how deliriously happy I am right now, but YOU GET THE GIST OF IT.
