One of the things I want most is to write fiction for a living. Whether or not it’ll ever happen, I have no idea, but as long as I have stories and the will to tell them, I’m going to keep writing them down.

Except for my earliest attempts, I’ve always written male main characters. I never thought much about the reasons; it just sort of happened. But recently, I did.

One, more male characters = more HoYay and more slash. Which I’ve kinda been into since before I even knew what it was.

Two, writing male characters lets me put more distance between myself and them. I always play the spectator/director and don’t get too enmeshed or identify too closely. That way, I can avoid putting too much of myself in the story.

That leads to reason Number Three, the dreaded Mary Sue. Writing her is apparently a capital offense. Writing as an outsider let me feel protected, gave me some assurance I was (like any “good” writer should) just analyzing and presenting a character instead of putting out some ideal version of myself or simply indulging my fantasies. Because, as I’d internalized without even knowing, writing to indulge your fantasies or merely acknowledging certain ones is the worst thing you can do, and even just being accused of it is The Crime That Shall Not Be Named.

Then, on a whim, I looked up an old fan fiction site. Not mine; someone else’s I first found ages ago. It’s here:

CrazedWriter’s Fan Fiction Repository

This site has a changed a lot since the last time I visited. Different location, different focus, different lots of stuff. But the old fan fics that I remembered were still there, and I started reading them for old times’ sake. What were they about? Well, mostly the writer’s fictional alter-ego (who was, of course, the center of all beauty, love and attention) having all sorts of romance and adventures with the fictional man of her choice, who’d largely been reshaped to suit her needs. In other words, THE definition of a Mary Sue fic. And the funny thing is… I enjoyed it. No, the stories weren’t perfect; the writer, to judge from her homepage text, has pretty much disowned them. But the basic writing was competent and there was something in them I liked and wanted to revisit.

I think it might be the raw honesty of those fantasies she shared. It’s the kind of writing you get when you don’t feel self-conscious and you either don’t know or just don’t care how personal it is. I think that’s part of what made the Twilight books so popular. When someone is that honest (for better or worse), it can make a story more real, like pages from a diary instead of from a novel. Like something that, if it’s your fantasy, can happen in “your” life. And even if it’s not, voyeurism can be fun.

Over time, I’ve become more closed off, in fiction and in life, always afraid of revealing too much that might be used against me. Too afraid someone might make fun of me or judge me for whatever. And fantasies (sexual or otherwise) are incredibly personal things. I don’t exactly relish the thought of being ridiculed or psychoanalyzed for those or because people have the idea some fictional thing I’ve written reveals All There Is to Know.

But as I looked at those fan fics, I just had to wonder: Is that fear of sharing too much–of being too closely associated with the stories that I write–causing my writing to suffer? My own fiction is much better technically than it was when I first started, but it’s lost a lot of its soul. “I’m” not really in there as much. I’m outside looking in.

This brings me back to Mary Sue and how I fled from her. People describe her in so many ways, but often, her prime offense seems to be fitting the author’s wish fulfillment. Which (again, looking at Twilight and many, many others) can make a book very popular if enough people share the same wish.

I shouldn’t have been so afraid of her. Or so afraid of myself.

[Link: Making Peace with Mary Sue]

No words. Just watch. [Site Link: To This Day Project]

[Link: Friday Feature: To This Day Project - Shane Koyczan]

My apologies for the artwork, but I was in kind of a hurry and I haven’t completely gotten a handle on how to work in black-and-white yet. I’ll try to do better next time. ^^;

[Link: Dreaming You #10: No Surprise There]

Now that my hives have finally more-or-less cleared up, I took care of something I wanted to do for a while: I added a profile picture to the About page. In fact, I added two of them… and please, for the love of all that’s holy, don’t take the “sexy” picture too seriously. I was just having some fun.

As long as I was doing that, I figured I might as well 1)update the page and change it specifically to an About Me page and 2)put up a site map/site info page for anyone interested and 3)make some small improvements to the header navigation. I hope it worked out okay.

I’ve also put up the beginnings of a commissions page. Since all the cool kids are doing it, I figured I’d give it a try.

Oh, and from the looks of things, I’ll be resuming the webcomic next Wednesday. As usual, the hardest part was making myself get started.

[Link: A Few Small Additions]

Not that my hives have finally more-or-less cleared up, I took care of something I wanted to do for a while: I added a profile picture to the About page. In fact, I added two of them… and please, for the love of all that’s holy, don’t take the “sexy” picture too seriously. I was just having some fun.

As long as I was doing that, I figured I might as well 1)update the page and change it specifically to an About Me page and 2)put up a site map/site info page for anyone interested and 3)make some small improvements to the header navigation. I hope it worked out okay.

I’ve also put up the beginnings of a commissions page. Since all the cool kids are doing it, I figured I’d give it a try.

Oh, and from the looks of things, I’ll be resuming the webcomic next Wednesday. As usual, the hardest part was making myself get started.

[Link: A Few Small Additions]

Not that my hives have finally more-or-less cleared up, I took care of something I wanted to do for a while: I added a profile picture to the About page. In fact, I added two of them… and please, for the love of all that’s holy, don’t take the “sexy” picture seriously. I was just having some fun.

As long as I was doing that, I figured I might as well 1)update the page and change it specifically to an About Me page and 2)put up a site map/site info page for anyone interested and 3)make some small improvements to the header navigation. I hope it worked out okay.

I’ve also put up the beginnings of a commissions page. Since all the cool kids are doing it, I figured I’d give it a try.

Oh, and from the looks of things, I’ll be resuming the webcomic next Wednesday. As usual, the hardest part was making myself get started.

[Link: A Few Small Additions]

Having a weird medical issue that’s sucked up my attention and energy came with one advantage: it gave me an excuse not to think about much else. All the plans I had and all the decisions I needed to make could be pushed to the wayside while I was 1)miserable from itching 2)paranoid of how disgusting the hives and swelling looked 3)terrified I’d never get better and 4)trying anything I could think of to fix #1 so the rest would go away. Being preoccupied with that freed me from other fears, namely that all my creative ambitions might fail… or, in some ways, “succeed”.

Too much attention terrifies me. I really wish it didn’t. But I have quite a history (consciously or otherwise) of suddenly pulling back from things the second it sinks in that if I keep it up, too many people might notice me or I’ve otherwise convinced myself I’m just not good enough. All those voices I can’t filter out. All those reactions that I can’t predict and might not understand or know what to do with. All that possibility of having something to lose. It’s easier–so much easier–to just fade away. Even as I’m writing this, I hear the voices saying Hide while you can so they can’t attack you or make fun of you or end up disgusted that you’re really nothing special. You’re only safe if you keep it inside. If they know that they can hurt you, they’ll use it to rip you apart….

The more people notice me or what I do, the greater the chance they won’t like me. People will find things to ridicule and reasons I don’t measure up. And for so much of my life, I’ve only seen two possibilities: absolute perfection that makes EVERYBODY happy or absolute failure that proves to the world how worthless I really am. If I can’t be perfect, it seems, I’m simply not worth loving. No, that’s not how I see other people. Just how I see myself.

I know that’s no way to live. I know it’s not even rational. Especially since, more than anything, I would like to leave the world a somewhat better place than I found it. For some idea or creation of mine to improve things for someone else in some little way, perhaps even when I’m no longer here and no one remembers my name. I know that’s close to impossible if I keep running away from the danger that people might actually notice me, even if stepping out of the shadows might mean getting stepped on.

It’s just so much easier to hold on to a fantasy than it is to do something that might result in pain. I still have to try it, though, because the rewards might be worth it.

[Link: Fear and the Art of Self-Loathing]

(Warning: You may find this entry more boring than usual.)

Minimizing stress seemed to help… until it, well, didn’t.

Rewashing my clothes in a different detergent seemed to help… until it, well, didn’t.

Drinking more water seemed to help until…. You get the idea.

“So, what’s this about?” you might be asking. It’s about the two months I’ve spent dealing with a bad case of hives. Yes, you read correctly: TWO MONTHS. All because I couldn’t figure out what the crap was causing me, on a daily basis, to look like the victim of some scary-looking (and extremely itchy) alien plague-and what, on a random basis, was making my eyes/lips/half my face swell up so badly I barely looked human. It got so awful that if I had health insurance, I definitely would’ve seen a doctor. I also realize at this point that it’s just sheer luck I didn’t develop anaphylaxis or that hives didn’t form in my throat (yes, that really happens), so I’m thankful for that.

For much of the last two months, I’ve been preoccupied with this. With wondering why this was happening and why it kept getting worse and fearing I was stuck with it since chronic hives are a thing. I’ve also been taking lots of Benadryl so I could semi-function and to keep from scratching my skin off, basically having to choose between being covered in itchy, burning welts and the fact that Benadryl usually either completely knocks me out or leaves me feeling like I’ve had a lobotomy. Once I take the stuff, assuming I can focus well enough to finish a task at all, it ends up taking a lot longer than it normally would.

The good news is I finally figured out what the problem was. Y’see, not quite three months ago, I first washed my clothes in Gain, which I’d never used before. And I didn’t notice any problems with it after the first load, so it didn’t register that I might’ve developed an allergy. Then, suddenly, I was dealing with a badly swollen lip and had no solid idea why. And soon after that, I had a mild case of hives… that seemed to get progressively worse. Then, when I tried dealing with some stressful things in my life, it got noticeably better. Then, gradually worse. Then, I rewashed all my clothes and sheets in a different detergent just in case. Which made it somewhat better. Then, it got worse again. Incredibly, unbearably worse the longer it went on. So, I was getting desperate and praying to any god who would listen that this wasn’t a permanent thing. I also had this nagging memory that the last time I got hives this bad, it was an allergic reaction to memory foam. So, I knew I was probably predisposed to issues with weird chemicals.

So, about two weeks ago, I just took a shot in the dark that maybe-MAYBE-one washing hadn’t gotten all the offending chemical out of my clothes and sheets. And I wasn’t taking chances this time. I used hypoallergenic soap for washing, baking soda for a fresh smell, and white vinegar for fabric softener. I wasn’t using anything that might cause a reaction, not even things that hadn’t been a problem for me before. I even washed the mattress cover and dragged out a spare pillow, just in case the chemical had rubbed off on those things from the sheets and cases.

No noticeable improvement for the first couple of days. Then, the hives decreased some and the angioedema started getting less severe. And then… it got worse again. So, I started keeping a diary of everything I ate and wore to see if I could figure out what was going on. It turned out that what I ate didn’t matter, but some clothes caused less (or more) severe hives than others. So, figuring that some of whatever was causing me so much grief was still in certain clothing, I painstakingly hand-washed everything I reasonably could and re-laundered the sheets and other stuff… again. I’m not sure the hives are completely gone yet since it can take a couple of weeks, but I have finally pinned down the cause and recovery is going predictably. Soon, it looks like I’ll be hive-free. Being hive-free means no Benadryl. And no Benadryl means I can finally have my brain back. ^^;

In summary, that’s what I’ve dealing with for the last couple of months and the main [physical] reason why I’ve gotten things done on such a sporadic basis. Especially after the first recurrence, I just didn’t want to say much about it until I was fairly sure the problem was under control.

Anyway, I’m glad the mystery’s solved. And I learned some things that may be of help to people with sensitive skin:

1) Chemicals from laundry stuff can be ridiculously hard to wash out.

2) Always keep some Benadryl around just in case.

3) All Free and Clear laundry detergent is probably safe to use.

4) Half a small box of baking soda in the wash leaves your clothes nice and fresh.

5) Half a cup of white vinegar in the final rinse makes a pretty good hypoallergenic fabric softener, and no, it doesn’t leave any smell.

This issue gave me reason and time to reflect on some other things, too. But that’s a whole ‘nother blog entry.

[Link: Adventures in Allergies]

THE CISPA PETITION HAS 6 DAYS LEFT AND IT ONLY HAS 75K SIGNATURES OH MY GOD PEOPLE FUCKING SIGN AND SIGNAL BOOST IT DO YOU NOT KNOW HOW VITAL THIS IS

(Source: komaedasans, via tricksterbelle)