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Greetings and welcome to the Gallery, where all the cool illustrations hang out like they're in a club or something. If you like arts that don't move, this is the place for you!

2024 Gallery

Updates and Blog - 2024

Roller Coaster Year

Tuesday, December 17, 2024 - 2:05 PM

Man, this year's been a roller coaster. Changed jobs (again), a deadly election, and just...a lot.

Project-wise, I finally finished Zone 1 of It Doesn't Matter! I finally ordered a small first time print run of New Normal last night (to debut at Further Confusion next month!). I joined in on the Therian/Otherkin HRT comic making, and have made several installments playing with that! I made two paintings, painting for the first time in literal years.

^_^;; Work-wise, I've been all over the place this year. Started the year fully thinking I'd be trying to pivot to supporting myself through my art with the idea of making and selling pet portraits and stuff via art fairs and art shows. I ended up getting swamped by anxiety and not doing that, but did get a job teaching at a different stable, which has been hella less horrible on my body.

I was seriously looking at going back to school to try and become a vet.

And the election happened.

We're three trans people. We're in the best place in the United States to be trans. We do not trust that to last.

So we're currently working on moving to Germany.

Like. The schooling was a long shot. Part of the reason I was thinking about doing it was to make immigration easier. But we're trying to leave the country FAST. Literally as soon as we possibly can. We were unsure even about continuing with my plans to go to Further Confusion in January. We'll see. Things could still happen, we'll see how they shake out. But I'm currently in "Behaving as if we'll be here in a month to dealers den the con" flight patterns. And then immediately being ready to leave.

Germany's immigration policies seem pretty chill. Basically, you have a good amount of time to try and get a job to then help you get a work visa with? Well, that's the plan.

It's still scary. I'm working on learning the language as fast as I can, and I'm pretty good at finding jobs, apparently? But I'm still scared. It's a lot.

So, as is my wont when stressed about something I can't do anything about, I also be doing the contingencies? I dunno.

I like telling stories with art. I want to finish more stories. I REALLY want to finish New Normal. I can't do more It Doesn't Matter until we record zone 2. I like making comics, even though I'm often infuriated by my slow progress.

I want to tell more full, complete, short stories. I want to make and sell books of my stories. I want to make that happen. Sooo...let's fuckin' go, I guess.

Art and Work Pursuits

Tuesday, December 3, 2024 - 3:02 PM

What dooooo woooooooooorrrrrk? AHHHH, I don't know...!

I'm so tired.

I was so close to pivoting to trying to be a vet and having my art pursuits be It Doesn't Matter and stuff and just for fun. But with the expected upcoming move, those plans are scuttled. At least for the time being.

I still want to make art. And I feel like pursuing it for part time moneys is a good idea.

I hate doing commissions. I shouldn't strike them entirely, but should limit them. Doing timed commissions in hour blocks, 2 hour blocks, etc would be a better approach. Still some logistics to work out, but might be The Approach.

I want to tell stories. I want to write stories and make things. I want to do comics. I'm so tired, and having so much trouble with focus and touching my own spirit.

Exploring my spirit this morning, been clamping down far too hard for far too long, not letting myself feel for fear of pain. For requiring myself to be under control. Control, control, control...

So, so damn tired.

So. What am I gonna do? How'm I gonna set this up? What approach am I gonna take?

I love teaching riding. I'm not gonna stop doing it. And trying to make my job just art right now doesn't feel feasible. And also.

Either way, I'll be joining SIN doing Dealer's Den at Further Confusion in January, and need to prep for that anyway.

...unless we end up in Germany before then...

But anyway.

2024/12/01

Oh fuck, it's December

• Organize collection of Otherkin & Fictionkin writings on webseat
• Work on finishing stories
• Come up with endings:
• Sonic HRT
• Head First
• New Normal

Sonic HRT

• The Point?
• Comfy wish fulfillment
• Exploration of transition themes
• Growth and self-acceptance
• The unicorn shifting stuff does play into that, especially with my reluctance to be Less Than Sonic
• So. Introduce unicorn shiftery-ness as fallout from od-ing Chaos Cola
• Push back Dr. Herkin meeting comic to include some unintended shifting first, as catalyst for actually going in
• More basis in my actual experience that way, anyway. I and others tend not to address problems until dealing with them becomes unignorable
• Ending then would be at a point where internal peace is reached. What does that look like?

2024/11/25

• Fuck.
• We got some time (no-show appt), let's write some stuff
• Out back:
• Head First
• New Normal
• Ideas
• Pony Power
• Magical girl stuff
• Solarpunk shifter roëmance
• Unicorn xenofiction
• I saw someone publishing a therian HRT book
• Pony Power
• The melding with their horses thing?
• Horse camp (sleepaway)
• Now I'm interested in whether a horse sleepaway camp exists

2024/11/24

Trashh Cann Publishing

• Write the self-indulgent garbage
• Shifter romaence
• Shapshifting garbage
• Speculative fiction
• Let's get my solarpunk girlie boys going
• Idk, get smashed/high and go, maybe
• A book a quarter?

2024/11/22

12:21a (night of 11/22)

• I'm so damn tired.
• I just. What's the fuckin' point. I'm fucked, I'm tired, what the fuck do we even do.
• My friends are begging online for "Don't kill myself" money
• And it's not like after resolving the current emergency their situation will be okay
• Fuck
• We're fleeing to Germany. Probably immanently
• I don't want to. But it's the smartest move.
• I want to die
• I just. What the fuck can anyone do?
• Weak of me, I'm sure. "Oh, just because you don't have your superpowers you're gonna give up? I thought you fought injustice?" But fuckin' how.
• Gone from being simply depressed and traumatized to Emergency Mode. And just. More and more stuff
• Stressing about job things, stressing about getting presents for Robin, stressing about Thanksgiving, stressing about Germany, stressing about how damn many of my people and my friends are going to suffer and die. How we're all already suffering, and what can we even do
• What'm I gonna do for job in Germany, when I'm already garbage?
• Stupid fuckin capitalism
• I just want to go home and be okay, but if I did permanently go home right now I'd be broken and useless because who can fight when you just want it to be easy?
• I'm so tired, but it's not like I'm sleeping, anyway

2024/11/18 - Sonic Online Handles

6:44a

• Dumb online handles like windboy7
• @ActualStH @SonictheHedgehog_Actual etc fakes. @SonictheFKNHedgehog actual "public" profile
• I get doxxed/revealed
• "Why'd you hide it?" "i jest wanted to play"
• Bad spellur

Piercings!

• Clean gently with saline - sterile wound wash
• Sensitive teeth toothpaste
• No alcohol or peroxide
• Gentle kid's mouthwash
• About a month- come back to downsize bars
• Sandwiches evil
• Eat careful
• Rinse mouth with water after meals
• Avoid spicy for 2-3 days
• No mouth stuff/oral 2 1/2 months
• Nick the piercer

2024/11/16

I wish people would actually say what they mean so I wouldn't have to worry so much. Like, I'm sorry, I'm tired of spelunking into the darkest dredges of everything you've ever said to decipher the True Meaning, and usually being wrong, anyway.

Yes, my anxiety is running rampant, and yes, I'm stuck on overthinking through every interaction ever with Nicole after being "fired" yesterday. Yes I'm overreacting and overthinking, even though I'd been feeling burnt out and wanting to quit the mostly unpaid position, feelings are complicated.

2024/11/15

12:13p

Nicole "fired" me just now. Just a, "Things changed for me, I'm going in a different direction." Writing this while it's fresh.

It hasn't been working. Her teaching style hasn't been meshing with my learning style. I wanted to quit, and I'm sure it was clear I was frustrated. Still feel rejection.

Rationalizing. Probably because of the Professionalism talk. So probably because I openly talked about my grievances over overworking horses and the mill feed. To clients. I still feel that the lack of transparency is a problem, and that the way the Garrod's don't field criticisms well is bad.

Her teaching me made me feel like I could never do anything right. Admittedly, a trigger for me. By the time she was going over saddling, leading, etc, I'd been working under her for months. Too little, too late. And I have my own preferred approaches. I like to lead by touch, not sight. I was admittedly way more frustrated than I should've been at her corrections, especially when it was the way she wanted to train her personal horse. But again, really, reeeeally late for corrections.

I dunno. I'm relieved, but it stings.

2024/11/08

9:13a

• "Becoming useful (in a capitalist sense)"
• How and why I want to pursue becoming a vet
• Useful skills/certifications (even in an apocalypse)
• More money, better standards of living for me and mates (contributing more to our household than currently...which has gotten much more fraught suddenly)
• Help. Help people, help animals. Medical training imperative.
• Life's too short to miss the things you love. Life's too long to endlessly do something you hate
• Assess qualifications. Order transcripts. Possibly take prerequisite classes. Possibly pick up second job in vet clinic. Then apply at application cycles
• I love what I do. But the way I have my life structured needs to change
• May need to flee. Easier to immigrate with professional skills. Not the first time I've thought becoming a vet to move would be a dec play.
• Gods. I wouldn't be a vet until the end of his term either way. Whatever, fighting for it is still a good idea.

3:33a

• 3-5 drawings each character/scene ish

IDM Zone 1 Finally Finished!

Thursday, November 7, 2024 - 6:38 PM

OH HOLY FUCKIN GODS, THE FIRST ZONE/EPISODE OF IT DOESN'T MATTER IS FINALLY DONE! I'm so fuckin' proud! ^_^;; And exhausted, which doesn't bode particularly well since tomorrow starts out my work week. And is a particularly long day. ^_^ Also my birthday, so that's exciting! (I was thinking about bringing cupcakes or something to work tomorrow, but probably won't end up doing so.)

I'm so relieved. I started writing It Doesn't Matter when I had my Awakening as Sonic in 2009. I'd always, always planned for it to be an animated project...but I had no idea how to teach myself to animate then. ^_^;; It's a comedic exaggeration that's also not totally inaccurate to say that when I went back to college to get a degree in animation, it was so that I could make It Doesn't Matter...? Like. Yeah, that's kinda exactly what happened. Especially as working in the animation industry didn't work out (for a whooooole lot of reasons).

I started the current round of storyboards for zone one in 2018 after a few (fewer attempts than I'd expect, honestly) false starts. We recorded...fuck, way before that, even.

Fuck. I think we recorded Zone 1 in 2016. Because we did it in my old bedroom in my parents' house. And I finally moved out in November of 2016...right around our first round of the horrible fascistic shitbag getting elected. Chaos, all this has never not loomed large.

But that does make sense. Sonic the Hedgehog (as a me, as a person, as a franchise, as a form of media, as an identity) is all about fighting fascism. It just...also really fuckin' sucks. And I'm not saying that me making It Doesn't Matter is a revolutionary action--like, save for in the "Existing while trans," and "Making art with your whole heart" are revolutionary actions kind of way. Just...this art has always, from the very beginning, been about letting me connect with my real self as Sonic.

Cuz it's literally just a fictionkin story. Discovering yourself, who you've always actually been. Giving yourself permission to embrace yourself. Picking up those parts of yourself you'd expected to need to shave off...I guess those themes are less part of the story than my experience of them.

2024/10/29

Chores

• Cat litter
• Trash
• Dishes
• Kitchen counters
• Studio --> Paint
• Home --> Writing It Doesn't Matter
• Phone dump

10:05

• I think maybe I just wanna focus on It Doesn't Matter
• Maybe especially if/when I start school again
• It's HOME.
• Like, I love the Therian HRT community in theory.
• I love the theory of belonging to a community
• I'd like to JUST FUCKING FINISH New Normal
• And be done with it
• Primary project, It Doesn't Matter, with New Normal and Sonic HRT side projects? Does that change literally anything?
• Whatever. It Doesn't Matter day today

4:50p

• FUUUUUCK!!! Where did I put the notes on Robin's insight on faer response for Heat Blast!?
• Okay. It was...keyboard directing the mirrors to cause a self destruct while Shads does interference in the background...? I think?
• Okay. Write after work
• Fuck I just wasted all day scrambling to find notes I may've just Echoed forward

2024/10/20 - Loss of Sapience in Therian HRT

I think the "The Crossroads = suicide" in animal/therian/otherkin HRT stories concern has more legs than not. BUT.

First, you're always playing on dicey ground when analyzing a story that hasn't completed yet. The HRT stories have grown far out of my ability to follow them all, and I know some have finished, but all the ones I am following are still in progress. In particular, ayviedoesthings's dragon HRT that started it all is still ongoing.

(GODS FUCKING DAMMIT, WHY DID I START WRITING THIS LONG ASS THING IN APP, I JUST LOST A BUNCH OF WRITING!)

In general, analyzing a work in progress often tells more about the analyst than the work.

As a result, there are a lot of plot threads that may resolve in one way, like the suicidality analog, or that could be revealed to be very different in actual practice.

In story, the only source of information so far about "the crossroads" is a doctor shown to be biased and gatekeeping. He's a morally grey character, his intentions are to mitigate harm, but his actions often cause it in his patients. He very much does not understand what they're going through, though he does seem to be trying to help.

This reflects a lot of trans encounters with doctors. Especially the "real life test" of being required to live as your desired self before being allowed to medically transition. Like, that's just a thing that gatekeeping doctors used to require before administering hormones. Fortunately most places don't have THAT hoop anymore, but we still have hoops to jump through. I had to get letters from 2 different therapists to get my top surgery (granted, that was to get insurance to cover it, but still).

There's a difference between a cis het administrator of the process' experience of the situation and their trans patients.

IRL, medical transition is often lifesaving (obviously not a requirement). Most of us know despair way, way too well. It makes sense to explore those depths in our art, especially in stories of transition. It's dark, it's messy, and it doesn't release its claws easily...or well. Even when things start to improve. Sometimes, getting release in our situations just lets that internal pain surge and swamp us. It sucks.

But transition's also often isolating. Some of us lose family or friends, recovery from surgery is painful and long. Every step of the way, we're being interrogated, whether we're sure, whether it's right, oh, isn't that awfully permanent? Moments of triumph always shaded by doubt.

So taking all those elements? Doctors blocking the door of relief, constant self doubt, the agony of both decision and recovery, those themes are strong.

And then, there's the release of wish fulfillment. Cuz fuuuuuck, no amount of transition is ever gonna fix my species. And it hurts. Cuz everything is wrong and alien. And there's fuck all I or anyone can do about it.

So that, I think, is where the potential "loss of sapience" comes in, which we haven't actually seen represented yet, and may or may not be (most likely is not) as clear cut as it's presented by our unreliable source, Dr. Erian. Because there is/would be a huge change in cognition, as your body and brain's structure changes...but how much of that would change you? As your body alters to what you've always actually been, how much does what makes you you actually change? And, what's more, how much would other people outside of you perceive what actually isn't changing?

I think there is an amount of exploring the seeking of lack of pain through loss of self, and that the suicidal parallels to that are worth discussing. But that's not necessarily what's being told in most of these stories. When people mourn our loss simply from transitioning in the real world, I find the interpretation of loss of self depicted in our fiction from those same sorts of people in story suspect. There could be, and likely is, more to thematically delve into within these stories. I think for most of them, more will come to the fore as the stories themselves progress.

That being said, I don't enjoy identity death in my TFs and stories, though I do like examining mind change, and how new memories and instincts can affect a person. And I get the squick, as a person very prone to suicidal thoughts, I side eye the loss of sapience as explained by the characters in these stories a lot myself. I just also think the individual in the story presenting this information is meant to be an unreliable or biased source, and that these stories will explore that more, even when some of the characters take it at face value.

Cuz on the other side, if you take this track as a suicide analog, as a way to terminate pain, and you and your pain still remain, then that's an interesting story to explore as well. I'm also really partial to stories that explore after the "ending" in general, tho'.

Tldr; Your concerns are legit, but I think it's more nuanced than that.

2024/10/20 - Chill Parents in Media

So I was thinking about chill parents in media, and was reminded of watching Princess Diaries with my dad. And we're watching the scenes with Mia and her mom, probably specifically the balloon painting scene, and he tells me that the mom in this movie's always bugged him.

I ask why, and he tells me that he just thinks she's too buddy-buddy with her daughter.

And I'm like, yeah. Well, she can be. Cuz Mia's not doing anything wrong.

And he stops for a second like, oh yeah. Well, I still don't approve of it.

And like. Of course his abusive ass couldn't wrap his head around the concept of having an actual relationship with his kid. Cuz even as I said it, I was watching him, watching myself, and hoping I wasn't about to step on a landmine for "Disrespecting him." Trying to keep my tone casual, without being too flippant, and testing the boundaries to see if I could get his ass to see himself, juuuust a little bit.

Vlog 2024-10-16

Thursday, October 17, 2024 - 9:51 PM

Mostly did art, editing, etc.

Vlog 2024-10-15

Wednesday, October 16, 2024 - 1:33 PM

Didn't have the spoons to talk into the camera today. Was running late again, got behind, felt like I couldn't do anything right. Got some footage of animals being cute, tho.

Vlog 2024-10-14

Wednesday, October 16, 2024 - 1:32 PM

Rough mental health day.

Vlog 2024-10-13

Sunday, October 13, 2024 - 10:36 PM

Sometimes a day can be a good day and a rough day all at once.

Vlog 2024-10-12

Sunday, October 13, 2024 - 10:36 PM

Work day vlog!

Vlog 2024-10-11

Saturday, October 12, 2024 - 9:45 PM

Third day vlogging in a row! Long work day at the barn, teaching, cleaning waters, and talking about rotating poop.

Vlog 2024-10-10

Friday, October 11, 2024 - 10:01 PM

Day off vlog. Video editing, game night, and time lapse video of character design for James from New Normal's dragon self. And musings about how I dun know to use Garage band anymore.

Vlog 2024-10-09

Thursday, October 10, 2024 - 5:56 PM

It's a vlog! I dunno, I intended to do a bit more--adding some backing music with the B roll stuff, a few places with text on the screen...but I ran into a wall, and I'd rather just publish it as-is than let it rot on my hard drive forever. So here we go! Vlog! Hoping to make this a habit.

Hopefully this doesn't coincide with my abusive-ass parents come out of nowhere and show up on our porch again. Wheeeee...

Oh, right! Also included is the time lapse of the work so far I've done on [spoiler warning] a character design of James' dragon form in New Normal. Whoa.

I'm trying to work on it, buuuut, it's not coming easily.

Dying Horses

Monday, October 7, 2024 - 7:10 PM

At work our horses have been dying. It's hopefully stopped now, but it still feels like nothing's been done. I want to buy my favorite, and part of that is that I don't trust him to stay safe. Or alive. But I can't. I want to so badly. I want him so badly. And I can't save him. Couldn't save Gabe, either.

The husbands 💙

(Second picture was taken after Goose orchestrated a jailbreak (opening an unlocked gate) that led half the herd galloping around the property in a merry chase.)

2024/09/27 - Stars

• I gotta take care of my whole self, not just piecemeal
• "And I look up at the stars just like me," I'm amazing, and so's everyone else. Everyone's protagonists. No one's "just a supporting character" or "background character". One of my big flaws is I've been too far away to see others clearly, they faded into an impression of a brown blob, and they're so much more than that
• We're a constellation, each star extraordinary, and we add to one another's splendor

Dun Feel Good

Thursday, September 26, 2024 - 8:41 PM

I dun feel good.

I haven't been feelin' good, and I don't know what's wrong with me.

I'm having trouble handling my depression lately. I don't know how to approach it when there isn't some Big Obvious Life Thing That Needs To Change. Job killing you? Find something better. Abusive family? Move. Not that any of that was easy, and didn't take years and years of work to escape. Not that I didn't plunge the bowels of desperation.

But now...? Things are better. So, so much better. My mates are lovely, my work is good, fulfilling, AND I'M GOOD AT IT, and I've done a lot of work to heal.

...and I'm still getting swamped with despair, and harassed by pestilent swarm of chanting self hate.

I don't know how to fix myself. I don't know what's bothering me, what's really bringing this all up to the surface. Hell, it's not even really at the surface, it's just a general malaise I can't overcome. And I'm not doing well.

I want to be okay. I want to feel better. I want to stop hurting. I don't know where to start.

2024/09/22

I'm having trouble handling my depression lately. I don't know how to approach it when there isn't some Big Obvious Life Thing That Needs To Change. Job killing you? Find something better. Abusive family? Move. Not that any of that was easy, and didn't take years and years of work to escape. Not that I didn't plunge the bowels of desperation.

But now...? Things are better. So, so much better. My mates are lovely, my work is good, fulfilling, AND I'M GOOD AT IT, and I've done a lot of work to heal.

...and I'm still getting swamped with despair, and harassed by pestilent swarm of chanting self hate.

Sonic HRT #14 - progress

Thursday, August 28, 2024 - 11:22 PM

I always forget that there's ways I can do behind the scenes stuff! I always love seeing the process of other artists, it's fun to realize I can do the same myself. Sometimes I get so stuck in trying to pound it out, I think this will be a way to keep myself excited and enjoying the ride itself. Hells yeah, let's get excited!

So it's funny. When I started doing Sonic HRT comics in May, my rules for myself were that I needed to keep it simple, easy. No backgrounds, unless elements of the background were pivotal in telling the story. No shading. The first several installments I even barred myself from hiding the sketch layer. I tried to limit my pre-production to keep things as streamlined as I could manage. I didn't block out the pages as pages, I just went frame by frame and then put them into a page at the very end...but that wasn't actually less work, in some ways it was more.

So I've thumbnailed this based on workflows that've worked well for me writing New Normal and the ways I storyboard It Doesn't Matter. ^_^;; Tho' I've less blocked out these pages by page, I've only blocked the first page of this installment...I'm still using my tools to keep things easy, instead of needing to fight it later.

I'm really enamored of the therian HRT-verse as a way to explore bringing the really awesome, fantastical, magical, affirmations of our true selves in the grounding of our current lives. It...helps that my current life is pretty rad. I'm away from my abusive ass family, living in a beautiful place with my fantastic mates, doing work I thrive at and am passionate about doing. Doesn't mean there aren't rough spots. My mental health is still...not great, recovery's a bitch. Capitalism sucks. My mates are also mutually traumatized and stuff bubbles to the surface at odd times. But I like exploring the concept of a really, really cool transition in all this.

2024/08/27

2:27p

Things I need to be able to afford before horse

• Credit paid off
• Remt
• Dentist
• Optometrist

• I want to stop wanting to kill myself
• Mostly I don't think that's what I actually want. Mostly I want to just stop hurting, or it's self harm to alleviate pressure and keep going. But I don't like the pattern
• I'd like to have the option to just stop and step back in those moments. I don't feel I do. Which again, is part of why I can't disrupt the pattern
• I'm so tired
• And I just wanna go Home. Mobius home. Myself home. I'm so fuckin' sick and tired of feeling this way in this body
• I'm so fuckin upset it's never gonna be better
• I do think now that maybe I can be okay. Maybe I can be better than okay
• But my body is never gonna be better than okay. I can't do anything to fix it, and it guts me that I'm just fuckin stuck.
• Things are so damn good. And I'm gonna twist on this blade forever and never get over it.
• I'm so damn tired.
• I'm hungree. I wish I'd arranged my day better so I could get lunch
• I really should start packing a lunch...
• -_- Maybe I can eat after Little Wranglers
• Like. I know one of the reasons I'm crashing is because I need food
• But all these things are still true, even though their pain is amplified at the moment.
• I really wish I could just be myself
• Even being my hedgehog self here would be rad.

2:45

• I don't know that I would've got here with my real self and powers, that's one of the draws to explore in HRT-verse
• I feel like that's kinda a failure, me not playing the same rules? For my part of the HRT game? That I'm not playing in Hyper City or whatever? That I want it to be Here+?
• But I guess I can include Hyper City. Just need to read up on the lore

What If Project Rotation

Thursday, August 22, 2024 - 10:38 PM

What...if...What if, after having done exactly one project rotation of It Doesn't Matter, Sonic HRT, New Normal, and OCs/Pinups/etc, I switch to:

• It Doesn't Matter
• Sonic HRT
• It Doesn't Matter
• New Normal
• It Doesn't Matter
• OCs/Pinups/etc.

Is that a thing? Is that a thing that's okay for me to do? I dunno. I'm slightly drunk and pretty tired.

2024/08/18 - Horse Trainer

4:50 p

• I think I wanna be a horse trainer
• That's what I'm learning to do, right? With Nicole? That's what a working student is? I still don't know for sure, and I'm way too scared to ask. What does it meeeeeannn!!!???

Project Rotation

Thursday, August 8, 2024 - 8:45 PM

Been testing out a new project rotation since the end of Art Fight. Doing Art Fight bullshit was really fun, and I really liked just busting out art like crazy cuz it wasn't narrative and needing a ton of frames or panels or whatever. But also. I have so many narrative projects, and I care about them deeply.

So here's the rotation I've got rn.

• It Doesn't Matter
• Sonic HRT
• New Normal
• OCs/Pinups/etc.

So that'd mean New Normal is next on the docket. I'm not planning to put a time restriction on these? I've been turning things out about a week at a time so far, It Doesn't Matter last week, Sonic HRT this week.

From my end, New Normal is gonna look like me writing a chapter, and also making the chapter art for the completed chapter waiting. So like, right now I'm midway through writing chapter 5 of issue 2, and chapter 3 of issue 2 has been waiting for art, so those would be what I'd be making for it.

OCs and pinups are just whatever arts I feel like doing, and I have a list of things to play with.

Forums and Peopling

Thursday, August 8, 2024 - 2:27 PM

Hahahaaaaa...I don't know how to square this circle...

Joined the Discord for the Therian HRT art community last week, and been trying to join in. Not easy, I'm horrifically anxious, but I'm trying. One of the people I'd like to know, and the boyfriend of someone I consider a friend is doing a Black Arms HRT. Black Arms from Shadow the Hedgehog.

The genocidal aliens.

He was writing about how he has some redemption arc stuff planned, and I...mentioned how that was good, because I wondered how he was going to thread the needle what with the genocide and all.

Then I tried to hop into a voice chat where some people were streaming a game. He was there, too, and I was excited to hear him. But he dropped out while some streaming logistics were happening. No big deal, shit like that happens all the time.

Then an admin pulls me aside, tells me people have been messaging me and I really upset him, and I need to change what I said.

I go, and I do, and I apologize.

And they're still...and this is where things get complicated. Cuz I Know and Knew that the Black Arms is Important to him. They are part of who and what he is, part of his heart, soul, and identity. I know it. I feel it. They are him, and part of him, and he is part of them. They are his home.

The same way Mobius is mine. And they did attempt a genocide. And I don't have any explicit exomemories from that time...but I feel it as happened. I feel the dust and smoke and debris and blood. I feel the fire and the sirens and the screams. I feel the shouts and the shots and the bullets and the blasts. GUN's no better than them. It was our monsters against their monsters, and who cares which are worse monsters when our people are getting destroyed in the process.

I know why and how my words hurt him, I know it's a problem.

I don't know how to explain myself without making excuses. I'm scared we won't be able to be friends whether I try to explain or let it lie.

But I also felt needlessly chastised by the other people in the thread. "You shouldn't say the 'g word'", "At least you changed it."

I get it. I get that I hurt him, and that it's wrong. I get that most people won't know, or will try and diminish it. That's not where I came from. I came from feeling this shit just as deeply. And it sucks, and I don't know how to make it better. Cuz I really like him, he's a cool guy. Just sucks.

2024/07/12 - Shifter Romance Popcorn

11:30pm

• Lawl, getting back into dumb shifter romance novels again same time Robin's starting faer werewolf journalling game
• I wanna try writing my own shifter romance popcorn
• Low stakes, simple stories, and lots of them
• Start with werewolves?
• Try to keep things simple, basic. If it starts to get complicated, propagate that complication off as its own thing
• Solarpunk?
• Oooh...I was thinkin' modern setting, but solarpunk is awesome flavor. Too complex, tho?
• But maybe
• Was thinking backdrop world very like Wriggles and Sparkles. Just that everyone's shifter
• Shifters have full flexibility to shift between human and animal forms, and anywhere (were) in-between
• With several notable exceptions?
• Full moon
• Solar eclipse
• Certain poisons
• Illnesses
• Do some end up in diff forms for these events? I.e. not all human, or animal, or secret third option?
• Different results from different triggers?
• Non-shifters are just regular animals?
• The stuff Robin was talking about re: packs and alphas tonight

• Vet school
• Bridleway Bay
• Vet school students. One performing at local cafe

2024/05/28

It's weird to think about Overlander being basically a racial slur. Even apart from negative connotations. Cuz like, it sounds cooler than "human" does. But like, when it's not the self-identifier of the group in question, us Mobians as outsiders don't get to just decide that that's what they should be called. We don't get to impose our cultural name on another group.

How's your gender doing? If you don't like it, it can be changed

Monday, May 20, 2024

foone

May 19

Four things that are 100% true and you should think about if you haven't already:

• You don't have to be a boy if you don't want to
• You don't have to be a girl if you don't want to
• You can be a boy if you want to
• You can be a girl if you want to

This isn't a joke. This is reality. Have you considered these facts? If not, maybe take a moment to think about it. How's your gender doing? If you don't like it, it can be changed. Hell, even if you do like it, maybe you'd like something else more?

sonic-spirit May 20

This! This is what it's all about! It doesn't have to be deeper than this! You deserve to be happy! If this makes you happy, then guess what? This is you! We don't need to keep endlessly litigating whether we're BLANK enough. It can be simple!

I feel like a lot of the pearl clutching about transition from the cis/het community could be easily dispelled by wider public understanding of what transition is and how it works. If they could get a look "behind the curtain", to come to understand that their ideas of people "Suddenly jumping in" to the gender fuckery pool is blatantly incorrect. (The stuff that's actually in good faith, anyway. Fuck the christan moralizing bullshit. They literally want everyone miserable at all times forever, so that they can continue selling their poison kool-aid as the silver bullet Solution to All Things, for control and power. Also christianity's a death cult trying to bring about the end of the world, and I can show my work, fuckin' fight me.)

Like, first steps we always advise people to take are very easily reversible. Try some new clothes. Maybe play with your hair. Here are some tips to try with makeup for both a more masculine or feminine presentation. The trans boy's first packer--a roll of socks. Here's how to safely bind, and here's stuff that might work in a pinch on a budget.

Play around. Have fun. Open yourself up, and give yourself the freedom to explore.

If you decide to pursue a medical transition, cool. You'll need a GP (general practitioner). Sometimes they can prescribe you HRT, sometimes they can't--either they'll refer you to someone more experienced, or they'll give you the run-around, and you'll want to look for a trans friendly care team. Some of the changes are permanent, many only persist as long as you're on the meds. If you're unsure, or if a fully binary gender presentation doesn't feel right for you, you can ask your doctor to start you on a low dose. We can't pick and choose how our bodies change, it's up to our genetics, but we can ease in to the changes.

There are a variety of surgeries you could choose to pursue, both top and bottom, and new techniques are always developing. Hate your boobs? We gotcha, fam. Want big boobs? No problem. Bottom surgery can be a big recovery commitment, but the satisfaction numbers are even better than knee replacements (by a lot).

We go into this eyes wide open. We can each go as far as we need and no further. Medical transition not for you? No problem! You're still family.

There's no such thing as "trans trenders". It's a bullshit concept made up to make people feel small. And it's okay to be wrong. It's okay to try something, get super excited about it and tell everyone, and then realize there's more, or you things went deeper, or that it just wasn't quite right. Going through that kind of identity exploration and introspection broadens your world. It gives you better insight in this vast, beautiful world of individual experience. It can be mortifying to admit you were wrong. Most of us have had to do it, often several times. I was sure I was a lesbian. Then I was sure I was a gay boy who couldn't do polyamory. Now I'm a gay boy in an amazing polyam relationship with my favorite people, and I'm so lucky.

We need to be free to explore. And it's okay to just want to be happy. It's actually good.

#trans#transgender#nonbinary#enby

What makes you believe you're your fictotype(s)

Sunday, May 19, 2024

through-lines

May 7

Every once in a while, I'll see someone saying they want to write more about being fictionkin but have no idea what to write about. It's hard to get specific without knowing the individual or their source material, but some general ideas on what to write about could be like…

• What makes you believe you're your fictotype(s)
• How being fictionkin affects your day-to-day life
• Your relationship with your source material(s), before and/or after discovering you're fictionkin
• How you feel about your source material's fandom
• If/How discovering you're fictionkin affects how you interact with other fictional works
• How you deal with doubt (from yourself or others)
• What you do to cope with homesickness/canonsickness
• What you consider shifts and what they're like, or what it's like not having shifts
• Aspects of your source materials (weird pacing? gameplay mechanics?) and how they compare to your memories/noemata

I'll also add that getting into the habit of journaling regularly can help you figure out topics to write about! Of course, journaling is first and foremost for better understanding yourself, but if you make it a habit of journaling about anything that comes to mind, you could find some entries cover topics that may be interesting or helpful for others to see.

(On that note, it can be very interesting to address how things have changed over time--whether that's your identity (or your understanding thereof) or the community. That's the benefit of both journaling (for yourself) and sharing your writing publicly (for others).)

But I think in general, there's a serious need to talk about what being fictionkin is, so anything you can think to write about and share helps.

sonic-spirit May 19

Okay, hells yeah, I'll take these as prompts! Probably one at a time, since each one is pretty big and cronchy, and I am but a simple lad.

• What makes you believe you're your fictotype(s)

OOF. This one always feels so damn big--it's so much to parse, and such a huge thing to deal with. Like, my current coping strategy is "Fuck it, I don't care, I am what I am," but how I got to that is a series of embarrassing stories that will actually be way more helpful than me just saying that the answer is fuck it. And anyway, the answer isn't just "Fuck it."

Short version: I had reason to try assuming I was Sonic the Hedgehog, and it stuck.

Long version?

I had my unicorn/alicorn Awakening starting in 4th and 5th grade--it was kicked off by a soulbond, the soulbond relationship really fucked me up cuz, hey, even unicorns can be abusive, manipulative assholes. I discovered the unicorn Otherkin community online for the first time around 7th grade or so, had a pretty rocky ride in that because the Main Dude running the unicorn sites was a bit of a manipulative, abusive shithead himself, because again, even unicorns can be abusive and manipulative. Fuck you, Emshir.

So, by the time I was a junior in college/university, I'd dipped in and out of the online Otherkin community a few times, mostly just lurking. One day when I was walking to class, I started ruminating about the phenomena of Fictionkin (though I only knew to call it Otakukin at the time, cuz hey, it was 2009). The buzz I'd picked up just poking my toes into the communities from time to time seemed to be of an "obviously these are all fakers/fakeclaimers". But I'd also seen at least one memorable thread positing that there couldn't be any unicorn Otherkin because our poor, pure, unicorn souls would be blasted to bits by the horrors of this world sooo...yeah. My personal line had been for a long time by then that if I could think of even one way for a phenomenon to be possible, I would accept that that phenomenon was indeed possible. Doesn't mean that I've never though someone was wrong, but what I think about an individual doesn't matter, it's their own experience (like yes, I've noticed you can take up a lot of space with your aura, I don't think that's necessarily because you're uber powerful).

I'd done a decent amount of soulbonding, and definitely believed in a big, wide multiverse, so yeah, I could think of at least one way for an individual to be so-and-so from Universe.

Well...that opened the floodgates, didn't it.

It wasn't instantaneous. But if it took me more than two weeks to start noticing I was feeling Sonic feels...I'd be surprised. It was complicated, though, by my having had a soulbond with a Sonic. A really important, soulbond. But hey, that didn't rule it out, right? It's a big multiverse, after all.

But hey, I couldn't be Sonic, could I? No way...! There was no way! I just really, really liked him, didn't I! And who wouldn't want to be Sonic, right!? Nah, I was willing to entertain the idea that I was somebody, but Sonic!? Not a chance!

Besides! It's not like I had gender dysphoria, or anything! Sure, I fundamentally did not understand how my girl parts worked, I'd come to the conclusion that my alicorn self was indeed male, and I was having phantom penis sensations...but that was all normal, right!?

Nah. I was definitely actually Amy Rose, and just sooo obsessed with Sonic that picturing myself as him felt right, right!? I mean, it's close, right!? Both hedgehogs. Both Mobian. Sure, I drew myself as Amy with back spines and a very different clothing style, and changing my Actual style to be as girly as possible was...new (although actually, I'd totes wear those same bright colored leggings and sheer skirts I got then now, that shit was cool). But surely I was actually just Amy Rose. Sure.

Yeah...that...did not last very long.

But...the next part I usually gloss over. Because it makes me uncomfortable. It made me feel like a faker. I've always been a spiritual 'kin. ^_^;; Honestly, I'm a little lost on what a psychological 'kin means, even. Like, there's plenty of valid ways to be 'kin, I'm just used to thinking about it this way for myself. But it'll be 15 years in July (chaos...I've known who I am for as old as I AM. Fuck that's trippy as balls), and if it's stuck this long, I have no reason to think I'm gonna wake up in a cold sweat and realize I've been wrong all this time. And that's the breaking point where I had to accept I was Sonic.

Cuz it wasn't simply that I got overwhelmed by the discrepancies, it wasn't the bad fit, it wasn't just the dreams. What really shoved me over the edge was that, as Amy, I'd always be separated from my object of obsession. -_- I needed Sonic. I couldn't go my whole life without him. So...yeah, there had been some very interesting experiences, mental shifts, memories, dreams, all the sort of things I'd like to say brought me around to this realization. But really, it was that if I didn't try to be my own Sonic, I was gonna be stuck in despair.

So like, I'll often phrase it as "I stopped resisting," or "Realized I was Sonic the whole time," and yeah. There was a lot of that that was actually there. I also had to accept I was trans, and what that would mean for me--with my life, with my family, with my body. It was a big hurdle to jump, and I leapt it all at once. And I guess that was how I needed to do it, now that I think of it. I couldn't have jumped it all for anything less than Sonic the Hedgehog.

It just also turned out that he was me.

So...yanno, I was fairly skeptical of myself at first. So I did the thing I'd advise anyone to do when feeling out their identity: Fictionkin, Otherkin, therian, trans, queer, whatever. Just try it out for a bit, and see. See if it sticks, in whole or in part. See what feels right and wrong. It can be just for you, or just for you and a few trusted friends at first. It's okay to be wrong. But the only way to know is to try.

Chaos knows, I believe this as much as I've believed anything. It's stuck for 15 fuckin' years, so I don't think I'm gonna stop anytime soon. Except it did a few times there, where I had other kintypes or past lives come to the fore, and eclipse it for a time. It just also came back.

So yeah. I could talk about phantom shifts, dreams, the way I end up acting like myself when I'm relaxed and confident, and how happy that makes me. I can talk about my weird parallel life stuff, and I absolutely should. But though those things reinforce my belief I'm Sonic the fuckin' Hedgehog, they're not, on their own, why I believe it. Not without the rest of it. Not without acknowledging I needed to try it out, first.

#fictionkin#fictionkind#otherkin#alterhuman#otherkind#therianthrope#therianthropy#therian#theriomythic#sonic otherkin#sonic fictionkin#sonic sez

What do you miss about your world

Thursday, May 16, 2024

whimsical-heart asked:
From the fictionkin asks: What do you miss about your world, and What makes you closer to your source? Thanks, I hope things are well for you !

^_^;; Chaos, sorry it took me so damn long to get to this. Anxiety's a bitch and a half.

It's hard to narrow down what I miss most about Home, it's made of so many things. Dysphoria hella sucks, not having my powers and being able to help people the way I want sucks, being away from my friends and mates sucks. Mobius as I've experienced it is such a cool place, with so much untouched natural beauty, and crazy topology. It's a generous world, rich with food and natural healing in the form of power rings. It has its dangers, like any world, but they feel manageable? At least more navigable, if that makes sense. Or at least, I guess, myself and my friends have more tools to use on those problems. I dunno, it's weird, because I've also got a parallel life thing going on, and there's def things I'm super out of my depth with...but yeah.

As for things that make me feel closer to my source: Hiking, running, art making are all on the list! I love using drawing and writing to connect to home. But yeah, being out in nature moving around usually helps me feel most connected to myself.

*huuugs* I hope things are going well for you, too!

#alterhuman#otherkin#sonic the hedgehog#fictionkin#mobius#hearthome

2024/05/08

11:45a

• What you practice is what you get good at
• What you do is who you are
• I don't care about the purity of your motivations, I care about what you do.
• Growing up in christianity, hearing sermons about not judging what people do because we don't know if the person committing monstrosities is, in their heart of hearts, Actually Good...but no. I don't care that you've been Secretly Good this whole time, I care about the harm you've done. It's so bullshit that this incredibly judgmental

2024/05/07

2:15p

• I'm so damn tired
• First day of Little Wranglers!
• Hell!!! What'm I supposed to do!?
• I'm so pissed about Chaparral. Just in general, and yesterday and tomorrow in specific
• Was thinking I should blog about Chaparral, but I kinda should blog about everything in general, too
• -_- Was a half hour late for working student training with Taylor for Nicole today, feel really shitty about that -- just overslept
• What even is a working student?

2024/05/05

I bring a certain Sonic is a transboy horsegirl vibe to the occasion that has the homies feelin' confused

2024/05/03

Shower: Feels good? Yes do.
Not: Is morally and ethically correct thing for me, as individual living Among Humans to do, and therefore Must Be Done.

Meeting my students and horses needs. Yes, good. Do.
Meeting arbitrary and ever-moving requirements to Make My Bosses Happy and therefore Be A Good Employee. Fuck that. No. Bad.

2024/05/01

The bats stare in disbelief of how fuckin' funny I am.

2024/04/23

1:30p

• Physical body and magical body
• Soul implies subpart of physical body, rather than dual being

2024/04/22

Chaos, this shit is stupid. Yanno what. Instead of trying to get this out post ready in one go, I'll make determinations of what to redact later.

I cover extra jobs for my job A LOT. Oh know, we scheduled camp months ago but we couldn't actually be assed to hire counselors? Okay, I'll be there. Oh no, we scheduled camp but all the employees who work this site are out of town, but we scheduled camp anyway even though the site manager told us they only had college students working there, and that the college students were all going to be out of town this particular week? Apparently, I'm there. They overbook, underhire, and I help bail them out. And the people doing this don't have the fucking decency to have their own damn boots on the ground, working beside you while you dig them out of the shit THEY caused. Because heaven forbid the gods damned company owners actually deigned to leave the office!

Okay, that's not fair. I've seen proof of some of the hard work they sometimes do. But this still doesn't mollify me as I keep bailing them out of emergencies of their own making. And hey, maybe if they actually worked at these sites with us once in awhile, the everyday would be less infuriating and basic changes or maintenance would get done. I'd even settle for not bad-mouthing us who work off the main site as incompetent buffoons as much.

But anyway. Today's stupid. So Thursday, I get this text from one of the company owners:

"Did jen ask you if you could work monday at woodside. We need you"

With this follow-up Friday:

"Hi Skye still checking can you help monday at woodside"

I agree, and for once

New Arts Schedule? New Arts Schedule

Thursday, April 18, 2024 - 7:30 PM

Okay, it's a mistake to try and establish this Right Now, This Week, Today, because my work schedule just changed and I haven't given myself a chance to get my feet under me on the new schedule yet...and just came out of 3 weeks of camp, but whatever. Doing it anyway.

I've really liked the experimenting I've been doing with trying to queue up daily art posts. I think it's gone really well, helped me try and stay loose and not get bound up in Making It Perfect, and I like how well I've been doing at not letting myself spiral when I do have to miss a day (or 4) because it's a goal, not a requirement. I like that I've managed to not let myself block myself off when I "get behind", because I don't have a "behind" to get. If I miss that day, no worries, we'll try for the next one.

You knew the "but" was coming.

I need to make my Big Projects, too! I NEEEEEEED to make It Doesn't Matter! I need to make New Normal! I need to set aside time to paint and stuff!

Cycling through projects week by week worked really well for me when I tried it June to November in 2019, so let's do that again. Right now my days off are roughly Wednesday, and Thursday, so I'll try and use those days for Big Projects, and work days do one off arts to post. This week can be It Doesn't Matter, cuz I already did it, next week New Normal, and week after painting and stuff, then back to It Doesn't Matter!

So, yeah, hopefully that'll go well!

2024/04/16

6:30p

• I want to die
• I don't, but I'm So, So Tired
• And I talked about it when Nicole's lesson asked if I was joining them to ride, and it made me look like a weak loser who can't handle being at the barn from 10:30 in the morning and
• I'm So. Fucking. Tired.
• I want to make IDM. I want to go home. I want to go Home, home. I will never be able to
• I like the life I've carved out here. It's really good. I'm so, so tired, and I'm so tired of still hurting all the damn time
• I should try therapy again.
• I refuse to Try Therapy with a therapist who doesn't admit that Getting to Therapy is a fucking gauntlet

2024/04/15

4:15

• Set days for working on NN and IDM?
• Thus being able to have weekly updates of both
• And Update Days for them
• Rest of days are goof off with pinups or whatever
• So can have something to go live most days
• Painting.
• I forgot about that
• And I'm seemingly about to not have 3 days off a week
• Well, I get stuck in a thing anyway, maybe weekly cycles between the 3? That might work
• Went pretty well in 2019, right? I think. How many months did that last, was it a good representative trial?
• June to November

2024/04/10

10:54p

• I want to get confident
• I want to be confident
• Practice?
• Do more positive self talk?
• Stop undercutting myself somehow
• I don't value modesty
• But I think others require it of me
• Can just feel it. Separate from whatever's going down, it seems

Writing It Doesn't Matter

Thursday, April 4, 2024 - 9:28 PM

Rrrrrffff...

I'm trying to start writing It Doesn't Matter again, finally. I really, really miss feeling connected with my real self, and writing and working on It Doesn't Matter is one of the ways I use to immerse myself in it. Writing and drawing help me, to various extents, put aside my human life and body for awhile and just be myself.

So I read back through the last zone I finished and the current zone I'm working on and started scratching at the current zone. It's hard to not get into my own way.

It Doesn't Matter is a way of telling/chronicling/recording my parallel life. But writing it is walking a razor sometimes. Because some parts are like telling my memories. Some are like summarizing things that happened. Some are things I'm experiencing as I write. And some are just writing.

So it trips me up. I start to ask myself if I'm lying, or being disingenuous with how I'm approaching it. I tell myself, "This is my life," and then feel myself making choices as a writer.

It sucks and it's hard.

The part that I'm at in my writing is one I'm not really sure of how it went. I know or experienced stuff that happens later. But my understanding of this particular part is, "Eggman attack, we won." But even though that's fine for my own personal recollection, it doesn't work for the storytelling I'm doing. When I close my eyes and focus, I just get the impression of heat, and smoke, sweat, stress, and fire. The hard clinch in my guts as I dig in, and push through, and figure out this seemingly impossible situation, and refuse to give up. That's the important part for me to take away.

But I'm writing it into the story, and this is one of the first Eggman attacks with us back in our real forms, and we were learning our powers, and dealing with all this garbage, and it's An Important Part of the Story. -_- But I really have no idea how it happened. So now I gotta make this shit up! Which again, feels so fuckin' weird.

So, spoilers going forward, I guess, for It Doesn't Matter, my big, stupid Sonic animation project and also my telling of my parallel life.

The Eggman attack I'm on is, again, one of his early ones--all of our powers have only recently come back, myself, Tails, and Knuckles have only recently transformed back into our real selves. So it's a very, very low rent version of an Eggman plan. It's literally a scaled up version of the old bratty kid burning ants with a magnifying glass. ^_^;; James Bond Die Another Day did it with Project Icarus. ^_^;; Again, I'm going off vibes here, I don't know if this is literally actually what happened. But it's the aesthetic/how it all feels.

Buckland's Big Blue

Tuesday, February 27, 2024 - 11:32 AM

We just moved to a smaller apartment recently, which means we looked through all our stuff (until we hit our TIME TO MOVE NOW deadline and needed to just start throwing shit in boxes and slinging it to the new place), and I decided to take the Buckland's Big Blue with us. Buckland's is a witchcraft book by Ray Buckland that is, in some circles, considered THE starting point for beginners.

I haven't spent a lot of time with it. What I've looked at in it, I haven't been impressed with. But I'm keeping it anyway. Because I'm reasonably sure this is my second copy, and that SOMETHING would conspire to drop it in my lap AGAIN if I didn't.

Cuz again, I'm PRETTY SURE I bought a copy in high school, hid it from my parents, and got rid of it before or at college, since Secret Book Space was at a premium.

I didn't buy the current copy. I'm not even supposed to still have it.

I DON'T borrow books from people. I'm well aware I'm flaky, and had I Don't Borrow People's Books (libraries are Different) as a standing rule for myself by the time I was in college, when I joined a Pagan group that met weekly at the Interfaith Center. It was good, I made friends, we did some Sabbats, and went to the leader's house a few times, a dude in about his 60s or so. Since only 2 of us group members were still college students, the rest just lived in town or had graduated and stuck around, the whole group had a nice, very laid back, "we don't have any deadlines to worry about in our relationship with each other" vibe.

So of course, the leader guy felt himself to be in a mentorship role of us newbies.

And he Swore By Buckland's Big Blue.

When he learned I didn't have a copy, he Insisted I borrow his.

No, that's fine, I don't borrow books from people.

No, he insisted. Just bring it back.

No, I don't borrow books, I'm too flaky.

No, it's okay, I trust you, just bring it back.

Gods Damn It!

So that's how I got our copy (not actually ours) of Buckland's Big Blue.

I really should mail it to him, or something.

Website Down

Monday, February 26, 2024 - 11:44 AM

Website's still down, but at least I can edit it.

Renewal problems. See, cuz the auto-renewal for the hosting caused my card to get flagged for fraud, and also we moved, so I put in an address change, had to get a new card shipped twice, and it was a whole mess. By the time I had a card I could pay the ALMOST $700 RENEWAL WITH everything had expired. And APPARENTLY, iPage's shitty UI has domain renewals separate from hosting renewals. I didn't realize that, and thought the "Domain and Privacy Security" line item was the domain. -_- Ugh. I'm getting screwed. It LOOKED like iPage was cheaper than Bluehost when I was looking at my options for the new Unicorn Spirit Studios site, and for storage space and bandwidth MAYBE it still is. But all the extras and add-ons in my billing cycle that I don't even know if they're worth it... -_- Well, I'll re-re-revise when it all comes due in ANOTHER 2 years.

I mean, Bluehost bought iPage, maybe it'll be completely subsumed by than.

Monday, February 26, 2024 - 11:38 PM

-_- Nightmares again last night. They were...they were different than normal, not in content but in how much I forgot I was dreaming. I almost always sleep lightly enough to know I'm still just asleep, but this time...I completely lost touch with my waking memories.

Ever since I finally escaped my abusive family (it'll be three years in April!), my nightmares have all, with maybe exactly one exception, been about being stuck back with them. As time has passed, my nightmare narrative has gradually transitioned from never having left but still trying, to having been forced to return due to financial hardship, and for my mates and I working to reunite.

Last night was different.

Something bad had happened, I didn't know what. I was damaged, and trying to recover. And I was living with my parents. But I didn't have the ability to connect to my real memories at all. I didn't have my fire, my passion, the things I protect myself with. I was just the grateful little girl they tried to abuse me into staying. I was cheerful, chirpy, and affectionate--again, not anything I'm actually not...but something I've emphatically not been to my abusers for over a decade. But I was.

Once the dream lightened, I asserted some control over the narrative, remembered my mates, and was able to realize they'd be out there, waiting for me to be able to go to them. And that I was trapped, but that I could fight. That I needed to fight.

Because the scary part was that I'd forgot.

I can know why this nightmare happened. It's been a long, hard week of work where I've covered for people the company is too cheap to hire and taken on more days than I should, been stuck doing only the parts of my job that I don't like. This is after a move two weeks ago we still haven't quite settled in from, and my partners have been out of town the past few days and only return later tonight. I'm tired, I miss them, and I'm lonely. I get that. That unmoored feeling of insecurity is a perfect catalyst for nightmares.

I'm still shook by the experience. I didn't have any separation from the nightmare. I didn't even realize it was bad for a long, long time. That nightmare muffled me, it took my fight away, and made me hug and dote on the people who hurt me, over and over, for my whole life. Once the dream lightened, and I started to remember, I was still in there, and it still felt so real, and I could see how they had been holding themselves, drawing me in, expecting this to be permanent. I finally started to feel my fire again, finally started to be able to get angry, as they tried to stomp that down. The dream and I came to a crest, we were about to go to some meaningless Important Event, and I couldn't hide my feelings, so they pushed and pushed to get that happy chirpiness back, and I burst out with things as I do now. "I understand we can't do this now, this is for later, but why do you do these things?"

I started actually talking about things that were wrong, a thing I'd given up on when I was...chaos, I was gonna say actually 15, but what? 12? I dunno. It had never helped, just got me hurt. So I stopped trying, knew it wasn't safe, and had it burst out from time to time unbidden. Which naturally went poorly. So yeah, I guess not much change. Just how I didn't feel the same weight over it.

Monday, February 26, 2024 - 12:00 PM

SonicSpirit.net is back! YAY! In the time it took me to write and post 2 wingey blog entries! ^_^ They'd said 24 hours. Rad.

2024/02/14

Groceries

• Milk
• Hairbobs for Robin
• Oatly
• Krave
• Fabric
• Blankie fix
• Hoodie patch
• Hankerchiefs
• Hot dogs
• Hot dog buns
• Bread
• Candies
• Flowers
• Cat food

7:45p

• Oh fuck Robin and Vi are fighting
• I can't do this I can't do this
• Robin's right, but Vi shuts down and it doesn't help to actually get to a point where anything helpful can happen
• I hide in kitchen
• Scared I will make it worse, because I know I'm unable to keep from jumping in
• Have been doing triage w/ Vi or bonus groceries since vi got home
• I want to hide
• Hide harder
• If I try to cross to the bedroom I will Interrupt
• The Thoughts of "I should kill myself" resurge...because I am perceive myself as burden
• It has been silent too long
• These are not the sounds of recovery
• I want to throw up
• Lawl, was gonna try and be all bubbly and charming while I doled out treats
• I wanna die
• I don't, actually, and the Badness is better than it's been in a long, long time

2024/02/13

7:30a - Brain Dump

• Cons list - for future reference and current planning
• Leatherwork research
• Yes, you can still play with your Sims/dolls
• Paint?
• Cool Dusk finish
• Paint pet portrait from ref on cardboard
• A couple more times - get through some wiggles
• Push buttons on dishwasher to make it not last 6 hours a cycle
• Okay, fuck budget right now, get on it with Friday payday
• Heeecccc iPage needs paid and has probably lapsed
• Schedule for cleaning car?
• Fuuuuck, bujo things! - set up for moons in advance
• Writing
• Publishing
• Make a art work schedule? Even just setting windows where it's Bizniss Time, and I can do whichever in that space, just to make sure there's space for that, chores, AND leisure
• Also make a game plan for the various avenues I'm pursuing? So at least I have next steps in front of me and ready to go when time comes/inspiration strikes

Art Avenues

Painting

• Pet portraits
• Stall cards
• Collections

Storytelling

• New Normal - write and print
• More stories - be prolific

Leatherwork

• Manacles
• Bracers
• Bags
• Phone cases?

POD

• Stickers
• Shirts
• Totes
• Enamel pins
• Sweatshirts
• Tumblers?
• Prints
• Postcards

Candles

• Low and no-scent (from herbs or nah) beeswax
• Magiced

Furry stuff and wearables

• Ears
• Tails
• Hats
• Hoof and paw gloves

• I'm worried about with my impulsivity, I won't be able to maintain work time and off time the way I'm gonna need to to make this work long term
• I guess that's always gonna be a struggle that needs adjusting, it's Long Term, not just Right Now
• I know how rebellious I get when I feel shoved in a box, tho, even when I'm the one who did it
• Hopefully keeping it open and having it be Work on Any of These instead of carving it into Slices so Everything gets touched all the time helps
• It Doesn't Matter as playtime and warm up

Appointments

• Optometrist
• Dentist

It Doesn't Matter - Zone 1, Sequence 17, Scene 18

Saturday, February 3, 2024 - 8:54 PM

Bum, bum BUUUUUUUUUUUUUMMMMMM!!!

Shit's about to HELLA pop off.

^_^;; I didn't do any It Doesn't Matter scenes in January, which feels really weird. But now that I'm trying to get art business off the ground (again) and we're in the middle of moving here we go...? Okay, sure a lot of it is just that it's a project I use to relieve pressure. But yeah, strange, isn't it?

2024/02/02

11:00a

• Storytelling, painting, and leatherwork

6:30p

• So fuckin anxious all day
• WHY ISN'T THE CHAPARRAL TEXTING STOPPING
• So worried about fucking it up and pissing all these good things away
• Maybe pick the Thing for the day?
• But like, the above is not what it actually is rn
• PoD
• Portraiture
• Wearables
• ...I think part of the perceived choice paralysis from today was partially with the pressure of the move I feel I can't bust out the paints and stuff
• Plus just pressuring myself in general without priority of attack
• Study leather stuff tonight
• Not having the light to do other things has taken some of the pressure off
• Do I rebrand my furry accounts?

11:50p

• Mythical beast stall placards
• Daily blogging

Wednesday, January 24, 2024 - 2:56 PM

URGH. My abusive-ass dad stumbled on my Instagram account last week. It wouldn't have mattered, but I've been working on trying to get art business going again, and I INTEND to go to fairs, events, and other things in addition to fur cons and stuff. So my first instinct is to run off and build a new brand. Which isn't the worst idea. Having a separate business email etc from my personal is a good idea. But I've used SonicSpirit everywhere for more than 10 years! Fuck! It basically means I need to start building myself up again from scratch.

Again. It's not the worst idea. I've attempted to do the same several times, to a certain extent, over the years. Not the exact same way, but I tried to have a "professional" profile beside my regular me junk. This would be different than that, at least. It's still really frustrating.

What I'm thinking right now is that I'll build up Unicorn Spirit Studios as my SFW art profile/imprint/whatever, and Felix Fire Foundry for my NSFW stuff, and then present both works on Sonic Spirit.

But the big concern is I don't want my parents to show up ambushing me at an event. That would be the entire reason to split in the first place. I guess I make my Sonic Spirit accounts private, and only post the wheres and whats to my new accounts? I guess that's a way I can point the people who've been around to those places. IDK, I still need to figure out how to approach the things to make them boomer-proof. -_- It's very tiring.

Friday, January 19, 2024 - 6:25 PM

Man, it's so easy to freeze up. Or maybe, it's so hard to keep from freezing. But fuck. It's hard. I've been doing good about making art the past couple weeks, but I've been hesitant to post it, for some reason? IDK. Part of it is definitely me putting pressure on it again. Like, "If this is what I want to do with myself, I gotta make it work," and all that. Then just...not super loving what I'm making. Which could also just be from pressuring myself, because I could not point to what I'm not liking about the things.

I finally started painting again, for the first time since college, and for the first time for myself since probably middle school. It's nice. It's weird, familiar and really strange at once, nerve wracking and relaxing, giving me a really cool experience and feeling like I'm still falling short, but it's good. One of the things I really like about physical media is that it helps push me towards keeping moving...at least as long as I can get through my initial block of anxiety and start. And I've been good about not letting it get in my way, not letting myself tense up over "ruining" my supplies. The fact that I'm making sure to not spend a lot at a time, and that I'm also making sure to only get supplies I want to use is definitely helping. Springing for a small range of a higher reputation set of acrylic paints, instead of the Liquitex Basics I had the last couple times (and HATED) is def paying off. The fact that the set was both a more expansive palette than I wanted, and is missing some colors I consider essential (like a nice, dark purple. You gave me 3 dark blues, two of which that are nearly identical, and no dark purple...though I am getting WAAAY too much use out of that light violet!), is also nice for encouraging me to pick and choose what I replace and what I expand to and don't (ultramarine, my love, you are already nearly gone...!)

And then, like. I want to do events. I know I want to do events. Which events? Obviously furcons. And then I really like the picture in my head of vending at Ren Faires, and the like. And I really want to do the regular, local shows, especially as I get my legs under me for booth setup. All of those seem to have fairly broadly different, if intersecting enough, niches.

My current plan is to expand my Printify and Etsy, utilizing Printify's print on demand services for stickers, wearables, and any other kinds of merch that seems cool (I've been needing a new full zip sweatshirt, why not make a cool design for it myself?). I intend to continue making my Astral Deer series of paintings to keep working with the medium and getting myself comfortable, and to have a good place to experiment, and also branch into pet portraits and the like. I also want to make stall plaques for horses--their names and portraits painted on them, and also a slot to slide in a 3x5 index card for feeding instructions and such. And if that weren't enough I also want to start getting into leatherwork, making some kink items, like wrist and ankle cuffs, ponyplay things like bridles and halters, even harnesses and stuff, as I grow in skill and confidence. I want to make things.

I also still really love my job as horseback riding instructor, and I think my current mad plots synergize really well...well. Except for one thing: I'm down to working only weekends and Mondays...the same days of any events I'd want to plan to play in. So that sucks.

I'm pretty sure things will change with my schedule again soon enough. But also, it doesn't feel like something I have as much control over. It's frustrating.

Anyway. Current stage is to utilize the 4 days a week I'm not going out and busting my ass working with the horses and kids to make arts.

Tuesday, January 9, 2024

Hah, okay, I decided to start trying to do "week in retrospect" blogs without realizing it was still the first week of 2024. It has been a VERY rough holiday season. So yeah, I don't usually vibe with New Years Resolutions, but a fresh start is usually pretty welcome, especially when I have things I've been wanting to do, like writing, blogging, and doing various arts.

But chaos. this week as the start of the year? Yikes.

It wasn't all bad, of course. Nothing ever really is. New Year's day with my mates was lovely, I got paid Friday, Saturday was my first day at a new job that I'm getting pretty optimistic about (sadly only one day a week with that job right now, but again, I'm optimistic), and I kinda ended up having a philosophical breakthrough that seems to be really helpful for my mental health. But.

Chaos. It got super rough fast. First up, it was the second week of camp at my job. Camp days are HARD. Especially when we're perpetually short staffed. Two counselors trying to wrangle 30-odd kids and 10 horses? Well, at least the horses are mostly trying not to be little gremlins. Aaand we end up with one counselor teaching a riding lesson with 10 of the kids while the other tries to keep the rest entertained. And not stepped on. IT'S PRETTY ROUGH. Ah, the childcare professions. You will be fucked.

So that was rough. Working at the location that gives me an hour commute to do it is also rough. Not being able to afford gas and eking along in $10 increments on tip money is...worse. It's worse. Having my Venmo locked down because a transaction didn't process until after I was already overdrawn threw another wrench in the works. My mate was generous enough to switch cars with me and put up with my very, very smelly car for the day.

And then...rent. We were about $1,200 short. Yeaaaaaahhh...it was...not good. We eventually managed to scrape what we needed together, but it was rough, and...it's been building for awhile. We're gonna end up moving from a 2-bedroom apartment back down to a 1-bedroom. It's tight for 3 people and 2 cats, but we can make it work. But now we need to pack up all our stuff and pare down to fit in the smaller apartment within the month. Yikes. We'll get it done, Robin and I have played this game before, and Vi knows what vi's doing too. It's just, yanno. A Lot.

Sooo, crazy work days, severe money issues I went into already overdrawn, and the looming First Day at a New Job.