Holy frackin' July!
19 July 2020 10:12![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
nym_wibbly
And then you blink and it's been over six months since you blogged. Blimey!
I've been rediscovering what it's like to have a Real Life, without the welfare state breathing down my neck and setting artificial ticky-box goals for me. I'm just now getting to the stage where doing things at my own pace is no longer a novelty, and where I'm not looking nervously over my shoulder and waiting for the next crushing shoe to drop.
The mastectomy has all healed up beautifully. I haven't looked back, and I've only donned a pair of falsies once, to wear formal dress to a neighbour's funeral. I'm so comfy without boobs that I don't even think about it until someone else notices I don't have any! My decision to grow out my previously short and spiky hair may not be unrelated. I felt kinda genderless with the flat chest and the pixie cut, plus, with one major discomfort gone, I have the mental breathing space to try out another. In the past, long hair gave me migraines. Since then, I've been properly medicated, and a genius has invented the Invisibobble. I'm at the haystack stage, but my decision paid off during Lockdown 2020 when nobody could get their hair cut.
There was no catastrophic Covid outbreak in my little area of England. More cases than should've been allowed to happen, but we never reached the overflowing hospital and backlogged crematorium stage of the disaster. Lockdown makes surprisingly little difference to my lifestyle, but it did affect my diet - with restricted shopping options, I made bad, bad food choices. For three months. A moment on the lips, a lifetime on the arse, right? I can hardly fit in the armchair.
Fandom-wise, I'm still Once Upon a Time and Doctor Who. The most recent couple of seasons of each are just about finished percolating into my fanfic-brain. The rewrite of A Bed of Thorns has been rewritten half to death as I fix the bits that bother me, while drawing on the canon that came along after I wrote the first version. Belle made a lot more sense to me by the end of season 6 than she did at the end of season 1 when much of the story was written. I filled in a lot of blanks with her and was a bit 'meh' about some of my innovations. I 'get' characters like Rumple - tormented with largely self-inflicted pain, trapped in their own web of fail. I can reach deep and find plenty of fail of my own to draw on when fleshing them out and filling in any gaps that a TV show leaves. Perky hero-types like Skin-Deep Belle, on the other hand, are a fascinating but total mystery to me when it comes to their motivation and decision-making. I'm a lot more comfortable with the idea that she's a reckless, well-intentioned-but dangerous hero-wannabe who holds herself and others to an impossible standard because of how she interprets her mother's death. And because of a book that frames her whole way of seeing the world. She always tries her best, and goes on doing it even after a massive fail. That I get.
I hope everyone's kept safe from the virus and has someone to look out for them. Take care out there.
I've been rediscovering what it's like to have a Real Life, without the welfare state breathing down my neck and setting artificial ticky-box goals for me. I'm just now getting to the stage where doing things at my own pace is no longer a novelty, and where I'm not looking nervously over my shoulder and waiting for the next crushing shoe to drop.
The mastectomy has all healed up beautifully. I haven't looked back, and I've only donned a pair of falsies once, to wear formal dress to a neighbour's funeral. I'm so comfy without boobs that I don't even think about it until someone else notices I don't have any! My decision to grow out my previously short and spiky hair may not be unrelated. I felt kinda genderless with the flat chest and the pixie cut, plus, with one major discomfort gone, I have the mental breathing space to try out another. In the past, long hair gave me migraines. Since then, I've been properly medicated, and a genius has invented the Invisibobble. I'm at the haystack stage, but my decision paid off during Lockdown 2020 when nobody could get their hair cut.
There was no catastrophic Covid outbreak in my little area of England. More cases than should've been allowed to happen, but we never reached the overflowing hospital and backlogged crematorium stage of the disaster. Lockdown makes surprisingly little difference to my lifestyle, but it did affect my diet - with restricted shopping options, I made bad, bad food choices. For three months. A moment on the lips, a lifetime on the arse, right? I can hardly fit in the armchair.
Fandom-wise, I'm still Once Upon a Time and Doctor Who. The most recent couple of seasons of each are just about finished percolating into my fanfic-brain. The rewrite of A Bed of Thorns has been rewritten half to death as I fix the bits that bother me, while drawing on the canon that came along after I wrote the first version. Belle made a lot more sense to me by the end of season 6 than she did at the end of season 1 when much of the story was written. I filled in a lot of blanks with her and was a bit 'meh' about some of my innovations. I 'get' characters like Rumple - tormented with largely self-inflicted pain, trapped in their own web of fail. I can reach deep and find plenty of fail of my own to draw on when fleshing them out and filling in any gaps that a TV show leaves. Perky hero-types like Skin-Deep Belle, on the other hand, are a fascinating but total mystery to me when it comes to their motivation and decision-making. I'm a lot more comfortable with the idea that she's a reckless, well-intentioned-but dangerous hero-wannabe who holds herself and others to an impossible standard because of how she interprets her mother's death. And because of a book that frames her whole way of seeing the world. She always tries her best, and goes on doing it even after a massive fail. That I get.
I hope everyone's kept safe from the virus and has someone to look out for them. Take care out there.
no subject
Date: 22 Jul 2020 09:28 (UTC)Happy you're rediscovering Real Life. Our government temporarily doubled the unemployment welfare, and I got plumbing/garden work (roots and grass in the pipes and pits) I've been saving up for years to get done already paid for! And even doubled it's still below the poverty line/minimum wage but I have so much money I have *savings* like....this is how the normal, non-disabled and able to work live? Even if they're underpaid?
Real Life has got it *made*
Hoping for the best for you and yours!
no subject
Date: 22 Nov 2020 08:00 (UTC)no subject
Date: 25 Jul 2020 06:17 (UTC)Sometimes I popped here to check on updates and, not having found any for months, I was quite worried. Above all considering the virus spreading in UK and what you have passed through recently.
I made an account only to reply to your post because I also wanted to express my enthusiasm for your work, A Bed of Thorns, which has made many of my days better than most of the book I have read: I am so enthralled to see how it’ll be after the revision!
Take care and stay safe!
no subject
Date: 22 Nov 2020 07:59 (UTC)no subject
Date: 27 Aug 2020 03:15 (UTC)