Yes, I am alive.

I am a writer - I know it, and people have told me - and of course I know the most important rule of being a writer: a writer must write.

But then of course that silly little thing called life gets in the way.
My final year of undergraduate is set to wrap up in just over a semester, and my applications for graduate school are in the works. I have spent the past semester learning things I never even thought to ask about, and discovering that I actually am quite capable of handling myself in the academic world.

I also have just about hit five months with my boyfriend, who has been one of my best friends for four years.
I'm not sure how to organize my thoughts on this. I'm tired, sick, and full of stress, but the strange thing is that even though life keeps bearing down on me, I am happy.

I don't know how it happened, but I grew up to be quite the romantic - odd, considering how I was when I was a little girl. And of course with romance comes the jarring ride up and down and back and forth through this turn or that drop.

Over the past few years I've been through more relationships than I likely should have.
I spent a huge portion of the time being "the other woman" in one relationship - which honestly and admittedly was the only one I really felt attached to. I had the displeasure of being with a boy who was unfortunately highly emotionally abusive. I've had some relationships that were good, but not quite romantic enough. At least I made wonderful friends out of those.

It is not to say that we are defined completely by a relationship. I don't need any man or woman or otherwise to tell me who or what I am - something that indeed has caused my self-esteem to wither in the past, with someone who thought he had the authority to decide my personality for me, even though he was constantly wrong.
However, we are a reflection of the people we love, and in turn we learn things about ourselves.

Since Sean, I've been mellowing out somewhat. Granted, I still am a bit volatile and likely a bit selfish, but I don't think I've ever been with someone before who would rather keep me happy than be right, or drop everything when I need him.
I feel loved, and cared for.
I feel like I'm growing, and I think I like what I'm growing into.

All my life I've been the bud of an artist and thinker. I've had the passion and the interest, but never the means. It takes more than passion, just as it takes more than knowledge. You can know every word in the dictionary and be able to command English, but it doesn't necessarily make you a writer.
I can discuss protofeminism in eighteenth century literature, or read through middle English. I can write a story or a poem, and draw new characters. But that basic ability does not necessarily denote an emotional maturity, an empathetic ability that takes a thought, feeling, emotion, and makes it something almost tangible.
I think I've searched for that most of my life, and maybe I'm coming close.

Despite the fact that this ma not be so coherent, and perhaps I should stop writing at 1AM while barely awake, I think I feel content.
Sometimes you just need to share something, in whatever way you can. It doesn't always mean that it can be written.
It may not always be able to be explained.
But sometimes there are those things you just need to say, regardless of how well it's done.

Dear You

What are you doing now, at what place?
Are you at a place where this sky continues into?

I lost that which has buried my heart until now
And noticed it for the first time
The fact that you had been supporting me this much
The fact that you had been giving me smiles this much

The price of having lost it is way too preposterously great
And I desperately reach out my hands and struggle to recover it, but-
It slips by just like the wind; it looks like I'll reach it but I don't

My chest is tightened by loneliness and despair
And my heart seems to break
But your smile that remains in my memories
Always encourages me

Let's return to that time again
I'm sure that we'll be all right this time
I'll always laugh by your side

What are you doing now, at what place?
Are you at a place where this sky continues into?
Will you be there with a smile like always?
Now I simply keep wishing for that...
- "Dear You - Vocal -"; Higurashi no Naku Koro ni

I loved you.
For three years.
Unquestioningly. When you were gone I missed you, and times like the disastrous relationship with Mark, you were the one I wanted back all along.

When you came back, I was here. This time though... I don't think I can do it. Hopefully you won't come back at all, but... if you do? It's just too late. I'm too good to be the consolation prize after all of this. After the day I've had, trying to fix all the damage she has done, without your interference.
I'll miss you. I'll miss your smile and the way you laughed.
I'll miss your drawings and the beautiful messages you wrote me.

The days without you stretched on as if they would never end, and the nights with you were amazing.
Let her go away, and leave the memory untarnished.

She can try to ruin it all. She can try to say all of these things, and post my photos online. She can change your online accounts to call me names.
But she can never touch what we had, whether it was sincere or not.
It felt sincere, and that's what matters.

Somewhere, someday... I hope we're reborn again, and can be friends without the complications.
Some day, in another life, I want to meet you.
You always said "If only I'd met you first."

I'll be in the video store, looking for J-horror movies, and run into the cute Filipino boy who seems to know everything.
I'll laugh as he points out something horrifyingly graphic and details the "best" scenes, and we'll decide to get coffee because we like the same games and shows. It will be that instant connection all over again.

I've come this far and worked this hard.
I'd like to believe it will mean something someday.

But for now, dear you, it's time to say goodbye again.
See you, Space Cowboy?

Forever and Always

”If you're looking for love in a looking glass world,
it's pretty hard to find"
- "Mother of Pearl," Roxy Music

“You should run away and just come here. Be with me.” The words were standard fare for her and, really, she did know logically that she was kidding around. Still, the more she said it, the more she actually pictured it.

“I wish,” he said – the softness in his voice seemed so against his character. She loved him that way.

Love is a tricky thing, you see.

Everyone talks about that ideal love.
The love where you only want their happiness. And that happiness makes you happy.
That kind of selfless love that everyone seems to think is supposed to be default. Everyone begins with “if you really loved him...” when complications happen, or when love strikes unrequited, tearing out a piece of our hearts. Everyone expects that the high road is really on level ground with all other options, and that it only takes one small extra step.

Ideal never quite equals real, however.
Everyone wants the one they love to be happy, but they want to be the source of that happiness. It is the selfish way of being selfless, and the desire to provide true meaning and love to another.
It is also what most people find themselves trapped with.

Sometimes she found herself trying to blur the lines between the two. Justifying why it could work both ways. She was looking for her happy ending and – though sometimes it seemed more a pleasant daydream than any sort of plausible reality – she felt she was getting closer and closer to it every day. She had grown older, and matured. So much about her had changed. But nothing about her feelings for him had.
There was meaning in that, and she wanted to make sure that meaning wouldn’t go to waste.
Some how. Somehow she would find a way.


She wondered what it would be like. She wondered how it would feel to step on to the train, meeting him downtown. They would walk along Granville, with uncharacteristic sunshine lighting the sidewalk, holding hands like they had wanted to do for years.
Breakfast at a French café and a detailed search through any comic book shops they came across. With their luck, rain would break out after they left, but she would have her girlish polka-dotted umbrella, and they could make it work between the two of them.
She wondered how it would feel to love him there. Next to her. Within reach.
She wondered how it would feel for them to be normal.

Instead, there she was, rolling over on her bed, facing the computer screen. He was quiet on the other end, but it was okay. There were times when just having him there – or “there,” really – meant just as much as having a conversation. It was the feeling of his presence and the awareness of his existence in the same space as hers that filled her heart and made her believe that it could really be okay in the end. She heard him typing, being, existing, and she smiled tiredly.

“I love you.”

(I really do)

Resident Evil 4... and counting?

(Insert obligatory spoiler warning here)
I keep this blog for fiction purposes, but everyone else is complaining about Resident Evil: Afterlife. I may as well get in on it.

So, most people who know me know that I’m in to the traditional geek ware: comic books, video games, cartoons, etc. I have a fair number of fandoms that I’m pretty into. Among these is Resident Evil, which I used to sneak into the back room to watch my cousin play when I was seven and such things were forbidden (“But mom! They’re not killing people! They’re killing zombies!”). I still remember boys in 9th grade being surprised when I brought in a Resident Evil novel for a free-reading period. I think it was City of the Dead (and actually, since we're talking about Resident Evil adaptations, I have to say I think the books are good. They make enough changes to be interesting, but don't mess up the series)

I’ve never been outright against the movies. I mean, they’re just movies. I have always had minor issues with them, however. With the release of a shiny-new article from IGN, I really feel like it would make me feel better to join in the fandom’s bitching.

The article in question can be found here: http://movies.ign.com/articles/108/1082207p1.html

Let’s do this point by point.

1. There is a line between fanfiction and adaptation.
Essentially when you create a movie of something, there are three main methods: direct adaptation, adaptation with some new twist or interpretation, or something based on and inspired by the original, but that is essentially new. As far as I’m concerned, the first mistake with the movies was making them take so much directly from the games, only with the nice, new insertion of the writer’s wife as the be-all, do-all character.

Suddenly the bosses that we spent hours trying to destroy (Nemesis, anyone?) are easy targets for the almighty Alice, who clearly is unbeatable (and when she has any real trouble, another Alice shows up to save her because of course only Alice is worthy of saving Alice), and our favorite characters are pretty much extras. Jill has had the most attention so far, and I do have to give props to Sienna Guillory for apparently really getting into the research of the roll. Jill wasn’t perfect obviously, but it was a fantastic attempt and hard not to like her. Anyway, essentially what the movies are saying is “Yes, we see your characters and franchise that you love, but clearly they aren’t good enough. We’re going to give you something better.”

This forces us to take the movies in the context of the games while alienating the fanbase.

2. You’re just doing what the games have done.
And really, there’s not much wrong with this. It’s even the way I’d prefer to see it happen. But the emphasis on “We’re being different! Oh yeah... the games did it too...” is beginning to sound sugar-coated to make it seem like this is some completely original idea.

"The dogs, their mouths open up like a flower, and these huge jaws and teeth come through. So we're keeping within the realm of undead, but we're just doing an interesting twist on the creatures. Like the games have done."

Well yes. Been there, done that. Maybe I just read these statements wrong, but it really does constantly sound as if someone is trying to say all of it is so shiny-new.

3. You did not inspire the setting of RE5
"I know for a fact that the last game, which is set in Africa and a warmer climate -- we influenced that with our last movie," he says. "So there is a kind of respectful collaboration going on”
Yeah.... no. I’ll believe it when there’s an official statement saying “Oh yeah guys! See, the movie being set in the deserts of the Southwest United States really made us what to put the fifth game in Africa. Using a warm climate is so new and fresh!”

As someone who apparently was very into the games, Anderson should know that the T-Virus was predated by the Progenitor virus. Any guesses on where that one originated from? West Africa. This was long before the movies, and bringing Resident Evil 5 to West Africa is a way of bringing everything around full-circle. Well, that and Wesker is a jerk who likes to try to pick on out of the way places.

4. Keep your God Sue Alice out of my video games
A good bit of the fandom seems quite vocal about this, and I agree. Having Alice in a game? Why?

Essentially Alice invalidates everything that’s happened in the games. Jill and Claire are essentially ineffective. Actually. Everyone except Alice is ineffective. This is troublesome. If Alice is brought into an official game, it is saying that “Well, everything else doesn’t matter. Alice is here.” Not to mention, I really am assuming it wouldn’t do very well. This is an uneducated assumption, but I’ve heard enough long-time fans say that they would not buy a new Resident Evil game starring Alice. And of course – Resident Evil has been pretty good with its characters. They are strong, smart, fun to play... and they have been important throughout the entire franchise, with the exception games such as Outbreak, and other non-main series installments.

“"We have Alice flying a plane in this one”
“And so he wrote this really great scene during the clone sequence, where my clones crash through this plate-glass window and then get into this needle dive going down like 50 stories of the Umbrella headquarters."
I hope she can bake cookies too.

5. Again, demoted to extra
“But what about a return for Jill Valentine, who was last seen in the second film? "There might be," is all Bolt will say when asked. Oded Fehr's Carlos Olivera is definitely not back -- no surprise there, judging by the events of the last movie”
I can deal without Carlos. He was important, like, once. If I wanted a minor character back, I’d like to see Billy, personally. But I don’t understand the treatment of Jill as if she’s a minor character. Jill is highly important to the series. She was one of the first two playable characters, and the heroine of Resident Evil 3 entirely. Her part is Resident Evil 5 was more behind-the-scenes, but the addition of Lost in Nightmares and Desperate Escape gave her more play. Now suddenly... she’s shown up in one movie, been outshined by Alice, and no longer really matters.

6. Chris Redfield is not a grab-bag of personalities
“Miller did some research and found that there are several different interpretations of the character, including Anderson's take on Chris in the script for the film.”

As my best friend Danielle said, “different interpretations of Chris ROFL. I'm convinced they read a lot of OOC fanfics on ff.net.”

Chris hasn’t really changed much in personality over the years. He is a loving brother, a can-be-funny-during-serious-business kind of guy, and quite determined. Kind of like a teddy bear. Or, in Resident Evil 5, a teddy bear on steroids, but a teddy bear nonetheless. I’m not sure what kind of “different interpretation” of Chris they’re talking about here, but that could be a very, very bad thing.

7. Clothes do not equal the character
“And yet, it's also the fans' Chris Redfield, says Miller. When it came time to put together the character's wardrobe, Miller and the filmmakers harvested what was already out there for Chris.”

I think it’s safe to say I’m speaking for a majority of the fandom when I say that what we are most interested in when it comes to Chris is not what he’s wearing. Also.... sword? Chris.... does not use swords. But maybe that’s too nitpicky.

8. Oh Claire Redfield, how the mighty have fallen
“"I have a very exciting sequence with the Axe Man, which is so cool," says Ali Larter, who's just as hot in person as you'd expect her to be.”

Well I’m not sure why suddenly it’s the “axe man” instead of the executioner. I guess we’re just not so great with big words? But regardless...

Now Claire, you have done some kickass things in the past.
At the age of 19 with minimal self-defense training you rode into the Raccoon City incident in your bike-shorts, kicked some ass, saved a little girl, and made it out in one piece, still full of determination to find your brother. At the age of 8, you were my hero. You are the only recurring main character who came without serious training. You’re also among the youngest. I still want to be you.

You then booked it to Europe, infiltrated an Umbrella facility alone, which takes guts even if you did end up getting caught (I will say though that I do judge you a bit for the people who died there, but that’s another story). When things went to hell in Code Veronica where you were locked up for being so kickass, you handled it like a pro. Seriously. Alexia Ashford was about as insane as they get. Hell, you even got beaten up by Wesker and still kept on being good, old, awesome Claire. Hence why, in Degeneration, we see the “... and later...” Claire who is active in trying to change the world and still remains to be insanely kickass.

So... I guess I’m not really impressed that in the movies you’ve basically led a resistance group, and get to fight with an enemy that really only makes me want to cry when I’ve got three handgun bullets left and there’s not an incendiary grenade to be found.
Also, I’d prefer you’re Claire-like, regardless of whether or not the outfit is the same as in the games. See point 7.

9. Some of us have ovaries
"I think a lot of the fanboys are going to be thrilled because it is beat-by-beat from the videogame,"

Um, excuse me, what? I don’t know demographics. I’m actually a firm believer that demographics are rather more pointless than people would like them to be. So I don’t know how many girls play RE, but I know there are several of us. Most of the friends I discuss these games with are female.
I go over to my best girlfriend’s house occasionally to blow the heads off some zombies. And really? We have a bit of work to do, but we’re not too shabby.

My issue is that people tend to say "fanboys" when the underlying assumption is that it's a boy interest. My boyfriend tries to insist "fanboys" can include girls, but if it did, it would not be "boys." The noun there says a lot, because it is a rather descriptive one. Political correctness is overrated, but dammit, it’s one less syllable to just say “fans,” and it makes me hate you a lot less.

10. If it were for the fans, it would be different
This is fanfiction. That’s all the script ever was. It was fanfiction retelling the games with the addition of a character based off someone close to the writer. There are even a few times where the name “Milla” is used when referring to Alice the character.

If you want to give us something new, okay. But don’t give us what we already loved, with our characters ruined and a character that makes all of the work we’ve done in every installment seem like child’s play.

I’m tired of hearing “It’s for the fans” and then seeing the feedback from the fans.

I suppose that I’m taking a movie too seriously. They’ll do what they want, and people who enjoy it will go see it. But clearly I’m not the only long-time fan who is bothered by what’s been portrayed, and for how long. If it ever invades the video game franchise, I’m out.

We interrupt your daily broadcast for...

My ex-boyfriend is a raging idiot of epic proportions.
At least he only comes armed with a dictionary and delusions.

That is all.

Damn right, here it comes.

They were an odd partnership.

Neither knew where they were headed or quite what they wanted to do there, so they just wandered. A couple days in one town, helping local farmers, the next few in the big city, living off of their temporary income, and then the next week on the road.

In some ways, they knew everything about each other, and in others they knew nothing. He knew the ghosts haunting her past and she knew the skeletons littering his, but each knew the other had secrets.

On occasion he would find her off-guard, locks of hair softly hiding any of her facial features, excepting a pair of full, pink lips parted in lost thought.
Sometimes she would catch him in the same state of vulnerability- staring at the sky with unmatched concentration, questions dancing in his eyes.
At least they had something in common.
They wanted to know the answers.

And in their search, they would find heroism, adventure, romance, and ultimately.... destiny.

Little Red (super-rough planning draft)

Tap-tap-tap
The footsteps of Little Red were light, despite her frantic running - she was soft, light. Blood had been running down the inside of her thighs. It was drying now.

Thorns bit into her feet - the black mary-janes had come off somewhere. She was holding red-stained glass in her right hand.
She needed to make sure nothing could get inside her again.

"Red! Red, please stop!" The wind howled through the trees. It was so frightening - why wouldn't he go away? She had left her breadbasket behind for him. Couldn't he eat that?

"Grandmother, grandmother," she chanted desperately, and the small, rotting cottage came into view. "Grandmother!" she cried, throwing open the door. She felt relief at the sight of her grandmother, sitting still in her rocking chair, staring blankly ahead. "Grandmother, the big bad wolf is after me! Would you let me use grandfather's axe?"

Silence followed, and Little Red clapped, picking up the heavy weapon from right where she'd left it, safe with her first husband, John. He was a woodcutter.

The strain of lifting the heavy weapon re-opened her wounds, but she felt safer now.
She needed to kill him, and then she needed to fix herself.

Little Red had given birth to the Big Bad Wolf's child.
Little Red had given birth to a monster.

The door creaked open, and he stepped in softly, gingerly. He wanted to trick her into thinking he was safe, didn't he?

"Please, just take the bread, take the bread!" she cried, stepping back in fright. He looked confused for a moment, and then upset.

"Red! It's your daughter in here! What the hell is wrong with you?!" He held forward the basket, revealing a small baby in ragged blankets. As soon as its eyes settled on her, she began screaming.

Thuk
The axe went into his side.
And then his head.
Arm.
Stomach.
Face.
Heart.

Little Red ached.
She was bleeding again, and her body was sore.

She left the monsters behind her, stumbling through the forest until she came across a young man.

"Miss, are you alright? I heard screaming." She looked up at him with blue eyes full of tears.

"Mr. Woodcutter, I was just attacked by wolves. Please take me home..."

But they say that hindsight is 20/20

Whenever I wonder "how could I be with him" about Ben, it's in a completely different way than I wondered about Dahlia (though, admittedly, I thought many times that Dahlia might be wondering the same thing about me that I wondered about Ben - assuming any of it was ever real).

Dahlia turned out to be something frightening, sure, but from the outside she was perfect. Not just physically, even if it's true that she was flawless, but she came off as brilliantly sincere.

Ben never appeared to be perfect to me.
He was twenty-five when I met him. Tall, with a slightly hunched back and no definition. If I remember right, he'd already started balding by then, but often concealed it with combovers and hats. He wasn't ugly by any means - the sharp nose and deep brown eyes suited his features well - but he wasn't the type that you looked at and just fell for.

The moment I confessed to Kat that he had come on to me, she crinkled her nose.

"Don't tell me you went for it."

She had never approved of Ben. She disliked his attitude - a pseudo-intellectualism that he pushed across by being wordy and asserting his authority. She had commented more than once that he was an expert in nothing but entertainment, and that he didn't even understand most of that. I don't think I really noticed at first, even though I eventually realized she was right - Ben knew very little, but always offered up a lot.

I never saw him much during the day. Like a lot of highschool graduates in the area, he had settled into a retail job and didn't bother with any more education. It gave Kat time to talk about him.

I really wish I had spent more time listening, especially because of that night.

Because when he asked, "Are you in the game?" I would have just said no.

Hello, 2010

The new year is here, and with it came... commissions.
Time to get to writing a couple requests.

God it's weird to have "fans" of my writing.

Mostly I would like to say that sometimes the sentence "Well at least she has tits" is very, very true in the saddest way possible.
Oh yeah, and that people still need to learn what feminism is.

Year-long Fandom "To Do" List (as of yet)
- Cosplay Claire Redfield at Fanime; possibly bunny Haruhi Suzumiya as well
- Resident Evil fanfic for Rosa
- Finish Harmony
- Proofread and edit novel
- At least four new chapters of Like Nicotine
tbc