February 7, 2012

I'm working on a long short story now (so let's just call it a "story") but at the rate I write, it will probably take me two months or so to finish. In the meantime, I thought I'd post a little part of it. I really ought to change my tone after this one... if I keep going like this, I'm going to turn into Mr. Brightside.

****************************************

we face each other over the chessboard
she's not very good
not on this board
plus, we are in the dimly lit basement,
where I can barely see her
this works in my favor

I hate these guys, she says
there are eight of them but they are so weak

and the pointy things can never attack where I want
and I can never see where the horses are gonna go

the king is useless
but the queen can do anything, that's what I like

you forgot the rooks, I say
do you like the rooks?

oh, she says, I hate the rooks most of all
they just sit there

****************************************

if you don't like these other pieces,
we can take them off

so off go the pawns and the knights
and the bishops and the kings

the rooks are flicked violently away
only the queens are left
on their original squares

hers takes mine, the game is over
(I guess)
now what do we do? she asks
in the dimly lit basement

My trigger warning project generated a lot of controversy today. I was sad to see that an ultimatum from a user I deeply respect was the catalyst for much of it. I don't want to create conflict and alienating users is the exact opposite of what I was trying to do with this.

I'm also not an authoritarian and I meant it when I said nothing was set in stone. I've listened carefully to all of your responses to my Editor Log and I've made some changes that I hope will alleviate some of the concerns that were raised.

• Guest User may no longer add writeups to the trigger warning categories, to protect them from being misused. Right now I am the listed owner, but I feel like that isn't entirely optimal either. I'm thinking maybe e2docs? Anyone got a better idea?

• As is only civil, noders will be notified by /msg if their work is added to one of the trigger warning categories. This was something that couldn't be enforced before when anyone could edit them.

• If a user strongly objects to their work appearing in a trigger warning category, their writeup will be removed from that category. This was a big compromise for me, since it sacrifices some of the project's already limited functionality, but it's coming across loud and clear that this is how it has to be. To throw some perspective on it, these categories are small by nature, each containing about twenty nodes whose themes of sexual abuse aren't unambiguously indicated by their titles. I do not think it likely that there will be significant overlap between the set of people with writeups in these categories and the set of people people who'd like to opt out of them, but we will have to see.

That's where we're at right now. If you like to read about what these categories are, hit up Editor Log: February 2012 or Trigger Warnings on Everything2, nodes whose content that is more or less identical. This decision making process is ongoing and everything is still being worked out. What do you think of the changes? Better? Worse?

So I’m taking a psych class with an obviously misplaced kindergarten teacher. She talks to us in a really condescending way. Like the way someone who doesn't like kids talks to a small child when they ask a question: they answer the question, but they do it in that fake-happy voice they think is the way they're supposed to talk to kids.

I’m in fucking college, and our first assignment is to make a poster about our families. Like, a poster board poster, with, and I quote, “Crayons, paints, magazine cut outs, photos- anything you want”.

I. . . .what?

I’m paying to make fucking grade school poster board projects? Really?

The class is about family and marriage- weird one for me to pick, but I was hoping to learn about family dynamics and how to better manipulate my- I MEAN care for my family. But then she went and ruined it by focusing only on marriages and couples. I guess that can be useful too, maybe, but I’m sort of out of my depth on that one.

Today she had us talk about our definitions of intimacy, and what we learned about it from our parents’ marriages. Like how our parents acted towards each other shaped out opinions on it as stuff. So we had a few people talk about how their parents are super loving and annoying with one another (this got all the girls in the class going, ‘awww’, even though the girl whose parents they were was kinda grossed out because- eww! My parents kiss in front of us!), and some how their parents were stone cold towards one another. Mostly, we got people raising their hands whose parents were loving, but had their bumps and troubles, but usually managed to work through them.

All of them were still married.

And while I appreciated the stories they told (which were genuinely entertaining, and sometimes a real nice peek into more normal families), I couldn’t help thinking,

“Doesn't anyone in here have divorced parents? Or am I the only one?”

The teacher had us all write up a little paper discussing the relationships of either our parents or out own or of someone we knew closely. Just a little in class thing she could use to take role.

My mom and dad got divorced when I was twelve and mom’s got a no contact order built right into the divorce papers, but lately they’ve been getting along and she hasn’t tried calling the cops on him for anything-

Scrapped that and wrote about my unofficial surrogate aunty/uncle/grandma/grandpa/godparents/favorite old people in the world Pastor Karl and Torri instead. Been married for over forty years and are still the most loving couple I’ve ever seen. Like, ever.

I’m actually at their house right now, watching Tom while they’re out. He had a little trouble earlier when Pizza hut didn’t give him marinara sauce for the breadsticks, but has calmed down since. (He actually managed to grab a bread stick and push it to the floor. This is more impressive than it sounds.)

Megan came over all last week, down from that foreign land of Nevadia. It was fun: we watched Slenderman vids and then the mock Slenderman vids to calm our nerves. Then went and saw The Woman in Black with the best audience ever. They screamed at ALL the jump scares- even the parts where there was no jump scare, only the anticipation of a jump scare. It was communal fear glory. She just left today and now I'm both happy to have some time to myself, but also sad 'Cause I know it won't be until the very end of the month before she comes back. We still text eachother near constantly (I'm actually texting her between typing this), but it's not the same, you know?

No real ending segue here, I guess. Just wanted to type. Ta.