'Disney's Best Anti-Villain' and Societal Injustice

This blog post was originally composed as a YouTube comment on this video. I enjoyed the revisit and analysis of The Fox and the Hound; it's been ages since I saw that movie. Thanks to KeyTheLich for making it.

Now, here's my two cents...

HAPPY, HURT

disclaimer: This blog post is 100% fan squealing enthusiasm about why an awesome thing is awesome. I have no business relationship with The Stupendium and am not being paid to say this, I just got caught up in wanting to.

 

Okay so, one of my team members has recently been linking me to a bunch of Stupendium songs, and they're really good. The other day I arranged a YouTube playlist starting with a song my teammate had been listening to a lot recently, which I took as tonal inspiration, seeking a similar sound in instrumentals for the rest of the mix. You can find the list over here, but that's not what I'm here to talk about, that's just the background.

"Slide Into The Void". It's based on Control. I have never played Control. I have, however, played Lobotomy Corporation and read a fair amount of the SCP wiki, so the tropes of the Federal Bureau of Control were instantly familiar to me.

A few days later, I approached my teammate with a nonsequitur message:
🤍 HAPPY, HURT

They didn't seem to pick up the reference, and so I felt compelled to analyze and explain why I thought they might have. Why these two words are so emphatically memorable to me as a symbol of the song.

The Rainbow

It's been a while since I've come back to write here, but maybe it hasn't been as long as it feels like. For a while I was thinking from time to time I should come back just to mention that the heartbreak is fading and although the challenge of trying to get by here on the budget I have available for it is a big one, I think I'm getting more of a handle on it.

A couple of weeks ago, I think on the day I last wrote, now that I think of it, I applied to Rev after looking through some articles on more unconventional ways to make money, as opposed to a regular hired job. Rev is a captioning and transcription service and work space; they hire freelancers who can use the online tools they provide to claim jobs as they come available and type captions to videos and audio from clients. I went through some testing and was approved to join.

It's been exciting to have something I could do with my hours from home to make money on my own terms, and although I'm not currently earning at a rate which is going to solve all my financial problems, it's work that I like and I think I can get better at it over time.

Yesterday just for example I wrote captions for a weird music video, and started work on an hour-long documentary I'll need to finish today. I get exposed to a lot of different media I probably would never have watched on my own, and the variety makes this job interesting. I'm glad to have something that takes advantage of my precision with words and good typing speed, although in this case, it's precision in listening to hear exactly what words someone else used, not choosing them myself.

As often happens, I've found solace in love from those around me by deepening my relationships into romance. There's a degree to which I feel uncomfortable about that, since it's happened so many times before it feels like I'm turning predictable or something, becoming a cliche. It's frustrating that that meta-awareness messes with my appreciation of the moment, because the thing itself is beautiful anyway.

So once again I've had a wonderful time talking endlessly to one of my friends and finding that there is potential for us to be closer, and it was all appropriately delicious. I've drawn a few pictures, hit by inspiration from the new relationship energy and finding with pleasure that the skill I've accumulated over the years makes it much easier for me to depict what I want to reasonably well, and I've been producing work I can be proud of in just a couple of hours.

The thought to see if I can try to market that as well does come to mind, alongside the long-standing intent to try to set up an online shop for my macrame bracelets. The way things are going so far, it'd make me an all-around crafter-freelancer, and you know what? That could be pretty cool.

Sunday night this week I pulled an all-nighter hanging out online with this relationship that's changing colours in my life, and so yesterday I had trouble staying awake in my classes. I gave up and went home to sleep after the first two. I slept again last night, although not ideally long, and walked to school today listening to a variety of renditions of "The Bonnie Banks of Loch Lomond". There was one instrumental version in particular that I reflected would sound just about perfect if I could have added the sound of rain into it, for an atmospheric connection to the sky and fields as they are, I suppose.

Well here's where it gets a bit strange, because not five minutes later it started raining. I'd finished the song by then, but the timing was remarkable anyway. I had been admiring the many colours of silver in the clouds, as there often are in Ireland, and it's not as though it seemed unlikely for it to rain, but just that it happened right then, as opposed to fifteen minutes earlier, struck me as somewhat uncanny.

But what was moreso was when I looked up and almost jumped to see the change in the sky; where there hadn't been not five minutes before when I took a photo of the lovely silvers in the clouds over the green field I was passing, there was a rainbow, full across the sky and not the slight half-bow I'd sometimes seen in rain in Canada.

Over the next little while, the rainbow got brighter and brighter by the moment, not only a full arc across the sky now, but apparent right to the ground on both sides, even casting its colours in front of the distant hills on the horizon. It looked as though you could have guessed to within a dozen meters or so where exactly it seemed to touch down on one side. Looking on with awe, some of the old legends of searches for leprechauns' gold made a lot more sense all of a sudden.

For a period of not more than ten minutes or so, the rainbow brightened and brightened, clearer and more vibrant than I had ever seen a rainbow in my life, with a second, dimmer arc beginning to show outside the main on the sides, and then began to dim and fade away. I caught a few photos of the rainbow before it was gone, and the sky returned to gray as the rain continued lightly for a while longer and I went on my way toward the college. The whole of its appearance may have been contained in a quarter of an hour.

I thought back to King of Dragon Pass where the appearance of a rainbow was considered to be among the best of omens, and to other similar things, and felt rather a lot as though the sky had smiled at me, 'like forgiveness' in a way, I remember thinking. There's a certain cheshire-cat-ness to it now, looking back, that leaves me feeling curious and portentous. Perhaps it smiles on the progress of my new relationship, or to reassure me that my efforts are good enough, for now; or that I may be soon rewarded for not giving up on my time here. Who knows, but there is that in me that wonders, even while its being silly and seeming misguided is also felt in my thoughts.

So there, anyway, is the rainbow which greeted me this morning, and the trend of my activities these past few weeks. Health and fortune to the ones I love and to all those who love me, if I may spread it out to them, for their fortune is also mine after all.

And good day.

Continuing On

"I feel like you imply to me that I'm wasting your time every time I ask a question, in class or outside of it."
"No, it's not that. It's just that we have a lot to cover and very little time to do it all."
"The way you say it upsets me every time."
"Ditto."
"Well, I'm sorry for my side of that."
"Me too. Let's begin again next day."
handshake

-Monday 24th, September

The term is now thoroughly underway, and I have been neglecting my blogging again. I have become acquainted with the chaplain on campus and one of the two counselors, who I am set to meet once a week. I have been feeling busy, with pressure from classes, homework, and financial stability; regular job searching has as usual been discouraging. My several runs of boldly introducing myself and dropping off CVs in person have yielded nothing so far and largely robbed me of the energy to continue making online applications to posted jobs.

I am seeking to break into freelancing, to work on my own terms, and maybe do some tutoring, even in IT Carlow itself. UpWork has rejected my application twice, though, perhaps negating the hearsay I had from a friend of a friend that the application process was pretty much a formality. Having taken ten tests on the site and scored above average on every one and in the top 10% on some, I feel indignant about this, and am wondering whether you have to already be an established freelancer for UpWork to want to support you.

The lecturer I had the above encounter with has been treating me with greater kindness and consideration since. In my Excel-based computer labs, I race ahead. In non-computer lab Management Accounting classes, I have begun to sometimes stop even processing through the problems. Vainly racing the lecturer's Excel with a hand calculator while my mind is crowded with her talking was growing very tiresome, and I feel confident I already get the idea by now. If I could find the time to do more practice on my own it would be great, but my time is mostly spent wondering how I'm ever going to juggle all of the things I need to do.

And then there is archery. It's the one club I've been going to reliably, learning form and stance and hearing encouraging words from the coach, who is acting as a better teacher than any of my lecturers, using effective repetition, class participation and good humour, much like my statistics lecturer back at Fanshawe did, to help us memorise the safety rules and terminology of the bow, adding a little every week. There is also a lot of waiting, since the beginners shoot only 4-6 at a time so that the coaches can observe us and correct mistakes, and the rest queue behind. I have begun to get to know the other left-handed archers; In archery, which hand you fire with depends on the dominance of your eye, not the regular dominance of your hand, and so someone who is a right-handed writer may be a left-handed archer. There are perhaps three right hand archers to each of us lefties, and we share the same line to shoot with a left-handed bow.

I enjoy archery, even though there's a lot of waiting. I have been challenging my social courage to chat to and get to know some of the other lefties. I had an amusing conversation with one young man yesterday who's in the first year of a software course going into cyber security. For the money, he said when I asked, and we talked about different countries and pronunciations, accents and languages. He wondered why out of all the countries in the world I would want to come to Ireland, and expressed a dislike of the Irish accent and disdain for the country in general. He was an interesting conversationalist, although as I said to him myself it seemed in some moments as though we were chatting across from different sides of the D&D alignment table. He laughed.

Between the talking and building my skills and the generally welcoming atmosphere... Well, probably more important than any of that is that when I am at archery club I feel a certain pseudo-obligation to leave school, work and busyness matters mostly aside and just be still for a while, focused almost entirely on other things, and that's just deeply refreshing.

I had an ongoing email conversation with someone who runs the campus's tabletop games club, suggesting some ways he could make his emails and Facebook messages more welcoming and less cynical. We met in person yesterday, and essentially he told me that he wasn't interested in spending the effort to improve his approach for this thing he was volunteering his time toward. I am proud of myself for continuing to speak animatedly but cheerfully with him until we parted ways, although I went away from it feeling stressed and perhaps on a verge of my social anxiety that I am a bit surprised I managed to cling to, and not tumble over. He did thank me for the feedback and admit to some surprise that the way I had rewritten a couple of his messages registered as so much more welcoming even to him.

Also yesterday, a couple of my friends introduced me to A Capella Science, with Entropic Time and Banting's Imparted Years, which has made my Song of the Day list. The single-voice a capella of the latter is a little harsh on the ears at first, but it really grew on me over time, and the arrangements are good.

I had better get moving. It is another school morning and I need to be at school in a little under an hour to book an appointment with the campus doctor to get a renewed prescription of my thyroid medicine. Oh. Also also, I picked up a bottle of apple cider vinegar, which was mentioned in my marketing class, and have begun trying to take a spoon of it every day like a medicine. I don't know how valid are its claims as a health tonic, and I feel a little self-conscious for following a trend like this, but I'll just give it a try, and see if it seems to do me any good.

IT Carlow: Week Two

I am easily embarrassed and may take over an hour to really get over the embarrassment from merely being told my questions are too frequent, or perhaps too insignificant by her measure, by a lecturer. Time really seems to be flying. I had not noticed we had so little time left in the lecture. This must be a good thing. I will try to figure out other ways to approach this lecturer with my questions

-Monday 17th, September

I enjoyed sleeping this morning and clung to it. I arrived late to my first class and unfed. In the second I was continually distracted and annoyed by the man next to me who checked his phone under the desk, wobbled the bench and jostled against me with his arm. In the hallway I wrestled with the anxiety-forbidden temptation to call out to everyone not to block the hallways, in case someone needed to get through. I bought myself a breakfast in the upstairs caf, which helped fuel me through the rest of my classes.

-Tuesday 18th, September

The clubs sign-up was loud with music over a boombox in one corner. I signed up for archery, tabletop and Irish dance. I met some of Rachel's friends for the second time. I gave out 3 CVs with a cheerfulness that surprised me. I slept before midnight and soundly rested until 9 the next day.

-Wednesday 19th, September

Yesterday I found an organising toy, lifeRPG, for goal setting and tracking, with EXP gained for completed tasks. I woke to find a rejection from UpWork and a bunch of forms to fill out for my new clubs, plus obligations to further support Tabletop. It was a bad first impression. Missed counselling appointment, and didn't realize it until 9 at night.

-Thursday 20th, September

I had a sluggish morning. I helped Rachel practice categorising costs for Management Accounting and felt that I had neglected my need for leisure, so once I got home I watched a bunch of old shows of sfdebris and bought and enjoyed a game that was on sale on GOG. But I dropped off four more CVs on the way.

-Friday 21st, September

Saturday was a day of job searching work. I made a particularly strong and hopeful application to a health food store looking for a weekend shop assistant. I improved some of the phrasing on my CV and made a new version which I hope will be relevant to waitress work. I handed out four more CVs, including one to an actual bar. The approach was intimidating, as I have never felt comfortable in bars, but having overcome my mounting fear to come in and talk to two friendly counter staff was one small victory. I visited another and heard that the manager to speak to would be in on weekdays, but was not at that time. At the end of the day, I reviewed my progress and found that of all the CVs I had dropped off, positions I had applied to online and employment inquiry emails I had sent, one entire third of them had been over the last four days: Wednesday to Saturday.

Tuesday I had gotten an email from the school office reminding me of the urgency of my job search: appointments for the immigration meeting at which I would need to show evidence of 3,000 euro in a bank account to stay were beginning. Over the few days that followed, I gathered my friends and spoke seriously about the choice between returning to Canada and forfeiting the deposit my father was generous enough to let me talk him into paying for me... or staying on, although if I became financially unable to stay through the end of the year and finish the courses, I would be out by thousands more. Still, the real need of finding work is a challenge that my past self knowingly threw my present self into, determined that I should grow to meet it. Incidentally, this fits well with a new determination song shown to me by a new friend: "I'm now becoming my own self-fulfilled prophecy!"

Sunday I woke up feeling utterly done with job searching. I spent the day lazy and played Theme Hospital for most of it. Chatted with Iris, and stayed up almost all night. It set me up to wake to my alarm so hazily that I thought I had multiple alarms keyed to different states, and go back to sleep after turning it off, feeling confident another one would ring. I slept in and missed my first class, but only the first one. I was in attendance for the second.

Dear Memory: Nondispassionate

Yes, that is a deliberate double negative.

After having written four days ago in a state of surprised and surprising calm, and reflected on my own detachment from the emotional side of my return, I find that strange dispassion... it has not... gone away, exactly. I don't believe that anything I said then has become untrue. I still await the future with great curiosity, without certainty, without demand... and I think, ready to face a disappointing answer if that is what awaits me.

However, perhaps in response to having thought about it more seriously for the first time in quite some time, I notice a more emotional side of my experience. Perhaps it is rising up in response, or perhaps I am just noticing it in response, in all of the little ways that the things I said do not show the whole picture. The details of my life that those words do not adequately describe. Perhaps a combination of both, and I think this is more likely. I always seem to think of an exception to an assertion just as or after I make it.

Like rules in Magic: the Gathering always interacting with one another, and allowing for so many variations and conditions that almost any absolute statement you make will have exceptions. Like, "You won't have more than one sorcery on the stack at once." I have to admit, dear memory, I have enjoyed your Topdeck Tutors podcasts and videos a great deal. I listened to them many times, much like rewatching CarlSagan42's videos over and over again, which you also introduced me to. I like your taste, dear memory. The things you do and recommend have often been interesting, hopeful, clever and funny. Much like you...

I told the story of my relationship with you to one of my co-workers today. She has been working with us only two weeks, rather than the five that I have shared with the other summer students who joined at the same time as me. She is more than ten years younger than me, and working together with a co-worker more than ten years younger than myself feels very strange indeed. It gives me a sense of being older and more experienced in my surround that is very distinct and I am not sure how to react to it. I feel I should be a voice of wisdom and experience to some degree, but am also concerned against being a pretentious adult as I know I used to see adults who would try to talk to me: who thought they knew better, and needn't listen to me. I never want to be like that. I think I am managing not to be, so far.

I told her about meeting you at tabletop society, inviting someone else at the table to walk, but having you answer that call instead, and noticing you in a way I had not noticed before. The March-a-thon, and the long walks you markedly failed ever to make an excuse not to show up for. The discomfort on your face when I mentioned a lover from home. The request to kiss you. A relationship beautiful and intense and supportive, but always bound by time to end with the school year. My own desperate reluctance to leave you behind. A promise perhaps unfairly extracted. Intentions forged from fear of letting go. Inability to keep up a relationship worth having between the pain of distance and the dissynchronicity of time zones. A coming apart, first resisted, and then formally agreed. An attempt to move on. A song, a breaking point, a realization, and a decision, to come back. Plans, applications, formalities; step by slow, beaurocratic step. Success. Acceptance. Further plans. A plane ticket. And an email, requesting your consent to meet me. And a message, charmingly misspelled, 'of coarse'.

I was crying a little by the end of that story. I am crying a little recounting it here. The feelings... they are still there. Of course they are. How couldn't they be? And yet, none of the words I said four days ago, I think, are false. I do not think I am obsessed anymore. I do think I am ready to take whatever comes. It remains true, so far as I can tell beyond a veil of perspective behind which I cannot be objective, that the travel and the adventure may have been welcome even if I did not have this exceptionally romantic excuse to undertake it. That I expect the adventure to be welcome even if the answer I find is not what I hoped it might be.

Beside that strange dispassion is a shining storm of quiet passion, controlled... in some way respectful... perhaps even polite. But passionate nonetheless, moved into a whirl that twists the air into eddies and currents, that pulls me, although perhaps not inexorably. That moves me, because I consent to be moved by it. It would be a great struggle not to move to this current in some way or another, but I can direct it, I think. I can channel and turn its flow. I still am convinced this is not really a contradiction. Like so many other things, my dear memory, in this ball of seeming contradictons, as you called me long ago. I don't think I ever claimed, or ever expected, that I would not feel. I don't think I ever said, even to myself, that I would not cry, or hurt. Only that it would be worth it. It was, and is, my choice. The story worth telling, both the bitter and the sweet of it.

Out of the Fire and into the Pan

It has been a stressful month or so for me, increasingly so over financial debts and concerns that I may not be able to arrange things adequately even to get myself to Ireland, much less beyond... I was very reluctant to return to Ontario Works, but this week I did so, and spoke very humbly to the staff member there who was quick to listen and encourage me, and trusted me when I said I was job searching already and had applied to ten or a dozen summertime positions, which I had.

I've made up a chart on Google Sheets of when I applied to what and how long I spent doing it, and roughly what sort of positions they were, and I've given to my friends and to my employment counsellor at Goodwill Career Center a link to see it as I add to it. I was feeling so glum and reluctant one evening that I turned to examining the feeling and what exactly it was about. I decided a large part of it was probably the silence. I've never been able to happily endure silence as a response when I put myself out into the world, whether it's a joke or a request or, as now, a job application. It feels like casual rejection, which feels hideous. Although I know that keeping at my job hunting a little at a time, stable-like, is how best to make sure I can find something, it's awfully discouraging to me not seeing any mark of progress, because I've not got interviews or hire offers yet.

So I thought about that, and I decided to ask my friends to help me by setting up like video game achievements for me, so that to help me keep going with gradual consistency, I could measure progress by milestones like grindy achievements; applications X days in a row like studying on Khan Academy, or apply to five receptionist jobs, or to ten labour jobs, or thirty jobs in total, whatever it'd be. Then I'd have marks of progress to look forward to, and to look back on, that didn't depend on any feedback I'm unlikely to get from the jobs themselves.

So that seems alright, and I do think it's helping me stay happy, which ultimately makes everything better. One of my friends agreed in right away and will share with me a song from his music library or a sketch he's drawn that I didn't see before for each two online applications I submit, or each one place I submit in person, up to two rewards every day. And yesterday, I went through and did five applications online to mostly labour oriented positions, so I could focus on how to present as a good labourer rather than trying to organize a bunch of different fronts at one time. I like that strategy, I think it suits me well.

There's also mother. I don't remember whether I wrote it here, but I got back in contact with my mother, and that's been stressful. I think she's trying, though. I told her once a little while ago that she had been behaving unappropriately and to stop sending me any more messages until I could figure out what to say back to her, and then she sent me a message to say she would (because no-one ever apparently thinks that saying yes counts as saying anything), but since then has stayed quiet, and I've got a long email sitting in drafts that I haven't gotten back around to yet to trim down and decide whether to make it milder, but I've been focusing on trying to keep my morale high enough to job search. I might say more about my mother here later, or maybe I won't.

I've come 'round to sleeping days again, which is all a great frustration, but I can still do my job searching at least, in the evenings when I'm awake. Normally I'd try to push my sleeping forward and forward through the days some more until it was back around to nights again, only I talk to Iris in the evenings. He's been very sweet and loving to me, and it makes me feel happy to have that place and time when I'm welcomed for a while. I've got him playing through Doki Doki Literature Club, which I played my virgin run of a while ago. I thought we might be done with his own virgin (or I suppose you could say blind) run through it by now, but he goes through the game so slowly, reading the dialogue and discussing the poetry and thinking hard over every choice and talking to me about it.

We spent some amusing and interesting hours together finding a bunch of secrets in the game, much earlier than I would have expected and which I hadn't even known were there, so I was able to participate in unraveling them from ignorance and with sincere exploration myself, which was great fun. I won't say any more about that here, because between them being secrets and the type of game DDLC is, if any readers have not played it, I would want to encourage them to do so and experience it all themselves. Iris and I have recorded our playing the game and I might put it on YouTube at some point if ever I find a comfortable way to edit videos again, so it's not like our experiences will be lost if I don't write them here.

Last time we played, Iris had a substantial conversation with Yuri for the first time in the game, having mostly spent his time talking to Sayori so far. It was very fun for me to hear him read it, partly because it went like conversations he's actually had with me even more than I expected. I see a lot of myself in Yuri, a lot of my own strengths and weaknesses and fears, depicted very well in some places, and that gives me reason to love the game if I didn't already have an inclination to. I spoke to Iris about it and he can see what I mean by that, although he finds much more kinship in Sayori himself, which doesn't surprise me... Such a simple sweetheart, taking unabashed delight in the simple solaces of the world like restful sleep and tasty food. And what's better, he doesn't mind if I make a little fun of him for it. It seems I get along very well with fellows like that, who can remind me by example to enjoy the simple things, and aren't too proud to let me laugh at them.

I say simple, but it doesn't mean stupid. Iris and Fish and Coda too can understand the complexity and darkness in my perspectives well enough to empathise beautifully and sincerely; I know it's not any lack of understanding or capacity that leads them to deal with life on such simple terms, but their own preference, and oftentimes conscious decision about who they want to be. I can thoroughly respect that. I can enjoy walking a time with Iris's sunny attitude, knowing that he is sincerely willing to take his turn walking with me through nightmares... so spending time lighthearted doesn't mean denying the dark is there, in the way that it has often felt to me as though it does in broader society. It's not whitewashing. It's not stupid politics. It doesn't make me pick sides between two ends of a waveform as though they were contradictory to one another for the contrast. I love that.

Anyway, I started out this writing meaning to say that my benefit return from filing my taxes has come in, and now so has Ontario Works support for this month, since I hadn't paid my rent yet, not having the money, and I asked humbly if they could help me with that and was told they could and would. So I've paid my rent, and I also paid off most of the debt on my credit card that's been building up from groceries and stuff... And my plane ticket... and there's such a weight off my shoulders now about that. But I still need to work at finding work for those weeks of summer I have left if I can, because I can use all the money I can save up to get myself started strong in Ireland.

Dear Memory: Overlap

It's been a while since I wrote here... A lot has happened.

I mean, a LOT has happened now that I look back on it. Three short weeks later, and so much has happened after these long, stretching months of seemingly so little... I have finished my diploma. I was a bit worried about Tax, so I studied it purposefully and did well enough on the exam for a solid pass, although still not a great grade overall. I have moved out of the house with the loud and inconsiderate roommates I didn't feel I could talk to. Moved right next door, to another room managed by the same landlord, with different roommates. These ones don't bother me much. The walls are thicker and the room is further away from main flows of traffic. I've been sleeping full nights again, at long last. I even have access to quite a large downstairs den which I can reshape to my heart's contentment. I cleaned off and rearranged the furniture, populated some neglected shelves and a mantlepiece with books, knicknacks and an assortment of tasty snacks. I actually set up my round table, which has had no space to be useful in for over a year and was just in the way at my last house. It is so pretty now, a comfortable and happy place into which to invite my few local friends. Including a special new addition...

My asexual girlfriend finally moved to London! I had been forgetting this was even a thing, but a few days before I moved (which was a few days before the end of the month) she was landed and local. The night before the move, unable to sleep and stressed, I called her up to go walk the London night streets together and we hugged and kissed and chatted about all sorts of wonderful things. I've been showing her the markets on the weekends. It gives me an excellent excuse to go out to them myself, and there's a great budget stall at Gibraltar that sells non-perishable foodstuffs that are past their expiry date. I've found some pretty great things there (like sunflower seed butter and some delicious little cookies) and also some not great things there (like protein bars and Welch's fruit snacks which become very tough as they go stale), but the prices are certainly right for experimentation.

I got another three offers from Irish colleges, and am currently trying to decide between Sligo IT, Carlow IT and IT Tralee. I also got mail from Waterford, but to be honest their letter wasn't even a conditional letter of offer like the other three were and I was very unimpressed, so I'm not seriously considering it. I'm currently leaning towards Carlow because it's the closest by transit to Athlone.

I booked my plane ticket. Five hundred dollars or so, including baggage allowance. I'm bringing a real suitcase this time, bringing more with me; since I'm leaving nothing behind to wait for me.

And I broke the silence. I wrote you an email on the first of May. Brief and simple and somewhat formal, but contact has been made. I got a response the very next day, which was even shorter and simpler, but although little is said and although you did not take me up on the offer to talk more by starting a further conversation, there is enough confirmation there to make my heart sing. Misspelled and humble is a simple message that validates all the work I have done to get back across the sea. "Of coarse I'll meet with you".

Now my next big task is to choose between these three colleges and get access to enough money to pay my confirming deposit before May 30th. I'll probably need a student line of credit. And for that, I'll need a co-signer. Probably my father, if he'll agree to do it. Otherwise, I might reach out to Iris. Or Ashlynn. Or maybe even Brian, possibly. I'm willing to have some really awkward conversations about finances in order to make this happen. I will find a way.

As I was heading out to the bank today to discuss this, I paused and wanted to hear a specific Ani DiFranco song. This happens often enough, but this time... I didn't have the version I wanted to hear. I have the song, somewhere in my discograpy, but... it was too loose and whispery. I remembered a different rhythm. The search for the correct earworm involved a flustered overturning of YouTube to no avail and my purchasing a single track for 99c of the other non-live recording that was made of it... only to be sent the wrong song. They sent me "Shameless" instead, so I called the support line to have them fix it and ask questions about the song I was looking for.

It's been sorted. I have it now. The lighter and jazzier, more rhythm-tight 2007 recording, from the album 'Canon', of Ani DiFranco's song "Overlap":

...I know there is strength in the differences between us
and I know there is comfort, where we overlap;
Come here; stand in front of the light.
Stand still, so I can see your silhouette.
I hope... that you have got all night,
because I am not done looking at you yet.

I love this song. This version of this song. It prompted me to draw an analogy between communication and light that I built up so thoroughly I drew a colourful diagram of it years ago. And thinking those lyrics brings tears of intensity to my eyes. I feel this so much. I feel this about you. Not just you... So many of my friends. But also about you.

I have started taking firm steps in the process of job searching. There are postings on a student website. There are agencies in town that might be able to find me a temp position; maybe even one related to my accounting studies. I had an intake interview with one of the recruiters at one of those agencies on Tuesday (two days ago).

But I think I may be pushing myself a bit too hard. I came home feeling somewhat dizzied today, my mind full of blades and violence. I've had a particular propensity within the last week and a half or so to imagine stabbing myself through the left eye with my biggest, sharpest, favourite kitchen knife. It has been making me very twitchy, and I'm not entirely sure what to make of it. It may be... I hope... just down to a high intensity of stress, which is natural as the school term is ending and one is looking for a summer job. And preparing to go back to school. And adapting to changes in romantic relationships. And a move into a new house. And finances... So all told, I mean, I don't think I have a reason to be all that worried, but it's still a particularly unpleasant symptom of stress and I hope it goes away soon.

I hope I will hear from my dad. I hope he will be willing to co-sign a line of credit for me. I hope I can find a summer job that pays enough that I can do some saving for Ireland. I hope so many things, really... And I look forward to seeing you, sometime in my first few days of being back on the isle. I want to get to know you again, Fish. I hope you want that too. I really do.

Dear Memory: The Games You Play

Hi, Eoin.

I feel very close to you today, dear memory. I have been listening to your voice. It has been... over five months, I think... since the last time I listened to your voice, and that sound, so familiar, carries an amazing weight of nostalgia now.

I know you must be doing okay, for now, because you're part of a podcast now. Maybe later, I will come back and add a hyperlink to it into this post, but not yet. Not today. I'm a little afraid that you'd see the back-link somehow, and find me here, watching you, and that that would make you uncomfortable. So as much as I would love for you, for this person you are now, your voice still familiar, your jokes told with the same friendly sass... but not to me... As much as I might love to see you turn and see me watching you, I do not rustle the branches. I stay quiet and hidden and permit you not to be any more likely to notice me than you already are, for I've posted links to my blog sometimes on Facebook and I think once, the preview line visible from there held your name.

It's so good to hear you laughing again. And Gearoid and Troy, too. I miss hanging out at your house, listening to you banter with them like this, at home and happy and comfortable. I miss listening to you talk about the games you love, and shows you love, and things you do. I hope I will one day be welcome again to stand awkwardly at hand, listening. Trying sometimes to find something to contribute by saying. Even feeling self-consciously out of place there, but still allowed to be there, listening, enjoying the stories... and talking to you about them afterwards.

Maybe someday I will play games with you again. I hope so. You're so fun-loving. It's... relaxing just being around that, sometimes. It... was, I mean.

While looking through Steam today after nabbing a game which was released for free as an anniversary promotion, I stumbled across something I had remembered only dimly for some time. The Beginner's Guide... And I remember, like vision, like the physical world coming back as a dream fades. I remember sitting and laying on your bed and exploring it, rapt with attention. I remember the prison cell which ostensibly would originally have trapped the player for hours. I remember the trick-door which kept coming back or something, although I'm not sure I remember the trick to it. I remember three figures with blank faces, asking questions about how I got there, and how to move forward. I remember a huge room full of bubbles with comments in them. I remember a combination lock without any clues to the combination. I remember a man standing at a podium. I remember a red curtain around a stage, and a gun which shattered the scenery into blank whiteness... I remember a house full of little things to fix. Little chores to keep up, maintenance to be done. I remember liking that part. It seemed... peaceful.

I remember sitting with you and speaking aloud back at the narrator about the point I thought he'd missed. I remember... rising above the maze. Do you know, Fish...? I still keep that screenshot among my wallpapers. And whenever I see it, I think of you.

I listened to your podcast while I took a long walk today, and bought some ramen. Many times, I laughed at your jokes. Not just yours, Eoin, I mean Troy's and Gearoid's too. I'm glad you're okay. I'm glad you're talking about things that you love. I'm glad that I can listen to your voice without getting in your way. If you keep doing this, then there may be a way that I can have your good humour and your cheeky cleverness in my life even if you don't want to talk again when I land.

When I land. Dear memory... I haven't written this here yet. But last week, I got my first offer of placement back from an Irish college. Dear memory, the only condition set out in that offer is that I successfully finish my diploma and hand in my transcript by May 30th. Dear memory, I don't even have to get good marks in my classes, I only have to pass them. Dear memory...

I am coming.

I hope I will get more than one offer. I hope I will have a reason to contact you and ask which one I ought to choose, a lapse in the silence that's existed between us for more than five months. But even if this is the only choice I am given... I am coming. It's gone from "hope" and "maybe" and "trying" to something more solid.

The day after I received the email, I woke up in my bed, and squirmed gradually to consciousness, and my first conscious thought was to repeat, in my mind, I could buy my plane ticket today. I'm going to Ireland. Where to head after I land may not be set in stone, but I have my confirmation now. There is at least one answer available to that question. I'm going to Ireland. Coming to Ireland. I'm coming back, and I'm coming for you. It sings in my heart so intensely it turns almost to a shriek when I think about it. Like a perfect tone, sweet and high and pure and so loud it could shatter glass.

There is still much to be done first, but the greatest hurdle, the most doubtful issue has been cleared. The rest is details. Details which will fill my days, my nights, my schedule, until mid-August.

And this is why I felt it was now an acceptable time to look through your Facebook page again, and see a couple sorta recent pictures. And I found your new podcast there, and I've been listening to it. It's close enough now, somehow. It doesn't feel distant and stalkery the same way it did once before, because I expect I may have cause to actually be in touch within just another two weeks.

It all comes down to this... and now I hear you laughing and joking with your friends, just like you used to. And something in me that had worried that you might be somehow a very changed person now, someone less likely to like me... something of that fear melts away. You will very likely have changed somehow... but you laugh the same. In your most recent pictures on Facebook, your smile is as I knew it before I left. That's Eoin alright. And that's something right about the world. Something happy. Right now, it must be night time in Ireland, though it's yet early evening here. Goodnight, Eoin. May you rest healthfully and wake happy. I love you.

The Old Storyteller Barney McCaffrey

I've been watching a sort of mini-documentary on old stories from the valley where I grew up, presented by a man I remember from my childhood, Barney McCaffrey. He's dead now, but I remember him as one of the things that I think contributed to my feeling so attached to my own Irish heritage. He was a great local character, a story-teller. Half-Irish and half-Polish, so he adopted the area by Killaloe and Wilno as his home. Whenever there was a party or a significant social gathering about Wilno, he'd be there. Playing his accordion and singing songs and telling all manner of stories.

My father would take me to those sorts of things often enough, and sometimes my mother would too, when I was young. So much so that the sound of people playing live music some distance away or old classic rock through a radio makes me a little sleepy even to this day, because it reminds me of falling asleep in my mother's or father's car after I'd got tired, but they still wanted to stay and keep having fun.

I wonder now how much my love of stories and the tradition of telling them in songs and poems may've been shaped by Barney McCaffrey and characters like him.

Dear Future: Remember to Be Awesome

This post isn't written to Eoin, it's written to me, Serp, in the future when I look back over my blog, with someone else or alone. Hi, Serp.

I've been doing pretty sweet, despite a long stretch of repeatedly very little sleep. Today, I found myself listening to a very cheerful song I like on repeat, and went a surprising length of time without getting sick of it. Instead, I built a happy fantasy around the song. And like last week, I decided that instead of chiding myself for my fantasy and the expression of something I cared about but might never achieve... I would see where I could follow it. In this case, I followed it into the big empty football field near my house where I could expect other people not to hear me talking to myself, imagining something delicious, and deliciously plausible, if not necessarily likely.

I paced, and thought, and recited, arranging the words of a speech. And then I turned back to the song and practiced singing it, until I got through the whole song once or twice, along with the short speech. I came back home, and wrote the speech down.

Serp, I don't know whether you made it back to Athlone or wound up somewhere else. I don't know whether Eoin is with you, or whether he ever will be. But no matter where you are, or who you're near, remember how delicious that idea was. Go back and reread it, if it helps. You have the capacity to dream beautiful dreams. And I know that someday, if you keep trying, you will be able to make some of them a reality.

Maybe the plot I schemed up today doesn't work for you where you are now. Maybe you've seen a flaw in it that I don't see. If this particular one never happens, that's alright. You can think up something else. Something better. Just... remember that it's not a waste of time to dream beautiful dreams. It's not. It gives you ideas about how to get to them. You just have to be willing to look at them in the right way. You need a little hope for a brighter day. A little love to find the way.

And remember the vlogbrothers. Remember ToadyOne. Remember Elon Musk and Eliezer's Harry and Dave Moreland and all the other people who have inspired you. Remember that you don't need to be afraid of them. Follow their lead. Don't Forget To Be Awesome.

Rationality: A Different Prisoner's Dilemma

There is a certain kind of person who notices that the world is full of suffering, and after they have noticed this, they feel obligated to remind themselves regularly, even to great personal detriment and into depression. These people cannot bring themselves to turn away from suffering even to maintain their own health... not until they are so overwhelmed by compassion for other peoples' pain that they are at risk of breaking down with stress and illness. Why? ... Likely guilt, because they would perceive it as selfish to deliberately ignore someone else's suffering in order to feel better themselves, even if there is nothing they can do about it right now. Likely also fear... that if they did turn away, they would be making themselves into monsters, joining the complicit majority of people who do not act to prevent suffering, who do not seem to care.

I am one such a person, and the kinds of people I make friends with are often prone to this phenomenon. Jennifer Freed calls it "The Empath's Dilemma," but I am not under the impression that it's a term in common use.

A friend of mine came to me tonight stuck in a mental spiral of concern and guilt I recognized as the state of someone being overwhelmed by the Empath's Dilemma, and I swooped in with my own concern, to reassure and comfort them, to shake off the undeserved guilt and help them toward a mental condition from which they would, hopefully, be able to get a decent night's rest.

And then they asked me, "How did you get through this sort of a dark night of the soul [...] whenever that night was for you?"

This is my answer:

I constructed a question. A scenario that might be put to people by which to judge their preferences in a pinch, like the old standard one about pulling a switch to route a train onto a track where it would hit only one person rather than five.

The scenario was this:

Imagine that you are a prisoner in a terrible prison. In your current position, you are almost completely helpless. Your contact with the other prisoners is minimal, and tightly governed. You cannot, now, save them... But you do know that they suffer. If you don't cover your ears at night, you can hear them screaming. If you don't turn your eyes away, you can see how the guards habitually beat and torture and belittle them.
Taken metaphorically, this is not far from the truth.

Your own condition is good compared to most of the other prisoners, but very bad compared to the free citizens who live outside of it. You do not, now, have the power to do anything that would stop the atrocities that happen here. You think you could grow to have more power, though, after your sentence is up, assuming you actually are released. And assuming you survive that long.

But you also know, because the prison is still here, that the free citizens, who have so much more power than you do, have found other things to do with their time than campaign and publicize and get this prison torn down or reformed. A lot of them don't even acknowledge that it's a real problem. You might worry that you will become like them, after you're free. Stuff all your memories of this place into a bag in a closet in the back of your mind and never dare to touch it, because it would hurt.

Well then? Every night, you effectively have two options.

A: You lay down with your ears uncovered. You listen to the screams, and harden your resolve that you will never, ever, allow yourself to forget or to deny what has happened here... but at the cost of your sanity, and a greater risk of not being able to hold a job or garner any respect after you leave.

Or B: You cover your ears, you close your eyes, you do whatever it takes to swallow your meals and nourish yourself despite the sickening surroundings, and you push away the pain and the fear enough to survive another day in as healthy a state as you can. Maintaining your self and your capacity, but increasing the risks of falling into a habit of denial and inaction.

Which one will you choose?

~~~~~

That's the Empath's Dilemma, the way I see it. People we call empaths will choose A far more often. Some will choose A any time they think they can do so without the pain killing them.

I contemplated this long enough to realize that neither extreme was "right". Given a choice between someone who always chooses A, and someone who always chooses B, neither one is necessarily better. This may be difficult to accept, because it's a very emotional question, and it can be hard to imagine, if you are particularly driven to choose A, for example, that someone could choose B and it wouldn't make them a worse person than you are. Knowing whether someone is more driven to choose A or to choose B could, however, offer some useful insight into that person's strengths and weaknesses.

The optimal solution does something vaguely analogous to maximizing the area of a rectangle which is SANITY units wide and COMMITMENT units long. If you let your sanity fall to zero, your capacity to help anyone will also be zero. If you let your commitment fall to zero, your willingness to help anyone will also be zero. In either case, the prison stands just as tall, and the suffering goes on.

So, sacrifice enough of your comfort to maintain your commitment, until your commitment is sufficient to fuel the most effective actions you could take. Do not sacrifice more.

Sacrifice enough of your emotional urgency to maintain your sanity and health, until they are sufficient to support the most effective actions you could take. Do not sacrifice more.

And recognize that knowing the perfect balance is functionally impossible. There are just too many variables in the environment. Calibrating your model to be more accurate is a fantastic excuse to be neither properly maintaining your self NOR acting effectively in the moment.

Err on the side of overestimating the cost of tweaking the model if you possibly can (because you will probably fail in the attempt anyway), and if you find yourself outside the prison, if you see an opportunity to act which is likely to help and unlikely to hinder, heavily weight your preferences toward taking it, rather than trying to make sure you should. Quantity over quality; it is a provably better cognitive habit to make many mistakes than to wait until you have a perfect plan.

The time that passes as you do things other than actively and visibly and tangibly fighting death and suffering in all its forms is a sunk cost. It is a fallacy that will drive you into irrationality and error to weight it so highly that it outweighs all the factors you actually do have any control over in your decision making.

The only choices you can really make are between the opportunities you actually see, to influence outcomes you actually have the power to affect.

And, actions taken to sustain yourself, your life, your sanity and in fact also your morale, are instrumentally necessary to preserving your own capacity to fight death and continue to fight death into the future.

You cannot stand to fight if you have laid down to die with the first of your fellow-soldiers to fall, out of compassion or love for them.
So get up. I will not tell you not to remember the dead and the dying.
But we fight for the living.

I decided to borrow that line from a video game trailer. It's been used in other contexts as well, but this is the one where I personally first saw it. a damn good line, in my opinion. Hell, it's a damn good motivational video.

I would not have communicated it in quite these words when I first built the question over five years ago. I had not even read HPMoR up to the Stanford Prison Experiment arc (where a call-to-action is realized in pretty similar terms) yet at that time.

If I had, I probably would not have constructed the question this way, as it would have felt like a form of plaigiarism.

Dear Memory: Panic Attack

I have continued to be largely passive, skipping a fair few of my classes, playing video games with most of my time. I feel some pressure about school responsibilities, and more pressure about dealing with the applications to Irish colleges, but it is rarely enough to move me to action.

On the other hand, yesterday I had a visit with my counsellor. It cheered me up quite a bit at the time, just being listened to as I discussed some of the issues in my past that I had been unpacking with a new friend as well, who I have come to call Stars. I also did quite a bit of talking with my landlord about the matter of my roommates semi-regularly bringing people into the house late at night and talking loudly without any forewarning.

Then I played Don't Starve Together with a friend of mine, and watched GrimithR streaming Spooky's Jump Scare Mansion. I participated quite a bit in chat and enjoyed the stream. I experienced waves of fatigue several times, but at the end of the stream, I nevertheless spent another bunch of hours gaming on my own before I slept.

I slept long and through the morning, through my morning class and my early afternoon volunteering hour, although I woke up for brief minutes twice when someone slammed the door coming or going. I woke just as one of my one-hour classes would have been starting. I did not elect to rush to attend it. I prepared some soup. I went to my last class of the day, and participated somewhat in discussions, trying to keep up and catch up with information I had missed from previous classes. Sometimes my questions had a fairly obvious answer. I shrink in my seat, I rub my arms frequently, once I make a soft whining noise without meaning to. I feel intensely self-conscious and uncomfortable. I feel myself come close to hyperventilating a little, but I think unless someone was staring at me instead of the lesson, they probably would not notice.

It is tempting to flee home and into the distraction of video games, and the soothing of familiar voices preventing my brain from doing much with words, and some nice hot soup. I stay for the class, feeling panicky and feeling as though forcing myself to stay is almost a form of self-flagellation. Yet, at the same time, I am learning, becoming acquainted with some systems of accounting which are worthy of my attention. Pity my attention is scattered and split. Why is my capacity for enduring my classes so decimated lately? What's wrong with me...?

I stay, I follow along with the work. I comprehend what we're talking about, although I am extremely distracted and feel somewhat nauseous. I turn my mind tentatively to the question of Ireland and wonder a little whether I will really make it. I suppose there is room for doubt. It is a component of experience. This does not mean, necessarily, that I will not. I just feel so feeble right now.

Dear Memory: Night Vale and Daytime Dreams

Dear memory...

I have been bingeing on Welcome to Night Vale, as well as the Sims, lately, as I have shifted into a state of rest and reluctance to apply myself to anything. However, and perhaps unusually, I am mostly enjoying the rest, and the opportunity to let my mind and body be comparatively still. Perhaps, I have been overextending myself recently, and it is important to allow myself a time to pull in on myself.

I think of you often. Night Vale reminds me of you... since, of course, you were the person who originally showed it to me. I am up to episode 74 now, and when I heard the announcement describing the dog park, repeated almost exactly word for word from the pilot, I went back and listened to part of the pilot again to confirm that it actually was almost exactly word for word.

I remembered hanging out in your bedroom. I remembered commenting that the segment featuring advice to parents while bringing their children to play in the scrublands had some very genuinely sensible advice in it. It felt strange to remember so vividly a thing that happened about three quarters of a year ago, but then... My memories of my time with you are vivid. More vivid than usual, and my memories and imaginings are usually... vivid. Emotional intensity, I am sure, has a significant amount to do with memory formation and retention. That which a person feels strongly about, in any way, their brain will register as important, and reinforce.

You have always been important to me.

I think of you much, recently.

I have had strange dreams, the past couple of days (I had four days off of school in a row, and started sleeping during the day again; I have been unable yet to stop sleeping during the day, and this has contributed to my recent retreat into myself). Twice in a row... I think... My dreams involved getting to know a person, and winding up lying with that person and kissing them. The person was not you. The person was different in each dream, and represented a real person that I recognize, and sort of know, and have sort of liked, but not someone at all close to me. A YouTuber I occasionally watch, and a classmate I never really talked to much, but had a slight crush on for a time.

It feels strange to have my dreams repeat themes so strongly like that. I miss kissing you. I miss kissing anyone, really. It's been quite some time since I have. None of the people I know that I would want to kiss and feel comfortable trying to do so are here in London with me. Perhaps the dreams are simply an expression of desiring that kind of physical contact again. And yet, there was something about both of them that seemed as though they were trying to retell the story of my meeting you, and becoming involved with you. In one case, I asked the dream-partner to let me have a moment to process my feelings, after I had somewhat unexpectedly wound up kissing him, and I thought about you. In my dream. And whether I was okay with this, given how much I still miss you.

I have been very passive lately, but aside from a sense of slightly concerned pressure about an assignment which is due in two days, I'm not worried or upset about it. I was working hard for the first few weeks of the term, and we really didn't get much of a winter break at all this year. It's been very tense and active at school since the strike ended three months ago. It seems I am well able to forgive and tolerate myself taking time off to just relax for a while. I believe with some quiet, non-dramatic confidence that I will be able to pick up and start working again, once it becomes necessary for me to do so to keep pace with the course and continue to perform at my high standards for myself.

When I listen to Welcome to Night Vale recently, I snarl and giggle more often and with slightly less care to ensure no-one is close by to notice. I feel fairly peaceful with my own acknowledged, adopted, personally delighted in creepiness. I feel happy about my friends, who know that it is part of me, and love me no less. I have one person in particular who tells me that they really value the fact that when they talk to me, some of the things I say reflect a darker side to the world that they don't notice until I point it out. But he appreciates being able to see it, like a shape on the other side of the water, behind the clearer reflection of his own light, his own experience, his own face. Enlightening, endarkening, as he says.

It is... beautiful... to have contexts available to me in which this tendency of mine; although it arises quite naturally out of my perspective, and simply sharing the way I see the world and what things mean to me; is acknowledged and appreciated as a service.

I miss you. I hope that you are well. I look forward hopefully and with quiet, distant excitement to the time when I can speak to you again.

Burn Out - Oceans

I woke up this morning feeling really exhausted, and very much wanting to go back to sleep. My system reacted to waking up before it was ready with awful indigestion that kept me returning to the bathroom five minutes after leaving it, until my gut and intestines were acclimatized to my being awake. I had a class to go to. No time to go back to sleep.

While in the bathroom though, I noticed a little detail of definition, a little inward crease running vertically down the center of part of my chest, that I had never noticed before. I've only worked out in my new routine three times so far. Is it possible it could already have made a visible difference somewhere? Perhaps I'm just more inclined to notice details of my body now. However, this is interesting. I might keep looking for new or developing details.

I'm pleased to report that on my days between workouts, I am looking forward to going back, although the curl-ups and shoulder presses are still kicking my ass pretty hard. If my tolerance for them seems to worsen, or fails to get noticeably better for another week or so, I will talk to a coach about it.

I had been looking at Thursday as my second-longest day of classes in the new term. However, it actually seemed pretty forgiving today. The law class I'm taking seems to emphasize different areas of focus than the previous law class, despite using the same textbook. This is cool. I expected to already know this stuff more than what I actually do, which demonstrates that the re-learning and reinforcement will be valuable.

For the last few days, I've been jamming a lot to a song called Burn Out, by Beatdrop, one of the artists I got a free taste of by supporting OCRemix before they got full charitable organization status. It may be one of the first dubstep type songs I've been tempted to try to sing along to. Admittedly, most of the dubstep I've heard doesn't have lyrics. The whole Revolution album has a pretty good pace and tone for my recent start on working out, and continuing to write and complete checklists, pushing to get quite a lot done. It's honestly been a pretty awesome week, but I haven't been getting enough sleep lately, and it's starting to take a toll in the mornings.

A classmate let me borrow her Intermediate Accounting textbook to photocopy pages full of exercises; I bought an old version which doesn't have the same questions in the same order, and the solutions are in an online key only provided for the current version, so if I want to have practice work I can actually check answers to, I'm going to need them.

Actually, this connects back to a weird story. Yesterday was a very packed-full day for me. I had stayed up very late having an awesome conversation with a couple of old friends and someone I had spoken to once about six months ago, but saw online and decided to try asking to play Xyzzy so that we had enough players for a game. The game went great, and we just kept talking. I have found a new awesome person. I also realized that I have been establishing a collection of awesome people and storing them in a little place of my own. I left Ashlynn's Discord server a while ago, having grown increasingly detached and alienated from the community there. Now... I'm building my own. Around the kind of friends I want to have. Some of them I found there. Some, I found in other places. I have my own curated pack of friends. That's... really cool. That's leadership I guess.

So, having stayed up late, I slept in and didn't have as much time as I had originally expected to do everything I planned to do. A session of homework, a meeting with one of my professors to talk about promoting me, my workout session, a bunch of classes, and a household meeting.

I started with homework and did some exercises from my non-current textbook. It was published in 2013, and some of the questions were exactly the same as the ones in the current version which we had taken up in class together, except for the dates, which had been edited to be one year in the future relative to the publishing date of each.

The last question I attempted to answer before heading out for my meeting involved parental leave. I don't really know how to account for parental leave yet. When is it paid out? Periodically throughout the leave? All at the beginning? All at the end? I acknowledged that I didn't know, but decided to attempt to answer the problem using the presumption that it would all be paid at the end. Unlikely, but it was the kind of book keeping I'd been dealing with the most. 17 weeks of parental leave, starting Dec 1, 2014. Okay. Excel, how many days is 17 weeks? So, I need to accrue 31 days of benefits within December and the 2014 year. That leaves 88 more days into 2015, and the last journal entry should be dated...

Um...

March 29th... My birthday. Specifically, my twenty-fifth birthday. Specifically, that one particular day that I started out by staring at my ceiling for half an hour, contemplating my accomplishments at my entry-level retail job and how poorly I felt I was treated there. My ambitions and whether I would ever do anything with any of them. That was the day that, ultimately, that I decided I was going to stop working as a stocker/cashier/donor greeter and go to college.

That... was a really creepy date to show up in my accounting homework. And... if it hadn't been this version of Intermediate Accounting Vol. 2 that I happened to find and picked up at the used textbook shop... it wouldn't have.

And with that bizarre experience feeling strangely profound and important in my head, considering how far I've come, and how many fascinating things I've been through in the past going-on-three years, I headed off to my meeting and told my professor the story of what had just happened.

Today, I actually included "rest and relax" on my list of things to do today. I'm not sure I've done much resting, but I have taken the day happy, and am not stressing myself out taking on more homework.

Law was fine and interesting, and then I went to the first of my Tax classes for this term. My Tax professor is a woman with a fairly thick Bahamas accent who blazes through slides so fast that sometimes I lose track of what she's talking about entirely while trying to figure out what she just said. However, after the lecture, we got to practice, and the practice was actually very clear, and hands-on, with checks and feedback at every step and a clear procedure to follow. I made forms with in-cell equations in Excel that filled themselves out with just a few inputs from the question, and was able to finish several exercises that followed the same pattern very quickly, then spent some time making the spreadsheets beautiful while the rest of the class caught up.

There was a concert at the school this evening, called the "Upside Get Down", featuring three bands I had never heard of: Kid Royal, Chad Price, and Texas King. Tickets were free, and I've kind of committed to participating more in the culture of the college, since I moved right across the street. It was one of the best things about Gate Lodge. I should milk it for what it's worth here too. I invited Ampersand, a local friend and crush, to come with me. He came to my house to hang out a bit beforehand. We shared fries and dumplings and played Ultimate Chicken Horse and watched a bit of TierZoo, then headed to the concert and listened to the opening band play.

They were pretty unpolished, amateurish in both lyrics and performance, and the speakers turned the music into a wall of noise whenever they decided to rock harder for a climactic moment. Not... bad, though. There was some ambition to try things that were difficult, and while the performance wasn't tight yet, I felt that these guys could be on their way towards becoming great. I kept wondering whether Ampersand was having a good time, and tapping my foot, swinging my hip, wanting to get more into the music, wishing people around me were dancing so that I could dance and not be the first one trying to. Wondering whether I was having a good time, mostly feeling tense and affectionate as over-amped love songs, and the lights, and sound loud enough I felt the rhythm hitting my breastbone like waves crashing onto a shore, created an atmosphere of awkwardness and tense romantic potential.

After the set, which Kid Royal closed well, with the best song of the bunch, I took Ampersand away from the noise. His knees were sore, he was getting tired. It had been fun and the music was pretty good, but he wanted to turn in and get some rest. Yeah, okay. It was fun. I walked him back to his car, and hugged him and waved goodnight with thanks for coming, then stood outside for a bit, wondering whether I wanted to go back to the rest of the concert.

After some indecision I did. However, the college doors had locked, and now it was a matter of finding an entrace that had student card access, as many of them don't. The easiest route to the concert was blocked by a security guard in blue who stiffly turned away anyone attempting to enter the free concert through an entrance which had been inexplicably designated exit only. In order to attend, you had to enter from the West, and either have someone open the nearest door from the inside for you (since it lacked a card access point) or detour the long way around the outside of the Student Union Building.

To be honest, this encounter seriously diminished what little was left of my interest in seeing the rest of the concert. However, I found my way to the allowed and intended entrance and inside just in time to hear the second band announce and perform their last song of the set, a song called... "Oceans". I stayed and listened, and softened and enjoyed. In contrast to their openers, this guy, Chad Price, and his band... They had polish. They didn't make the speakers emit a raw mess of noise at their dramatic moments, but made good use of silence to frame sound. His style includes a lot of shifting and bending his pitch around and stretching out vocal tones to play around the rhythm. A lot of people try to do that and it's something I often find pretentious and pointlessly frilly. But he built his style around it, made it fit, and kept the rhythm tight while playing around it. They were good. And it was a really nice love song.

This, I decided. This made a good end to the concert, for me. And I headed home, happy to have returned for that one special song. I found it on YouTube. I sent the link to Ampersand, to share that part of the concert with him in some sense too, and I reflected that... It had sounded better live, something I was delighted to be able to observe. I'm going to download this one. I'm going to make it my song of the day today on Facebook.

It's been a good day.

Also I misplaced my smartphone sometime between my tax class and the concert. I'm not particularly concerned, though. I'll probably find it again tomorrow, and I don't actually use it as a phone anyway, I mostly just listen to podcasts with it.

Final Exam

Before writing the exam:

The first exam I took in this same testing room was in much different circumstances, just a few students here.

Today, I arrived just on time, and had to wait in line to be processed for about ten minutes, then sit and log in to a computer and wait again until one of the staff on duty here comes to open my exam with the password for me. Five minutes? Ten? I brought a Monster drink with me, and I consider that there is some risk of my being distracted during the test by a need to pee. I wait anxiously for my chance to begin.

I did not study much for this, but I did put in a solid two hours from home this afternoon before coming here, to get my brain back in the practice of the course's exercises and ready. I've got my depreciation pretty well down, from the looks of it, although I'm still a little confused about some methods of tracking impairment. The review document was about half depreciation, with some impairment and capitalisation of intangible assets and goodwill.

-----
After writing the exam:

It went pretty much as expected. I did have to pee for about half of the duration, but regained my focus thoroughly enough to get through the test and answer every part neatly and thoroughly. In a couple of matters, I put a great deal of work into applying all the details of a theory that I wasn't sure was actually the right theory to apply. The doubt was a difficulty, but I overcame it to make my explanations thorough, if it turns out they were the right ones. All in all, I think I can feel fairly confident of earning at least an 80% on the final exam and on the course in general. Grade A, although not A+. I'm happy with that.

I came back from the college hungry and shaky with caffeine jitters, chatted to my roommates, ate some spaghetti, and then retired to play Drawful and Xyzzy with a few close friends for several hours. It was an excellent evening of gaming. My friend Lyric stormed the first game of Xyzzy, reaching 12 points and victory while everyone else was back at 6 or so, and then we played another one, to 15, and it was my turn to have an awesome winning streak. I closed the game with a blank card and a reference to a theme about sandwiches having voting rights which had been established in the previous round. The last winning combination of the game was "WHY DO YOU HATE SANDWICH FREEDOM?" ...And I was very, very happy with that as a cap to it all.

The relief of being finished the term at last is tremendous and happy and floaty. I look forward to a short rest from active enforced schoolwork, and a fresh start to the next.

I will take a couple of days to just relax, if I feel like I need them, and will make a point of prioritizing checking out free available classes at the school's fitness center, and preparing for Pathways Week.

... It's been a good day.

Dear Memory: A Turn to Hope

Today, I did some research into Irish accounting organizations and immigration. I reached out to someone at Fanshawe whose card was given to me by a pathways advisor, and recieved pretty much the best possible news I could have hoped for regarding my plan to return to Ireland.

OSAP does offer support for people studying outside of Ontario, outside of even Canada. There are already a couple of Irish institutions on their list of approved colleges and an appeals process for adding more. I feel... a little embarrassed. I had been so intimidated at the thought of this being difficult that it took me quite some time to really work up the courage and get past the procrastination to do some looking... and find that this may indeed be much easier than I thought.

For most of today I have been in an energetic cloud of hope and happiness. Fantasies rush upon me of announcing on Facebook that I would be returning to Ireland. Of being able to make the journey less than a year from now. Of meeting you again...

Last night, I stayed up late chatting with two of my friends, and we had an awesome conversation, discussing everything from the community management snafu surrounding Roko's Basilisk, some theory on the nature of dimensions and different kinds of infinity... And lots of asides and jokes and... Damn, it's good to have conversations like that. It's been so long. I should get those two to hang out with me more often. ♡

So even though I was woken up early by a roommate's phone call... I didn't really mind. I like my new roommates, and am more inclined to make allowances and feel tolerant towards their impact on my life. Besides, I knew she would be getting up early, and I had stayed up late. It's just a pity these friendly girls will all be leaving in two weeks.

Classes today were fun. Conversation Circles was easy, and as always a valuable exercise in exposure to other cultures. And I even finished my daily checklist. Well, almost; the shop I went to to drop off some electronics for recycling had closed down, but that isn't my own fault; I give myself credit for doing the thing. A setback will require me to do it over again, that's all.

And at the end of the day, I am altogether too proud of myself for a horrible pun I managed to put at the end of my short Microeconomics assignment, about the direct distribution razor company, Harry's, needing to continue to manage their brand positioning as new companies try to copy their distribution model, to maintain their 'edge'.

Visiting Facebook briefly to post a song of the day there which happened to be in my head, I scrolled through my history and paused at your name. I followed it to see a few more recent pictures of you, dear memory. However, I feel it's something I probably shouldn't have done. It felt creepily stalker-ish, although there was really very little to see. I think... Until my plan for return is set up and in motion, I should keep myself away.

When I have my plane ticket, my approval for funding, and it is time to break the silence... When I get the long-awaited treat of greeting you and asking whether you can meet me in a couple of weeks, when I will be there... Ah, hasten the day. Four years, I would despair of. Eight or nine months... I think I can bear with much better grace. Ah, if only. If only you could see me now, perhaps. If only you knew I was coming back for you.

But I am not allowed to tell you, and I cannot know that it would be for the better if I could.
Someday, I will come back, and probably look over any tracks you have left recently as of that time. Hints that you are, or are not, still in Athlone. Hints that you are, or are not, in a new relationship. But that day is a long way off yet. My heart has been crying desperately through much of the day, but not so much in sorrow. It is a desperate, dizzying hope and joy-of-hope, and it repeats: I love you! I love you! I love you!

I must retain my composure, and keep my head about me. My heart, though, flaps about in giddy circles like a bird on a leash. Here, and with my friends, I can speak of it honestly. Here, I dare to express my inner melodrama. Those who do not want it have no reason to come.

Goodnight, distant Memory. I still have not made up for the lost sleep. But I am happy, with the affection of real friends. It is great solace to remember, to experience, that you are not the only one who can listen with love, who can make me laugh, and invite me out to laugh at myself. I am happy, and that is better than sleep. I will catch up on it tonight, or the following night.

Dear Memory: Little Reminders

Dear Memory;

I have been going through my days trying to be dutiful and get things done that need doing. I set myself some bit of schoolwork, and to continue steadily packing my things into boxes for the move on January first. I have returned to tracking my activities in a variety of categories by scoring myself points for them day by day, and have gotten better about recording each day either in the day itself, or the day after while memory is still fairly reliable.

For the past couple of weeks, I have been repeatedly been reminded of you in a painful little way when I pull up the sheet to record my points. For the past couple of weeks I have been wanting to mention it here, but my writing has taken a different direction and it seemed a bad time. My document is divided by weeks, not by months, and it starts each week on the Wednesday, simply because it was a Wednesday back in July when I first thought up the system and decided to use it.

So, since early November, every time I have returned to the document to record points, in the first visible area of the sheet which Google docs must sit on for a moment while it loads, in the small description box under Oct 30 has been the text, "farewell to Fish", my recording of the most notable thing to have happened on that given day. It has given me little pangs over and over again to see it. In another couple of weeks I will be on a new sheet and past it, but it is something that turned my mind to you in a particularly bittersweet way since the silence fell.

Another thing has been the audiobooks that I have been listening to. Jane Austen, old classic literature that I got from freeclassicaudiobooks.com. The quality of the reading is often not very good, but I have been enjoying the stories anyway. Of course, Pride and Prejudice rang quite close to home with the wondering whether someone far away actually loves one, and still loves one after mistakes and obstacles have fallen between you. Now I am listening to "Emma", and I think it has not really gotten into its strength yet. Still, today I was almost vexed to find all of a sudden one third of the way through a part of it about some young lady being anxious to go back to Ireland to return to her family. It begins to be irritating how many things casually spring up to point there, all because it means so much to me now.

Earlier, this morning, while going through my things to pack and sort them for the move, I found another reminder. Of course, there are many among my things, so that's no surprise. For instance, I still keep a bus ticket that brought me once from Dublin Airport out to Athlone. But this is a special one, a precious one. I found those little slips of paper, bundled together, that I saved from our exercise of suggesting things to do together. I looked through them all, remembering and wondering. Such sweet, humble little things are written there. Some of them, we did do, I think, after writing them. We went to a restaurant, for one. Humble little dreams, affectionate wishes for happy times future. I keep them still. I will probably bring them with me when I come back over the sea. Perhaps there is yet the chance to see each one fulfilled. Perhaps.

Forgiving Mentors, Relentless Longing

It is the second day of classes resuming, and much of the miserable doubt and worry of the empty time during the faculty strike is lifting surely as our professors reassure us, cut out small pieces of the courses, and focus the first week largely on review. Every gesture shows understanding and mediation for the difficulties of resuming after such a long interruption. My intermediate accounting professor, having read an email I sent him telling him that my morale and confidence had been very low trying to navigate his online course with the textbook alone, thanked me for my refreshingly candid words and invited me to sit in on classes in person. It is all a soothing balm to my troubles.

Sadly, the professors themselves may have had little relief from theirs. The strike's disputes were not resolved, and there is some worry that this might all repeat in another four years, after the new contracts expire again, and they must meet to agree on terms of renewal again.

My spirits are higher, and I look forward to moving into a very nice house directly across from the campus, the nicest I have lived in... Looking back, and looking back further, it may be fair to say that it is the nicest looking and most modernly appointed house I have ever lived in in Canada. My parents' houses were a welcome home to me, but simple. My new room will have an ensuite bathroom, and the kitchen has a central island and two big fridges to accomodate I think five female tenants.

Through all that, though, my thoughts remain restlessly and inexorably drawn back to Eoin and distant Éire. It feels to me as though the memory of him stands always behind my shoulder. When my mind wanders, it wanders to dreams of return, and meeting with him again, with much tear and hope and fear, desperate to know what his answer will be...

It has been three weeks since our last goodbye, and since the law of silence has been set between us. These last few days have tested my will to adhere to that law. I felt that I was doing fair well, for a little while, at looking to my own life alone, although it was a miserably empty stretch of life indeed with neither love nor work nor school to sustain me. I took up to make a game to run for friends, which I have nicknamed the SCDP game, a Super Casual Drop-in Pick-up game of Pathfinder such that I can run it and invite people to play it without a set group or a set schedule. I finally finished writing all the stats for available player characters to the website I'll be using just a day or two before the return to classes, and I have not played it yet. I am not certain I will even get the chance, but the project was something with which I might hope to enjoy the social attentions of friends.

At some point, perhaps a week ago... I lost track of the empty days for a while, so I am not sure... I was re-watching a bunch of video reviews, and one of them ambushed me with the high, haunting and familiar voice of Loreena McKennitt and the sweet melancholy violins of Irish tradition behind her. I knew the song, The Old Ways, I had heard it and loved it and felt magnificently drawn by it from my early youth. It hit me like a hammer blow, and broke open yet again any thought that I could deny my desperate want to go back there, back over the bounding waves to the distant shore of a land I have always loved, in music and legend, and the man I loved who lives there.

Eoin could not promise me any answer. It has been three weeks since I last heard his voice, and now at last doubt begins to creep back, and I begin to worry and wonder. We knew each other scant three months, and it is already past that long ago. Even if I do make my way back to that great isle, and see his face again... If it is a year, if it is several, how could I expect him to look on me as other than a sad and obsessed woman whose storms and ferocity he may have been glad to be rid of?

But. I know with enough confidence to say that I know... whatever may happen in the coming years, at the time three weeks ago when he bid me leave him be, Eoin was yet undecided. If he had in his mind any certain answer, I know with confidence he is too good and honest a man not to have given it. When last he spoke to me, there was love enough in him, and perhaps also longing of his own, that he was not set against seeing me again someday. He was not sure what he would feel. If it had been more honest to tell me he would rather never see me again, for all the pain it may have cost him, I am sure he would have said it anyway.

So. What his answer will be, I cannot know until I have heard it from his own lips. I cannot hear it until I go there, for until I am there, he cannot know himself whether he will be willing to bring me close again. As I walk out from my house into the cold, bare young-winter, gazing up at the steely light where the sun shines through the thinnest parts of the grey clouds, returning at long last to my studies with the weight of my work things at my back... As I walk the cold and formal halls of my college, which now seems too large and too impersonal... I know that Eoin is not the only or the first man for whom I have felt this utter determination, the deep and aching sense that I would be willing to do nearly anything to see him smile at me again. I feel rather as though I will set my determination to heading there, but do it all with a sheepish apology to him, and hope he will not feel my devotion cheap because he has not been the only one to inspire it.

I know my will, though mighty, is shifting. I know I may look back on these words with embarrassment and a shake of the head that I was so caught up in love and grief. Still, from here, as of now, I am determined by all the madness of my heart and a relentless longing in my bones to go back to Ireland, to distant Éire, and find out what his answer will be. I know that to do any different while I feel as I do would be to rend apart my nature, to bury my desire and smash my compass, and live as someone I am not. It would not be a story worth telling. Better to go, full of all my courage and wild strength, and profess myself to him as simply and as gently as I can, even if the answer I find is to be turned away as a nuisance, and go back to the rocky path of lonesomeness, to stalk on like a restless ghost and seek on anew for someone who will at long last stand and travel by my side.

So every day, whether I resist it or not, my thoughts wander back again when I am not looking, and I imagine living in love with him again; or I imagine troubles there might be in trying to get in touch after I land; or I imagine cautiously studying his eyes when he first sees me again, asking how things have changed, what shape his life has taken, and trying to learn whether there is room for me in it; Or of being greeted with a kiss and falling into desperate tears, begging to know if he meant by it that I would be given a chance to stay this time. Sometimes I imagine talking to a border guard of my intent to immigrate. Sometimes I imagine talking to a representative of an accounting firm for which I intend to work in Ireland in an interview about my reasons for coming. But it is always something, and it always pulls my view East, across the ocean, with the call of the bounding sea.