Thoughts on the Journey

Today I did one of my goals for yesterday and posted on my librarian blog; What I don't have to explain: Yuletide and Chessiecon. This post has been in my thoughts for a long time but it happened to coincide well with the youth media awards and I feel like I put across my thoughts in a way I like.

The State of the Union was powerful, I felt like he's done a lot and now I'm watching Hamilton videos on youtube and on Thursday I'll see Fiddler on the Roof. Words have such power and speaking them to audiences changes the chemistry in ways that I love.

What makes you fannish? And by that we mean, what is it about a tv show/movie/book/band/podcast/etc that takes you from, "Yeah, I like that," to "I need MOAR!!!" Is it a character? A plotline? The pretty? Subtext that’s just screaming to be acknowledged?

In your own space, tell us what it is that gets you to cross that line into fandom.

For me, this is all about character, if I believe that there are people who feel true and a world that does the same then I'm hooked. Just this year, I fell into Sense8, first season of Friday Night Lights, and was reminded how much I adore musical theater fandoms like Les Mis and Guys and Dolls with Hamilton, always Hamilton. There are others but these ones come to mind first. Honestly, I haven't watched the second season of Friday Night Lights because I don't know if I'm ready for what's going to happen to the characters. Its the double edged sword part of how I love fandoms, I care so much that I sometimes hold back for fear of what happens to them.

Though the times when the creators just land it like Seanan McGuire with the newest October Daye books where it breaks my heart but I love it, I want all the fic and meta. Star Wars too, I started falling back in love with Star Wars thanks to first the X-Wing novels and then the Clone Wars series which I'm now rewatching and its the depth of it all. If there's a larger world and characters I can wonder about then I'll go into fic.

This has been a good year in fandom for me, I keep remembering a new fandom that clicked for me like Check Plase! or Miss Fisher's Murder Mysteries then Yuletide goes, look, you're not alone. This is one of my more rambling answers but for me, it all comes down, do I care, do I want to know more?

My week is off to a good start, I have plans for my interview tomorrow and am about to buy some new luggage for my trip at the end of the month. Think good thoughts for me tomorrow at 1 pm. Today's question for snowflake_challenge is one that I find interesting.

Day 5

In your own space, talk about your fannish origin story. How did you come to fandom, why did you choose your fannish name, do you have more than one secret identity?

Fandom's always been there for me even though I didn't truly understand what it was that I was connecting to until college.

As a little girl, I fell in love with Paul Creswick's Robin Hood, the N.C. Wyeth illustrations pulled me into a different world. Robin Hood is still that touchstone story for me, I get annoyed at retellings I don't like, but love talking about what works and what doesn't. At the same time and earlier, I was reading through and having read to me the Narnia books. There was a day camp I went to where a part of every day was being read to. This wonderful man named King who had a deep voice and a beard read the Narnia books, that was where I learned the love of sharing books with others. Also at this same time, I was watching Star Trek: The Next Generation, which combined with Robin Hood inspired my first works of fanfic. Will Scarlett ending up on the Enterprise and being friends with Wesley Crusher through weird magic. I used to write in the back of my school notebooks, have the notebook open, flip to the back and write stories there then turn to the notes when I needed to take them. In a box, I still have these old school notebooks and later all the journals people gave me full of words.

At the age of twelve, I went to this wonderful summer program, Longacre where another world of interacting and creating opened up to me through playing Dungeons & Dragons. My first character and still the only one I've ever played in D&D was a half-elf bard and I made up a backstory for her that my GM liked so much, she started at level 5. That GM taught me that its possible to step into a world with words and that dice and all are beside the point, he also lent me R.A. Salvatore books to show me how rich the D&D world was. I was also taking theater classes and thinking about the importance of background, how even if you don't hear the details, every character has their backstory.

By the time I started doing LARPing and entered the World of Darkness, the idea of being able to write a history for my character was natural. The World of Darkness showed me a wider way of interacting as there were rulebooks, novels, pins, all this wonderful stuff that came along with this world. Then the internet was there and I could see other fans, I once even tried RPing in the offical Star Trek chatroom like set ups.

In college, I found Harry Potter and then an amazing friend showed me how to find fanfiction and I had that moment of oh, this is home. In the midst of writing papers, I would spend time on the Sugarquill while I ran my own Changeling: the Dreaming LARP and tabletop game. In my creative writing classes, I tried to slip the fantasy of Changeling: the Dreaming into my work. It only partly worked, Fangirl perfectly captured how some teachers don't get fantasy or fanfiction.

From that same friend after college, I was told about milliways_bar and learned that I could actually roleplay my favorite fandom characters. I began with Will Scarlett and now play ten characters. Milliways brought me friends who shared where they wrote and suddenly I was sharing my own fanfiction, first on my LJ, then later on Ao3 and participating in Yuletide, Narnia Fic Exchange, Ineedmyfics and ficathons.

My user name ceitfianna was created my sophomore year of college, my partner at the time had an LJ invite code. I thought it might be a good way to keep in touch while studying abroad in Greece. Ceit is the Scots Gaelic spelling for my first name, Kate, and one of the few languages I've found where I can find my name as it is. I'm a plain Kate, where its not short for anything. Fianna is the name of a mythic tribe of warriors in Ancient Ireland and a werewolf tribe from Werewolf: the Apocalypse. I honestly don't recall exactly why I decided to combine them, but its stuck and is how I'm known on LJ, DW and Twitter.

On Archive of our Own, my name FiKate is a reference to my AIM screenname which was the name of a character from a Werewolf: The Apocalypse game that only lasted one summer; Fiona. In Milliways, a huge amount of interaction happens in a chat room and since my screenname is Fiona, I was dubbed Fi. Yet there are Milliways' people who call me Kate and when I was creating my Archive of our Own name, I thought that I would combine them.

My Tumblr name on the other hand is something different as I didn't know how much it would connect to other areas of my life. Its atthelamppost as I'm currently feeling at a crossroads while I try to figure out a way to do what I love and be paid for it. Its inspired by Narnia, which is one of my oldest fandoms and one that I'm still a bit weird about. I haven't read The Last Battle, because when I was about eleven or twelve, I decided I didn't want the series to end. I'm 33 and still haven't read even though a little while ago, my father read through the entire series for the first time. Maybe I will someday. I've also considered getting a tattoo of the lamppost as an iconic image for me.

The last name I have online is for my librarian/professional blog, that I really need to update which is called nurturingstories. This is because I consider myself a storyteller and a good teacher and librarian is all about stories. We all have our own stories and children's stories need to be nurtured to allow them to grow.

I had a good day, I woke up and went to the local library for the volunteer appreciation meal. The food was delicious and there's such a wonderful community there, also my mentor recommended someone else to look over my resume. Then as a gift, I was given a small poinsettia, which made me smile.

Sadly there was a low point when I went to Starbucks before heading to see Frozen. I was sitting and reading and the couple sitting next to me was awful, everything they said was a variation on things used to be better and 'these people' covering migrants, young people, women and even soldiers didn't appreciate what they have. The bit that made me truly consider speaking up was how the man was going on about how in the 1950s suddenly housewives lives were so much easier they had nothing to do but spend their time lazing around all day. After all that was what it seemed like his mother was doing and that women might say they wanted equality but if offered a pedestal, they would hop right up. Somehow the woman he was with kept nodding and not disagreeing, I didn't get it but it did end. It made it hard for me to concentrate on my reading and those of you on Twitter saw my grumbling, because honestly wanting to be respected and paid well isn't being entitled. This shouldn't be that hard.

After I went off to see Frozen which was wonderful. I loved how the heart of the movie was the sisters and trying to fix a broken family along with helping a kingdom. Also the chant/singing at the start and end of the movie gave me chills and seemed almost Polynesian. I don't know if I want the entire soundtrack but I get parts of it.

lady_bols: Favourite TV shows, at least three, and why you like them. <3

Now for the question for the December meme, this is going to be hard one as I love a lot of shows. And the last few nights I've been dipping into Netflix Streaming which always reminds me of shows that I love but have forgotten so as with these others, these are the first few that I think of. If asked on a another day, the answer would be different.

Firefly: Created families and ensembles are some of my favorite things to see in a show and Firefly does them right. I also love cowboys and space cowboys are just better. I didn't see Firefly when it was on TV, but instead was introduced to it in New Zealand. Some of my friends there lent me their set and I marathoned all of them in I think two or three nights and fell in love. I adore all the relationships and thanks to Milliways have been able to see some of what else might happen. This is one of those cases where Milliways made me appreciate the show even more since the incredible players in Milliways expanded the world and added even more depth to what was there to begin with.

Buffy the Vampire Slayer: I started watching Buffy when it first aired but then stopped before getting reintroduced to it in college. I have a lot of good memories of watching Buffy life with friends and talking about how strange and wonderful it is. The friendships and loves feel real and while sometimes the plots are a bit silly, the heart is always there. Joss knows how to do ensembles. I've been reminded of Buffy mainly due to Tumblr where gifs of it keep appearing.

Elementary: I'm currently rather far behind on this show but I grew up watching Jeremy Brett's Holmes and I feel like this show captures the feel of the Holmses' stories. I love the push and pull of Joan and Sherlock as well as the sense that its actually happening in a New York City that I could visit. The mysteries aren't anything special but to me that's never been the point of the Holmes' stories, they're more about the back and forth of Holmes and Watson.

Teen Wolf: I marathoned this show because I was curious about where alexiscartwheel's Stiles came from. Then discovered it was on Netflix Streaming and lost a few nights sleep to it. I have a soft spot for shows about young people trying to grow up and find their way which Teen Wolf hits in a way I like. I appreciate the variety of families, how nothing is easily solved. It would be nice if the plots made more actual sense but Stiles and Scott, Scott and Allison, Mama McCall, Danny, Isaac, Derek and the rest of them make me happy. This is one of those shows that I would love to actually write some fanfic for as its all about friendship and love and family. I have a fanfic started crossing it over with Sleepy Hollow that I need to write more of.

TaleSpin: This is the show of my childhood from Disney Afternoon and I've bought some of the DVDs and would like to in time get the rest. Its a show about a created family set in a vaguely steampunk world and I love it. If I could ever figure out how to RP or properly write some of the fanfic in my head of it I would, but cartoon worlds are tricky to write.

There, that's the five that immediately come to mind and I feel like they give a good sense of the variety of what I watch. I do love reality TV shows but I don't come back to them as often as I do these.

I forgot to mention that I finally wrote an entry on my librarian blog that I've been meaning to since the start of November; Connecting through Art about the Film Festival I went to and a sculpture garden I went to after Thanksgiving.

This week the weather has turned, its been rainy, cloudy and windy every day. Its nice to have it feeling like Fall again but I think the grey has been dampening my mood slightly, which I don't like. Though I have been getting things done as I'm working on another job application and I need to do far more of them. They just never get easier, but other stuff is happening. My car is back and registered in Delaware and slowly, slowly all my ties to the bureaucratic stuff in Michigan is going away.

I signed up for Yuletide with many requests and offers because I kept noticing options that I hadn't seen before. I may regret this but I love the challenge of writing something I haven't written before, it makes me happy.

If you follow me on Goodreads, sorry about all the reviews this week, I'd fallen farther behind than I meant to but it did prompt a librarian post. Too Many Books to Review, I have another post I plan to write as well about how I keep getting into conversations with my parents friends about how can you read fantasy?

Let's see, the other good news is that the Age Spell plot has started in Milliways and I'm having a huge amount of fun with ten year old Charles.

My last couple of days have been a mix of lazy and not fun due to health. I spent last night coughing up far too much gunk from my throat and blowing the rest out of my nose. At the moment I'm feeling closer to normal but still worn out. For the Fourth, I did almost nothing which was what I needed after how busy the conference and travel were. This weekend, I'm getting a visitor who is all about a lazy time, which should be nice.

Though I'm not doing a lot, I have been getting things done. I completed the online application for the job I had an interview at, it was a really annoying form. One of those where it claimed to be saving it for you but really wasn't, but its done now. I've also added another part to my conference write up on my librarian blog about the school library program I went to.

Yesterday was wonderful in Milliways with the Hulk plot and me and Charles sharing hurting heads. I might end up opening that EP again today, last night I was too out of it to start more threads.

I have a number of writing projects that I need to get started on; book reviews on Goodreads, more conference write up and starting a fic for an exchange. In the spirit of help me find words, here's a meme I love from newredshoes:

Tell me about a story I haven't written, and I will give you 1-3 sentences (or more) from or about it.

I saw Iron Man 3 today and wow, Marvel stepped it up with that movie. I loved the arc and the set up and while there were some issues, it all came together in a wonderful way. I'm impressed and it was a great way to spend an afternoon.

A reminder too that I have a tumblr now called atthelamppost, I've been following everyone who's tumblr username I know. If I don't know yours, follow me and I'll follow you back. Mainly I'm just using it for pictures since its pretty but still seems awkward for conversations and trying out memes on it.

This weekend has been quiet for me, which is nice. Work is still being odd but I've put a few cover letters out into the world, I'm working on a library blog post about gaming and technology and plotting going to the ALA. The rest of this month is going to be strange as there will be AP tests and lots of end of the year things, which are going to feel bittersweet but I will cheer the kids and enjoy the moments.

At this point I have no idea what I'm going to end up doing for my birthday which is a month from now and the same weekend as the school's graduation and then the next week is the last week of school. I'm making a promise to myself that I will do something special for myself to celebrate it and not let any pain of this end of the year ruin it.

This FicFriday was quiet but I still ended up writing a few stories that I'm happy with. And I finished a draft of my queer fest fic, now it needs lots of editing, but it isn't due until May 26th, so there's time.

( FicFriday )

I hope everyone on the East Coast is safe, dry and warm, you guys are on my mind a huge amount. My parents are safe and farther inland in Southern Delaware, they lost power last night, but I got an email from my mom. They seem to be doing well. Michigan is feeling too far away from everyone at the moment, Sandy is making her presence known here with cloudy skies, wind that I can feel on my car and rain. When I wake up in the morning, it's hard to believe that it is morning since the clouds make everything dark. Apparently a school that we compete with lost power, but everything's holding here. Compared to what's happening elsewhere, we're getting off lightly. Everyone on the East Coast, keep on keeping safe.

In terms of moving, yesterday I signed my lease and I really like this apartment complex, the lease is easy to understand and was explained to me. My lease on Ann Arbor was printed with this tiny font that was hard to read, this one was over many pages and felt like it was to help me. I keep realizing that this place is a step up from where I lived in Ann Arbor in terms of space, the company and other things without actually paying that much more. The person I've been working with for moving in isn't that much older than I am, and helpful and sympathetic, as is everyone at school. It just makes me hopeful that this will be a good place for me to live.

On Thursday, I'm going to pay my first month's rent and get my key, but I don't know when I'll actually move in. Due to Sandy, the movers weren't able to pick up my stuff in Delaware and I don't know when they'll be able to. My plan for now is to keep staying in my hotel and possibly camp out in my apartment if I can get access to an aerobed. I'm so close to finally having my own apartment here, but as with a lot of parts of this job, for every step forward, I get three to the side, one to the back and a turn around. It's all completely possible to deal with, I'm just tired and miss having my stuff. Also all my winter clothes are in storage and I only brought some fall stuff with me and that means at the moment, I don't actually have a proper jacket just sweaters. Depending on where I am moneywise this weekend, I'll go to one of the local outfitter stores and get one. There, that's my whine for this entry.

Yesterday I began doing some decorating in my library, I went shopping at Michael's and bought some stuff just not enough. There's now this ribbon that looks like bloodstained printed paper on my bulletin board, a big Hobbit poster, foam, shiny leaves, shiny ribbon, a vase with glittery fake leaves, wooden ornaments of a finger, spider and an eye as well as an operator symbol made out of ribbon on the bulletin board. I want to get some more stuff to keep up the general fall theme but the space is challenging. The bulletin board is half papers posted for school information, half my own papers, so there's only so much space and then I have all these shelves and this big glass wall between the main library and the quiet room. It's challenging figuring out how best to use decorations and which ones to get, and you don't get a lot of ribbon when you buy a roll. I thought it would go farther. A student just asked me if I bought the Hobbit poster for the library and I told him where to get it. That's a great sign that I'm making the right choices. When I finally get a desk that will help a lot as that will be a space I can really own. I'll take pictures of everything and will do more next month.

I'm currently waiting on the okay of the various heads at work before I can post up my librarian blog post, but that will feel great to have up. Then I can start on the technology one and more moving forward.

The Slendyplot in Milliways is nearing an end and I'm looking forward to getting to read all of the threads, especially the final confrontation.

My body is being unhelpful this week, I didn't go to work on Thursday because I woke up feeling wobbly. Yesterday went okay but today I'm back to feeling out of it as my head hurts and I can't seem to find where my energy's gone off to. I apologize if I'm too quiet or snap a little bit, I haven't been feeling my best, but I'm trying to take care of myself.

I'm also worrying about lots of things even though I think I'm doing okay at work, there's just a lot to do. I have an idea for a librarian blog post of what I've done and what's in the works for this first month, but need to check with my supervisors if I should write it. As I'd like to use that blog to record some of the changes and things I notice at the school and my journey as I figure out how to do this. Writing is what helps me get through things and this is such a big job that I need to take time to stop and look at what I've done.

In good news, the roleplaying club is coming together and another student asked me to the supervisor for a video game club. I love that the kids get that I want to support them in their gaming and make it more a part of what happens at school. I just hope that I can get the teachers to see how gaming connects to the bigger conversation about living online and everything like that. It's just a lot and next week are parent-teacher conferences and I have no idea what I'll be doing during them, which is also stressful.

At Milliways, I'm loving the Slenderplot and so glad that people are willing to let Charles slip into their dreams as its a part of the way he works I find interesting. Will's not being as loud, but I'm hoping to get him more involved in the endgame as I love his connected with Jack of the Green. William's involved in a quiet way, which I like since the different levels to approach the plot are nice. Thank you misslucyjane for putting this together.

Yesterday was Friday, which means there was FicFriday and I wrote a nice variety.
( FicFriday )

I just wrote a new blog post on my librarian's blog that I'm happy about as I've had the idea since Sunday. It's over here at Go where you want to be on Wordpress.

I still have a fic that I really need to poke at but I'm quite happy with how this turned out as well as my Peggy, Natasha fic, that's Get Your Claws In, which is also about finding where you fit and not letting go. I will definitely be getting to more meme answers tomorrow as I work a five hour shift but just wanted to share this.

I will find the library I fit in and stay there.

GEMINI (May 21-June 20): Your core meditation this week is Oscar Wilde's
belief that disobedience is a primal virtue. Be ingeniously, pragmatically,
and cheerfully disobedient, Gemini! Harness your disobedience so that it
generates outbreaks of creative transformation that improve your life. For
inspiration, read this passage by Robert Anton Wilson: "Every fact of
science was once damned. Every invention was considered impossible.
Every discovery was a nervous shock to some orthodoxy. Every artistic
innovation was denounced as fraud and folly. The entire web of culture
and progress, everything on earth that is man-made and not given to us
by nature, is the concrete manifestation of someone's refusal to bow to
Authority. We would be no more than the first apelike hominids if it were
not for the rebellious, the recalcitrant, and the intransigent."

Well, Uncle Rob, I have no idea what to make of that. Today I feel the weight of summer and waiting to hear about the last job sitting on me alongside my body being sore and awful. I have all these ideas and worries swirling around in my head from working on XMFC plot stuff in Milliways and not wanting to be too bossy, but also going I want all the threads and overthinking to worrying about the last librarian blog post I wrote and was it too honest. I don't feel how to be terribly disobedient at the moment, but its something to think on. Maybe its a reminder to stop worrying so much about spending my tax refund and instead go, if I see something I should do it just like that. It might also be that I'm feeling a little sharp at the moment, mainly due to the waiting but its okay to say, this is what I need now.

Yesterday at the cookout, I was talking about the characters I roleplay and how I tend to play fixers who forget to look after themselves, mainly because this is the kind of person I am. Perhaps I'll take my coming birthday as an excuse to indulge and take care of myself first.

My birthday's coming up in under two weeks now and dodger_sister has offered to take me out to dinner or a movie, probably Snow White and the Huntsman, which sounds wonderful. Yesterday I hung out with her and various friends for a cookout and talking about family, fandom and playing the six degrees game with actors, which is hard. It was a really lovely day and life is overall good, today I just feel a little tired.