It's been a long time, friends. The first photos I uploaded to this FA were on April 9th, 2014; More than 10 years ago. Often these days, I find myself looking back on my previous work, and every time I'm astonished at my growth as an artist; at how much I was able to accomplish with the shabby equipment I had. There's definitely a lot of flops and photos that I think are in poor taste and should be deleted, but I can never bring myself to do so. They're part of my story, and as I age, I find it harder and harder to remember some of these finer details. I decided to read through my oldest surviving journals from 2019 and it genuinely feels like a different person is talking. I've changed so much in 10 years; part of that is terrifying, and yet part of it is beautiful. I'm not where my younger self thought I would be, that's for certain. Many of the things I've tried have failed and I'm still stuck in thee same apartment I was in 2018. My path forward is unsteady, but it is a path of my passion. That's never led my astray, has it? haha.

10 years of photography. Saying it out loud really gut checks me. It's older than any other skill I have, and so I figured I ought to stop shitting around on FA and maybe try to make some money with it. I invested in a few lenses and a body back in. . . twenty-twenty-something, and my latest photos have all been with them. I recently invested in my first telephoto lens for wildlife photography. I might be able to use it for sports, as well. I'm actually reading a book about my camera body specifically to learn a few new things about it. I wont be able to make a living off of this, of course, but it will take me places outside and expand my world and pay me extra for all my trouble.

I've failed as a motorcycle mechanic, I've failed as an electronics technician, and I've failed as an HVAC technician, too. I've decided to hang up my blue collar. Working for other people, seeing all my time and energy disappear. . . it hasn't been working. I must forge my own way through life while I'm still young enough to change, and damn it, I will. I've grown closer to nature with time, as is evidenced by my almost exclusive portfolio of wildlife photos. I've been involved in environmental movements and politics. The last few years, I've also learned so much about biology, ecology, and chemistry. I discovered that I like growing things and being outside in the wild. So, what did I do with this new conditioning? Well, I signed up for an urban agriculture internship, of course! And checked out a few books on the subject. I'm working on forming an urban agriculture cooperative in Tacoma with some friends and acquaintances. It's just a seed right now, but once day it will break ground.

My future is certainly less sure than it ever has been, but I have so much hope!

I will continue to upload here, since i have no better outlet for wildlife photography. I doubt I'll post any of my professional work, no worries there. I cannot wait to give this new lens a shot!

Thank you all for coming along on this journey with me for 10 years <3

Flatfish possess chromatophores. They are special cells that can change color. They use these to adapt their scale pattern to blend in with the substrate they're on. Amazing stuff, and really important, too. Flatfish are demersal ambush predators and prey to larger fish. Hiding is essential to survival. But have you wondered how they are able to change color? Is it a conscious or unconscious process? How do all of those cells coordinate? I may have some answers!

I dug into a research paper by Derek Burton [1] which examined the physiological mechanisms of flatfish chromatophores in great detail. It is the source of all I'm about to share.

Let's begin with taxonomy! What is a flatfish? A flatfish is a teleost (a subphylum which means bony fishes, further, they are under the class of actinopterygii, the ray-finned fishes) in the order of Pleuronectiformes. They are characterized by their asymmetrical body plan as adults, where one eye migrates to the other side of the head during metamorphosis. They lie flat on the sea floor. The blind side is characteristically a pale white, whereas the dominant side is covered with color-changing scales. The dorsal and anal fins run the length of the body on the dorsal and ventral sides. The fins have highly articulate spines that allow them to prop themselves up, crawl, and throw substrate over themselves to become buried.

That's neat! Now, not all chromatophores are alike. Some are responsible for specific pigments and colors, some react to neurotransmitters more than the others. So how many types are there on a flatfish? Five! There are epidermal melanophores, dermal melanophores, xanthophores, iridiphores, and erythrophores. Clusters of these different cells are present in different proportions on a flatfish's body, and give each one a distinct base pattern; between species, and between individuals. Here's what these grouping look like: https://64.media.tumblr.com/27fc881.....fb28c41143.pnj

And here are the proportions of cells that make up all of these distinct clusters: https://64.media.tumblr.com/c1e1675.....ebc9e1de00.pnj

The cell type that stands out the most in this graph is the great concentration of iridiphores in the white spots. As a matter of fact, the blind side of a flatfish is mostly made up of iridiphores! Why are they so bright? Well, these cells contain elongate crystals of guanin; a copper-gold alloy. Shiny! These crystals can become covered by melanosomes in order to reduce their prominence. Notice how the density of iridiphores decreases from white to dark.

Iridiphores are relatively inflexible when it comes to color change. But there are other cells that can take up that mantle: those present in the general scaling.

Before I start talking about hormones and neurotransmitters, I'd like to mention that flatfish are not the only fish who possess chromatophores. Salmon and tilapia have these cells, as well as others. Control of their pigment is largely hormonal, though. Given the importance of a flatfish's camouflage, they have adapted greater control over their colorful dermal cells. Their changes have some hormonal factor, but it is largely neurotransmitters that manage this complex active camouflage system.

I spent hours making this schematic specifically for this purpose, so behold: https://64.media.tumblr.com/8aa3104.....3193d2ab17.pnj

It's a lot to take in. It was a lot to sort. I had to make a truth table of cells and stimuli, and sort out which effect one had on the other. This is not entirely comprehensive, either! Depending on which group these cells are in, they react more quickly or more slowly to these stimuli.

For example: Melanosome concentration in melanophores in the dark band group reacted quickly when the background the flatfish was on changed from white to black. White-spot melanophores respond more rapidly to noradrenaline than dark band melanophores. If you wanna know how each cell responds to each stimuli, check out the paper!

Following my colorful graphic, we can see that the chain begins with visual stimuli. A flatfish settles in a new area of sea floor. The sun is rising and the colors of the substrate become more visible. This signal is processed by the autonomic nervous system, specifically the sympathetic nervous system. Unconsciously, the work of adapting the scales’ pigment starts. Melanin hormones are released from the pituitary gland as necessary to achieve the desired change, and neurotransmitters are sent such that the right scales become the right hue and brightness. This could take dozens of minutes or even hours, but it happens. The flatfish is now well adapted to their new environment.

If that isn't the most fascinating thing to you, I don't know what could top it! There many more questions to be answered, and this is just a simplified overview of the general physiology at play. In my future research, I plan to set out to determine which substrate colors and patterns are imitated by flatfish by using complex images featuring various shapes and colors.

[1] DEREK BURTON, 2002; The Physiology of Flatfish Chromatophores (https://sci-hub.se/10.1002/jemt.10166)

Correction: The melanin hormones from the pituitary gland don't necessarily instigate change. That's the job of the neurotransmitters. The hormones do, however, keep things from changing. The neurotransmitters set melanosome aggregation or dispersion, and the hormone concentrations maintain them.

Caveat: Some chromatophore activation was done outside of the animal, so it's ambiguous how big of a role some of these mechanisms play in the flatfish.

In addition to the photos I get when I dive, now, I also record videos. They are uploaded to my YouTube channel, and feature edited footage with music and voice over describing the sights and providing context. I also have similar videos from my ROV expeditions. You can expect a video every week; about four videos a week once the ROV is back from repairs.

Dive footage: https://youtube.com/playlist?list=P.....4OOuzQ18TtVKrT

ROV footage: https://youtube.com/playlist?list=P.....BfhNn1IJE74NC1

Aquarium footage: https://youtube.com/playlist?list=P.....Yx-9QktAHJXKuL


Hey all,

I'm raising funds to cover the cost of the equipment I need to study our local bluntnose sixgill sharks (Hexanchus griseus). Here is the donation page: https://www.gofundme.com/f/help-fun.....f+share-flow-1


Here's the description of the project:

"Hello,

My name is Sean and I'm a marine biology student in Puget Sound, WA. I've been fascinated by ocean life since I was a kid and I've devoted much of my time to learning about ocean ecosystems and marine organisms. The object of my research goal is to gain a better understanding of the activities and life cycle of our largest native shark, the bluntnose sixgill shark (Hexanchus griseus). I have read almost every paper on these amazing animals and I've identified gaps in our understanding that I hope to fill in.

The research objectives are as follows:

- Uniqueness of Subadult Sixgill Residency in the Northeast Pacific
- Sixgill Social Behavior
- Sixgill General Behavior
- Primary Feeding Method of Sixgill Sharks (scavenging vs. predation)

These sharks spend the day at great depths, only ascending into safe diving limits at night. As such, little is known about their daytime activities and natural behaviors when not being baited. Most of the data we have are from strandings, feeding station footage, bycatch reports, accidental encounters, and tagging.

Ocean robotoics technology has come a long way since these early advances in our understanding of this shark, and ROVs (Remotely Operated Vehicle), essentially underwater drones, have become available for purchase by individuals. I intend to acquire an ROV capable of enabling me to meet my research objectives.

The ROV I've selected for the task is the Chasing M2 Pro MAX, for the following reasons:

- 200m maximum depth (which will allow me to explore most of Puget Sound)
- 5 accessory ports + 2 x 4000 lumen flood lights included (this will greatly improve the footage quality as the aperature can be decreased due to more light being available, reducing noise, as well as placing the light source away from the lens, which would otherwise illuminate particulate matter in the water, muddying the image. In addition, the 5 accessory ports will allow me to add additional sensors and equipment, thought for the bare minimum, all I need is the laser scaler so I can estimate the size of the sharks I observe)
- 4+ hour batter life (this will allow for longer exploration sessions0
- 3 knot top speed (this will help to keep up with the sharks, as well as resist typical currents experienced in Puget Sound)


The quote I received for the ROV from Chasing was $6,499, with the laser scaler accessory adding $399 to the total. Not including taxes. It's a steep price to pay for an individual of modest means, but the lower models don't have the depth ratings or the accessory capacity required for my research.

What do you get in return for your donation?

If you live in Puget Sound and own a seafaring vessel, you may summon me to utilive the ROV for hull inspections.

Every week, footage I've accumulated will be uploaded and made publicly available, in addition to raw footage being accessible through Dropbox. If donors provide an email address, this footage will be sent to them as it becomes available.

In addition, anyone, regardless of location, may request footage of specific resident marine life in Puget Sound, and I will do my best to capture said footage.

For marine scientists, I will make myself available to aid in your research. The ROV can be equipped with a sediment sampler, a water quality sensor, and sonar imaging technology (all these have their own cost, though). I am more than happy to help you achieve your research objectives in Puget Sound, if it is within the ROV's capability.

If you have any inquiries regarding my objectives and accountability, feel free to reach out. I will be more than happy to answer your questions.

Thank you for reading and I hope you ill consider helping me research these wonderful sharks who call our sound home!"

I’m autistic, but not in the cute quirky kinda way, like fidgeting with a rubiks cube or complimenting people in a blunt, but endearing way.

No, I’m autistic in like, a–:

- extremely limited range of acceptable foods I will eat without immediately vomiting it because it smells or tastes bad. Is inconsistent. Has a bad texture. or reminds me of earth worms.

- Unable to adequately focus on anything except my very specific interests

- Can’t adapt well to dynamics within groups of people, being well aware that what I say may be out of place, and feeling bad for speaking just because of it.

- struggling to maintain friendships because of that. struggling to finds friends who are as hyper-focused on my interests as I am, and appearing disinterested if I have a friend whose interests aren’t aligned with my own.

- having to feign or otherwise manufacture “That’s cool!” type response to someone sharing something with me that I’m not all that interested in, because it’s polite and expected.

- my default response to traumatic or tough situations where I can’t escape is to shut down physically and mentally, and
- if my default response is challenged, become aggravated and enter a physical or social power struggle.

- being forced to work to hours and duties NT’s have to results in me burning out, not being able to get out of bed on time, or perform well, if I do. Resulting in losing job opportunities I was otherwise excited about.

- can’t communicate to superiors why autism is a disability, how it affects me, and how they can accommodate me, in any other way than “I need to work less hours or I’ll burn out.” (which means I’ll get fired and replaced by someone who can function normally with a full work day).

–kinda way.

I say this because, while the show Atypical does a good job of portraying meltdown and hyper-focusing (and I enjoy it), somehow Sam is able to balance gen-ed school, his job, and friendships with little difficulty.

So, even when media portrays autistic individuals well, it still is just scratching the surface.

Sam has moments where he’s overwhelmed and copes by leaving or repeating the names of penguins, but when I got overwhelmed at school, I shut down and school staff had to fight hard to remove me from the classroom. I didn’t graduate. Obviously there are individual differences between every single autistic person. I’m never going to expect an artistic medium to encompass all my difficulties. But I’d like something to portray more serious failures in life, because I’m certain that’s more common and relatable than difficult success.

I imagine an NT looking at that and going “Well, he had some challenges, but he still managed and made it in life.” When a lot of us just--can’t.

I can point at The Good Doctor, too. Who had someone from within vouching vehemently for him just to make it into his career, and a lot of us just--don’t. I do realize that there wouldn’t be a show without such an exceptional circumstance.

But I want to see something genuine. If an NT’s only experience with autistic people is through media like this, they expect us to struggle, but in the end, overcome it. Some a lot of us can’t. I see shows like Atypical and The Good Doctor, and I myself wonder why I can’t be like that. Why I can’t overcome my serious limitations. Why I can’t find a friend who is understanding and supporting to the extent of the protag’s friend(s) in these shows. It creates its own stigma.

A lot of us are stuck living with family, can’t hold a job for too long in our careers, are endlessly coping with the loneliness that ensues from it all.

And this isn’t even mentioning those with more severe autism. I get that it’s just television. But you’d be a fool to think it has no influence on other’s perception of us. Including ourselves.

Since my affectionate emotions peaked, I’ve run out of meds, and I just feel overall burnt-out (not even depressed), I’ve felt increasingly misanthropic. Like, I’m returning to my introvert self, but during my several months of being more outgoing and socially reliant, I’ve learned through pain how cruel, disregarding, disinterested, petty, and foul people can be; and that’s just to name a few adjectives.

There’s no longer this person-sized hole within me that I want so desperately to fill. I’m just me now. I like sitting around and playing games for hours on end again. I’m doing things for me. I suppose this is the logical conclusion of being rejected, having my heart broken numerous times, ending college and starting a new job, and just being socially isolated for the better part of this year.

Being a misanthrope is seldom a good thing for most, but at least I’m at peace, for once in a long time. No longer do I swing from high to low as I go through the cycle of connection and distancing. A few months ago, I told myself that after I abandoned the Furternity, I would find peace. Same thing a few weeks ago when I said I would abandon Telegram and Discord entirely. This is what peace feels like. I did it. It’s not as though I’m going to campaign to build up my walls and become a hermit or anything--that would be extreme--rather, I’ve just come to understand that just because someone isn’t interested in dating me, or even talking to me, it’s not my fault. It’s not a “me” problem.

I spent two years looking at every negative situation as my fault. That I did something to deserve the way I was feeling. Even when every friend I had told me otherwise. Spending time in your head is valuable, but not too much time.

I am finally okay, now. I can move on with my life and grow. It’s a calmer feeling than I had expected when I got this ball rolling, but I am grateful for the strength I possessed to keep my head up.

You will get through this. It will take time and tears, late nights and perhaps some unhealthy coping; but you will make it to the greener grass. Not all bad things lead to bad outcomes--in time.

I'm writing here because I have nowhere else to record my thoughts. No Discord vent channels, no Telegram groups, and not private correspondence with friends. I want to preface this with the good news, because I believe it will be easier to understand that way.

For the last 15 months, I have been studying Electronics and Communications Technology at Bates Technical College to earn my associates degree and transition into a rewarding and fulfilling career solving problems and engaging with science and engineering in a more hands-on approach. It is a field that gained my interest five years ago, and the sees planted then blossomed into this great achievement of mine. That's right, I graduated! Finally. As my long-time watchers may be aware, I never graduated high school. Rather, I tested for my GED and passed. And I never graduated from my first college program, that being Powersports Technology, because during my last quarter I was fired from the job that served as my work study. I happened to be one-hundred-and-thirty miles away from my campus and lacked the funds to move back to attend in-person. So close, yet so far. I spend most of 2019 in limbo, trying to find a place to work as a powersports technician, but either the jobs were shit, or the places I wanted to work at weren't hiring. I returned to Tacoma and kept trying. Same deal. So, I decided that I must return to college. Now, 2019 was pivotal for me. In January, not only had I moved out on my own again, but I started my career, and soon lost it. I was introduced to Telegram by one of my watchers at the time, which allowed me to access the furry community in a way I'd never before. I met many people, for better and for worse.

During my journey, before and during my college program, friendships blossomed and withered. I felt love and happiness, I felt anxiety and anger. It was a brand new world. Consequently, after getting accustomed to Telegram, I stopped writing these journals as frequently. I had friends, now, who I could confide in and get more immediately responses from. My reliance on friends for this support manifested itself is many ways--some good and some awful. And that is why I am here today.

Have you heard of post-graduation depression? If you haven't, that's oaky. There isn't much dialogue about it. I suffer from MDD, so I'm more than use to this feeling, but after getting on meds in late July, my life started feeling better. I was doing well. The things that had haunted me in February way into the heat of Summer no longer got under my skin like they used to.
So, since graduating just last Thursday, I was shocked to have felt depressed, again. It was the same low feeling I get during my birthday. There's this amazing thing happening to me, and yet, everyone around me seems to pay no thought to it. And if they don't care, why should I? I should feel excited and proud! And yet all I want to do is cry. And cry I did.

I need to specify that the world is undergoing a pandemic. And for nine long months here in the United States, we have been in lockdown. I had the misfortune of both turning twenty-one and graduating from college this year. The pandemic may very well drag on into the next year, as well. Two monumental achievements in life and I was robbed of my ability to celebrate them as I'd always wanted to. I wanted to go to bars and clubs with my friends! Have a blast! I wanted a commencement ceremony--the first and only in my life--dressed in my royal blue cap and gown. And I got to do none of that. Hell, the only bar I've been to was a TGI Friday's at the DFW airport. I have always been reclusive, though not by choice. As a matter of fact, I love going out and spending time with people. (The trouble is, it doesn't seem like anyone enjoys spending time with me). So as you might imagine, the pandemic only worsened this. I spend three out of five quarters of college in my room. I spent most of this year in my room, in fact. I still managed to get together with friends here and there, but for the most part, these walls are my home, my classroom, and my mental prison. I'm sure you all can relate.

Though, some of you may have essential jobs, and so you got to continue you're weekly work routine, but this time behind a mask. And some of you entered this pandemic with your friends as roommates, or perhaps with a lover. I consider all of these things good luck. For the most part, assuming you managed to maintain that job or that romantic partner, or those friends, you made it. but for people like me? Well, an idle mind is the fault of idle hands. And my mind can be cruel to me. I've seen my friendships crumble to dust before my eyes, even before the pandemic. The difference now is that I am unable to make new friends. I can't go out into the world and actually meet people. Be in the moment with them, you know? It has been a heartbreaking and fleeting experience. Some friendships just faded because we were never really close to begin with. Others are more complicated affairs, and I don't have time to go into it in this journal.

Either way, I made it. I made it to the end of my college days. And there was no one left to celebrate it with me. No one who gave a fuck, anyways. No one who was willing to set some time aside to be with me even virtually. My college produced a pre-recorded online commencement ceremony for the class of 2020, since we'd never get to walk on stage together before your friends and family, and flip that tassel. I asked my closest friend to watch it with me. It was a special occasion, after all. And he declined. Spent the whole day working at home. Could even be there for me for the fifteen minutes it took to get through the video. So, I decided to stream it in my Discord server for furries with horse fursonas. One person joined. I paused, we chatted for a few, then I resumed the video. After a couple minutes, he told he that he's not watching my whole graduation and then left. I started crying. This was not how it was supposed to be. I remember my mother's graduation back in 2017. There were so many people there to support their loved ones taking this brave new step forwards. My sister and I were there for her, I even have a photo of me hugging my mother outside the football field where it was held. She looked so happy.

And there I was, sitting the the same chair I've been sitting in for a year, at the same desk, wearing the same clothes. Sobbing as I watch some lackluster supplement of a ceremony alone in my room.

Where once I had felt happiness and hope the last few months, I now felt depressed and sorrowful. Prior to this, I asked my friend Brandon if he'd like to visit to celebrate, and he declined--saying that he and his housemates have decided to quarantine until things die down again. Didn't stop us from meetup up earlier this year, but I suppose it's the smart move. I thought about reaching out to a former best friend of mine who I'd met in the spring of last year. He suddenly stopped talking to me in early August of this year after I had a depressive episode and had to cut our visit short. But I figured that there's no point in lingering in the past. I mean, after all, if he truly cared for me he would have stuck around. That set off a chain on thinking. Are any of the people I consider friends and close friends truly friends at all? They never reach out to me first, never ask me to hang out, or paly something. It's always me who has to initiate things. If I just stepped away from my keyboard, would I just disappear from their consciousness?

I pondered this last night. it kept me awake. It dug into my mind like a worm to an apple. Venting it didn't help, either. There was something there waiting to burst in all this depression. Rooted in a sense of feeling unwanted, unloved, undeserving of peoples time and attention. Worthless, spiteful, and eternally depressed. What made my friends of the past fall to the wayside or suddenly ghost? Lovers, too. Oh yes, a lover ghosting me is perhaps the most torturous example. I could pour my heart and soul, time and effort, craft and money into my close friends and lovers and get bullshit in return. I'm not catastrophizing on this one, I need only go into detailed examples as evidence. Do I just fall for shitty people or is there something seriously wrong with me? Something everyone else sees, but I don't?

Suddenly, all the friends I had left stopped looking like friends. All this time, all this love and pain, the miles travelled, and the futures imagined all felt as though it were for nothing. And whose fault is it? Not who, what. That little part of my brain that craves attachment. That craves love. That craves the company of others. It went into overdrive, fueled by fallacies and facades broadcast on social media and in messenger apps. Happy couples, friendship, good times--all of it unattainable by someone as inept as I am. I thought I'd learned to overcome the hurdle that autism placed between me and a healthy social life. I was wrong. That part of my mind was inflated past its usefulness and it began to rob me of contentedness--of my ability to just be okay by myself. And so I clang to anyone who would stick around, even if they weren't healthy for me.

I knew what I had to do. I had to unplug. No matter how painful it may be in the immediate future, I needed to learn to be okay with myself, alone. I needed to stop believing that everyone I met online could fill the role of a healthy, close friendship. I'm done whoring myself out on Grindr. I'm done letting Twitter sick my confidence and time away, I'm done letting people on Telegram warp my perception of reality, and I'm done letting Discord falsify a sense of order and community. I deleted it all. Desktop and phone. I had to. Forcing a cat into a cage to take her to the vet may be unpleasant for the cat, but it's for her own good that she gets the medicine she needs. As uncomfortable as this decision is already becoming, I must learn to not my imagination of what other's perceive of me drag me down any further. I deserve to feel happy. I deserve to find love. I deserve to have friends who care as much for my as I do for them. I deserve a life outside these walls. We all do. Maybe this act of isolation is in turn an act of self destruction. It's time to change, no matter what. Something had to.

Matt, Matthias, Austin, Dan, Brandon, Brenden, Joseph, Charity, Noah, Ryan, Jackie, Charles, Matthew, Garrett, Hunter, Ed and Azzy, Chris, Feron, Rio, Bryce--they are all gone now. Some disappeared long ago, some simply lingered nearby. I loved some of them so deeply, and their loss caused me so much pain. I will not let them hurt me any longer. I will not open my skull and chest to them and let them rob me anymore.
Because let's be honest, it's all in my head. Most of them never had malicious intent. It's my fault that I fell so hard for some of them despite the signs that our friendship wasn't as I imagined it was.

My old friend matt once said, as we were driving back from Furvana, that he felt he was about to step into a portal. Where everything in his life was going to change. He was talking about his professional engineer exam that he'd been preparing for. I understood it then, but I truly understand it now. I can't be this lovestruck, miserable boy anymore. I'm past college and I'm pretty sure I've landed this job I've interviewed for twice now. I'm about to step into a portal. I can already see my world changing. And I hope for my own sake that I'm ready.

When I'm working fulltime, perhaps I'll make actual friends and meet new people. If not, I'm sure I'll get the chance once we have overcome this pandemic. I hope to meet you all at a con one day, I appreciate your ongoing support. If you made it this far, let me know what you think of my thought process, here. Do you agree with my decision? my thought process? Do you disagree and think I'm making a mistake? Hah, there I go again trying to rely on external validation. In any case, I hope you have a wonderful December. Happy Holidays! I imagine I'll see y'all later after I've been working for a bit.

What would you say is the defining feature/trait of my art style?

I'm trying to figured out what fit and finish sticks out to people and makes my art unique to the eye; and perhaps develop it or choose art projects that utilize it.

All input/feedback is accepted! <3

I've recently considered all the people I've met in my life, who I'll likely never see again, and examined them in a new lens; one I find is starting to be more useful and practical. Previously, I thought about the friends and loved ones I've parted ways with (formally or inexplicably) and felt that I had lost something. But, because they are still out there in the world, one day, I may have them back in my live. Even if it was unlikely or untrue. I felt worse off because we were no longer friends or together in any capacity. I felt I had to fall to my knees and beg, scrape together any semblance of remorse and ask for forgiveness. I would put myself down for others to show how much they meant to me. And while remorse and a genuine apology are valuable things to feel and express, and healthy in the right cases, the extent to which I went to try and ensure that people didn't leave me behind was poisonous. I would always blame myself, even if I wasn't at fault, because if the issue was internal to my self, then I could fix it. I cold change. The friends I have during those times would often say otherwise, and try to pick me back up. I still couldn't bear to imagine the near future without their presence.

I often try to find informative videos and articles on how to handle specific intense emotions and situations from professionals. I will often look up "how to deal with depression/anxiety/polyamory/jealousy" and so on. Tonight, I thought that I would explore the psychological field of grief and coping with the loss of loved ones. Surely, if I felt this intensely about cut ties and high walls between my former friends and lovers and I, then I could learn a lot from the experiences of those who have actually lost close people to death. In the case of my last boyfriend, this may have well as been the case, because we shared a happy, close, and loving life together before suddenly he disappeared. That was at the end of January of 2020. I'm still having trouble coping with that. I think about who he is with now, where he is, if he misses me, and what have you. I actually dread seeing him again because I'm afraid to have to questions answered. An intense reaction to and intense shared connection, for sure.

It would perhaps be healthier to imagine as though he's dead. Then that potential is gone. I can't see or talk to a dead person. We can't kiss and make up, so to speak, He can't be fucking someone else. He's dead. Sure, someone critical to my thought processes, or a concerned friend, may say "well, that's just avoidant." It's true, in part. But I've confronted these feelings a thousand times internally and externally.I think I've earned time to avoid it. I'm not avoiding these feelings, though. I'm avoiding the person who once occupied them. As you all may very well know by now if you read these, I confront my problems head on. I think it's unhealthy to let things stew under the surface. Moving on.

I recently met someone who I shared a lot in common with. We enjoyed each other's company right from the start. We enjoyed engaging in the same activities, we suffered from the same disability, and we both found each other attractive. Our first day together, after riding our bikes around my city, we came back to my house, where we watched a movie he was really interested in. By the third act, he broke the ice and invited me to cuddle with him. I accepted, of course. Halfway through our day, I had caught feelings, but I wanted to suppress them until we had spent more time together and got to know each other better. I felt genuinely happy for the first time in a very long while. He stayed the night, we had an intimate moment, and we got lunch together before we said goodbyes and parted ways. As we were eating lunch, he told me about his crush. How they were going to spend a week at some water park resort in another state, and how they were saving a certain special experience for each other. It felt as though someone had shoved hot coal down my throat. I knew it. I knew this was too good to be true. But I held on. After all, this was just a crush, yes?

Later that week, he came down to visit a second time. We played some racing games, got pizza together, cuddled some more, built some Lego's together, and got some milkshakes. Again, I felt much happier when I was with him that day. Our exchanges over Telegram became more and more soft and flirty. Like, heart stickers and "i miss you's" through voice messages kind of stuff. It was a long day spent outdoors with friends, and I had drank two cans of sparkling margaritas, and I had the liquid confidence to break the ice on these feelings I had. He felt them, too.
I wasn't necessarily asking him out with me at the moment, but I was asking if this thing with his crush was for sure or if there was any potential for us to date in the future.
The short answer to keep this story going without stepping on toes is "No, there's no potential." His plans have been in arrangement for months, it's just not official yet.

To say it was hard to hear would be an understatement. I breathed heavily and rapidly as though there wasn't enough air in the universe. I felt intense sadness. I closed the chat, turned my music up, and did what I've always done at these dark hours for weeks, now. I grabbed my pocket knife and brought it to soft skin inside my forearm, and let it drag. I can only ever do this when drunk because the inhibition is gone and the physical pain is dulled. Dull. Just like my knife at this point. I retrieved my utility blade. It was much sharper and it did the trick. I bled. Still superficial, but each time I come back to his place, I cut just a little deeper. A desire for death, but a fear of pain. I had had enough, there wasn't enough real estate for another go. I returned his message and said that I couldn't handle this right now. I deleted our chat history and went back to sulking. I drank more. A half-and-hour later, I had enough courage to continue writing. He sent me messages after I pushed away, so the avenue was still open. All I had to say, in short, was "Why? Why would you invite me to, and engage me in, intimacy?" Why mislead me with these heart stickers and the raw, emotional moments when you have your eye on someone else? It was cruel. I sent the message, and shortly, i heard a knock on my window.

In the dead of night, he rode a good forty miles to see me in my time of despair. No one's done that for me, before. At first, I cried in his arms. And we talked. We talked for and hour or more. There, on my back porch steps, we saw the sky brighten up into twilight as we got lost in our conversations, as we always have before. It felt calmer. Though he still wanted to be friends and have me in his life, it was clear that his path was set. This was someone he felt he'd spend the rest of his life with. We parted ways, and I went to bed.

For the time being, he's promised to no one, at least in formality. And the friendship we have is a great one. But I don't know if I'll ever be able to throw away my love for him. When the day comes in August, if they work out well together, and it's official, I don't know if I could bear to stick around. It's a terrifying thought and I'm conflicted. Do I protect my mental health and set sail for other shores or do I stick around in his life, a constant remind of what I lost out on? I'm either going to lose him or I'm going to lose myself.

That decision become a lot easier if I think of him as dead, on that day. No potential. No tears. I have time to think about it. But I'm fucking scared.

I'd like to open this journal up with a metaphor, if you will:

Sometimes, there's too much blood in the water to continue swimming. But you can always climb ashore and find safer seas; Unless the sharks get to you, first.

Yesterday, I nearly drowned in the bloody water. I felt the most anxiety I've ever encounter in recent memory. I'd been struggling with my social, emotional, and mental health for a good two weeks, now. The stresses of this new world caught up to me. From staying at home nearly 24/7, to the entirety of the internet, family, and some friends telling me how to think and feel about the protests, to losing one of my closed friends, and to something as simple as being berated and bullied in CS:GO for, you guessed it, not being good enough. I self harmed, I lashed out, I vented, drank, and bled. But I also learned a lot about myself and others, and I wanted to take the time to talk about that, here, in the hopes that others may learn from my trials and tribulations.

Time Bomb

This story begins on June 1st, 2020, my twenty-first birthday. I'm expecting my friend, N, over for some wine and daiquiri's. The sun is shining, and I feel mostly okay. The previous day I had bothersome and difficult conversation with my brother and father about the protests, and they asked me what I thought of them. And, afterwards, they proceeded to talk about family drama regarding my mother and money she owes my brother and I, and how she wont get the government to back off on payments from the divorce, which happened ten years ago, mind you. All while I'm stuck in the car with them on our way back to his hotel on a rainy day. Yeah, not the kinda stuff you ought to discuss with your son on his birthday, no less.
I asked to just go home at that point, my mood was fouled and I felt uncomfortable and saddened. The following day, we made up and had a beer together by the BTC tower. We watched old motocross videos and movie clips from Better Off Dead (which is the world's best comedy, in my opinion). It was a good day.

Fast forwarding a bit, N arrives with a bottle of Sailor Jerry's, he stopped outside the steps to pet my cat, Zulu, who was basking in the sunshine lawn. I lead him to the backyard where we sit at the outdoor table, and i bring out a bottle of Pacific Rim sweet Riesling. Turns out, it was far too sweet for my tastes, heh. We chatted for a few minutes before my brother came outside to ask for a temporary replacement phone. Followed shortly by my sister. The air became uncomfortable, as I wasn't going to just tell my siblings to leave us be, after all, this is their backyard too, and it's a warm, clear day! So, I shut my mouth, allow them all to greet and converse while I worked on that bottle of riesling. Eventually, I break away and invite N with me down to my room, where we cuddled and had some idle conversation. Eventually, I became restless and introduced him to some of my friends on Discord. He, sadly. had to go. A friend of his wanted to speak with him about something important, and I could tell N was becoming antsy at the thought. I walked him out the front door, and returned to my desk. I had already opened a bottle of Dark Horse Sauvignon Blanc do share with N, but now it was just me. I wish he'd stayed longer.

What followed was a discussion with J, Na, and S. I was browsing Twitter and saw a headline that said the LAPD was outnumbered by protesters, and I jokingly said "Damn, LA knows how to throw a riot!" It was not received well. What followed was a heated discussion about current events that left us all feeling upset. And I, even more tipsy. We broached the subject of who had it harder: straight people, gay people, or bisexual people. We all represented a side, and things were getting tense. We did our best to take turns, but ultimately, I we rolled over each other. Unable to get my footing in the conversation, riled up from the stress of the last three days, and quite intoxicated, I slammed my pocket knife on my desk, puncturing it, before raising my voice. That's how it began, my first meltdown in a long time. One of the lovely defects that came in my Asperger's package is meltdown state when overwhelmed or cornered. It made life in elementary and middle school very difficult, as school staff didn't know how to handle a meltdown; turns out, no one else does, either! As I continue to shout at my friends and acquaintances, S and Na leave. Leaving me alone with J, also a close friend. I go off on a pained monologue as I bang my head against my desk occasionally, and drawing superficial cuts of my forearms. My mother descended the stairs to see what was going on, at this point, my headphones fall off, my hands are coated with tears, wine, and blood. She and i continued talking for quite a bit, J stuck around for about half of the conversation before disconnecting. My mother, as always, de-escalated me. I returned to the call to find another friend, D, who was sent there to keep me calm. I apologized to D and continued to cry. My mother informed me that there were police officers outside that wanted to talk to me. I panicked. I sent a photo of my bloody arm to a few channels within the Furternity before I was removed. My contact with D was cut off. I ran into my garage and grabbed a pry bar before hiding under my desk. It's always been a safe place for me during times of high anxiety.

I called N in great distress, my hands are shaking, my heart is pounding, and voice is strained from the sobbing. Still clutching my pry bar, I ask him what I should do. I asked him to come and save me. The police became impatient and marched downstairs, I think there were three or four of them. I refused to drop my pry bar and demanded that they leave me be. I didn't swing it or even threaten them wit hit, I simple clutched it close to curled up body. My time ran out. Two of them rushed forth and dragged me out from under the desk, flipping my on my stomach and seizing the pry bar, the third on placed the cold, hard cuffs tightly around my soaked wrists. They dragged me upstairs and out onto the front lawn, where firefighters were waiting to inspect my wounds and take my vitals, before sending in the ambulance. I pleaded with the officers, the firefighters, the paramedics, and my own mother to release me. I knew exactly what was going to happen to me, and I was deathly afraid. They didn't budge.

I spent the rest of my birthday drifting in and out of a drunken slumber, as nurses would come by now and then to take blood samples and vitals. The bed was not comfortable, the blankets and pillows were thin, and someone would frequently have a loud conversation in the hall, waking me up. During my stay, I reeled in this feeling. I felt awful for shouting at my friends and I felt like an absolute moron for posting photos of my forearm to the group. I didn't want explode like this again, so I came up with a plan. First, I was going to personally apologize to my friends who were involved. Then, I was going to schedule a therapy appointment. I would also hand all the liquor I was gifted to my mother so that i did not have access to it during this volatile period; not until I complete my first appointment would I allow myself to drink again, and even so, to meter myself.
Around 3am, I met with the social worker. They are responsible for evaluating you and determine which actions need to be taken, whether outpatient or inpatient care is needed. This was the most gut wrenching part, because what I said and how I said things was detrimental to my fate. I told her, along with my story, that I wasn't trying to kill myself--that I was just trying to express my pain in the only way I felt I could. It is the truth. Luckily, she sympathized with me and trusted me with my plan, and provided me with a list of outpatient clinics I can approach. She arranged for a vehicle to transport me home that morning. The sun was rising, and the air was cool. I'll never forget that feeling. The city was quiet and the sky was pink and orange. I felt like I'd just woken up from a very bad dream, and i felt tired.

As soon as I got home, I got started on my plan, I wrote my apologies, collected my liquor, and waiting until the clinic opened up. Unfortunately, my fellow leaders were giving me the ruler, and made demands of me after my apology and plea for re-entry. They were very harsh and I felt betrayed. I begged for my acquaintance, V, to just sit in a call with me that morning and see me. Hear me. Listen to what I have to say, as they did not consult me during the decision-making process. I imagined that the only image of me they remember was during my meltdown. I needed them to see me as I was now. He agreed, gratefully, and spoke with my colleagues. They reduced the severity of my banishment from a 3 week ban, followed by one month of sobriety and regular therapy appointments as probation, to just one month of regular therapy appointments as probation, beginning after my first appointment. I agreed and tried to cope with my new reality. You see, the Furternity was my only social outlet, all my friends and acquaintances were on there, and that's where we all spent time together. With that gone, it was as though my support system was gone, which I badly needed to get through this difficult moment in life. I made it three days. My first window for an appointment was on Monday. I checked in with B, the creator of the Furternity, to see how he was doing. We had pleasant conversation and eventually he returned the question. I spoke honestly and candidly about how anxious and alone I felt since my birthday. And he heard me. He made an executive decision to allow me back into the Furternity, contingent on confirming that I did, indeed, have an appointment on Monday. I confirmed it, though it wasn't until Tuesday that someone actually sat down with me. I was very grateful for his trust and understanding. During my first evening back, a couple members pulled me to the side in a private voice chat to talk to me. It appreciated them taking the time console me like that, particularly Dj, who I spoke with for what must have been an hour. Things were better, and my plan was working.

I don't remember the specific day, but I had just sold my carburetors on Ebay. It was a hazy afternoon and I decided to walk to the post office to drop it off. On my way, I figured I'd text N and catch up with him. I hadn't spoken to him since the meltdown. He hadn't reached out to me, and I assumed he was upset. I just made it to the front lawn when I got the reply. Two long messages. My stomach dropped. Among other things, he said that the experience was traumatizing and he felt helpless; that he couldn't be the only friend I lean on. And then the obligatory "I hope you get the help you need..." I just can't be your friend anymore.

You never know in the moment when it's the last time you'll ever see that person. The cost of my meltdown had raised.

I fell to my hands and knees, fighting back tears. This was too much to bear. This is the moment that inspired my sketch "Pain."

Treading Water

I had made it to my first appointment, and intake appointment, and had been accepted. I was scheduled to meet with a prescriber on the afternoon of the 11th, followed by my therapist on the afternoon of the 15th. I met my obligation. As I recovered from the loss of my friend, N, my mental state had improved. One part of my plan I forgot to mention was muting any words relating to the protests or any other stress-triggers I could think of. And suddenly, it was as though a weight had been lifted off my shoulders and my mind was clear. Though, the weekend following my birthday was supposed to be a party with my close friends J, D, and Br, it had to be postponed, which was a bummer. I allowed myself to drink some wine in the evenings what I had completed all my responsibilities. I'd sit in voice chat, as well, and I had no issues. I proved to myself that I am capable of enjoying my wines while also in a social setting. I was really improving.

I wanted to try and address my faltering engagement with peer activities within the Furternity by moving outside my comfort zone and trying new things. I figured it would be the best time to spend meaningful time with my friends and acquaintances on the server. I joined B's Shadowrun campaign along with my friends, which was a good time. We all became stressed out with the character creation, though. I also picked CS:GO back up--a game that is traditionally wrought with personal insults and failure for me. Our server has a small ensemble of CS:GO players and it felt good to be among them. Our first couple days of playing went well and I had a lot of fun! I found that some Iron Horse beer loosened me up enough to mesh well with other players and generally be less tense. It made a huge difference. Things were good.

Insult to Injury

So, it's the 11th. I'm up alarmingly early because of some rather vivid dreams and a stiff back. The Playstation 5 is being revealed this morning. My friends assemble in a all, one of them streaming the stream to everyone else. I, already feeling tired, slip in bed and watch from afar. My appointment was coming up at 1pm. I didn't realize just how tired i was, and couldn't keep my eyelids open. When they re-opened, it was 3:30pm and I realized the level of shit I was now in. Why didn't I set an alarm? I felt awful and beat myself up for missing it. My friends wanted to play more CS:GO, and I obliged, but not before fetching my bottle of Sailor Jerry's and cherry coke to go with it. The matches were fine, I was making more mistakes and I openly expressed more self-pity for my low-skill level and failing to show up to my prescriber appointment. People began to take notice, including my friends. I was wasted at this point, the sun was setting, and we called it a day. I was left alone in the call with J, but he was away. Feeling abandoned, I began spiraling again. I broke a thin plate and started to cry again. My mom came back down the stairs once m ore to investigate, and I was laying flat on my back, sobbing. In an attempt to rationalize with me and calm me down, regarding my missed appointment, she dug up a demon of mine, some that still haunts me. I thought it to be a betrayal. I raised my voice at her to not bring him up. My ex boyfriend, that is. He lived out in Ocean Shores, and after my crisis in December, I ran to him twice for extended visits--missing class and outpatient appointments alike, just to spend a few wonderful days with him, away from my world. I'm sure I've written about that previously and will not re-write it here, but you can see the parallel she was trying to draw.

She gave up trying to discuss it with me, and I was once again left alone.
I put on my Bates sweatshirt, my Bates beanie, and grabbed my Bates plushie and slipped out the back door into the sunset. I was spiraling and I wanted to escape to the ocean. I called my ex twice and left two voice mails, in the haze, I mistook my outgoing calls to him in my history as an incoming call. I thought he tried to call me. I thought it to be comical. My mother tried to get ahold of me, of course. I refused to come home. I was going to see the sound. Night fell, and i drunkenly wandered the sidewalks of my city. I found a place to sit under an overpass and opened up Discord. I joined a full call in the Furternity and shared my predicament with the others. Suddenly, everyone was worried, but they let me drone on about my inner thoughts and self-worth issues regarding the missed appointment. They seemed to understand and were being kind to me. One even offered to pay for an Uber to pick me up and take me home. They really wanted me to turn back. But Insisted that I see the water tonight, and picked myself back up. I remained in the call to talk with everyone on my walk, but my battery died and i was left alone again. At this point, I was lost. I didn't recognize where I was and I suddenly found myself in Fircrest. But, based on gut feeling, I steered myself back to familiar surroundings.

The night city was gorgeous! It reminded me of the nights I'd spend exploring Ellensburg with my bestie. the air was fresh and cold, the light was low, and the cars were few. I did make it to the water eventually, and I sat by it for a few minutes. I spoke to some strangers walking by, briefly, who tried to walk through a path that was covered by the high tide. I decided that I was ready to go home, and began the long march. I stopped at a tavern for some water, as I was quite parched. I walked past a Safeway with some carts sloppily left astray. What better use of a Thursday night that wrangling some Safeway carts? I returned as many as I deemed necessary and returned to my journey. I felt useful, for once in a while. I did a good deed! I was signing my favorite pop punk songs all the way home. I returned to the call as soon as I could, it was just past midnight now, and there were some stragglers. They were happy to hear that I was home safe, and I apologized for the dead battery. I imagine that must have been stressful for them. Unfortunately, the conversation drifted in a direction where I couldn't offer much, so I stepped away once more and worked on my customer's bike, as I had some new parts. It seemed like we, as a group, worked this one out. But it was nevertheless another meltdown, and that's all they saw.

I uninstalled CS:GO that night, as it became another stress trigger, and I could do without it.

Recoil

This is where things get juicy, and not in a good way. This is why I'm sitting down, writing all of this.
Yesterday, I returned home from Br's house for the party. It was great to see J and D again after all this time, we had a lot of laughs, play Skull Wizards, Br and I went hot tubbing, and we got a little frisky before calling it a night. There was an assortment of wines we all enjoyed and even a couple mixed drinks served up my Br. He even bought me a cake. A cake! I don't know what I'd do without him. That morning, I sat with J and D in the living room. They are a couple and the back and forth's they have are just amusing and cute. I put on some Internet Comment Etiquette for us, as well, which we all enjoyed. Eventually, though, we had to part ways and say goodbye.

So, I had another meltdown, but i proved to myself and my friends that I can enjoy drinks and not fall off the depression deep-end. And i got to spend time with my close friends! I felt great, like I finally had the missing piece of that puzzle. Social contact, in-person. Something that has been decidedly missing since mid March.

I got everything sorted at home and was sitting in voice chat, alone. Hoping someone would pop their head in and say hello. I had no idea what was happening behind that silent curtain. Suddenly, as I am watching a Youtube video, I hear the disconnected sound from Discord. I open it up, thinking it was my network, but then poof! The Furternity logo disappears from my side bar and F, on of my friends and former-colleague, sends be a paragraph in a very corporate, impersonal, condescending tone that they have removed me for what happened on the night of the 11th and that they want me to seek professional help and so on so forth. They''l let me back in when "progress" has been made. Which is nondescript. I write my response to this, mostly expressing confusion and offering to have a discussion, but he's blocked me. Welp. I write to two other administrators, V and B, maintain a calm, respectful tone while offering a solution and further action, mostly extending a n olive branch for discussion, and no one consulted me about this. My anxiety returned and I was afraid. I reached out to J to try and talk with him, because I needed to talk to someone. I began working on my customer's bike to take my mind off of this very pressing matter. J calls me back and I tell him what's going on, after pleasantries, of course. I seriously owe him one for standing up for me, on my behalf, last night. He is an invaluable friend to me and I wish I could repay the favor. I didn't get back in, but he helped calm me down.

Up until I received a private message from an artist I will assign the pseudonym "Honolulu." She prefaced her cruel message by saying that she doesn't care if what she says hurts me. I can't write what she wrote in my own words, I simply do not possess hatred to do so, so I will let Honolulu speak for herself: https://www.dropbox.com/s/xbtncvm0q.....q74/1.png?dl=0

At this point, it felt like my heart was point to explode and the lungs stopped working. Full-on panic attack. J was concerned and wanted to see what she said, and after sending him the screen shot, he dropped what he was doing out of outrage. He went to speak with B about it, and when he returned, he said that B was furious with Honolulu and that he was in a call at the moment with F. I was amazed that they' go to bat for me, and it helped reel in my anxiety. J told me that what she said is bullshit, that it was baseless, and that is was rude. So many adjectives.
I was more concerned with why she perceived me as all the these awful, negative things. What was it that I did?

Historically, I use our mental health channel to vent about my struggles to see if anyone out there feels as I do, but I never point the finger at others for my episodes or my issues. Never. I don't use my struggles or venting to twist people's arms. I don't manipulate people. I'm having a really fucking hard time living at the moment, so sorry for using the resources at my disposal for coping with them! Nevertheless, I will enver get an answer to my question. But I do know that she was very misinformed, and I had bigger fears--no one was actually communicating with me, they are taking each other's hearsay at face value about what has happened. It a painful thought.

Though, after this experience, I learned something valuable, this is the reason why I'm writing this, the lessons I've learned with the context of how I learned them (partially, there's a lot before my birthday I can't cover, i'd be here all day. But know that I'd only ever been banned once, and that was on my birthday. I'd never been removed before, and I was actually a colony leader in the group and required over 12 people to the group from my area, I also created the linguistics channel for linguist majors, and organized a meetup for my colony to save everyone's sanity. I'm not some heathen, I was an integral member to the group's success and I miss it).

Reflection

I was diagnosed with Asperger's syndrome in 2009. I was diagnosed with clinical depression in march of 2019, which was changed in December to major depressive disorder. I have a lot of demons from my past, and a lot of traumatic memories and experiences that sadly beaten me down to what I am now.

I have a lot of self-worth issues and I feel inferior to everyone else, even when there's no cause for it. But I know that talking about my struggles in a public environment is helpful, because it helps me lay everything out and pick it apart, as I am doing now. I used to write about my troubles here, then on Telegram, and then on Discord. It seems i've come full circle.

I also recognized a pattern, both between meltdowns and rum (haha), and between meltdowns and extreme stressors in my life. If I want to avoid this in the future, I need to recognize stressors before they metastasize and remove them from my consciousness, or remove myself from the situation. It's what I did with twitter and the protests, as well as CS:GO. Even before these issues, I was already managing stressors by muting AD accounts (long story).

After reading Honolulu's message, I realized why I feel worthless. It's because I'm always bowing down to people like her, B, F, and V. I am always at their mercy, and when they crack down, I feel I have to beg for a simple discussion, let alone forgiveness or understanding. I let their words send me into panic. If I want to free myself from that, if i want to start valuing myself, I need to let go. I should be self critical, still, but I should realize my own self-worth and the value I can bring to a social group, and that if people want to push that away, then they are missing out. My friends have always told me that "Fuck them, they're missing out," but I never believed it for long. But now? It's clear that everyone is upset, everyone has a different version of events in their head, and things may never return to normal again. there's too much blood in the water. So, I'll swim ashore, and see the shark for who they are and understand that I shouldn't be shedding blood, tears, and putting myself in the wringer for them when this is what I get.

I don't know where I'll go from here, hopefully make some local college friends that i can see in person. That's what i've got my sights set on. I need to stick to my pre-planned schedule that only allows me to drink on the weekends, at most, one bottle of wine per weekend day. And I hope my appointment tomorrow goes well. I'm doing this for myself, now. Not them. Because for once in a few years, I'm beginning to love myself. They aren't the center of my thoughts. And to clarify, I'm not saying I'm superior. No way I'll ever feel that way. But I recognize my own skills and strengths, and how I can the lives of the people around me better.

This is abnormal, but hear me out:

I will pay you to draw Sean all cut up, bruised, and bleeding. It's not a kink, I just have a sudden fixation on wanting to see myself absolutely bent.

So go on, fuck me up, fam.

Back to the ol' grindstone, I suppose.

I'm feeling very low tonight and I've got my saddest Knuckle Puck songs on tap, so lets wring this out.

I'm part of this group of college furs known as 'The Furternity" (get it?). It was a vestige for me after Telegram crashed and burned. It felt great to be among similar-aged, similarly-determined lads and ladies. I could have a real conversation about my studies and interests and it's been good. No drama, no horseshit, but colleagues, in a way.
The leader of the Furternity began doing Jackbox nights three weeks ago for specific chapters to try and get people together and engaged in a fun fashion. It accomplished this goal, tonight was Washington's night. The first two games were nice, but then everyone wanted to switch over to the monster dating one, and I know this sounds stupid, but I failed miserably. It wasn't about winning, but I just couldn't seem to function at the timer ticked and every round I had to be paraded in front of everyone as the loner.
No laughs to be had here.

No foul rebuts to be had here, I simple bid adieu with an Irish goodbye. I felt depressed and on the verge of tears. Not because of my poor performance, but because the mechanics of that game flipped a switch in my mind that reminded me of all my romantic failures of the last year, especially a very recent one this week. All of a sudden, after all these months, my vestige because a reminder of my pain.
I left the server, the only thing keeping me on Discord. I don't believe I'll be returning.

I suppose I just dumped gasoline on my fire, here, as it was the last place to socialize for me. Sometimes I just need to tear down the old so I can build something new. perhaps this will redirect my focus to my studies, sketching, and guitar practice. Maybe this will accelerate my loneliness and depression. We'll see.

But right now, I need an outlet for my emotions, and considering I don't have alcohol or the patience for drawing, I'll have to settle for a journal and music that's just a little too loud.

While i'm here, speaking to my audience of one, I may as well talk about N. N was a close friend of mine. After my last boyfriend ghosted me on early February, N and I were both looking for a Valentine. Though just a Grindr hookup at first, we both enjoyed each other's company and continued to hang out long after that. We shared a lot of interests. We rode to my favorite burger joint on a sunny afternoon and he took me to a range he frequented. He wanted to get into radios, and who better to introduce him than I? We also had a lot of, erm, fun together. It helped that we both lived in the same city. What a godsend.

After the stay-at-home order, it put a damper on our ability to see each other. He took the order seriously, whereas I was completely happy with going to the grocery store and visiting my other friends when a window opened up. In this time, I had time to miss him and I realized I ought to do something with these feelings. I planned to ask him out the day that we saw each other again, but would hold off until I was sure.
When we finally reunited, we went on a long walk in the beautiful Spring weather. And during the return trip, he had something he wanted to tell me. For reference, our texts between each other were hinting at something during quarantine. He struggled to put the words out. I kind-of-jokingly said "are you gonna ask me out?" and the response to that was "The opposite, actually." In The nicest way possible, he said that he just likes me as a friend. This was backed up by the conversation we had on our walk prior, where he discussed displeasure with his current pattern of falling in and out of interests and partners as interests peak and fade. I understood, of course. Under the assurance that we could still hang out, we continued our walk and spent the rest of the day together. We ate dinner, made by him, and watched "The Vietnam War." The episode ended and the the sun had set. he decided to call it a night.

We walked out to my bike, the air was warm, the light was low. It was good day.

And then N told me that we shouldn't see each other or hang out for a while. I told him I understood, because what else was I gonna do?
I had this poisonous feeling that that was the last time I was ever going to see him. And that may very well be true. I sat on my bike, not even starting the engine. I stared down sullenly at my gas tank, taking a moment to reel in the moment. I dropped me visor, got her running, and looked up. There he was, waving goodbye to me.

N was my shelter in the storm as I realized that I'd never hear from Zenith again. Watching as my relationship silently unraveled. Through all of it, I had him. I knew that it was going to be okay. he was my friend.
And now I have fuck all.

Perhaps I haven't dealt with this new reality in full. Perhaps that's why I'm self destructing. Perhaps that's why I want to jump off a bridge tonight.
I don't know what to do. I've talked about this with a couple people and I'm still not over it.

I'm not a failure, I have my passions and curiosities. Lacking any opportunities for the time being and any place to be; I stew. I wish I had something to bury myself in that wasn't the dirt.
Writing about this has helped, I don't feel in as dire a mood, yet I still feel like I'll never be able to find someone to come home to. Someone other than myself to pour my efforts into. I've seen too many faces come and go, and I only hope that my experiences strengthen me. That's all there's left to hope for, after all.

I just enlisted in the USMC today! I wanted to keep it under wraps until I actually process through MEPS in order to avoid false hype.

I've wanted to join the Marine Corps since 2015, and for those who can remember me mock-up MARPAT outfit and their associated photos, you can confirm. Trouble is, The USMC has higher standards than the other branches, those being the Army/National Guard and Navy. Those standards include a high school diploma. Being a GED holder out of necessity, I shelved this idea for good.

Until my recruiter reached out to me via phone call one fateful morning last week. I wasn't sure the outcome, but I figured that I would indulge him. Lo and behold, I am one step closer to my dream!
Now, I'm not going in to become a grunt. My technical achievements thus far are notable and my interest in the respective fields of motorcycle technology and electronics/communications systems and radios still hold strong. My interest in the USMC may not be based entirely on the same drives of yesteryear, but are based on new visions of what my life can be. The USMC employs some novel communications technology that I find fascinating and I'm excited to have the chance to work with that equipment. Most notably, troposcatter, a topic of hobbyist intrigue. Troposcatter's characteristics and advantages are highly useful to military operations, and thus, they work with this equipment often. This is but one radio system I may have the ability to work with intimately.

Enlisting opened doors to technologies I was dying to operate and understand, but it is not the sole reason. The honor of becoming a Marine is one I will cherish forever, and I hope I can one day step up to the plate and fill the boots of this brotherhood of service members; but first, I must earn it. This is a decision that will distinguish me from the demons I sought to topple. Whether I come out of basic training on top, or get sent home, this is an exclusive experience that will only better myself.

It's not flowers and sunshine; it will be one of the toughest undertakings of my life. But as long and I believe in myself and keep that vision in mind, I can persevere.
In the meantime, I have a college program to complete and graduate from. I'm going to make the most the my remaining time as a civilian.

Speaking of my college program, I haven't made many update. mostly because I haven't had any hiccups I needed to work through textually. Things are great! My grades are outstanding and my instructor is very impressed with me. The thing is, such and consistent level of success become some-old, and minor hiccups (such as missing a question or two on a test) bother me. Once you've hit the ceiling, there's nowhere to go but down, and being the overachiever I am, I become mildly distraught with these.

I can't tell if the material is simple enough (to me) or if I'm just that good at what I do. What can I say, I'm a passionate man.
Sadly, my instructor, Laura, retired a few days ago, and she has been replaced with a stand-in for the foreseeable future. He's an ex-Marine radio operator as well, so I'm sure I'll learn a lot from him. I've never met the man in person, but I am certainly looking forward to the day.

That is all. I hope you all are doing well and find success in your ventures. Hang in there.

[EDIT: Yeah, it ain't happening. Sucks to suck, I guess.]

I'll be at Vancoufur tomorrow through Thursday! If you'd like to meet up or say "hi," let me know! You can reach out to me through Discord or Telegram.

Can't wait!

I've got a lot on my mind, a lot of words I must say, indirectly. A place to dump my pained cries.

In my recent journal about 2019, I talked about how the only thing I wanted anymore was love, was someone to share my life with. Makes sense, if I am as accomplished as I like to believe, it only makes sense that that's the next thing to fight for, yes? Well, in early January, Zenith and I had an intimate conversation about how we felt about each other, and oh man, was I uplifted! I felt complete, I woke up every morning ready for everything. Everything I was working for had a destination, now.

I went to see him again that month, for a whole week this time. Though I had missed some classes and therapy appointments, It was amazing and towards the end, we made things official. I rode home at night across the peninsula in negative temperatures and rain, but I made it home. He was worth the frigid cold and the catch-up work that awaited me. We kept in touch regularly. Not soon after I returned home, he had to drive out to Idaho for work. I had planned to come out and visit him for Valentine's day, I made sure I had the time off, which I did. The last time I spoke to him, I wished him a good day on the morning of January 29th. And that was the last i'd heard from him. Just gone. A few days went by, and I figured he'd just been busy. I mean, that's what I've learned after all this time, is that they're always just busy. And then it became one week. I saw him post on Tumblr, so I knew he had the spare time to use his phone. I tried reaching out to him on there. I tried reaching out to him in every capacity short of riding there in-person. I did eventually get a hold of him,though! I called his workplace and an unsuspecting employee handed him the phone. He meowed at me, as he always did, and told me that we was just hit with a 7-day work week and that he'd talk to me later. Nerves eased.

Then it became two weeks, I could handle it. I felt forlorn. My good friend Emboof came down to visit me, which did help, but even then, I could feel a bomb in my stomach ticking down, but the tears would run. Valentines day came and went, I figured I'd moved on and I met a really nice guy with whom we shared many interests. He was also close by, so that helped!
Three weeks, and he still hadn't read any of my messages. Yep, it was over, I could just feel it.
I attended a party this weekend and got pretty fucked up. I don't remember what set me off, but I just started thinking about him and proceeded to bawl. Fate had forsaken me because as I was crying in the living room, a song that i'd discovered while dating him came on, and that threw me over the edge. There were a lot of people trying to comfort and calm me down. But I still had more tears to shed.
I made my way to the bathroom so I could isolate myself from the crowd. I tried calling Zenith twice. After the second attempt, I didn't even hang up, I just threw my phone across the bathroom, at the door.

The thud attracted the attention of my friend Shavii, who undid the lock to get to me. He took my phone away from me and placed me in his room. I was joined by Ash, Halloween Fox (or was it wolf?), and ican'tbelieveiforgothisname. Still crying, I was telling Ash abut Zenith. And he recognized who I was talking about. I showed him a picture and he confirmed it.
Yep, Zenith was interested in Ash at one point. Would drive up to visit him. And then Zenith ghosted him for 4 months before crawling back to try and explain. And that's when I finally began to calm down I wasn't the only one! It's not me! It wasn't me! My mood quickly picked up, and I become less and less drunk.

So, I sent him one last message on Telegram before blocking him and moving on, for once.

Where do I go from here? I don't know, honestly. I'm fucking fed up with falling in love with furries. It's sickening. It's degrading and poisonous. No one I've met is ready to commit to a relationship. And every furry couple I know is either open or is poly. It's the norm. Now, when I'm just scraping by, I'll partake in this, I'll sleep around just to feel useful or admired. It's a nice way to get external validation. But it's not enough.
I've lost all hope. I've grown to despise everyone in my local furry community. I don't know what is wrong with me, but I feel envious to the point where I'm beginning to wonder why I want a relationship anymore. Is it because I truly want a partner, or is it to spite everyone else?

Which ever the answer is, I won't find it here. Oh no, I won't find it in this fucking community. Love the art, not gonna lie, but man, the people are fucking backwards. Some have been kind, some have been antagonistic, and the rest are just passive, but they all have that one thing in common.
Maybe I just fall for the wrong people, who knows! I know who I love, it's rare that I feel so strongly for someone, so when shit like this happens, it is crushing. I want to self destruct, I want to throw it all away. I want a target, I want someone to be angry at. I almost took it out on an old friend of mine after cleaning through my Twitter messages, but I stopped myself.

Because it's not your fault.

It's clear I just don't fit in with furries, typicals, or any community I can imagine. I hate that fact. I want to bash my head against the wall. I want to put a bullet through my skull. I want to stop struggling, to stop feeling this pain. I don't want to be the outcast, I don't want to be sloppy-seconds, or someone's side-slut. I'm not the blood in my veins.

I want to be one half of a bigger picture.

I won't find my worth underneath someone else's skin, and I don't hold myself to a high enough regard to try and fight for success just for me. I don't know what to live for anymore.
I tried, didn't I? It's not Like I just gave up without making an attempt, without enduring one more hell.

give me an order, tell me what to do. I am slipping away.

yo I just made myself cry

I imagined myself shopping at a large grocery store late at night, perhaps 2am. I'm listening to my music and browsing the aisles. There is but one employee present. She stands bored at one of the cash registers. All is well. As I head towards the back through the canned food aisle, I get a strange feeling, like something is moving out of the corner of my eye. I pause and remove my earbuds. My head swivels. Nothing, no one. Not a sound. I continue forward, only to be confronted with the distant sound of circuit breakers disconnecting, one by one, as sections of the store become consumed in darkness. I freeze, motionless yet panicked. I can't see a thing, my sweaty palms grasp the handle of the shopping cart. The air is tight, like a vacuum, no sound escapes it. It's dead quiet, all that accompanies me is the ringing in my ears and the wind of my breath. My eyes strain to make anything out of the void surrounding me. But I can feel it, like a strong hand wrapped around my throat, the cold fear running through my veins and down my spine--I am not alone in here. I am being hunted. Not by someone as disinterested and tired as the woman up front, but my something unknowable.

I begin to think of places I can hide, if I can get there without my vision. I figure the bakery department would be a good choice, rather dry, lots of obstacles, and free cookies! I just have to get there. I abandon my cart, cheez-its and vitamin water are the last thing I need right now. My boots are heavy and loud, and if I am to avoid being picked off, I must treat carefully. My heart pounds and my ears strain to verify my light steps, but every movement is like thunder. The ruffle of my jacket, the tense exhale from my lungs, and clack of Vibram on the linoleum floor tiles--all of it was far too much and I felt it drawing near. I froze up. I couldn't take it any more. I fell to the ground and pressed my back against the shelves, burying my head in my arms, thinking I was safe to hide here in the open. At least I felt safe. And what of the woman up front? Surely, she would have made a noise, screamed, even! Perhaps it started with her. Maybe she is cowering behind her desk, as I am in this aisle, and all we must do is call out to each other! Safety in numbers. But what if the creature that stalks this interior tracks one of us down in our attempt?

What if I call out, and no one answers?
I can hear it breathing now. I haven't much time. The fear is paralyzing. Just end it!

Sleep is, by all extents of the imagination and the limited definitions by human language, a state in which one lays dormant while the world passes you by, hour by hour. A plane of exitance where time distorts, where hours feel like years or minutes feel like seconds. Your skin and bones fall heavily on the mattress, it wraps around your limbs as it consumes you. There is warmth so familiar, like a mother's touch, it caresses you and your waking thoughts bleed away, pooling beneath the frame for which you lay. Dark corners disappear, the creak and rattle of wood and pipes dance together in a lulling rhythm, when once they clambered like hellfire in a bear's den. The eyes for which you observe this wretched world from, yet also behold magnificent beauty, grow dry and cold. The eyes fall like stage curtains, heavier than a boulder. The mind is left alone from the world, in a soundless, sightless void. It the most frightening place you've ever known. Your eyes wrinkle as your fight to weep, but the tear nigh fall from your cheeks. This is no longer Earth, logic does not work here, in the land where hands reach through rocks, and the horizon does flips.

In tireless desperation, you build your house with the pieces of a life you knew, so that maybe this darkness can feel whole. The index has been shuffled, and when you reach into the box of love and care, you pull from it a long-buried trauma you too soon forget. It's wrath grabs your floating, formless, helpless body by the ankles and drags it through nails. Where once, you could at least breath, the air is suffocating. You want to go back, escape this horror you made yourself, but your screams and cries fall on deaf ears. You feel your fight and life reduced to one, two, three more long, pained drags of air.
And then, your lungs fill, and the burning, slimey palm releases your body. You don't remember how you got here, The sky is always changing color, and the faces of the people around your shift endlessly. You stand and lose balance all over again, fumbling through this land you now inhabit. It smells like him, doesn't it? That sweet, homey scent that could cripple an army, and has your heart beating again. You push past these faceless bodies, feeling their gruff texture, wandering through this maze of memories until you find him. His face hasn't settled, but you know it's him. His smile returns from the ether and his skin is soft to the touch. You remember. The crowd that impeded your journey now falls away, and suddenly you back in that room, in his bed, caressing his hair, feeling his heart beat. He speaks a language only you understand, and when you look into his recovered eyes, your flesh makes sense again.

Something is wrong, this bed is too small, these walls aren't right, that's not his outfit. He's grabbing you too hard, you're sweating too much, and the birds that sang outside scream and beep.
Your lungs draw in stale air, your eyes fly open, and you body jerks violently as your confused and tortured body scrambled for the alarm clock. The bed pulls you back with a tempting allure, and you yourself want so desperately to return to that world, to be with him where you otherwise wouldn't. Maybe if you close your eyes again. This world can wait.

I hope your year was mellower than mine! It has been one adventure, one tribulation, after the next. As my journals no doubt describe! Though, there is much that was left unwritten. I hope to rectify that, at least for the less-sensitive subjects.

Though, the year started with hope, it was quickly crushed my the loss of my job. I spent those early days looking for a way out, and alone the way, made good company with my roommate and his friends. God, I miss those parties! It was nice to spend time with my bestie again, too! Thanks to Sherbert and Zapper, I was introduced to Telegram, oh, the doors that opened! I'm grateful for them looking out for me during those trying times, through thick and thin, I will never forget them.

As summer approached and my roommate left, I was left to my own devices. Living my life, in my own place, at my own pace. And i found that it was awful. After creating Central Washington Furs, I grew a community I thought never existed in my corner of the world! I met Jett, who lived in my own apartment complex! Small world for sure. And then there is Dan, who didn't live far, either. We would hang out and kill time, making our very-small D&D campaigns and enjoying each other's company. I know it sounds like late November, but I am thankful for their friendship. Wouldn't have made this far without you two!

Then, there was the Puyallup BBQ hosted by Puget Sound Furs. I finally got to meet some of the people I'd been chatting with on Telegram! Notably, Ardent, Reggie, Emboof, and Wee-Woo. My friendships with them were life changing, as well! The weekend trips to Kirkland to spend time with Reggie, the loving company of Emboof, and the relaxed and adventurous times I had with Wee-Woo; it was an amazing Summer, one I wont soon forget.
Speaking of that Summer, I biked around Seattle with my friend (at the time), RushFox! It was gorgeous and I was put through my paces, in more way than one, hehe. We hit up a bathhouse after our long and refreshing ride, first time either of us had been. Oh my lord, was that a great way to spend the evening. I got to play around like all those fox bottoms, taken by one lad after the next. Some of my friends weren't happy with me after that, which I understand. Lesson learned. I picked up a ravenous case of Mono sometime afterwards and had a falling out with Puget Sound Furs. Not my proudest moment, wrapping up the Summer in a painful and panicked fashion.

And yet, I moved on. Some of the people i met fell to the side, while other prevailed, but it was a trend I did not wish to continue. It seemed, though, that the damage was done, and I felt more alone than I'd ever been. Sure, I had new connections, ones I completely lacked over the last five years, but everything we feel is in reference. The bar was raised, and my fingers started to slip. I had a taste for being social, and I craved it.

September rolled around, and I began my first day back at BatesTech. It felt great to be back in an academic environment again, a place where I could challenge myself, and build a better future for the world, myself, and the ones I loved. . . okay, maybe I'm inflating my impact on the world just a smidge, heh. I'll return to this later in the journal. Just after, Furvana 2019 was on the horizon! My first furry convention ever! I was accompanied my RushFox, arriving in the wonderful Ocean Shores late Thursday. Soon after, Moku arrived, our other roomie. I was restless! Friday morning arrived, I ate breakfast downstairs and headed to the beach to see the sunrise. It was quite chilly , as expected, but I was just killing time until the con opened up. I was there the minute registration opened up and. . . they were having trouble with the machines. I lounged around for an hour with some pals until the got things up and running.

All the while, I asked the staff if they needed help and they put me to work! I was a volunteer for 13 hours that day! Starting out in registration, then con patrol for the rest of the day. Not exactly what I'd expected, but damnit if I didn't feel proud when I was awarded my Furvana Staff shirt after the 8 hours! I was also given some wooden tokens to hand out to attendee's who were behaving exemplary! It felt great to help everyone out, and they were grateful for my assistance.

But Furvana was all sunshine and rainbows. I spent Friday night drunk at a room party hosted by someone very surprising. I had been seeing a lot of familiar and painful faces from this year, and I feared that it would all fall apart. Saturday, I made a pledge to take things easy. I sat down with Ardent again after so long and he had a very refreshing chat about August. I'm really glad he took to time to hang with me that day. I also met a very special wah that day! Were it not for Anubis, that con would have been a dump for me, but he brought me back to my center. But, as the night dragged on, my anxiety caught up with me and I was crying. I spent most of it in the lobby of the SHilo, engaged in a long conversation with MusicFox and one other lad whose name escapes me, sadly.

I also had the pleasure of meeting Ray, the audio mixer for the dances. Were it not for his company, I would have sure lost it, as well. I'll never forget him. Sunday was pretty mundane, I tried to spend what little time was left with Anubis, and that's exactly what I did. Rush wanted to leave early, and so we did. The sun set behind us as we left, quite poetic! That was the last time I saw him, in the capacity of a friendship, sadly. All the time we spent this year, and he was gone over. . . stepping on toes, regretfully.

I returned to my classes, intent on understanding electronics. I excelled this quarter, not only preforming well on paper, but finally understanding transistors on an intimate level, something that was made clear during ANW later in the quarter.
November 5th, 2019, 8:56AM, S 19th St and S Adams St, Tacoma, WA. An SUV turns left in front of me and crash into the drivers door at 35mph. I slam against the ground and open my eyes, my bike is barely running, my nose is bleeding, and my whole body aches. Did this just happen to me? No, it can't have.
Easily the most challenging, traumatic, and life altering moment of the year. I had the bike for nine days, took it on an adventure up to Nanaimo, BC to see Royce, a guy I was dating at the time. And it was gone. The bike and the relationship, not at once, though, haha.
I spent the night in the hospital and was soon back home, with crutches and an immobilizer. My mobility was gone, I was in a lot of pain, and I feared for my academic performance, as I could not make it to class for that week. I shouldn't have gone next week, either, but this was too important. Thankfully, my instructors worked with me so that i could get my work done over the computer and on my own. I was on the volunteer schedule for ANW 2019, too! How was I going to go about my duties with a broken knee and crutches? I wasn't. And so, I cancelled my schedule. The staff were very understanding. I fought my injuries and continued going to class, and over time, I saw my leg get better and better. It was healing much faster than anticipated!

ANW 2019. Whoa, where do I begin? I traveled with my pal, Kenic, and we made our way to Seattle from Tacoma. Making a pit stop in Federal Way to acquire a food supply for the weekend, since you'd be hard pressed to find a Safeway for a proper grocery store within walking distance in Downtown. I used one of those shopping cart scooters for the first time. I had a cheeky grin on my face the entire time! Life was good.

He dropped me off at the Hyatt, fully loaded with grocery bags, a full backpack, and crutches. I navigated the elaborate floor plan and initially confusing elevator layout after going through the process of checking into our room. I was not the head-roomie, so me checking in first made things complicated for Anubis, who was visibly stressed when he finally pulled up with the crew. We went out for food a few blocks away, which, for someone with crutches, was a little challenging, but I found ways to make it fun! Though, my internal stress and depression started to eat at me. Luckily, I had my friends there to rope me back in. After heading back, I explored the con space some more and ran into a certain Hyena. She was really cool and we had a nice chat. Never got to hang out with her after that, as per usual.

Kenic and I found ourselves in the hotel room, I had just drank some alcohol, and Anubis came back with another fursuiter. Kenic and I felt a little awkward just sitting in the other bed while they snuggled,, so he dragged me to a room party up top. Glad I went with him! I met up with Bink there and eventually had a physically flirty run in with Zenith. he was the highlight of my night~ As we drank more and the night went on, he had me up against the wall, sinking his claws into my chest, and oh my. . . I'll spare the rest of the details. I slept there with him, and woke up the next morning for my first full day of the con! There really wasn't anything interesting occurring throughout the day, my only goals were to spend time with Anubis and Zenith, drink, and get a photo with KiwiFox, Beta, and Zillion. I was able to do all of those, except Zillion. I had a chance the first night, after the film festival, and I tried introducing myself, but he didn't hear me. He was filming something with a friend and then left. Ouch.

My selfie with Beta was actually blurry and I felt awkward just standing there trying to talk with him, I imagine it must be rough walking around the con space for too long. That day, we came down in suit, and he got swarmed by the young furs near the elevator. Poor guy, heh. I am, however, very proud of the photo I got with Kiwi, had a nice chat with him, what a great lad.
Speaking of con space shenanigans, I saw Zenith in-suit and approached him. He spread his arms out for a hug, which I gladly accepted. But there was a problem! I always put my crutches aside for a hug, because it's more comfortable and less of a hazard, but I forgot to do so before hugging him. I was off-balance and elevated off the ground due to the crutches and I held on to Zenith for dear life. He, not expecting this lost his balance, too, and I fell on my back with him atop me. It was a little jarring, but I was laughing. This is a rom-com level oopsy! It was purrfect! I was worried that he had busted a stitch on his suit. Luckily, he was alright. The con staff were swarming us, though, as they asking me over and of again if I was okay. They wouldn't accept joyful nod as an answer, and so I was forced to say, very clearly, "Yes." We got back up and chatted for a bit. I would rejoin him later that day. In the meantime, I had time to kill. So I visited with my roomie's housemates and we had a drink together. I chilled with Spike back in our room and we watched the ever-hilarious parody, McGroover.

I met up with Zenith again. It was supposed to be 1-on-1, but we ended up visiting one of his freind's room so he could smoke weed. Eventually, we made it back to his room and he gave me a choice, just us and maybe a couple of his friends, or throw another party. I, an idiot, suggested that we have an underwear party. From what I've heard, it lasted until 7am. I dipped out around midnight, I was too tired and inebriated to continue functioning, and I could tell the it would still be a while before i got my 1-on-1 time. I never did that weekend.

I didn't return to the hotel room, either. I found a nice corner of the abandoned con space for a couple hours then hit up my friend Emboof, who was having an equally turbulent situation with his roomie. I crashed there for as long as I could (11am). I was summoned by Zenith once more, my roomie Spike had passed out hard and wouldn't wake up. He also wet the bed that night. Heh, kinda glad I bounced when I did. I came up to wake him up and make sure he got back to our room safely. He lost his shirt (momentarily), so we were looking all over for it. I said my solemn goodbyes to Zenith, thinking I would see him around again. Kinda got hurt feelings from that night.

I spent the rest of that day, sitting around the con space, trying to meet up with Coonkun and Deery, but we missed each other. I walked around with Rocoro and chatted. It was nice! Then I pretty much sat in one of the halls, listening to music and singing along as everything winded down, waiting for my ride to come and get me.

Both nights I slept, all I could dream of were transistor circuits. My mind was visualizing how they worked. That, and series aiding batteries, haha. See! I came back to it! Full circle. I ended up acing my transistors test, no surprise. I wrapped up the quarter and shortly after, I bought Sasha, my VFR800, as a stand in while I rebuild Sarah, my RF900R.

I was preparing to finally meetup with Acinonyx, a Chee I met on Howlr over the Summer. He finally moved up here. I bought him a gift and drew him a Christmas card with his character on it. But, plans kept getting pushed back this month, and I got too hopeful. Eventually, feeling down about not being able to do everything i wanted to with him. He saw this, and I woke up to two long messages saying that it would be best if we didn't meet because we were in this for different reasons. . . Oh, I'm a hopeless romantic, a poor Synth with a big heart, at times. And by heart, I mean a coolant pump. Haha. I never got to deliver his gift or his card.

I did my best to rectify the situation, but even before he read the messages, I knew it was lost, and after a particularly bad morning, I decided to execute my plans to hang out with Zenith sooner than planned. I packed up my stuff and rode for Ocean Shores and got to spend a few lovely days, just me and him. I would have stayed longer, but my dad is visiting this weekend, so I had to go back. The guilt would never leave me if I didn't ride back. But there was another part of me that was saying, "Fuck the world. I need to live for me while I still can." I wanted to stay , with him, just for a while. Before my life consumed me once again.

There are some gaps to fill here, but this is a journal, not a book, so I'm happy with this summary of all the notable events this year. I have some regrets, but I wouldn't change a thing if it meant I wouldn't meet the friends I have this year.
Looking forward, 2020 should be more fulfilling and stable. I've entered a PNW riders group, so hopefully I'll get some action photography out for you all! Personally, I no longer want things, I have everything I need. But there a hole still left unfilled. I want to find someone who lives for me, and I for them. Something exclusive. Someone I find attractive, inside and out, who fulfills me. I hope I find that someone next year, maybe I already have, and all I need to do is take that leap. In the wise words of Ben Barlow, "I've been moving mountains that I once had to climb."

No distance is too great, no divide too far, to keep you from the ones you love. I hope you all have a wonderful New Year, seeya next time!

Part 1: Arris

Oh boy, I seem to get myself caught up in him far too often, haha.

I was reflecting on the year and remembered the days back in Ellensburg, the weekend parties my roommate would host with his friends. We'd play games and drink. It was amazing. I got away from the laptop and my worries and socialized face-to-face. I miss them, I miss the furry friends I met there, too. Especially my bestie. If you looked through my journals from this year, you'd find one that expresses my hatred and feeling of imprisonment there. But the silver lining was my friends!

I also remembered the people I met in June, at the Puyallup BBQ, I may have written about that, too. Some of them didn't keep in touch the following weeks, but the other three did! One in particular stood out to me, his name is, uh, shit anonymity, right. How about. . . "Arris." Yes, there's no way anyone could identify the real Arris with that alias! Haha.

Arris and I, after moving back to Tacoma, began talking more frequently in July. I really liked him, you know. He lived all the way up in Kirkland, which is a 50 mile ride from me. It was a steep trip, at first, since all I had was Suzy (long may she live), but I'd put my body and my bike through that stress for him. We became close, or so I thought. We'd hang out in his apartment, cuddle in the bed, and yes, we did fool around. We also talked about our lives and where we wanted to go.
This was the usual for our visits. It seemed like he was really into me. So I kept trying to get closer to him and his life, not just his bed. I received two pieces of bad news as a result of this: 1) He was still recovering from a nasty breakup with his fiance and 2) He doesn't fuck his friends.
I can sleep around with most people of my choosing, so that isn't special to me. But being a part of his life is. So I did away with sleeping around, for him. Our visits became less frequent, same with our talks, as he was dealing with a job position transition, as well as a move down to Des Moines. It was clearly taking up a lot of his attention, but i had hoped that him being closer would mean that we could see each other more often. And I was able to make one trip up there. I can't quite recall the day or month. Must have been early September, before fall quarter and Furvana. Things seemed to be just fine! He was really happy, I noticed. He would make music with his housemate, all the while, I just felt like a third wheel. However, we had a warm goodbye, so I was optimistic.

I tried to keep in touch, which was hard, considering how busy he is normally. Furvana rolled around and that what cut me the deepest. I wanted to spend a lot of time with him, maybe even room with him, but he was already set up with some admins from PSF, no biggie, I told myself. We can still hang out.
And then we didn't. At all. The only time I saw Arris was when I accidentally stumbled into a room party, hosted by a certain-cougar. Which was shocking. That whole party fucked me up. I saw a lot of familiar faces there, people who I would consider friends, acquaintances, or allies, spending time with people who were more adversarial towards me. This was reinforced by the host insulting me, and then hitting me with the good ol "lol jk."
Of course, being at someones party doesn't mean that you enjoy the host, as was the case with me, but I was the only one who was visibly irked by it. Whereas Arris was very casual. The adminship and accompanied him there, and they were very friendly with the host, which made me question the merit of their moral standards, but nevertheless, that's a whole other can of worms.

Throughout Furvana, I saw Arris spending time with these people, never checking in on me to see if I wanted to hang out, never walking up to me if we were in the same space. It hurt to witness, he was drifting away from me before my eyes. Or at least, that was my perception. It was an emotional weekend, and that was one reason why.
With the college program beginning, I could now peel my focus away from Telegram and the people within it. I didn't want to be hung up on anyone. This was a fresh start. So I silently let him go and move on.

Now, during this reflection a couple days ago, I remembered those warm, passionate memories with him in his bedroom and I wanted to catch up. I've got a busted knee and a busted bike, I have too much time to myself, and I felt lonely. I also loved him. I found him again through a mutual group and saw on his profile, as I have to in order to send a message. His bio changed. He's partnered now. . .

Thaaaaaaaaaat crushed my heart, big time. My throat tightened up, there wasn't enough air in the room, and I couldn't hold back the tears. So I did what I always do when anxious, overwhelmed, or sad; I get under my desk and let it all out.
You may be asking, "Well, Fletcher, if that is your real name! Why would you care so much if you let him go?" And I answer that with: My feeling never died, they just took a back-back seat. And to think that I didn't keep in touch with him when he started to open himself up and get out there. . . I wonder if he ever thought of me. There are a lot of maybes that could explain it, perhaps he was still in lockdown, but his new partner came around and he felt whole again. In which case, it makes me feel like I wasn't special enough to him. As evident.

If I remove my left side brain from my right for a moment, all I was to him was a booty call. He just wanted to fuck me as long as he cared to, and the content of my person wasn't enough to keep me around. I feel used and heartbroken, that i could invest that much of my consciousness, time, and interpersonal effort into watering what I believed could be a long relationship, only to see that our friendship wasn't a plant, it was a pot with a big hole in the bottom. Maybe, I don't think that metaphor worked well.

The point is, watering a plant is a lot like maintaining a relationship. Where the plant is the mutual connection. Both of the plant parents have to water and fertilize it, so that it continues to be their plant. If only one parent waters and cares for the plant, well, it may as well just be that parent's plant. They're the only one putting time into it. The other parent is just like "hey man, that's your plant. I don't want anything to do with it." The parent who cares for that plant is now like "But we grew this plant together, what changed?" and he's like "I never really cared about that plant. I actually like this plant instead. Look how big and strong it is!"
And so I, the lonely plant parent, am left with a beautiful little flower that's slowly dying, because it needed two parents to thrive.


Part 2: Revival


Sarah came home today! I am upset with the towing people for how they handled her transportation. Fun fact: they never took her out of gear. That's right, they were struggling to move her onto and off the truck because they forgot that neutral existed. So she was brought to me on her side. She deserves better >:(

I got to take a close look at her in the comfort of my own property and examine the damage. Good news: She can DEFINITELY be fixed. With enough funding and parts availability, I can get her back on the road. So that's what I'm going to do. I imagine the insurance settlement is going to be enough to replace my clothing, equipment, and pay for a new bike, but I'm also going to spend it one fixing Sarah. Then I'll have two bikes!
The way I look at it, despite the evaluation of her being "totalled," is that nothing that special deserves to be left behind. I only had Sarah for nine days before the crash, but in that time, I rode her to the store, to class, and all the way up to Nanaimo, BC and back. And she was just fine. That built a trusting relationship between me and the bike, and so, I'm sentimental. She isn't just a machine, some broken motorcycle, she's MY RF900R and her name is Sarah.

Imagine if the doctors decided to pull the plug on me just because my knee was broken. You'd protest! No, no, no sir, I'm still all here! I just need some fixing up and some time, I'll be able again!
And thus, I wouldn't do that to Sarah. She doesn't deserve to be left behind and forgotten, just and you and I don't deserve to be forgotten and left to decay.

I actually started chatting in new group chats again, and since repair is my passion and riding Sarah is also my passion, I saw an opportunity to make new connections, make a new friend through common interest. I don't want to fix her alone, i'd probably cry. Plus,, I can't really do any heavy lifting. So I asked the group if anyone would like to help me fix her up sometime, and someone accepted!

Hopefully that leads to a fulfilling friendship, built around a hobby/skill/interest, rather than just "we're both gay and we're both furries." Like all my friendships this year have begun, haha. I will update you all on where I'm at on that and I can't wait to unveil her, good as new!

Seeya next time! <3

It has been almost two weeks since my collision and there have been some developments and thoughts I wanted to share.

Firstly, how am I doing? I'm off of my painkillers and the knee isn't giving me any pain most of the time. It's definitely an improvement from last week, where being off the pain killers resulted in agony. I've been seeing a chiropractor who specializes in "accident" injury. She gave me an exercise to do to keep my quad from atrophying and recommended that I try to bend my knee every day. So far so good. I've been skimping on the exercise. but I have to bend my knee to get in the shower, anyways. Most of the pressure comes from the tendon below the knee, I think. It's tightened up as a result of not moving my leg at all. Same goes with the thigh muscles. They've become squishy and soft. It worries me and I wonder if I'll ever get that strength back.

Secondly, how am I doing mentally? Honestly, I'm stressed the fuck out. The leg is done, all it needs is time and rest, but it's my finances that are causing me a lot of undo strain. My settlement has not been negotiated yet and unemployment isn't budging for the money thy stole from me. So I'm still living on the edge of nothing. The towing company is extorting me for the bike and put a time limit on her before they sell her to the highest bidder. That genuinely pisses me off. My mother caved and said she would pay me back for the money unemployment took from me. Getting Sarah out of the impound lot is ongoing.
I also have my classes. I attended two days last week, but the stress was too great on my body. I feel like I'm falling behind and under-performing. I got the worst grade I've had all quarter on my diodes test, an 86%. For the duration diodes were being studied, I was going through a lot of rush and instability, even before the collision. Goes to show what missing out on lectures does to grades. Now that the leg isn't hurting, I am going to make it early to every class i have this week, get all my shit done early or on time, and get my reputation back.

Internally, I think about the moment-to-moment of that morning. I think about how much I no longer have as a result. A wrong that has been done to me. Tonight, for example, I tried to get some shut eye, but all I could think of was that car, the panic, the squeeze of the brake lever. Knowing that I wasn't going to stop in time. I thought about how I flew through the air and landed. And it kept replaying and replaying.
I felt my leg, how it can't move, how empty my pockets are right now, how there is no Sarah or Suzy in my garage. How i haven't ridden a bike in so long, haven't kickstarted Suzy or felt the trust of Sarah's engine. It was taken from me. It fills me with sorrow and anger with the world, because there was nothing I could have done to save myself from that situation. I can't be angry at myself for making a mistake, there is nothing I can' beat myself up for, and thus, there is nothing I can improve on my own. Just the realization that I had no power or control. It's hopeless.

Who am I supposed to be angry at?! How do I fix this?! I do not cry every day anymore, but I did. I feel just as hopeless as I did a week ago, but now the pain isn't reminding me constantly.

I will leave you with this message I wrote to a close friend of mine one night, when the play-by-play was all-consuming;

"I think about the crash often. Sitting at the light on proctor. My visor was fogging up because it was cold and I wasn't moving. I could see the turn signal lamps flash on and off.

Our light turned green. The two cars ahead of me strayed to the right lane mid turn, which is against the rules. So I went left. The lead car was slowing down to turn right, to I prepared to merge right, after he had turned. I checked my speed, I changed my lane position, and then I saw it pop out into my path. It was a silver Subaru Forester. Late 2000's, it was turning left. If it was faster, I think, I could have cleared it. My heart rate increases, I pulled in the clutch, and tried to squeeze the breaks without locking the wheels. But it was so close, it wasn't enough.

I closed my eyes because i was scared. I heard the sound of the crash, I felt my body be thrown from the bike, suspended in the air, and then I hit the ground. I opened my eyes and looked for Sarah. I could still hear her engine running. I was on my chest, my backpack was aloof. I could feel hot blood flowing from my nose. You know when you bang up or scrape yourself on something Rocky or hard? That's how my body felt. That fresh, seering, almost breathtaking pain that makes you choke up. I lifted my head to look around, and the bystanders told me to keep my head down. Not to move.

She was dressed in scrubs. I think she was mixed. I reached out to my bike and cried for her. Repeating the word "no." Until a middle aged man placed a blanket over me, crouched down and looked me in the eyes, and said I was going to be okay. Told me not to worry about the bike.

Then another woman in scrubs knelt down and asked me to grip her hand and to follow her finger with my eyes. I asked them to shut off my bike and turn off the heated grips.

I watched as coolant leaked into a little river, heading straight for me. I think the man put his foot in its path. They asked for my emergency contact, so I gave them my mother's number. She didn't answer.

The paramedics arrived and assessed me. I told them that my right leg was hurting. Then I felt the cold metal of their scissors as they cut up my leg. My bare skin exposed to the cool, foggy air. Then the boots came off. And my backpack, my winter jacket, and my shirt. All cut off. Can't forget the helmet.

They rolled my half baked body onto a stretcher, I smelt the linen scent of hospital sheets. They lifted me into the ambulance, and the doors closed. It was quiet, and I started crying again. The sky looked so dark out of the Windows. They kept moving my leg and poking me with things, it was hell.

It was going to be a beautiful day."

Part 1: Patterns

It's been six days since my collision and I've noticed some interesting patterns, in physical behavior and thought processes.

The first pattern is mornings. Every morning, I am dehydrated. Every minute movement of my leg results in several sharp pains in my knee. My mind is tired and my body is sore. I emphasize, every morning. My water bottle is always empty, and so, in this state, I must trudge to the sink, clumsily. It's easier on my leg if I use two crutches, but then I wouldn't be able to carry the water bottle. Once full, I return to my bed and take my pills. One Tylenol for nerve pain, one gabopentin for anxiety, one pill for still softening, and 5-10mg of oxycodone for pain relief, depending on how bad the pain is that morning. I set my timer for 6 hours and 8 hours, that is when I need to retake my Tylenol and gabopentin, respectively. After that, I wait for the oxycodone to kick in so that I am able to ascend my stairs.

I like to think of the stairs as a mountain. A tall and intimidating mass that must be climbed with careful intent. The more you climb that mountain, the less scary it is and the better you get at climbing it. If you have the mindset of "let's tackle the world," then this mountain is a molehill. But if you wake up and you feel like the world has left you here to rot and that you'd be better off dead, then that mountain is a cliff--insurmountable. How easy the stairs are is dependent on the mood of the climber.

Once I am up the stairs, I take whatever vitamin supplements are available, brush my teeth, and grab an energy drink. This is normally where I'd shower, if I were able. We just got the shower seat on Saturday and I was able to test it out yesterday morning, so that will be part of this pattern.

Next, I retreat downstairs carefully, as I now have to grip the energy drink, the rails, and my crutches all at once, with two hands.
I lay in bed and drink. I feel groggy and disgusting, I have little pains and aches. What I do for the rest of the day is entirely dependent on what I have to do, that is, on my phone. There is no pattern for the rest of my day physiologically.

However, there is a mental pattern. Once I wash off and the meds kick in, I can think clearly. I often replay the crash in my mind. I think about what I'm going to say to the impound lot employees, I think about what I would say in court, should it ever come to that. I think about what I would say to people who think it's so stupid that I'm more concerned about my motorcycle than my own wellbeing. I think about drawing the crash as a comic, each panel sketched perfectly in my mind.

I think about the day I will see Sarah again, I think about the day I will buy my next bike, and I think about riding again.

These passionate thoughts occur frequently throughout the day.

Part 2: Dysmorphia

How often do you look at your body? When you do, do you feel like those parts are you? Recently, that answer is no. I see the cut on my left leg and the brace on the other, the ache in my left arm, and the bruise on my testicles, and I think, "well, these can't be my parts. This isn't me. No, I am able to walk. I can ride, I can jump and walk up stairs. These aren't mine."

I see my crutches, my sock aid, my grabber, my broken computer, the extra blankets, and my empty garage and it feels like I'm on another planet. No, this isn't me. I can walk and ride. Sarah was right here.

I see my bloodstained helmet, there should be a visit on it. I check my pockets, there should be keys in there.

Just tonight, I looked down, and saw my brace as a tumor, sucking my life away. I moved my knee inside it, trying to break free.

I cry every day. I think of Sarah and the joy she brought me. I think of the bond I had with her.

Crash, whoosh, slam. You know what the first I said after I hit the asphalt? I opened my eyes and looked for Sarah. I saw her smashed up. "No, no, no, no!" This can't be happening to me. This isn't my life. This was a beautiful day. This was my commute to class. Where did it go?!

I don't know what can fix this. Money can replace what was broken; what was taken from me. But it can't erase this trauma from my being.

Part 3: Passion

What offends me is when people say "you can replace the bike, but you can't replace your life." Fuck you.

Sarah isn't some machine. She's my passion, she's something I can rely on no matter what. She takes me places I could never go. She needs me to complete her. I put hours of work into her, and there were still many hours ahead. I want to ride her all day.

This is closest thing I've come to love. I love Sarah, not just because of what she does for me, but because of what I can do for her. It's hard to find a person who has been in her level.

I didn't lose a bike in that crash, I lost the love of my life. Now, she sits outside in some impound lot, cold and broken. Rained on. Mistreated. They're extorting her for me. They are fucking halfwits. They don't deserve to touch her.

She won't be the same. She may be dead. I saw her bleed out in front of me as I lay on that wet road. And all I could do was watch.

This is my pain. This is the nature of my existence as of late.

This morning at 8am, I was in a collision. It was a beautiful foggy morning and I was on my way to class. I turned left onto S 19th St from Proctor and was heading towards Union. Between the 19th/ proctor intersection and the 19th/Union intersection, there are several small cross streets, they have two-way stops.

On 19th, there are two lanes on each side of the divide. I was in the left lane, as all cars turning left should be, but the cars in front of me all went into the right lane; typical. Usually, two cars turn right into those side streets and the rest continue on 19th. Knowing this, I accelerated to 40mph to speed match the cars to my right who were turning, hoping to merge right after they turned off, as I do every morning.

An SUV to my right was turning right, thusly slowing down, which gave the Subaru SUV a gap in traffic to turn left from the side street onto 19th. I did not see her, and she did not see me. She drove out in front of me, saw me, panic stopped instead to accelerating to get across the street. At 40mph, I had 2-3 car lengths between me and the Subaru. The road was wet from the mist and I attempted a full stop. Swerving to the right would have thrown me into the side of another car, and swerving left would have thrown me Into oncoming traffic. I couldn't stop in time and I t-boned the Subaru.

When I realized this was it, I closed my eyes, not wanting to see what happened. I heard the crash, I was thrown forward from my bike and flipped while airborne, it felt. Then I felt my whole body slam against the pavement. Immediately, the pain began. I opened by eyes and saw Sarah on her right side, still running. She held on as long as she could before sputterinf off. Two nurses on their way to work came to my aid and an older gentleman knelt down, placing a blanket over me. Someone had called an ambulance. I was crying, reaching out to Sarah, trying to reach her. Her front end was smashed up. Her front cowl was in pieces, the headlight was dangling, and the front axle was holding on by a thread. A river of coolant made its way to my immobilized body, nearly reaching me before a man placed his foot in its path and diverted it. Blood was flowing from my nose, dripping onto the asphalt and my helmet. All I could do was cry and reel in my physical and emotional pain. In a flash, I lost all of my valuables. My bike was totalled, my laptop wouldn't turn on, and I was going to miss my classes.

The paramedics and fire department showed up and asked me some questions, proceeding to cut my pants, underwear, shirt, and boots off. That upset me. That was the only long sleeve shirt I had left. Those pants were the coolest I had, and those boot laces are irreplaceable.

They moved me, in agony, onto a stretcher. I identified where the pain was. My right knee, I could barely move, my left leg was able to move just fine, though. All it had was a deep and long laceration. My right testicle, however, was badly bruised and every time it shifted, it was like being kicked between the legs ten times. My right knee, they found, was fractured.

In the ER and Trauma room, I just closed my eyes and balled, the pain was everpresent and all consuming. They gave me a dose of fentanyl, which calmed me down, and took x-rays of my legs and abdomen. They then proceeded to take me to the CT scan room.

They found that there was abnormal fluid in my pelvis and wanted to monitor me overnight. I got an immobilizer for my right leg to prevent it from moving, thankfully. They also used tape and glue to close the laceration on my left knee.

Someone finally got around to ultrasounding my right testicle to see the damage. It was bruised, swelled, and there was a buildup of fluid around it. The aching would go away in time, it was just a bruise.

I spent the rest of the day in dread, pain, and uncertainty. My bike was gone, my laptop was gone, my phone was lost, and I won't be able to walk without crutches for ten whole weeks. Will I be able to go to my classes? Will I fall behind? Will I be compensated for all this damage?

There is no way I can get back on my feet without it.
Right now, I can tolerate the pain in my right knee without morphine injections. My mind feels clearer.

I hope I can stay on top of my classwork and get back on my feet soon. And I hope I can get that compensation, if not, I'm capital F Fucked.

It's been a while since I last made one of these journals, but I think now is the perfect time to do so. I'd like to start by saying that since my introduction to Telegram in January, I was able to take the complex thoughts and life developments to specific people and get personal feedback or just support. So the need to write to you all was reduced, but I want to return to this format, at least somewhat, because it allowed me to talk about a lot of what was on my mind without involved parties having the inside scoop; i.e., it's less complicated.

So where do I begin? Let's start with Furvana, my first furry convention!

The week leading up to Furvana, I was a little worried, there were some things up in the air that I didn't have answers to, that being financial aid and if I could get the Friday off for the con. But Wednesday came and financial was kind enough to put my tuition payment on hold until the grants came through! That made my day even better. The next day, I sat down with my instructor to speak with her about my program outcomes and whatnot. It was a nice meeting! After I told her that I was at page 97 of our textbook, she was impressed and said that I could totally take Friday off. Another relief!
For the those first two days of my program, things felt really good. I liked my classmates, my instructors, and the faculty in general. They are all really cool people. I even sat down and chatted with the dean! Things were going to be a-okay.

I'll spare you the play-by-play of the con, but things did not go as planned. I wound up volunteering for 13 hours on Friday after seeing that registration was an hour late to open up. I wasn't able to spend as much time with the friends I wanted to meetup with there, mostly just flagging them down when I saw them and chatting. I saw some people there who had caused me a lot of pain this year and it was hard to see them smile at me as though nothing happened. My nights were emotional, to say the least.
But I met someone at Furvana who is very special to me, and I fell in love. And despite everything that happened, at the con and this entire year, I don't regret a thing; because it brought me there, at that moment, with him. I felt overjoyed, though anxious. But I can say for certain that I went home that weekend feeling great.

Unfortunately, because of the complications with my planning, a couple of my close friends felt left out or jealous, and so I lost them as the work week picked up. It didn't hurt me the way I thought it should, but maybe I just learned to move on from these things over the year. Maybe it was all the things going right in my life at the time that allowed me to not place so much focus on it. I'm sorry to see them go, but it was their decision, you know?

I made plans with this special friend for this weekend and then something jarring came to my attention: One of my friends fell in love with him, too. Or at least, that's how it sounded. We talked Monday night and came to an agreement. But the anxiety started to rear it's ugly head because this special friend hadn't been on telegram for a bit. But once he did, we were able to talk and everything was working wonderfully. My friend's needs were that he wanted 1-on-1 time with our special friend, so we had to come up with a weekend schedule, what days and when one of us would head off so that the other could have their time when there was a crossover. It was taxing for me. But I want this special friend in my life, and if this is how it has to work, then I'll do so.

For Monday and Tuesday, the anxiety was heavy as time ticked by and we hadn't heard from him, but Wednesday and Thursday I was riding on this level plain of satisfaction that I've never been on my entire life. Things were going great for me, it seemed. Friday came, my classwork was finished, and all I had to do was wait until I departed for this special friend's home.
I enjoyed every minute I had with him and saying goodbye Saturday afternoon was very hard. It felt like none of us wanted me to leave, I could see it in all of our expressions. But I stuck to the plan instead of discussing it because I didn't want to make things tense.

When I got home later that afternoon, my world became very lonely and quiet, and the anxiety that was eating me up that week returned. Why was I still feeling this way? Isn't everything okay? As day turned to night, I spoke to my friends fro Central Washington on Discord and talked it out and it calmed my nerves for the time being. But I couldn't stop thinking about him and what I may be missing out on. I reached a point where I knew that this wasn't a passing moment in my life, that this wasn't a fling. and Though I said "i love you" to him that weekend, I never told him how I felt. I was nervous about writing that text because, in my past three relationships where I felt love for my partner, when I opened up like that, they usually went away.

But I wrote it from my heart and out it went. And to my pleasant surprise, the feeling was returned! He wrote a message back in length, and it made me feel so whole and then some. But, despite this reassurance, I still felt the anxiety and I couldn't put my finger on an answer that I was okay with. I watched the new season of peaky blinders and called it a night. When I woke up, I felt it again. I texted him a 'good morning' and asked what was for breakfast, since i had made us breakfast on Saturday. But I didn't hear anything back for a while. Aaaaand then the anxiety came back in force. So I talked with my CW friend again just after I got a message for my now-metamore saying that he was sore, then proceeding to tell me the details of their first night together. And I did not want to hear that. I'm not jealous about it, I had my own fair share, it was just knowing that info and playing it back in my mind that threw me out of whack. But after talking with my friend, I came back. Just in time to head to my meetup in Tacoma.

The meetup went well, but I still hadn't heard from him, and there was this worry in my mind the entire time. None of the strategies i learned for handling depression crossed over into feeling anxiety (that is, feeling too much). Nothing i had read about managing my feelings in polyamory or anxiety in general were helping me ease this strain. I figured out that I was feeling anxious because he and I were unable to talk frequently enough digitally or otherwise, but that it may just be a matter of not being able to talk to others in general. So this meetup was a good way to test that. It kinda worked. It removed half of the worry, that being of loneliness, but I still wanted to hear his voice and so it persisted. I ended up spending the rest of today with a couple of my good friends, but hanging out at their place. And when we were all tired and ready to sleep, we were finally able to talk about it and it helped. Now, I'm not anxious. I know that things are okay.

Being able to identify my anxieties has helped me figure out how to manage them, and better yet, how to communicate them to my partners when the time comes. It's ironic, communicating anxiety about not being able to communicate (as often as it'd be appreciated). So, perhaps half of the struggle is learning how to be on that level plain on my own, because he and my other friends aren't always going to be there. And I won't always have classes or things to do that occupy my mind in a healthy way. My classes, for example.

Last week was amazing! We were mostly doing engineering notation and metric prefixes, and during that time I drew some stuff out on the whiteboards to help my classmates understand DC circuits and how to test them, and it felt good! The last two days were more technical, we finally got into electronic components, starting with resistors. It was refreshing, since before that, we were going over the same electrical principles that I've heard over the last four years. It wasn't hard to understand and it was so interesting for me! I love being at my campus and in my class.

But I still have to go home eventually. And then I'm right back here in my basement quarters, alone, until the day cycle starts again. So my passion/purpose/hobby/career isn't enough to sustain me on it's own, unless I am able to do some hands-on stuff outside of class hours.
Thursday evening, I went to another drawing night and Coonkun and I worked on developing my new fursona, which was amazing! I'm so grateful for his help. And I can't wait to show Kayji to you all when he's done!

So, what have we established? I fell in love, my classes are fulfilling and interesting, I must learn to cope with being away from the ones I love, and talking it out with people helps bring me back down to Earth. It sounds like I have things figured out. . . until the next time I get anxious.
I have no rational reason to feel this way, but I can't control my amygdala. No matter how many times I remind myself that I'm in a great place in my life, I feel like I could lose it all. My program, my connections, and the man I love. And that, my watchers, is the core of my worry. Feeling like I have so much good in my life for once and feeling that it could all crumble if I do something wrong. There's obviously more to this picture than I can condense into a journal, but I feel like this lays it all out pretty well without getting into personal-specifics.

I'm heading out to Furvana now! If any of you will be there, here's my personal schedule; the events and panels I will attend, picked chronologically from the official con schedule. It would be an honor meet any of you wonderful watchers!

Schedule:

Wake up: 6:30am
Registration: 9am
Gaming room:10am-4pm
Friday Night Dance: 8PM
Open Mic: 10pm
Tigon's Set: 11pm-12pm

Wake up: 7am
Quiplash: 12pm
Call-out/call-in: 3:30pm
Drawful 2/tee ko: 5pm
Saturday night dances: 8pm-12am

Wake Up: 7am
Nerf War: 11am
Kayaking: 1pm-2pm
Closing ceremony: 5pm-9:30pm

So, I recently got some kinda lewd fursuit pics, should i upload them here?