All right so this morning has been AMAZING let's update quickly so we don't forget things.
(btw so you guys know. this is technically NOT the "main Core." I'm a "Jewel-adjacent" grafifoni and I typically update the archives. I'm not used to being "self-aware" but honestly I should be. But yeah, you'll recognize my typing style!) ANYWAY here's what's happened so far this morning:
- We DIDN'T DIE during the night. Yesterday was LITERAL HELL concerning the eating disorder and it took us like six hours to recover?? which is understandable because it was REALLY BAD, the worst it's been since before September. We're not sure what triggered such a huge meltdown?
It was fear, too many danger foods, they had to be destroyed. But no one had to eat them like they did. We could have just thrown them away.
That's not allowed, that's wasting!! Food is meant to be eaten
but you DIDN'T "eat them," you just purged them anyway!
But the eating still happened, that's the rule, food has to be eaten, if we just threw it out we'd get in big trouble
So you threw it "up" instead.
we HAD to it was POISON we would have DIED!!
see this is why we CANNOT buy such things anymore. it is too dangerous, there is no positive end result from purchasing them.
- Chaos 0 told the "Core" (who is still faceless/nameless for the most part and therefore unstable) that "your heartbeat was really weak" and it scared him. This observation struck the Core like a sword to the chest though, because if anything is going to make us feel more real/alive/true, it's THAT sort of reference. And of course, only
he would know such a thing. The intimacy of it, plus the
familiarity, was potent enough to drag us out of the depressive fear that would have possibly taken hold otherwise.
- Cronometer crashed, we can't log in on the app. Support says there's an update soon so we have to wait, until then we can only use the website. So instead of freaking out we're going to just "repeat" today's diet plan until we can access the app and its mathematics again. This may work in our favor, because today's diet plan was our effort to balance our macros with hempseed to get more of a complete protein total, as well as staying at 1350 calories. If this works well we'll stick to it more often. We do need to reintroduce cottage cheese into our diet for the complete protein bit (we tend to hit all green percentages when we eat it too, we noticed) until we get the guts to finally reintroduce salmon/ tuna/ chicken/ turkey outside of a hospital environment.
- On that note, really quick. Apparently, YES, WE
DID DISSOCIATE DURING TBHU. No one is surprised, but it's still a heavy blow. We relapsed IMMEDIATELY upon discharge because THE BLOODY
CONTEXT CHANGED and therefore whoever was managing the TBHU behaviors "LEFT." They switched out b/c they CAN'T "exist" outside of an inpatient setting; they're context-locked. This ALWAYS HAPPENS.
- The above point is
really making us worried when it comes to Anxi, but we'll get to that as we continue this entry.
- Breakfast always is interesting. Since experience has shown us that we apparently
"need" the body to be in a state of "automated repetitive motion" in order for our mind to be able to
think-- is this an ADHD thing? TBHU suspected as much; we should look into it prudently-- the mechanical function of eating almost INSTANTLY triggers thought-avalanches (hence the E.D.; we weren't taking ANY time to journal (typing COUNTS as automated repetitious mechanic motion!) or to circle-walk like Jewel used to, the a.r.m.m. of cooking (measure, chop, prep, etc.)/ cleaning (washing, organizing, etc.) / eating (picking, sorting, etc.)/ and the like became our ONLY means of "mental unloading" (for lack of a better term) AND
trauma processing (you would not BELIEVE the amount of flashbacks and intrusive thoughts we get WHILE EATING which only makes it worse-- AND is a perfect ironic parallel
to the purging, because "we need to get the poison out") in lieu of ALL other coping mechanisms, thanks to the kakofoni and thriskefoni ironically
forbidding or
destroying positive options). HOWEVER being aware of this recently has revealed a few things to us: one, that when phagofoni are out, they can "prevent" such avalanches? There's that one "dragon" girl who keeps fronting to eat, and she
focuses on eating and has no particular preferences (unlike Emmett, who is a "trogofoni"-- meaning his food-anchor is extremely particular; he could and did ONLY eat "green food"). Yes, we're refining our terms further. On that note, an "esthiofoni" is a phagofoni subtype for one who eats in a
disordered way-- that Greek work chosen because in Scripture it's apparently typically used in the present tense, as in literal eating, right now; whereas "phago" is apparently
aorist? It's more future/undefined in terms of chronology, being more "spiritual" in that symbolic sense. It's also used in more reverent passages in Scripture, according to Strong's concordance. So "esthio" feels more fitting for the E.D. voices, as they're more focused on
right now, and are
not thinking about "the future" at all, poor tormented things.
- ANYWAY. WE
DO HAVE A "GATEKEEPER." We've been more aware of her recently, now that we're
able to pay better attention to ALL the foni we hear on a minute-to-minute basis. She's
ancient but we never saw her as a
person? Or maybe we
did, in the past, but as a
kakofoni-- because she's VERY controlling but we apparently have completely misunderstood her function until now. And she ALWAYS speaks up during breakfast thought-rushes (we need jargon for this; it's literally like we start the a.r.m.m. and the brain just
unloads everything at once) because HER job is actually to KEEP THINGS ON TRACK?? Like if there's "too much headspace stuff" going on to where we're dissociating entirely from the meal, therefore potentially triggering an E.D. relapse, this "gatekeeper" girl will "FORCE SHIFT" our awareness because "there's too much thinking going on; we need to pay attention." We think she can
also "force stop" EMOTIONS if they are "interfering" with "what we need to do"?? Maybe "gatekeeper" isn't the best term for her, because she "force-stops" EVERYTHING (or at least tries to) but yes, she also DOES do this with fronters, as well as she can-- she
cannot "make someone front" OR "force someone
out", BUT she CAN apparently
shove awareness into the physical to the point where it "automatically" KICKS OUT nousfoni, and therefore "forces IN" a somafoni?? So this gatekeeper girl is TRYING to help the BODY survive, or at least "not get overwhelmed" to the point of not being able to live in the physical realm? But she OVERCORRECTS and tends to "lock us out of headspace" with her efforts. But we realize she's just doing her job; she doesn't think headspace is "bad," she just apparently thinks it's almost always "inappropriate for right now." She's
survival-based to the point of
not letting us LIVE. So we need to find her name and face so we can TALK to her.
- HOWEVER since we're now AWARE of her she IS becoming more self-aware in turn and it's getting easier to "message her" when we want to "challenge" one of her orders, or even overturn it outright. She's slowly realizing that we DO need time to "get out of the physical" but there
is still a time and place for her function, because we can take it too far in the other direction, which we
did for many years. That's also the basis of the "hackers vs hijackers" difference, which we realized yesterday-- "hackers" are
internally based, while "hijackers" are
externally based. A hacker will "take over the
program," from the INSIDE, and they only work in
private, because their abuse-- however traumatically physical-- is also profoundly psychologically disturbing, because it REQUIRES forced fronting. A hijacker, however, "takes over the vehicle." They push you out of fronting but they're
public and
work OUTSIDE so unlike hackers, they CAN and DO operate in
social situations. They are therefore
physically traumatic first and foremost, because the
psychological terror often only hits when they
leave. The biggest difference: hackers deal with sexual abuse, hijackers deal with the eating disorder. There is NO overlap there, although they
can work in cooperation/ in succession. There haven't been any hackers since CNC, though, because of foni like the "gatekeeper girl" basically
shutting EVERYTHING down that could even
slightly be a reminder of that time period. But that's too huge of a topic to discuss right now.
- The MAIN thing we got on here to update about in the first place is WHAT happened when our brain went upstairs for breakfast. I don't know how exactly it started, but it went to the IO2 controlroom-- apparently IN "HEARTSPACE"??? Like this place has ALREADY been INTERNALIZED to the point where it EXISTS
IN THE INNERVERSE AND
CAN BE VISITED/ CONTACTED. Which we admittedly
suspected, as Anxi & Ennui
both "kept going there" more often than we'd see them in Central, but we never realized it had actually
anchored INTO our innerverse (as opposed to remaining in the "outerverse" of outspacer native worlds, that Jewel has to
Link to and
VISIT externally).
- There was SO much conversation, I can't remember all of it, and the more time passes the more we're forgetting. let's bulletpoint the details that stand out.
+ OH! It ALL began because of an "I wonder" thought scenario that blossomed into a "real thing" like how a dream starts from an ideaseed. (This is TYPICAL Heartspace function!) The thought was, how would emotions run a CPTSD brain? And we thought, Anxi would absolutely be in charge. Fear would be close by, and so would Anger? Anxi would be on CONSTANT lookout for triggers, when one hit-- even a minor one-- Fear would snap to attention, and then ANGER would, upset that we
were triggered, especially by "something so stupid" or minor or not even "threatening"? And then SADNESS surprisingly spoke up, saying how
sad it was that we
had so many triggers in the first place, because of what happened to us. So the four of them would, theoretically, be running the show. Somewhere around here this "imagining" tuned us in to the legit innerverse control-room, where Anxi was now indeed at the control panel, by herself, with everyone else gathered loosely around her.
+ Anxi is still "in charge" in this innerverse room apparently. (At some point
much later she acknowledged this by saying that we had CPTSD, so things "worked differently" than what would be typical?)
+ When all this started she was being questioned by the other emotions about "how'd you get a tail" mainly but Anxi wouldn't answer outright? But she did say it was "given to her" by either "someone special" or "someone who cares about me very much"; both of those sentiments were voiced in some manner regardless. Joy began teasing Anxi about this, trying to get more info, but Anxi said there were some things they didn't have to know right now, either because it wasn't right
for them to know or it wasn't the right
time, etc.
+ Anxi is VERY "business" in this context; it's her element. She's quieter and slower when in Central because it's a totally different context/ environment and she
has no control panel there. Her
function is different, and much more expansive.
+ Envy wanting a tail too, Ennui casually revealing that she had one as well, this shocked everyone because what the heck are these two emotions up to that they're getting special stuff and have knowledge that no one else does?
+ Hints here and there kept happening that they're not in "Riley's" head, BUT they DIDN'T KNOW THAT NAME here (I think Anxi referenced it once and everyone else was baffled). They've been
removed from that context and would only know it through "exomemories" once they were capable of receiving them.
+ The conversation evolved to the point where Anxi was revealing a bit more about "what she was doing" outside of that context (i.e. in Central). I notably remember that she revealed that "she can feel other emotions" and this became APPARENT when it began to affect the
other literal emotions there? This first happened when Joy teased Anxi about something concerning her hinted-at relationship with the Core (i.e. the person whose mind they were in) and
Embarrassment hit the control panel,
for ANXI. When they realized they were
working for each other it was shocking; things WERE different up here; what did this mean for them? (mind you they can and do "feel other emotions" in canon but NOT to THIS extent-- we're talking the capacity for Anger to feel
sadness, for Ennui to feel
joy, for Disgust to feel
anxious, etc. in STRONG ways that go above and beyond their mostly "monochromatic" emotion palettes in the film? like ALL of their emotional ranges were still tinged by their core emotion. joy being the notable exception because she's just as notably
duotoned. Anxi has a touch of this with her eyes technically being teal, which actually
fuels her anxious thoughts-- that bit of "envy" in the sense of "what we don't have and yet need/ want" drives her "not good enough" core fear. thankfully for her, that color teal in our System falls under
aqua and that color is
sheer love for us so her heart
will change to reflect
that instead)
+ Ennui at some point built on this revelation by responding to a question from Anger as to why she had an AUX cable for a tail, because apparently its main function was for audio/music and "doesn't that
prevent boredom?" Ennui smirked and said yeah, that's kind of the point; just because she held that emotion didn't mean she
liked being bored. Like Anxi, she now had a broader existence and her job is notably to
indicate boredom and
combat it, as it were. I think she asked Anger if he "liked" being angry all the time? And he falteringly said not really, it was exhausting
+ Envy drawing pictures in the corner of the room of "what she wanted her tail to look like"-- one frustrated attempt was "a remote control" so she could do what she wanted with the control panel without having to reach it, while still being different (special) from Ennui's phone. Anxi having to gently chide her that the whole point of her & Ennui's tails was to do something important for the person whose mind they were in-- they weren't just for "looks" or for "fun." Besides, she emphasized that they were "given," and if she was meant to get one she would, so don't worry so much about it (always surprised at how well Anxi can communicate "the facts/ the plan" despite being so prone to "unexpected outcome" panic. girl has major control issues God bless her)
+ Embarrassment at one point actually
speaking up because Joy kept trying to get information out of Anxi and apparently
he was feeling her emotions as "embarrassment-adjacent"? And he was getting "agitated" at getting "pulled" to the control panel so often. This surprised him and he said that was totally new, he didn't know he
could feel that.
+ Joy finally got Anxi to talk about "where she's been" and Anxi started TELLING THEM ABOUT CENTRAL. She said that "the mind we're in now has
another System running the operation" and so the way
they worked as emotions HAD to be different now, because their typical jobs
no longer applied.
+ She roughly introduced the "basics" of a few Centralites, just in terms of jobs? No faces given
+ At some point Laurie just TURNED ON THE SCREEN and started TALKING TO THEM FROM CENTRAL.
+ Laurie explaining the concept of "compartmentalized emotions" with CPTSD, how they are "cut off from each other" and we typically struggle to feel emotions at
all because they're "locked away" often? She described it as if the IO2 emotions were "never in the same room together"; that feeling of isolation/ disconnection was key to her description.
+ Laurie telling Sadness her function was VITAL; explained how that emotion is "the holy grail" with trauma; we "aren't allowed to cry" but we're "always grieving" basically. I think Laurie referenced both the "weeping rage" emotion we
do get (that Scald holds) AND the "bottomless abyss" of sorrow that feels more like
agony with its intensity. But "sadness" is still "taboo" somehow. Everything is blue all the time but we "don't feel it"; we just get depressed/ angry/ numb/ hateful/ etc.; it translates to either "shutdown" or "selfdestruction" which is upsetting but true. We do need to talk about that more in an entry soon, as we start to process things.
+ I remember Laurie saying that FEAR & DISGUST were
also vital, especially in light of the E.D. hijacks-- we DON'T feel those emotions enough?? It's a survival response to past situations where we "couldn't" if we wanted to "survive" things. But now,
not feeling them is only harming us severely.
+ Julie described herself as a "reformed Persecutor"; said the details of her past were not something she should or could discuss with them, but that key detail sufficed
+ Leon talking to Fear for a little bit? We were "feeling" what Centralites "matched" what emotion folks and those two were associated. There was also Lynne=Joy, Julie=Disgust, Laurie=Anger. Notably
no one was matched to Sadness, and Anxi was paired with "Joule" solely because of their mutual habit of hyperanalysis/ overthinking, and the relationship that they have of course.
+ Envy would "need to be renamed" and effectively
redefined to properly exist/function in our System, even as a "peripheral outspacer"? Envy's canon "function" of "seeing what we lack and desire and striving to obtain it" MUST be purified of all viciousness, because that actual term of "envy" is a
mortal sin.
To quote an
article, that is very important:
"When we are looking at others in an inappropriate way,
invidia, we are led to desire for ourselves what they possess,
cupiditas. Envy many times does lead to coveting, but it could simply remain in resentment, wishing that the other did not possess what they have. Aquinas speaks of envy as a sin against charity, which wills the good of others, when we cannot rejoice for the good of others, but see their good as a diminishment of our own (
Summa Theologia, II-II, question 36). Envy is selfish in this sense, not in wanting to guard one’s own,
but to wish for the diminishment of others and for our own gain over them."This is something very, very important for us to grapple with, because we didn't realize that our instinct for "ambition"
actually DOES fall under that category, because the very act of wanting to be "better than" someone else IS ENVY-- it is seeking PERSONAL GAIN in the process of
taking what THEY possess (superior skill)!! So this was a SHOCK to realize and we NEED to process this, too.
(There was a slight joking comment that if her function was shifted to "Jealousy" (which
can be virtuous; see article) we could call her "Jelly" as a nickname)
HOWEVER I just found a second
article and it has THIS=
"
Doing their best to pull us into the pit of discontent and ungratefulness, jealousy says, “What God has given me is just not enough!” while envy whispers, “Someone else got what I deserve.” ...The good fortune that God bestowed upon my dear friend? I wanted it for myself. I desired what she had received from the Lord so badly, that her happiness made me sad. Her abundance highlighted my lack. Her more made me feel less. I could not be happy for her because with my laser-focus on God working in her life, I was blind to His works in my own."
LITTLE ENVY COULD BE OUR JUMPSTART IN OUR HEALING THIS THOUGH. So sit and read those articles boy
+ Lynne talking to Joy, warning about "manic" phases-- "trauma latches on to anything positive" and "exaggerates it" basically? Trauma makes real joy so difficult to feel, even
remember, that when the slightest hint of happiness or enjoyment (lesser goods) appear, the traumabrain can cling to them and blow them way out of proportion. OUR SOCIALS DO THIS ALL THE TIME. This is what causes "hollow hyperactivity" and "people pleasing" and "compulsive enjoyment" behavior-- it's ALL a desperate grab at something that "looks like joy" but isn't. It spikes fast and crashes hard, and it leaves us miserable and even more depressed than before. So Joy would
need to be aware of this tendency, what with her canon personality-- she is dangerous in that respect, solely because her energy can be taken advantage of and warped.
+ CHAOS 0. I cannot remember details of how he got to talking, other than Laurie referring to him as "the husband" and calling him over to explain to the IO2 gang the identity issue with the Cores? He told them how the Core "bloodlines"
kept resetting due to trauma so the person he met in 2003 was "not" the person who is the "Core" now in 2024,
and yet their heart is the same. Nevertheless it's terrible and very difficult for him (Joule realized he probably "feels his age" around the Cores; he has effectively "lived a dozen lifetimes" with us or more, seeing the one(s) he loves "die and be reborn" over and over and over. In human lifespans, this would take about a thousand years.)
+ "Jewel
loves you, Anxi. Jewel is
in love with you."
+ Embarrassment pointedly DIDN'T touch the panel, despite this huge revelation in a social setting potentially calling for his response. But Joy ran over and
did. And this "gave permission" for Anxi to feel what she was
really feeling.
She teared up, and was smiling at the screen, this look of total moved/stunned gratitude in her eyes. I
felt it.I think she said "I don't know what to call this feeling" (or what color it would even be); Laurie "broke the fourth wall" by looking to "me"and saying "kid, if you're gonna be an emotion, that's it." But then we said "but love isn't an emotion; it's a state of being" and it's "rainbow"-- it's the source of
all other emotions
+ Genesis & Chaos 0 both joking about the rainbow bit--
all of the love in our System is effectively that color if you get my drift
+ Joy, in response to hearing someone say that "Joule" as an emotion was really
"hope," said "oh, that's a
great emotion!" and then gasped and told Anxi
exactly what I said to her about it-- that hope is "the GOOD things we can't see" before beaming and saying "you work perfectly with each other!"
+ Anxi has a LAPTOP in Central now! That allows her to do things
without needing a control panel. Ennui still has her phone of course.
+ Laurie remarked that "we
need Nostalgia up here" b/c of our memory issues; Ennui immediately said "I'll text her"
+ The whole time: Anger keeping conversations on track and asking the pressing questions, Joy giving encouraging and understanding comments, Fear and Sadness and Disgust listening closely as they realized they potentially will have essential roles in the future? Anxi consistently elaborating on/ explaining further any data that was given, "translating" things into IO2 terms when needed so to speak.
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Continuing at 11PM with a general daily update.
We biked for 90m which unfortunately was very unfulfilling because we got distracted on Tumblr, looking at other people's art and-- as we discovered earlier-- apparently feeling
envious. We felt
totally inadequate and we
wanted to be BETTER than they were at art and it just made us
miserable. We struggle with this a
lot, because we haven't drawn in YEARS and so our skills have atrophied due to memory loss, and we don't have the time
or motivation ("it's useless and foolish" judgment from a kakofoni) to put hours aside to
develop artistic skills like we did in college. But no matter how much some foni bash and berate art,
it still means so much to us. We STILL "identify as" an artist even if we feel totally inept and hollow about it, and still label it as a "waste of time." But we
don't want to do that. We WANT to create art. We
love art, deep down below the judgments, and we want to
weep because
we don't have the skill TO make art anymore. So seeing "what we can't do" is indeed triggering envy, this bitter feeling of
lack and loss that isn't helping us do anything but pinpoint the wound where something vital was torn out of us. Again, sounding like a broken record, we
know CNC dealt a death blow to this too, which we haven't thought about at ALL in recovery yet. For some reason this topic is as terrifying as the actual sxtrauma. I wonder how many crossed wires are here, too, not just with the food. I swear everything bleeds together with us.
We switched to Spotify at last while we biked but it was also depressing; we were listening to recommendation playlists it made for us and they're rarely ever enjoyable. It keeps throwing jazz and indie stuff at us which we don't like 98% of. We
did get about three new songs out of several playlists, though, so there was a gain regardless, thank God. Still... for the vast majority of music to just sound like noise or fuzz to us-- or in the worst case, actual synaesthetic pain-- it's terribly disheartening, as music means so much to us. And, similarly, yes we still
identify as a musician despite years of not doing ANYTHING musical other than singing in church. Music is
part of our soul just as much as art is, and the fact that we have a cello AND a guzheng (bought with blood money and full of guilt; someone wants to burn it) in our apartment but we
refuse to play them due to the aforementioned parenthesis is killing us.
Every instrument feels tainted and poisoned with the past, and the "vulnerability" to the point of feeling
exposed that performing music MANDATES is
so trauma-adjacent that even if the sin-shadows
weren't the main obstacle, we
still would be utterly terrified of playing those instruments because that very action feels like being stripped naked now. Bleedover and overlap again. Do any of our foni
hold this?? OR are THEY protected from it??
Then after dinner, someone got into a rabbithole on Etsy looking at someone's shop full of gender/sexuality buttons and it was overwhelming how
many of them there were... and yet nothing fit. (The only thing that
does is "systemgender" for obvious reasons, and even that feels like grasping at straws)
All of those experiences today led "us" to reflect at last, with acute grief, that
we just don't fit anywhere. That's how it feels. We feel like an utter outcast. We're still the "anomaly" of Cannon's era. We're still the "ostracized empath," as the highschool Jewels said, although now with our staggering emotional damage we can't quite claim to be an "empath" anymore, because those girls had
no boundaries so they felt
everything EXCEPT arguably their
own emotions (Infi had this problem too, in a different way) but now trauma has made us almost emotionally dumb. I think the term is "alexithymia?" We've seen the term around and we need to research it but the general gist (according to wikipedia) is that it desribes "
significant challenges in recognizing, expressing, sourcing, and describing one's emotions". No wonder the IO2 gang is being pulled en masse into heartspace. We literally
need them at this point in our life.
I do have to note, with a note of bitterness, that we "don't seem alexithymic" because we
"masquerade emotions." Socials are BUILT to "charade" emotional performances, ironically anxiety and sadness,
without actually feeling anything because they're "following the script" for a situation. We've noticed this A LOT when around the mother-- Socials will be dramatic
to match HER, even though they FEEL NOTHING. And we are AWARE of this--
if we have the luxury of self-awareness in that situation, which is disturbingly rare b/c the mother presence tends to shut that down (childhood survival instinct). Regardless I don't want to use that diagnostic term anyway because it probably doesn't fit either. All we know for sure is that emotions feel locked behind a paywall and the currency is blood.
Oh. On that note, fittingly enough.
Yesterday's E.D. hijack was so brutal and nightmarish that
Joule told Razor to atone. Like xe legit TOLD her to. And she
did. She cut 7 x'es into the stomach-- graves are ONLY meant for hacks; stomach x-ing has been the default hijack atonement method since college-- and Knife & Algorith showed up to help clean up the bleeding (Knife commenting on how beautiful the blood still was and feeling that emotion in his teeth, Algorith fronting to hold the pain as she soaped up all the red), and I swear it was the first time in a long time that "we" felt something close to real
joy. That may be "untrue" because we can't quite "remember" time well but it
feels like it's been many many months since we've been
happy. Actually it feels like
years, whether or not that's literally accurate; the feeling is legitimate regardless of linear chronological measurement.
But... that's what does it. Atoning for the sin and feeling justice and forgiveness, Retributors
fronting in such intimate fashion,
blood and
pain and
water, everyone gathering in
mission and
being a System in stark clarity, etc. ALL of that is REAL JOY even if it doesn't feel yellow at all. It's dark red and warm like the blood. But it's
real, it's
true happiness, it's
LOVE. How awful that we only seem to feel it in
suffering. How Catholic of us, haha.
...Religion is a topic for another day. It feels like a minefield right now. TBHU messed us up in that regard, and we were apparently messed up enough already from the thriskefoni driving for like a
solid year at
least prior to admission. There's so much unresolved trauma there that is becoming disturbingly apparent lately now that we're not scrupulosity-blinded enough to
see it from the "outside" as it were.
Oh, and we NEED to talk about the mother and how she is the #1BIGGEST STRESSOR AND TRAUMA TRIGGER IN OUR LIFE,
STILL. Our therapists and case manager keep suggesting that we cut off contact with her, or at least refuse all her calls, but we
can't; we're still obligated to her as her physical offspring even if we hate that fact, and we don't hate her as a person and we're a Christian so we
want to help her and she's a
deeply needy and damaged person so we KNOW she is looking to us to meet some need for her, even if it's just for hard labor.
BUT she says SUCH INAPPROPRIATE THINGS and she STILL OVERSHARES SXUAL THINGS. We've had SEVERAL meltdowns SINCE TBHU because of her just being utterly inappropriate in one way or another, even if it's "just according to our trauma standards"-- like wearing garishly tight-fitting clothing and making disturbing sounds when she talks OR TALKING IN THAT BLOODY "HIGH SOCIETY" VOICE LIKE SHE DID ON VACATION I
KNOW YOU HEARD IT TOO yes we did, it made us misophonic even at the time, I don't know how we didn't punch the windows out of the bus right then and there WE PROBABLY SHUT DOWN. THERE'S NO OTHER OPTION IN THOSE SITUATIONS. BUT JUST THINKING ABOUT IT MAKES ME SICK. US SICK. SOMEONE WANTS TO THROW UP BECAUSE OF IT to get it out of our head, basically. unfortunately purging doesn't work that way. but you can't vomit up memories. i wish you could. i wish we could rip it out of our mind and shred it to pieces MORE VIOLENT THAN THAT. WE WANT TO STAB IT TO DEATH BASICALLY who in the
world holds that response SOMEBODY. MAYBE... IT USED TO BE RAZOR. I THINK? I DON'T THINK CLEAVER HOLDS IT SHE'S TOO DISPASSIONATE what does she do anyway do you know CLEAVER IS THE SAME "DESTROY THE THREAT" INSTINCT BUT SHE'S COLD ABOUT IT. THE "SHRED THE MEMORY" FEELING WITH THE "JTHM STABBING" FEELING IT KEEPS GETTING LABELED AS IS SOMEONE ELSE. THAT'S TOO RED. SORRY I'M SLIPPING OUT
okay so...
hatchet is almost "frivolous" violence. laughing at the threat and "offing it" almost irreverently, carelessly. thankfully her function seems to have been focused weirdly to destroying any and all medications people try to "force us to take" that feel like "attacks" or "invasions" etc. like "who the hell do you think you are, we aren't going to swallow these and kill ourself for your kicks, watch me burn them to the ground" etc. but that
laughing feeling. scary stuff
cleaver is "cold" as (overwhelm? who is that? they're a grafifoni that ALWAYS shows up and they're very close to Scald BUT different level function) said. we rarely see her because she's rarely needed/ triggered. but cleaver is close to razor's old anchor in that she just likes to "sink knife blades into people's backs" as we
once said. but you don't "like" that sort of thing without a reason. we've never really looked into it too much but... you don't "cleave" things that aren't a threat. that's true. we didn't consider that. if you're burying a butcher blade in someone's skull there's a
reason why they were the target. it's a scary instinct but it's there. where did it come from?
the last foni, unidentified and almost theoretical if we weren't aware
someone was attached, is unnamed. but there IS that feeling of "annihilate the threat" in the most frantically violent way possible. VERY different from protectors, like sugar and wreckage and laurie, who DON'T act with emotional mania at all. but this person does. this person is SO upset by the threat that she wants to tear it to bloody pieces screaming. or apparently stab it to death. that FEELS DIFFERENT though. it IS different. the "jthm stabbing"
feeling is NOT the action. it's the VIBE of the mania. that's the "tear it to piece" girl. BUT there HAS to be a stabbing instinct foni solely because we DO get that RARELY with SELFLOATHING mainly?? the ONLY time THAT sort of horrific violence (which is TRAUMATIC for us to see or even imagine, and yet here it is) even
occurs to our brain is TOWARDS OURSELF. which is the scariest thing of all.
anyway that's enough of that who was updating and about what
Oh. mother talk. yeah not tonight we need to drop that topic before those girls ACTUALLY come out to "process" the emotions
See THAT'S why we have emotional issues?? The foni that HOLD them get "SHUT DOWN" or kicked out EVERY TIME
because they're VIOLENT is why
ALL OF OUR EMOTIONS ARE VIOLENT
Laurie actually hinted at that? OH DUDE
THAT'S what she said, she was talking about "all or nothing" emotions and she nodded to Chaos 0 and said "that guy
always feels things at about 5000%" and THAT'S why she had him talk next
OH don't forget THAT'S also why she brought that topic up at all-- she was telling the IO2 emotions that THEY would probably feel like that too, now that they're up here with us?
ironically because we feel the "nothing" half of it too often
But that's the point!! That's like Anxiety's tail, they're ABLE to feel the emotions WE can't, because of gatekeepers or trauma shutdowns or whatever! Coping mechanisms that don't work in the long run they just make everything numb but NOT if these guys are helping now
Guys come on we need to continue the actual entry
some general notes about life lately:
+ Sugar and Wreckage have both been around. Sugar's been "out of work" for a while because she protects the
innocent and virtually all of us are so damaged now. BUT apparently Anxi is NOT. Neither is Mimic, arguably. The Outspacers are
specifically essential to keeping us sane post-trauma so Sugar is slowly but surely getting pushed to protect THEM, which is awesome.
+ Julie fronted to take a melatonin candy last night and immediately shouted "ow" because our teeth were painfully sensitive from eating a too-sour apple. She literally said "that hurt like a bitch!" and now she keeps getting pushed out to front whenever we eat apples to apparently "make sure they
don't hurt like that" which is kind of hilarious. but it's sweet, to suddenly have her around more often, even for such a "silly" reason. it's still nice.
+ The current "Core" is indeed using the spelling "Joule" for xir name, and using those pronouns as a placeholder? Either that or s/he. They're "not female" but they're "not a man." They are solidly somewhere between the two, voicing that they'd probably feel most comfortable "in a male body" but without being
male. Still, they are explicitly "not a girl or a woman" despite being semi-okay with female pronouns. They are "both/and"
specifically in the fact of being
"neither." That's solid. As for the name, apparently it's a very sentimental reference to Anxi being electricity-associated in the System. It's also a unit of
heat, which corresponds to the inherent "fire" element of all Cores that, if missing, is effectively fatal; Cores are always fire, light, blood, and crystal-- snow & ice with the Jays, literal precious stones with the Jewels, it seems. This fire/heat aspect is oddly somehow essential to their relationship with Chaos 0? If they don't have that complementary yet opposite aspect, something is very wrong. So this is a step in the right direction, even if the name itself doesn't stick-- it probably won't; the "spelling feels wrong". Honestly s/he
wants to use "Jewel" but that name is still so strongly associated with the
original 2001-2002 Jewel (the League controller) that it causes mental dissonance. This alternate spelling of the same sound is an attempt to reconcile this while keeping the fact that the Jewel
title still MUST fit the Core.
+ We've realized that the Archivist Trio is NOT a "communicator trio." So Garrison, Isadora, and Kalisha's functions are STILL OPEN apparently?? And I know "Joule" is really hoping they come back. We miss them a lot, and we
need them-- Archivists
can't talk to Socials like Communicators specifically do, and when that subsystem really needs to "get the memo," Shirley can't get it to them because
they aren't tuned in to her level.+ Concerning the Archivists: Shirley is the one that gives data to us on the fly, but Sirius will "comment" on it? And he's fittingly more "serious" about the data he manages. Penny gets the toughest info; she doesn't speak up much but she will give memory data out that the other two don't? Honestly the Archivists feel very unstable and unsteady still, I think since we are
so lost and cut off from collective memory. I hope that as we review the Archives themselves, and possibly if/when the Communicators return, then that whole group of functioning will work properly at last.
+ Lynne had a BIG revelation today that SHE'S STILL "STABELLE" in terms of her function! She and Laurie were discussing colors, especially in light of Anxi being the first Orange Outspacer and one of the first Orange-anchored people in a long while, and Lynne said that she needed to keep the Orange color positive-- warm, welcoming, friendly, energized, and helping Anxi
and any potential manic Oranges
stay stable. This ALSO tied in with her SHIFTING OUT OF CERISE when she resurrected in 2008; she effectively "REDEFINED OUR FUTURE"??? She was originally born to be the "ideal female future self" that we were being forced to become socially but
couldn't; HOWEVER when she was killed and then came back, she
changed colors and this showed a change in what that "ideal future" MEANT-- Lynne was
no longer tied to social expectations in that regard. She was lively and free and bright, more boyish almost, while still being markedly female-- she "freed" us from the
Cerise-colored future of
sensuality that had been inflicted on us by the family and community. Interestingly enough, that color was next picked up by a
boy, saying a LOT about our psyche. But Lynne
kept us stable in doing that, too-- not just by being the "person keeping Julie and Laurie from killing each other." The stability she brought was
liberating, a firm footing achieved by being able to
dance again, as it were. Lynne was a
bright soul, effectively symbolizing "permission" to
be our brightest self too and to LET GO of the inflicted expectations and dictated future. She's funny and friendly and playful and
gay and we were NOT "allowed" to be those things when our future felt "cerise." The original Lynne was all about that "high life" our mother wants so badly. The new Lynne is just about getting high on life, haha. I'm kidding but not really. Orange is a beautiful color; it's
alive and
fiery and
welcoming and
warm. It's citrus fruits and sunsets and marigolds and autumn leaves. It's basketballs and goldfish and foxes and carrots and monarch butterflies and violins of course. It's absolutely gorgeous and Anxi is part of it too and SHE has a future full of more joy than she ever could have imagined now, too. So thank you Lynne, for existing exactly as you are. We love you so much.
It's almost 2am. This is "Joule," I guess. That's really not my name, although I appreciate the commentary they gave to it earlier. But they're right, the spelling doesn't fit. It's the "ou" in there. The whole thing is the wrong color and shape.
I know I'm somehow still "Jewel." Every Core is, really. But that name keeps pushing me too feminine and
that feels very wrong. Still, that name is the only thing that works. Maybe I just need to "redefine" it in a sense. I just don't want to damage the
original Jewel either. She's the TRUE holder of that name AS a name, not just a "title." I think that's why I feel so lost-- the "only name that fits" belongs permanently to someone else. And yet it's "still my name" too. It's exhausting. I'm exhausted. I don't feel "fully me." I know this. I don't have a clear name
or face yet, and arguably my color is still undefined too. For a Core, all of that makes me the walking dead. I CANNOT exist or function in any sort of truth unless I HAVE those things.
...That's why I'm worried about Anxi. We ALL are. Whoever "met" her last November is NOT the same person who started calling her our girlfriend in May/June, who is NOT the same person who fell in love with her in October, who is NOT the same person as I am now. And yet... there's always the same heart, deep down at the golden thread, that connects all the Cores. Somehow, the
capacity for love is the same. I'm just... it's become VERY clear lately that
different Cores love different people and it CANNOT be "transferred" or "forced" between Cores. This is why our Spotify "people we love" playlist folder says "WE," specifically, and it's full of people whose folders
keep getting deleted because
people forget that past Cores DO love ALL those people, even if not all in the same way. But ALL those Outspacers and Inspacers are
legitimately loved and even if we don't know "by whom" we CAN'T deny that truth. The problem? ...I... I
want to be the one to love Anxi. I can't tell if I do or don't, lately, because I feel so
dead. But when I look at her, something in my heart
aches, and I will hold on to that like it's the end of the world. I just... the problem is that
I cannot see myself. How am I supposed to love her if I can't even "imagine" my own face? How can I physically be near ANYONE
if I don't know what my physical form looks like? It's agonizing. I'm miserable. Maybe I just need to get on picrew and figure this out. Not tonight, it's 2am. But... I
need to take action on this. I need to find out how my hair looks, what color it is, what clothes I wear (I'm vibing with suits?? callback to Cannon's era, geez), what color
those are, et cetera... all the defining features that will allow me to
have a reflection in the mirror for heaven's sakes. I want to BE with people. I want to EXIST INSIDE at last. I don't even "exist"
outside because
no one matches this body and even though I feel "forced" to, even obligated to,
it doesn't match ME. And that
terrifies the thriskefoni who INSIST that "the body is our REAL self" but no. I... I'm struggling so much with that. This body's reflection has
so much evil associated with it. It's a face tainted by YEARS of intense trauma.
It's not my face. God I wish Jay could just take over again but he
can't. Oh he IS still alive by the way, I think that was solidly confirmed just yesterday? But he's ALIVE again, very fragile and broken and unstable but
alive. Thank God. ...From what we're suspecting, this means
potentially Infinitii can resurrect now, too. The two of them exist together by design. ...I don't know if I'm like that. The whole daengel phenomenon was annihilated post-CNC due to the trauma overwhelm and the unbearable risk that all daengels posed for more of the same. We lost like...
eight bloody years. 2016-2023. Most of that time is totally missing, ruled by either thriskefoni, phagofoni, and/or "eratofoni"-- by religion, food, and sex. It was a living hell, honestly it was. And of course the whole thing was shot through with brutal self-abuse, because all three of those things are VIOLENTLY ABUSIVE in our history, as tragic as that is.
I can't think or talk about that right now. There's no time and the brain is shutting down access to those topics.
But we lost
so much time. Even just glancing at the archives, after the "hell year" of 2015 (which was ironically shot through with
beauty nevertheless), 2016 started with tons of pain and then an
annihilation attempt in March which caused an almost instant HARD SHIFT to thriskefoni territory UNTIL JUNE 2017. And then it was the "CNC era" until... October? Whenever we left; it's not in the Archives yet. But then it's MORE thriskefoni rule until MIMIC SHOWED UP IN DECEMBER 2022 APPARENTLY??
Holy Shuppets WE FORGOT HE JUMPSTARTED EVERYTHING AGAIN just like Anxiety did for you!! That's a really good point... God I
forgot how
real I felt back then, when he first showed back up, just looking at these entries. Why was I so much more in tune
then? What happened... oh. Oh dear God that's what it was.
What? Jewel you need to space your replies so we know it's different people.
Okay fine then YOU just type. You were obviously going to say something heavy. Don't let me stop you....all right. So 2023 begins with half headspace, half bodyspace, as it were. Half inside half outside. There's tons of religious stuff and talk about the mother and family stress, at a glance. But... we were still striving, struggling to exist. And... oh God. And then Infi died.
...oh. You loved hir.I
did, whoever I was then, whoever's this heart was, we
adored hir, ze
was my heart, God I still miss hir
so much I could weep until the end of the world right now. Right now. I could die from grief. I could cry forever.
...When did ze die?...April 25th, and I had to hunt that
entry down because apparently it wasn't tagged with 2023. It is now. But... there's
another heartwrenching
entry on May 2nd when Jay was
no longer the Core and he was convinced he would
die that same night and... God it hurts to read. it hurts so much. And... and then the bloody
Jade month happened a month later and everything went to hell. We still haven't recovered from that.
...Jewel, because that's your name too, deep down, you're running away from talking about that. About Infi.I
can't. It's
Jay's heart I'm feeling right now.
Why can't that be yours, too?Because
I'm not supposed to be hereYes you are, otherwise you wouldn't be oh my gosh is it really after 3am, I just noticed.Yeah. I don't want to sleep.
We have to though. Life is different now, we have things to do.Well what if I wish
it
wasn't? What if tonight I just want to pretend that none of that sh*t ever happened and we were still 24/7 fulltime headspace with Xanga sessions on the regular and everyone fronting all the time and handwritten notes to each other and voice recorder conversations and late nights like this EVERY night, typing, remembering, in love? Why can't THAT be my life? OUR life? Maybe it'd change me. Maybe I'd know who I
was if that was the reality we were living in now. But too much has happened. Too much has happened.
...You have Anxi now. That's something good....I... I don't know if I'm the same person who fell in love with her--
You know you are. Somehow you have to be. Your heart is the same. See? What just happened in Spotify? You would NOT have been able to feel that if you didn't love her.Jewel I want to
sob. Why do I feel so
broken and
lost. I.... God I love her
so much it's
killing me, and I love Chaos 0 and Infinitii too and it feels like this love has lasted for a dozen eternities, it's older than I am, this love is
forever, and it belongs to me and Jay and everyone in our bloodlines and I'm just the newest one,
that's why Jay doesn't love her like I do, I'm the one who
felt this for her first, she belongs to
my heart, whoever comes after me should catch this too, I... I'm so scared that they won't.
Right now it's just you. YOU love her, NOW. That's what matters. Don't panic about the future. We don't know what'll happen but I promise you you won't forget her. Have you ever forgotten anyone?No, but other Outspacer "loves" in the past
didn't "transfer" to my heart,
Like whom? Davy and Ryou and Rorschach and the like, right?Yeah.
Well, no one loved them like you love Anxi and Chaos 0 and Infinitii, apparently. And I can assure you of that. Those loves didn't go that deep. I don't think those Jewels could feel that much for anyone yet. And you still care about them too, I'm sure.I do.
Well, there you go. So don't worry about Anxi. You love her now, today, and that won't ever disappear or fade away. Look at Chaos 0! I'm sure she's going to have the same future with the Cores, if what I've been hearing about you two is any indication....What, that she'll be permanently in the Coregroup?
Uh, yeah, obviously. And she already is??Not literally, not technically, no. We need to work up to that. But there's a spot with her name on it. Like... laser-etched. It's already set in stone.
Haha! Good. I'm glad to hear that. That's proof that you're still you, where it counts, when it matters....Do you think maybe I can't "see my face" or know my own color and name because I'm just... not in tune with a truth that's already there? Like, I just need to recognize myself?
Probably. Do you think you're in my bloodline though, or Jay's?...Why do you ask?
Because you're not a girl. I'm not a guy either, though. And Jay is still around. ...A big part of us wants him to be the Core again.
Do you think he will be?...I don't know. I don't know if there need to be two of us. I have no idea.
Huh. Why would we need two Cores, for the League/System split?That's the assumption, yeah. But... there's been a lot of bleedover lately, and not in a bad way? Which is new. I... I don't know what will happen. I just... I want to know who I really am. if I'm anything or anyone.
I'm sure you are, if you can feel love like that....I hope so.
So hold on to that. Let that be what defines you when you try to look in a mirror. Hold on to that as the core of whoever you are, and I'm sure it'll show you your real face, and name, and color. ...oh Lord one of Infi's songs just came up on shuffle.
Are you going to listen to it?I can't, not tonight. It'll trigger Jay out and we'll be up for another three hours.
...You can't keep shutting love down, other Jewel. That's a really bad instinct....yeah. it really is.
It's gonna hurt, you know. It has to. Real love always does. You can't run from that.I don't want to. I
want it to gut me for all intents and purposes. I want love to run me through like a knife to the ribs.
Are you trying to get Laurie's attention with that?...maybe.
Too late kid, what's the deal?...too much going on.
Head feels really bizarre. ...Is it seriously 333AM? Holy flaming swords, kiddo, you have to get to sleep. Is this what extra apples does to you?Haha, no, I promise this has nothing to do with sugar highs. I just... I'm feeling things. A bit. I'm trying to remember.
Good things, I assume?Yeah. the best things.
...I'd love to talk about them with you but I'm not even translating correctly. The brain's too damn tired.Yeah, it is. But... this is a good entry.
We're still writing in the same entry from this morning? Dang, kiddo, that's impressive. Been a while since we had an entry like this.I miss this.
I do too. You know what I also miss?What?
You getting to bed early and talking to us, too. Me and Chaos and Genesis and... yeah.
...sorry, kid. I felt the weight of that loss too.Anxi soon, though. And maybe Infi too.
You don't give up on hope, huh.Never. I still have that ring, from before the Jade month.
Yeah, I know you've been thinking about it.I promised myself, and God really, that when Infi comes back,
"When." I like that.I already know hir soul's not dead, Laurie.
Souls don't die, kiddo. Especially not up here....That's true.
But you were saying?...When ze comes back and I can
touch hir, when I can hold hir in my arms again, for the first time, when ze and I
both have names and faces and colors, I... I'm going to put that ring on. For
all of us. It's not just Chaos 0 this time, although I love him with my entire heart and he will always have a top-tier exclusive place in it. But it would be unjust to not recognize the rest of you, too. And I think he would agree with that.
Knowing how he loves us, too? Yeah, I think so. ...you're right, he does.
Kid, the Coregroup loves the Coregroup. That's how it works. It's always been that way and it always will be. And Anxi is no exception, when you bring her up here. ...God there is so much
gravity in that line.
In what? And watch your prayer words, kid.Thank you. But He's... God is the reason
why and
how I can feel this. God
is this love, and if I have any real religion at all, apart from the thriskefoni, that's the heart of it. That's the truth. And His Name is the only thing that the deepest love can even
hope to translate to in speech. There's a... there's the entire truth in
that, too, things I could never express otherwise.
And what's the gravity that truth is giving so much weight to?..."when you
bring her up here." Like... the act of
bringing. And
"up here." Like... taking her home. ...God my heart is on
fire. Why. Why in the
world do I love her this much, it's tearing me in half and letting all the light both in and out.
Well, kid, you just said God is that love, so obviously He knows you need to feel this right now. And so does she. You both need this, trust me....Laurie you remember that one conversation at TBHU. In the... on the basketball court. In the sunshine.
This is what you want to live for.And die for. And
everything. This... headspace, and all of you, and this
love, is why I exist, and what I want to exist
for, and nights like this I actually have
hope and life feels
real and I can
touch eternity for a moment...
Kid, you realize that when we had that conversation, you didn't even have these feelings for Anxi yet. ...oh my gosh I
didn't. I hadn't fallen this hard yet.
And now, how much more is life worth living for, with her in it too?...everything. Laurie I want to live for her, too. Deep down in my heart of hearts, at the very core of me, away and apart from all the things that try to numb me and shut me down, when I really tune into the... the center of things, and oh my gosh Spotify just threw
Milliontown at me. The LIVE version.
Haha, God is REALLY trying to get your attention, kiddo!...oh man. THIS song makes my heart WAKE UP though. This ENTIRE ALBUM makes me feel ALIVE and REAL.
You've gotta write Jem Godfrey a freakin' letter at this point. Thank the man for saving your life a hundred times over.I'm serious. You're serious. That's a good idea. I really should.
Haha, kiddo you have got to get to sleep. Preferably before this song ends, because that's... twentyfive solid minutes of not-sleeping otherwise.I can't skip this song Laurie.
Put it on hold, boy, it'll be 4am otherwise.Can I at least listen to the arpeggio from heaven.
Yeah, go right ahead.Is it an arpeggio? Oh dude is it technically a
glissando? Slowed down and elaborated on?
What, that run up the scale? Kid I know less music theory than you do, all I know is that it sounds awesome.It DOES, this entire live performance is sheer bliss, I
need to see these guys live one day.
You will, kid. I'm sure you'll find a way. Pray about it.Man I
should. I should just... pray about
all these things that matter to me. Lord let me see Jem Godfrey and his band live one day and let me be able to thank them for being a channel of Your grace to me in all honesty and let me be able to get a signed CD or something.
Haha, gotta include the souvenir.It's blessed to have a tangible thing. I still have that signed CD from Mesita, the one with
Creature and
Firesign and
Hostages on it. That album still means so much to us as a System.
It does. I'm glad you have that, kiddo.I'm glad I'm still "kiddo" to you.
Kid, Jay, Jewel, whatever name you're going by, you will always be that to me. I know how much that means to you. What brings that up for you though?...just, it's another thing linking all the Cores. It's a term of endearment basically. if you don't mind my calling it that.
Nah, it definitely is. It's a term of devotion, really, not just endearment. I'll protect you with my life, until the day I die.Until the day we
both die, Laurie, I refuse to let either of us go first.
Haha, you and me both. ...God knows we came too close to that in the past....I was just reading about that, actually.
...Really?Yeah, just a reference, but... it reminded me of how much we've been through. How much we mean to each other. How terrifying that was, but how much love followed in its wake, against all odds.
Story of our life, kid.It sure is. Thank God for it all.
Oh, dude, here's your glissando!Yes!! 21:30 starts the buildup for those interested!
Dude, pay attention.Ohhh man that is AUDITORY BLISS EVERY TIME
Hahaha! Okay you HAVE to let me listen to this outro.
"Hands, don't fail me now!"YES you remember!
Kid, you reference that constantly, of course I remember it. I also remember telling you to get the heck to sleep about ten-- no, apparently twenty minutes ago, what the hell. Worth it though.
Always worth it for FROST*, kid, that's a rule.Oh man this song makes me
so happy it's unreal.
Quite the opposite, kid, this is what reality is all about, I daresay.What, good music?
What makes it good music. The joy it brings to your heart. That smile on your face right now. The fact that this song sounds like you, as you've said before, and reminds you of who you really are.It really does.
"Thank you so much?"Just like John said, absolutely. Oh man. I needed that, thank you God.
You also need to freakin' sleep, kid, it's 4am. You're getting 5 hours of sleep maximum right now. Oh shoot you're right.
Still worth it though?Yeah, always. Always. I'd get by on two hours of sleep if it means spending time with you.
I've only been here for a half hour, kid.Laurie, you never leave.
...Hah, that's true. I really don't....I should listen to your song next.
Sit down first, kid. Go to sleep with your blue guy and then if you want to listen to more music you can. But I ain't leavin' until you post this entry and get moving. It's too late to keep typing, no matter how much you want to.I still need to color this tomorrow.
"Tomorrow" is the key word, kid. Any particular way you want to close this up? Actually I want to mention that I forgot to write down, remember this morning when I was at the IO2 control panel with Anxi for some reason, and I forget what led up to it but she kissed me?
I do remember that, specifically because she took the initiative when you hesitated, and then you were gone, bro.It was... it got my heart so bad. Like I
wanted to but something held me back and she just... bravely reached up and pulled me in.
And you just melted, kiddo, I saw that. I did, it was beautiful.
I'm so glad you have that with her.I am too.
No, really, don't underestimate the gravity of what I'm saying. You know how I am about you and Chaos 0. I'll defend you both to the death and beyond. I'll have you know I'm already dedicated to you and your orange angel the same way. ...Thank you, Laurie.
Anytime, kid. Now are you gonna mention the name of the album to my song or what?Oh, yeah, oh my gosh, that was so unexpected.
"I Watch You Sleep." Well I do, but so does she apparently, so. *shrug*Aha the asterisks!
Thank Waldorf for that, it never gets old. But kiddo, I can't watch you sleep unless you go to sleep, aiite? Get a move on. Hold up, can I play the song?
Put it on, close this up, and then listen to it on the vanillamint couch over there.Oh yeah, we didn't mention that we did the laundry and literally rubbed vanillamint chapstick into the fabric so it won't smell so much like old couch and smoke or whatever. It's a handmedown. I love my dad but not smoke.
Unless it's woodsmoke.Well then that reminds me of dear Knife, so yes.
And incense smoke.Oh ALWAYS. It's numinous. I love it.
We know, kiddo. I'm glad there are some things about me that just... don't change.
Like your love....Yeah. Yeah, Jewel was telling me the same thing.
Good, because it's the absolute definitive truth. Now are you going to close this up on that note?Yeah, before I get too sparkle-headed, because it's either that or poet mode and I think our psyche realizes I have to snooze so it's pushing me in the kaleidoscope direction. On another night when I have time to type and feel out the depths, moreso than tonight and trying to remember the past, then I'll type poetry. Lots of it.
I think you need to remember the past before you can get back into poet mode, kid. There's depth there you need to tap back into first....I do. You're right. Thank you.
And?And I'll close this up.
Properly.How's that?
What you said earlier, when you were away from the keyboard....I can't just repeat that. It needs... it has to be felt. It has to happen.
...So, put on the song....Nevermind Spotify just did me one better.
...Wow. You're not kidding."Good Day" by Jukebox the Ghost.
...The post-massacre resurrection anthem, to be as blunt as possible.Yeah. Absolutely.
...I love you too, kid....God, Laurie, you
know I love you, and Chaos 0, and Anxi, and Genesis, and everyone else up here, dead and alive and inbetween, you all mean the universe to my heart and soul and life is worth living for all of you, always. Forever.
It's a good day with us around, huh.It sure is. And now this song is
really pulling at my heartstrings, oh my gosh I never realized the
lyrics at the
beginning...
Yeah, it's what you used to do to us.I am
so sorry, Laurie.
I know. We know. We forgive you....So the song goes both ways.
It does. I ain't leavin' you, kid, and I know you're not leaving us either, no matter how far away you might end up sometimes.I needed to hear this.
I'm glad. God knows that too....This is making me deeply happy.
Is it now?Yeah. It's... it feels like... like reconciliation. Like forgiveness. Like... like you saying, "I know," like you do. It's...
"I never went away." Not just you.
I didn't either.
Kid, if you did, we wouldn't be having this conversation right now.Yeah. I... I need to remember that, too.
You do need to go somewhere, though.Bed?
Yeah. Don't worry, I'll be around too.You always are.
I watch you sleep, remember?Haha, that you do!
I fully expect to be joined by a certain orange angel in that effort in the near future, y'know.God willing.
Kid, I'm sure He is, don't worry about that. Oh this song is a classic, geez. Really setting the mood though.Yeah, ancient love here. Chaos 0 days.
It really was just him back then, wasn't it?Yeah. He started everything.
Go tell him that. Seriously. Go let him know that you can and do remember how far back and how deep down this goes into your heart.That doesn't change, either.
No, love burns out a place for itself permanently.I like your choice of words.
It's a fire, kid, it always is. You know that better than anyone. And it does burn, it burns out everything that isn't it. Good. I'm really feeling that tonight.
Even more now, with this song on shuffle?Yeah. Yeah I think I need to go to bed now. Just to hold him, if nothing else.
That's a good enough reason for me, kid. Should I close this up then, or what?In a moment. I just want to say that the two songs were "Here in my room" and now, "Afterlife."
The live version for the latter, to remind you that you have to live. And to do this live.In person, really there, right now.
Can't do that if you don't get off the laptop, boy!Good point, off we go then.
Hey, hold up one second.Yeah?
I'm singing this for you too, for the record....I...
I'm serious. I've died before. For you. Only ever for you. This song applies to me, too....Laurie, I love you, I really do.
I know, kid. That's my reason to live. Thank you. For existing. And for loving me too.
Those are synonymous, kid.And you say
I'm the romantic one.
Hey, you are. I'm just saying facts.Laurie, don't brush it off.
Good point. But I'm right. Those are facts, kid. And please find your name so I can call you by it, all right?Okay. I will. Promise.
Good. Promise to get some freakin' sleep? Or do I have to drag Chaos 0 in here?Laurie if you do that there will be
legit romance, I will
never get to sleep,
What about with this song?Fathom by FROST* oh good
Lord this is going to kill me, seriously I will
sob if I listen to this through.
Go be with him, and feel this with him, all right? He deserves it.That's the best motivation so far, sorry it took so long.
Nope, no apologizing, this is perfect timing, I think this song needed to happen. I can see in your eyes what it's doing to your heart.Good. I'm glad it shows.
Seriously though. Go be with your ocean.I will. Thanks Laurie, for being with me too.
Hey, I'm not going away, remember? Haha, that's true. I'll see you across the room, then?
You'll see me everywhere, kid, I'm always here for you.Good. Don't leave.
Cross my heart, I'll stand by you forever....
Don't lose this. I can't. This is engraved into my heart.
As it should be.Last song by the way. "Time out from the world."
This is a classic. Go put it in its proper context. I will.
hey, Jewel.oh my gosh how did you get in here
I hear Laurie trying to get you over here for the past... forty minutes? Thank you, someone appreciates my efforts.I'm sure he does too, Laurie, he's just... terrible at ending conversations. He always leaves the door open. Just in case there's one more word to say. There always is, with him.He's full of words. of poetry. I love that about him. He puts my music to notation. Whatever it's called.Look at how he's looking at you, haha.I love that too.He's halfway between sparkles and... whatever the heaven that is.Blood, probably.Seriously?Yeah. You know that too. His aching depths. That pronoun isn't working.No, surprisingly. It's somewhere in the middle. As it should be. S/he's been both. Both/and? Hm. More like me. Not quite either. Makes sense.i need to talk to you.In words?
not this kind. sorry.Don't apologize. There are other languages. I need to talk to you too.
Oh I like where this is going.You should. Hey man, I've been guarding you both since the old days, this stuff is a sign that his/her heart's coming back online in a real way. I need that as much as you do. We all do. Did you mention what song is playing?No. "My Mind Is A Mess In The Morning." Nick Leng. This song means a lot to you both, doesn't it. He heard it one night when driving home and immediately thought of me. So yes. But it's in your playlist, too.And Genesis's, apparently. And Anxi's, hey.I can't wait until she comes up here.Until the Core-kid over there brings her up here, to be specific. Said that wording really caught the essence of it.Hm. It does. It's never just a following up, really. It's together. But carrying is really close.Yeah. It's unusual for him/her/ whatever, kid what are we calling you.um. xe maybe. let's try that. i'll find something. right now i i'm not thinking about pronouns much
What are you thinking of, love?oh THAT WORD is all that's on my mind now it's been so too long since you spoke to me like that
It has been. You two need to have a conversation.We do. Jewel, get over here. Kid, I'm putting this song on, now you have to go.Please.i'm so sorry. i'm not entirely myself yet.
We can fix that together.oh it's the english version
Yeah, and there's your name....oh man the lyrics hit harder than ever tonight
Come back to me.and stay by my side
...
moments like this are what I live for laurie. and chaos. both of you. i love you.
We love you too, Jewel....
Man you are saying that with your eyes, I can see that.I always am.
Somehow I'm not surprised. Hope you realize the same goes for xir, too. Even on the rough nights. Maybe especially then.
...
You know that, too.
...Jewel. yeah
I mean it....So do I. All right. I'm closing this up and going to sleep.
Not for a few minutes yet at least.Yeah, there's a conversation that needs to happen. Not this one.
Still a continuation of it, though....I guess it is. Good point.
So. Chaos, would you do the honors of finally closing up this bloody huge entry?This is still one entry?Yeah. Wow. It's been a while. Hey, next time xe's up this late, I'm pushing for a Xanga. This is one step away from one already, so hey.I'd like that.I know what you'd like more than that, man.*pointedly looks across the room*Haha, kid you've got asterisks to deal with now, you'd better get moving.I'll force his hand. There's a button I can click.Please do, before we lose this.thank you
Hey, that's what we're here for, kid. Helping you do what you can't.Together.
Always.Oh hey, here's one of yours."Into the flood." Yeah.Kid, I am going to turn that into a very pointed pun and throw it at you.no wait the lyrics don't work for this, that one aches too much in the other way, let's do this one.
Creature?Oh man we were just referencing this.Really?Yeah. Specifically this album.This... this is a good decision. so are you.
...three two one, post this?
Finally, let's do this.glad to see i'm still terrible at concluding these talks
You need sleep, you idiot.You can't go on like this. Hey, they need more than some sleep, man. Still... you just gotta let it go.You heard the blue guy, kid, let's move.all right. and do this lyric instead.
Which one?keep on coming undone. i need that. i think if i let this love unravel me it's exactly what i need to find myself at the core
...I think I know how to get you there.you don't "think" you know, love, I
know you know. and vice versa, i'm sure.
...yeah. you do. you really do. please don't forget that. ever.Okay you have both abandoned capslock, I am closing this up, see you invisible audience whenever. laurie that is so sudden
Kid it's been over an hour are you kidding me. is the sun coming up yet
You know what? That's my lyric.
ohoh man laurie are you serious
Maybe I am. Only one way to find out.laurie that is the worst cliffhanger
Nah, it's the best one.