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As is probably obvious from my little cliche title, I'm feeling quite well today, as though everything is exactly where it needs to be. The infrequency with which I feel totally sane and totally together is dismaying, although I'm sure many others would corroborate this feeling, so it really doesn't cause me too much concern. (I have my quirks, but I've studied enough psychopathology to know that none of them are pathological.)
It began yesterday. I promised productivity and got it: First, Arafinwë spoke to me. Finally! I made excellent progress on my chapter. This story is a challenge to me because I'm trying to do something different with each of the characters, trying to tease them apart psychologically, without coming right out and telling my audience what I'm doing. (Although such topics are certainly fair game for discussion here, since it's unlikely that anyone's going to read most of the crap that I write in here anyway.) I have always admired Arafinwë for not entering into the conflict between Nolofinwë and Fëanaro. It would have been easy for him to take Nolofinwë's side (given that Fëanaro is quite obvious in expressing his preference that neither of his half-brothers ever have been born), but he does not. Nolofinwë holds him in confidence, so I imagine that the two of them are close. It must have been hard to Arafinwë to remain neutral to all that was going on. Even if he didn't want to be involved politically, seeing that his brother was being hurt by it couldn't have been easy. (Although, by his removal from the situation, I believe he may also have seen that Nolofinwë did his fair share to provoke Fëanaro's actions.) I have also taken the liberty to assume that a tenuous regard exists between Arafinwë and Fëanaro, largely for this reason. In his effort to remain neutral, Arafinwë extends his affections to his half-brother as well as Nolofinwë; through much persistence, he achieves a degree of success. (Although Fëanaro doubtlessly also uses Arafinwë's affectionate regard against Nolofinwë too. Nothing is an unfair weapon in their fight!)
So I'm trying to convey all of these things as subtly as possible. I feel bad for Arafinwë: He really has no idea what is in store for him in the next few hundred years.
Now, of course, I'm stuck for how to end the chapter. I was always praised for my endings to essays and stories before, although I rarely planned how I wanted them to end but rather just trusted that it would happen. This is my MO now; the only problem is that trust takes a long time sometimes, and I don't always feel like waiting for the perfect ending to emerge in my head and holler, "Ta da!" Also, I need a title for my story, so that I can stop calling it "my story," especially on the title pages for this journal. One day, I'm going to have more than one story and "my story" will cease to work then. Although, titles--like endings--generally just come to me. I like to take my titles from a tiny, insignificant moment that nonetheless expresses the theme of the story in that instant. One of my favorite short stories, "Chasing Tomorrow," was titled after a single line of dialog by one of the characters. My longest story, "The Man behind the Curtain," was the same. I'm feeling as though the title will come out of Nelyo's or Fëanaro's chapters; they really are the main characters, as they factor most heavily in the plot later.
After working on my story, I made myself drag out my D&D books to work some more on the equipment list. D&D and I have a love-hate relationship. Once I get started on it, I love doing it. It's just a question of motivation. Never mind that the rest of the group is rather apathetic. I spent hours doing character creation sheets for everyone, yet no one has taken an hour to do them and turn them in. Argh! I really want to start playing soon. I'm such a nerd.
Last night, I had skating class, so Bobby and I got dinner out at Red Brick Station in White Marsh. (Great restaurant, by the way, if anyone happens to read this and wind up in the Baltimore area.) I skated for an hour-and-a-half last night. And by an hour-and-a-half, I don't mean circling the rink, staring at the wall. I mean that I was jumping, spinning, working on my routines for the shows. It was quite intense. I was half-dead when it was all over, but it was a great feeling. I told Bobby that I love the feeling my body has been used. (Not in a naughty way; that's not a topic I'm likely to undertake in a forum that will remain public! :P) I feel purposeful, like it is something more than a container for my nutty, sideways-facing brain. Even now, my legs have that nice heavy feeling that tells me that I worked hard last night.
On top of working hard, it was just a great practice. I have on-days and off-days for skating. Sometimes, I can nail every jump and spin perfectly, and I wonder how it could possibly be so hard on other days. On those "other days," I can't find a perfect edge to save my life, and my spins are all awkward and the jumps just plain scary. These are the days when I quit after a half-hour and figure that a shortened practice is better than the bad habits I will learn from too many muck-ups.
I have been skating since I was about four in the respect that I had a pair of those adjustable rollerskates, and I would skate around my driveway. After that, there is very little time that I can remember not owning a pair of rollerskates. I had a horrible gym teacher in elementary school, and he taught me first and foremost to hate sports or any kind of physical activity. He also taught me that I was a horrible athlete and naturally disinclined to such pursuits. (Aren't such teachers wonderful?) But skating was never a "sport" to me, somehow. A few times, I went to the roller rink for parties, and I always used to think that people who could turn in circles on their inside edges were so cool. (I couldn't do it; I was too scared.) The summer before middle school, my sister brought home a flyer about a rec council rollerskating program. "Learn jumps and spins that will impress your friends!" it said. I didn't really have a whole lot of friends to impress, but I was pretty keen on the idea of impressing myself with the jumps and spins I could learn. My mom wanted me to do it; I was under-confident in myself and scared. After all, I sucked at athletics--that much had been made plain to me by Mr. Dorr in elementary school PE--so why should I be any good at rollerskating? My mom told me that I might love it; that I should give it a try. If I didn't like it, then I was free to quit.
So I had an out. So I did it. I was placed by my age (versus my ability) and ended up in an Advanced 2 class on my first day, unable to even skate backwards. My teacher Miss Jackie consented to have me moved down to Advanced 1; the others would be a year younger than me, but I might be more comfortable there. I became resigned at skating that week: I was going to learn to skate backwards by the next lesson if it killed me. So I spent the next week in my garage every afternoon, pushing off the cabinets and doing backwards weaving for a half-hour. Soon, I found, I didn't need to push as hard. By the next lesson, I could skate backwards unassisted.
That triumph was all I needed to be pushed fully into skating. In a few weeks, I was learning simple, half-revolution jumps and two-foot spins. I would look up at the older girls doing one-foot spins with awe. I have always had this habit in skating: "If I can learn to do insert skating move, then I will be happy." One-foot spins were the first of such assertions on my part. These days, it is outer-forward and outer-back spins. (Needless to say, I can do one-foot spins by now, after twelve years of skating; quite well, in fact.)
I started skating with White Marsh rec. A few years into it, my teacher Miss Jackie "retired" and her assistant took over. It wasn't the same, but I still loved it. Also, Miss Jackie did some of my choreography for the annual skating show, and--as she is the best choreographer I have yet to meet--then this was always favorable. Then, this past summer, Miss Jackie sent me an email out of the blue, telling me that she was starting up semi-private club skating lessons at Skateland. The chance to skate in a group no larger than six in an actual roller rink? And with my favorite (and best) skating teacher of all time? I don't think I need to tell you my answer.
So now I do White Marsh rec and club skating. For a variety of reasons, I am thinking of not resuming White Marsh skating next year, especially if Miss Jackie plans on continuing club skating into the far future. I haven't learned anything new at White Marsh in years, and it's expensive and a whole host of other reasons which I will probably be griping about in the near future, since our show is only two-and-a-half weeks away.
After a marvelous skating practice, Bobby and I went home and I worked on building my High Elves' army (even that is going really well), then got a great night's sleep on account of half-killing myself with my hour-and-a-half practice. And I woke up chipper and happy this morning. It can't last forever, I know, but I wish it would. Bobby and I have an evening off tonight with no commitments, so I'm hoping to get our apartment cleaned and finish up my Phoenix Guard. I'm feeling very productive right now.
Okay, I think I'm going to sign off and work on my D&D stuff so that I can lord it over Bobby and Potter this weekend that I've done work for our group and they haven't. Also, I have a lot to do myself before I can hold the practice game that I'm planning for us, so my lording might come to an abrupt end if they actually get their poop in a group and are ready to play.
Namarië,
Medium Dawn Felagund of the Fountain
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It began yesterday. I promised productivity and got it: First, Arafinwë spoke to me. Finally! I made excellent progress on my chapter. This story is a challenge to me because I'm trying to do something different with each of the characters, trying to tease them apart psychologically, without coming right out and telling my audience what I'm doing. (Although such topics are certainly fair game for discussion here, since it's unlikely that anyone's going to read most of the crap that I write in here anyway.) I have always admired Arafinwë for not entering into the conflict between Nolofinwë and Fëanaro. It would have been easy for him to take Nolofinwë's side (given that Fëanaro is quite obvious in expressing his preference that neither of his half-brothers ever have been born), but he does not. Nolofinwë holds him in confidence, so I imagine that the two of them are close. It must have been hard to Arafinwë to remain neutral to all that was going on. Even if he didn't want to be involved politically, seeing that his brother was being hurt by it couldn't have been easy. (Although, by his removal from the situation, I believe he may also have seen that Nolofinwë did his fair share to provoke Fëanaro's actions.) I have also taken the liberty to assume that a tenuous regard exists between Arafinwë and Fëanaro, largely for this reason. In his effort to remain neutral, Arafinwë extends his affections to his half-brother as well as Nolofinwë; through much persistence, he achieves a degree of success. (Although Fëanaro doubtlessly also uses Arafinwë's affectionate regard against Nolofinwë too. Nothing is an unfair weapon in their fight!)
So I'm trying to convey all of these things as subtly as possible. I feel bad for Arafinwë: He really has no idea what is in store for him in the next few hundred years.
Now, of course, I'm stuck for how to end the chapter. I was always praised for my endings to essays and stories before, although I rarely planned how I wanted them to end but rather just trusted that it would happen. This is my MO now; the only problem is that trust takes a long time sometimes, and I don't always feel like waiting for the perfect ending to emerge in my head and holler, "Ta da!" Also, I need a title for my story, so that I can stop calling it "my story," especially on the title pages for this journal. One day, I'm going to have more than one story and "my story" will cease to work then. Although, titles--like endings--generally just come to me. I like to take my titles from a tiny, insignificant moment that nonetheless expresses the theme of the story in that instant. One of my favorite short stories, "Chasing Tomorrow," was titled after a single line of dialog by one of the characters. My longest story, "The Man behind the Curtain," was the same. I'm feeling as though the title will come out of Nelyo's or Fëanaro's chapters; they really are the main characters, as they factor most heavily in the plot later.
After working on my story, I made myself drag out my D&D books to work some more on the equipment list. D&D and I have a love-hate relationship. Once I get started on it, I love doing it. It's just a question of motivation. Never mind that the rest of the group is rather apathetic. I spent hours doing character creation sheets for everyone, yet no one has taken an hour to do them and turn them in. Argh! I really want to start playing soon. I'm such a nerd.
Last night, I had skating class, so Bobby and I got dinner out at Red Brick Station in White Marsh. (Great restaurant, by the way, if anyone happens to read this and wind up in the Baltimore area.) I skated for an hour-and-a-half last night. And by an hour-and-a-half, I don't mean circling the rink, staring at the wall. I mean that I was jumping, spinning, working on my routines for the shows. It was quite intense. I was half-dead when it was all over, but it was a great feeling. I told Bobby that I love the feeling my body has been used. (Not in a naughty way; that's not a topic I'm likely to undertake in a forum that will remain public! :P) I feel purposeful, like it is something more than a container for my nutty, sideways-facing brain. Even now, my legs have that nice heavy feeling that tells me that I worked hard last night.
On top of working hard, it was just a great practice. I have on-days and off-days for skating. Sometimes, I can nail every jump and spin perfectly, and I wonder how it could possibly be so hard on other days. On those "other days," I can't find a perfect edge to save my life, and my spins are all awkward and the jumps just plain scary. These are the days when I quit after a half-hour and figure that a shortened practice is better than the bad habits I will learn from too many muck-ups.
I have been skating since I was about four in the respect that I had a pair of those adjustable rollerskates, and I would skate around my driveway. After that, there is very little time that I can remember not owning a pair of rollerskates. I had a horrible gym teacher in elementary school, and he taught me first and foremost to hate sports or any kind of physical activity. He also taught me that I was a horrible athlete and naturally disinclined to such pursuits. (Aren't such teachers wonderful?) But skating was never a "sport" to me, somehow. A few times, I went to the roller rink for parties, and I always used to think that people who could turn in circles on their inside edges were so cool. (I couldn't do it; I was too scared.) The summer before middle school, my sister brought home a flyer about a rec council rollerskating program. "Learn jumps and spins that will impress your friends!" it said. I didn't really have a whole lot of friends to impress, but I was pretty keen on the idea of impressing myself with the jumps and spins I could learn. My mom wanted me to do it; I was under-confident in myself and scared. After all, I sucked at athletics--that much had been made plain to me by Mr. Dorr in elementary school PE--so why should I be any good at rollerskating? My mom told me that I might love it; that I should give it a try. If I didn't like it, then I was free to quit.
So I had an out. So I did it. I was placed by my age (versus my ability) and ended up in an Advanced 2 class on my first day, unable to even skate backwards. My teacher Miss Jackie consented to have me moved down to Advanced 1; the others would be a year younger than me, but I might be more comfortable there. I became resigned at skating that week: I was going to learn to skate backwards by the next lesson if it killed me. So I spent the next week in my garage every afternoon, pushing off the cabinets and doing backwards weaving for a half-hour. Soon, I found, I didn't need to push as hard. By the next lesson, I could skate backwards unassisted.
That triumph was all I needed to be pushed fully into skating. In a few weeks, I was learning simple, half-revolution jumps and two-foot spins. I would look up at the older girls doing one-foot spins with awe. I have always had this habit in skating: "If I can learn to do insert skating move, then I will be happy." One-foot spins were the first of such assertions on my part. These days, it is outer-forward and outer-back spins. (Needless to say, I can do one-foot spins by now, after twelve years of skating; quite well, in fact.)
I started skating with White Marsh rec. A few years into it, my teacher Miss Jackie "retired" and her assistant took over. It wasn't the same, but I still loved it. Also, Miss Jackie did some of my choreography for the annual skating show, and--as she is the best choreographer I have yet to meet--then this was always favorable. Then, this past summer, Miss Jackie sent me an email out of the blue, telling me that she was starting up semi-private club skating lessons at Skateland. The chance to skate in a group no larger than six in an actual roller rink? And with my favorite (and best) skating teacher of all time? I don't think I need to tell you my answer.
So now I do White Marsh rec and club skating. For a variety of reasons, I am thinking of not resuming White Marsh skating next year, especially if Miss Jackie plans on continuing club skating into the far future. I haven't learned anything new at White Marsh in years, and it's expensive and a whole host of other reasons which I will probably be griping about in the near future, since our show is only two-and-a-half weeks away.
After a marvelous skating practice, Bobby and I went home and I worked on building my High Elves' army (even that is going really well), then got a great night's sleep on account of half-killing myself with my hour-and-a-half practice. And I woke up chipper and happy this morning. It can't last forever, I know, but I wish it would. Bobby and I have an evening off tonight with no commitments, so I'm hoping to get our apartment cleaned and finish up my Phoenix Guard. I'm feeling very productive right now.
Okay, I think I'm going to sign off and work on my D&D stuff so that I can lord it over Bobby and Potter this weekend that I've done work for our group and they haven't. Also, I have a lot to do myself before I can hold the practice game that I'm planning for us, so my lording might come to an abrupt end if they actually get their poop in a group and are ready to play.
Namarië,
Medium Dawn Felagund of the Fountain
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