You can still contact me at svaha@iki.fi

30 Sep 03: Fiction and Family

Met with Meira and now have a character for her Werewolf cronicle. The whole concept came about in a suprisingly painless whole, and I'm really excited about getting to play. Have to study the setting a lot, though (as I said, I've never played in it, nor do I even have a very comprehensive picture of the whole mindset yet).

It won't be without challenges in any case: my character is a medical doctor, and her second mother tongue is Swedish. Both are subjects in which I feel terribly inadequate - but if Kalle can play an explosive, highly physical extrovert, then I'm certainly going to do my best and try my hand at these.

Have to read magazines in Swedish before the game, I suppose. And listen to FST. As to the mecical profession... I've yet to work out how best to fake that.

Also met with P&P and ended up having dinner at Memphis. Must remember never to order one of those woks again (they all taste the same and have too much cilantro anyway). Made tentative plans for them to come and have a sauna and meet Zenya some time soon.

Missing Lin and Anni both. (Oh, I quite forgot to mention that Lin decided to join Anni at the folk music course in Kaustinen. The house echoes emptiness, and I feel lonely and miserable. Kalle's not much company, as he's working fourteen hours a day to finish a project. Next week, with Kalle in Boston, is going to be even more echo-like.) Seriously missing them both. Surprised at own misery.

Should email several people, but for once, tired at ten pm. Will go to sleep.

Tomorrow, will see about picking up my character's threads in the Vampire chronicle. Narrator and closest contact seem supportive. Perhaps may work out, after all the angst and ...angst.

29 Sep 03: Great Words of Wisdom on Storytelling

Sometimes it pays to wander around. I followed Mike's link to Eirik Fatland's blog and found Eirik quoting Ursula LeGuin:

"Modernist manuals of writing often conflate story with conflict. This reductionism reflects a culture that inflates aggression and competition while cultivating ignorance of other behavioral options. No narrative of any complexity can be built on or reduced to a single element. Conflict is one kind of behavior. There are others, equally important in any human life, such as relating, finding, losing, bearing, discovering, parting, changing."

YES!! YES!!! This is what I've wanted to say about games and their themes all those times when I've been reading Kalle Mikkola's enthusiastic gushing over games that have been at best mediocre, or when getting overly frustrated at teenagers who think themselves all-knowing in what makes a good game when they barely know what makes a good moment of life. This is what I want to point out in planning my own games. Conflict, even interpersonal conflict, is not the only value. The drama of the moment is not the only value. Those listed in the last sentence are just as important - besides, they are the ones whose memory stays.

(Disclaimer: Kalle is a nice person, a respectable gamer, and I'm sure very capable in his professional areas of interest. However, life-changing art does not exactly seem to be his forte.)

To stay in the subject of famous and much-admired authors: Paula, the absolute darling that she is, went to Neil Gaiman's book signing at the Helsinki Comics Festival and brought me a present. It's issue 51 of Sandman (the one about the dreams of cities, and one of my favourites), signed by Gaiman on the cover with a silver pen, saying: "Kristiina - Sweet dreams, Neil Gaiman". Of course it's very much the sort of thing to write on a Sandman cover, but I still love the coincidence. Oh, and he drew a sickle moon in the picture of the Inn, too.

28 Sep 03: Down & Down

For some inexplicable reason I feel completely miserable. I don't really want to analyze this, or write anything now.

I wish I had someone to hold me right now.

27 Sep 03: Temporary Insanity

Oh dear. I don't generally do links, but I'll make an exception in this case. I confess: I ranted.

I couldn't help it. Honestly...

The reason was probably a day and a night spent immersed in Faerun plans: fiddling with the Cormyr pages, constructing complicated half-elf family trees, studying recent history in surrounding countries, trying to come up with more arms and emblems, enthusing about the game to anyone in the house, speculating on players for new characters... It's been... fun. And tiring. Why, oh why, can't one's actual day job be this satisfying?

I mean, at least not any day job that I've come up with so far.

Also fiddled with my own welcome page recently: decided to own up to my personal diary addictions. Actually, I read at least twice as many diaries semi-regularly, but the page was getting firghteningly long...

The Return of the King trailer is online, and I even managed to get through to the link at theonering.net - but the viewer only loaded the first frame and no more. Blah. Have to wait until Monday then, I suppose.

It's past seven am, and there is a pale pink and golden sunrise through the blood-red leaves of our vine, The Cousin of the Great Old Ones. I'm debating on whether to go to sleep or to write one more useful email.

Good night and good morning to yesterday's brave ones: Hanna and Mikko.

...Now I fear I was insufferably preachy in that rant...

25 Sep 03: Flu Vanquished

Feeling much better by now. Our server was down last night, so could not write. Instead, moved all fabrics from my room downstairs, to the designated sewing corner. Much neater and more sensible this way. Now all I need is to get them in order there... Oh yes, and finish all my set sewing projects, of course.

I didn't dare to venture outside yesterday yet, but Atte, Aarne, Nubi and Jaakko dropped by in the evening for sauna and gaming plans - both Faerun and tabletop. Aarne scared all of the house thoroughly with his new look, but I'll forgive him anything if we finally get to game in the superhero setting... And I clearly need to study the Faerun source material more thoroughly; it's really irritating when other people can tell me details of this or that short story collection or long-forgotten extrasomething that might affect my characters...

(Later, again) Been moving the bits of stories and characters in the plans for FIV here and there in my head, looking at them this way and that, mostly finding them very much wanting yet. Why is it that I always look at things from the point of view of what they lack, and not from the point of view of actually adding those things that are lacking?

Bored. Hooked on Everwood already, after three episodes. Bored bored bored. Need to see the rest of Buffy 7. Tomorrow I will absolutely beg for time and a nook in the Sopulilaakso living room. Can't wait any more.

Now, people, look: I've talked about having a spy program that tells me the addresses of the computers that have requested files from my pages, and I can see that most of them really do stay the same, day to day. Please do a service to my peace of mind and own up, if you haven't done so in the past already. Come on. I dare you. Step up from the nameless ranks of those distant acquantainces- of-acquaintances who read me for some unfathomable gossip value (that they probably never get anyway) and tell me who and why. I tried to prod you last week, but apparently I wasn't firm enough...

All input is welcome in general, anyway. I really prefer private email to guestbooks, so I haven't set up one. I've made some very good friendships or beginnings of same (and a few kindly mutual respect-ships) by way of this journal. Any and all emails so far have warmed my heart and made me honestly glad that I have kept up with these ramblings, as incoherent and inconclusive as they are. I am not always very good at correspondence, because I think and doubt too much, but I'll try to improve that. To all those who know they are dear to me but may not have heard from me for a while: sorry. Do prod me. And do believe that you make a difference.

And come to see me, if you find the time. I'm home most of the time anyway, for now.

(P.S. Lyn: the last entry's rant was most emphatically not directed at your email...)

23 Sep 03: Counter-counter-arguments

Yes, yes, I know: true courage and goodness is knowing and recognizing that you will never be anything glorious; will live a small life; will probably even live that life alone; and still going about is as best you can. Of course I have thought of that. Don't ever make the mistake of thinking I haven't already seen that or corresponding argument(s). I'm not stupid, after all. Many things miserable, but not stupid. Sometimes I wish I were, so some of the old, tired answers might even feel like revelations and help.

However. I can't live like that. I haven't got the strength, or the courage, or the means to make it through with nothing. I'm sorry. Call me weak, call me lazy, call me selfish. Maybe I am. But I am not able to live with no purpose and no worth. I know I should; I should trust that the purpose would be revealed some day, and that the meek should inherit - perhaps not the Earth, but at least some joy - but I can't. I'm sorry.

I want to write more stories, but I can never come up with complete ideas - my own always peter out after the setting up; I can only take part in someone else's vision, and even then I'm not sure if it's working.

And there's a LARP right here that I want to participate in, and would, absolutely - except that one of the organizers did a really nasty and harmful thing to me a while ago, and she has not apologized even after some discussions on the matter. Nor will she - after all, she is "such a sweet and innocent person that she would never mean anyone any harm, so I must have deserved it". And in a way, I did, but not what she did. And even after explaining what happened from my part, it all stayed the same. And I can't forgive it. I can't.

It was that one weird week in July when I could not sleep at all, and was feeling terrible in all ways, and so let two - two - emails out of my hands that were pretty catty. One day of letting my guard down; one hour even; just two small mistakes... and now I will have to pay for them for another year or two or five. You see, this person forwarded my angry email to a list that is read by at least fifty people, to most of whom I've desperately tried to prove that I can be useful and that I can be worked with. Well, I heard some of the reactions after that email, and all hope of that is gone. And even though someone with authority almost immediately said that she should apologize, she never did.

No, I am not saying I was blameless. What I am saying is, the punishment is out of proportion.

I shouldn't have put any of this here even now.

I hate all of this, all of my sad dregs of a life.

And dammit, I wish that that person who didn't, would at least have answered my email.

How pitiful is this? Is there even a scale for this?

Fuck it all. I'm probably just trying to goad God, fate, someone.

22 Sep 03: Crisis Alert

Still in full flu mode. Woke up after five pm, which probably was good for getting better, but didn't leave much of a day for anything to write about.

Lissu had been there yesterday, but she waited outside, while I waited inside. Oh bugger.

In the evening, we watched X2, which Timo brought for Lin (he also brought her flowers, which was cute; particularly cute was Lin's embarrassment). It didn't hold my interest as well as it did the first time, but I cannot quite pinpoint why. Perhaps because the emotion is lacking, or shallow, or concentrated on someone who elicits absolutely no sympathy at least from me: I think Famke Janssen is completely wrong for Jean Grey. She's cold and colourless, not at all someone whom everybody falls in love with, or who radiates warmth to everyone around her. As for Rogue and Bobby: yeah, they are adorably awkward and charming, but there's just not enough time and development to really feel for them. Or anyone, except for - for some reason - Nightcrawler.

Want to get better.

Want to get human. I'm tired of being less than functional. But I realized (or remembered) today that I am also afraid of resolution: I don't want to get well if it means becoming just another small-life person. And what else could it mean? What else do I have capacity for? Except I can't accept that. I can't accept living an ordinary, small, meaningless life, no matter how nice I would be in that life. I won't be satisfied with compromise that actually is defeat and can only be said to be compromise by someone as eternally optimistic and small and repressed as my mother. I'd rather be unwell than compromise.

Usch. I can't explain this well. I'm trembling for disgust and anger, but can't really paint a picture of what it is that digusts me so.

I want... I want so many things. And right now it pisses me off that I can't go to this larp in Sweden that Jaakko just praised excessively. I don't have the money, and even if I did, my Swedish is not good enough. I'm a loser. And I don't want that.

I'm angry. I think it's time to go to bed.

21 Sep 03: All the Same

Too deep in the throes of the flu to do much else but sleep. Everyone and a couple of extras came home from their weekend activities, so I've been a little sorry to be so asocial. I did go to town to meet Lissu, but she'd probably had something come up, as she wasn't there (and as I wasn't reachable by phone, wasn't able to inform me). The trip took every ounce of energy reserved for today.

Don't really know what else to say today. Tired, and head full of goo.

20 Sep 03: Ill

Coughed a lot and been feverish. Despite that, spent some of the evening at Irre's to watch more Buffy (middle of season 7). It felt better than tearing my hair out for sheer boredom here at home. Had a good time. Much Buffy goodness.

Apropos hair-tearing, the rest of today I've mostly spent digging clumps and clumps of thistle seeds out of poor Jero's coat. I let him run a bit yesterday night, and he found a rabbit... and ran after it through a whole avenue of thistles, it seems. I must have been after them for three hours today, and I'm sure I have as much work left for tomorrow. I probably won't even be able to get it all off - I don't think he will stay on his back long enough for me to get them all off his stomach fur. Must leave that to Kalle.

Stupid dog. And stupid breeders to create dogs with that much fuzzy undercoat...

Zenya is getting braver - she already eats even if the door is open and the dog is in sight - and much perkier. Now if only we can agree on sleeping arrangements that will not result in a) my squeezing her into a pulp b) her suffocating me, we'll be just fine...

Too ill. Must sleep.

19 Sep 03: Good and Bad

Put up a preliminary page for Faerun IV!

Got both good and bad news on the post today. Letters like the good one make life worth living: that someone actually takes the time and effort to send me a note to express their appreciation of me... And in my case, "worth living" is not an empty phrase, as you should know by now.

The rest of the house is going away for the weekend, again - to an EK event. I wanted to go, too, but better this way, considering that I seem to have caught the second round of the early-autumn bug that Kalle had last week. I'm feeling feverish and miserable. Luckily, I can expect an evening of anime with some friends.

18 Sep 03: ...And Failing, As Usual

Not much going on. I seem to wind down after every burst of opening up... I can't really find anything new to say, and no-one seems to have much to say to me.

Kalle has another voluntary army weekend, so I promised to take care of the animals. Now I'm trying to figure out whether to sleep upstairs in his room (where Zenya has spent her time so far) or to take Zenya and her stuff to my room for the night, since she got the scare of her life, when Kalle's window burst open in the wind, and now she jumps at every noise coming from the roof... of which there are a lot, the southwesterly being almost a storm.

I think I'll take her here.

Reading Charles deLint, again. The Cormyr books are still looming on the horizon...

Apropos Cormyr, more than half of my players from FIII have answered my query on FIV, and everyone except two want to continue with their characters. That's good, no? (And even the two were not absolute about it - and I know that both of their characters could use more work if continued, so it's okay.)

16 Sep 03: Feverishly Grasping At Contact

Do I write every day now because I need to, or because I need to be answered (not that I am, mostly)?

Anyway. I read some of the entries from a year ago. Why can't I not express myself as well now as then? Why do I keep going worse, worse, worse? Why do I keep drying up? People should learn and develop with time, but I only regress. All the bloody time. There's this slow spiral that I keep sliding down, down, inexorably, inevitably, and the worst part is getting used to it while it happens.

There were aliens in my dreams again; this time, I was not scared at all, even if they mostly looked like three-meter high crosses of a praying mantis and a crab. I ended up being one of the few who could communicate with and understand them, and one even became a family member. However, then the Earth was blown up by another species of space aliens that we had not heard of yet. Again, several more scenes, details and subplots. And the whole ended up being a series of books and novels set in one storyline, by Connie Willis herself.

I borrowed the car to go to my therapist appointment today, but even then, didn't get going in time and ended up being late. Liisa was not there, which I thought was fair enough - but in the evening I learned that it was not about my being late at all: she had been hospitalized for a serious infection. She called me after getting the note I left about Kalle's and Lin's phone numbers to reach me. We'll continue the therapy once they figure out what is wrong with her and get it fixed. Meanwhile, I need an appointment at the city mental healthcare office anyway, for renewing my prescription and for more sick leave.

After not finding Liisa available, I drove to Espoo to see if Suvi might have time for a cup of coffee, and after some adventuring, managed to get hold of her and have a chat before she needed to dash to the city. From there I proceeded to hang out at Qttiland and read Dork Tower while Heli and Ruini played a terrifying computer game that took place in a haunted Japanese mansion. Borrowed a couple of videos from Heli and got home to do some sewing - which is still waiting... for now, but I'm feeling much better and more energetic, and actually intend to get on with it.

It came to me today that it's time to start seriously reading poetry again. And books in Finnish. And in Swedish. (We'll see about French later.) Not for anything, except for words themselves. That's reason enough for me.

I've been thinking of with what kind of purpose and mood I write these entries, which is something I actually haven't considered before. It matters, though, because it affects how much I say and in which way. There is definitely the aspect of providing friends (or other interested parties) information on the small events and big emotions that my life seems to entail - or actually that is two aspects: information for the old friends, and perhaps increase in understanding for those others. However, when I am actually writing, I seem to go into this impersonal mode where my implied reader is someone or some group that I don't know at all. As I now consider it, it seems rather pointless... after all, I seem to have a highly faithful readership, 98% of which are either friends or curious acquaintances. Or is it even more important in that case to be impersonal; to not name names or other specific details, because otherwise they would be all too easy to figure out, and that might invade on people's sense of personal privacy?

Actually, now that I took this up, I want to try and be frank about something that may or may not be my usual paranoia about people's motives... Thus far, I have had surprisingly few negative experiences on going public like this - only two specific ones, one of which was a friend overreacting to my depression last autumn, and one was that snideful text message to Ari over becoming my friend. Many personal comments from friends and overheard mentions from acquantainces have been understanding and encouraging. However, these are only the things I hear about. I don't know how much gossiping or conclusion-drawing goes on beyond my knowledge, and it unnerves me a bit. At the moment, for example, I'm wondering how many comments have been exchanged in certain circles over my recent infatuation, and how much it might have affected some people's perceptions. Maybe none at all, to both counts, but... want to calm me down and tell me I'm just imagining things? After all, it's not like my life really is that interesting, is it...?

(To go back to the mode and purpose of writing: then, of course, there is the aspect of active self-examination. It comes last, at least for now, as I have noticed that I don't seem to be able to delve so deep into my psyche here that it would really serve as any sort of actual therapy. I've resigned myself to the fact that writing itself is good. Good for practice, good for staying connected with life, good for perhaps some day giving someone else a picture of how it may be. Whether it actually helps to change me... well, that sort of writing will have to wait. Maybe I simply don't work that way. After all, I find analyzing myself pretty simple all in all. It's much more challenging for me to try and form opinions or tell stories.)

The maples on our street are beginning to change colour, but only in patches that seem as if a tree here and there would be mortally wounded: a single sharp-edged area of bright red in an otherwise deep green, bleeding onto the ground in great fivefold drops. It looks disturbing. I'm looking forward to a more complete change.

15 Sep 03: The Confusing Paths Of Desire

It seems to me I've been somewhat incoherent in my ramblings of how I feel about certain persons. I think I need to explain a little.

So. It seems to be a fact that I am still in love with A Certain Someone that I have loved for more than two years now. However, as in the spring that feeling was still terribly acute and painful and desperate, now I seem to have resigned myself to it, and to the facts. I don't expect that it could never really work between us, even in the astronomically improbable chance that he might come to answer my feelings. It was driven home very recently that a) yes, I still find him very pleasant to look at, and desire him b) he is not inclined to indulge that desire c) I can probably manage to stay alive, and sleep at night, even knowing that. I know him, and I love him; he is one of my soul family; but it would be nice to get past the desire and the romance. By now I expect I could, and would, pretty certainly, if someone else I find attractive would appear in my life.

And at the moment, I would very much like it to be this person I developed that crush on recently, even though it does not seem probable for him to reciprocate, either.

And as a sidenote: people I find attractive and would be willing to date to see how it turned out exist, more than these two. I can think of quite a few. And no, I am not going to list a single one of them. Do you think me stupid enough to beg for public humiliation?

I had another night of those extremely detailed, intricately plotted dreams. This one was in the more unpleasant category: its main plot concerned a homicidal psychopath who could possess other people in the same way as that evil spirit(?) in that Denzel Washington movie that I can't remember. You never knew where or who he was... and he was after me. Subplots included ballet, severely dysfunctional families, the whole thing being a highschool movie production, looting said production's prop attic and coming out with several highly desirable items, flying on a broomstick with Harry Potter, and trying to negotiate a car away after the production's viewing, over stairs and strange traffic arrangements and missing relatives and my parents having a row.

Oh my goodness, I just remembered another dream from last night. That one wasn't pleasant either. It was one of those where I needed to escape someone or something, preferably far away; I was able to fly, but kept being trapped inside buildings... and other buildings... and even more buildings, one around the other in layers. I never managed to get outside and get properly free. It was much, much worse than the other one... and I'm not even claustrophobic. It was just that I had no way out.

This has not been much of a day, anyway. About the only positive parts have been some emails I've managed to take care of, and making the acquaintance of the new cat, a Russian Blue that came to Kalle by way of Kristel, whose old cat could not tolerate the newcomer. She's an absolutely adorable little lady who ended up in my lap on my third visit upstairs. So far, she's stayed up there since her arrival last night.

(Later) Okay. I don't want to talk about this, since this is about the most un-glorious subject ever, but I am supposed to stick to truth. And if I am supposed to keep a diary of my mental and emotional state, it won't do for truth to leave such things as this out (as I feel justified in doing with other matters, such as names of people who might be embarrassed by my public attention). I saw some pictures of last weekend's game today, and even though I had felt okay about my dress and my looks there, the pictures again revealed the naked truth: I looked awful. Fat and old. No wonder my constant flirting in-game brought no results. I decided then and there that even if it's my last deed, I'll lose fifteen kilos before Faerun IV. And what did I do after this decision? Cooked up a pan of pancake and ate it all. And not only that, but did something I haven't done much lately: threw it up.

There. See the beauty of eating disorders? The thing you want to get rid of; the thing you hate in yourself - eating without control - is the one thing that you turn to when feeling insecure about your looks in particular and yourself in general.

I haven't thrown up for months; no more than three or four times in a full year, if I remember correctly. Still, the whole thing is by no means under control. Look at my weight, look at the way I eat whatever I can find in the house, whether it is mine or not.

I'm ugly and I hate it.

14 Sep 03: An Ordinary Coward

I'm back to thinking that I shouldn't write at all, since if I write truthfully, my life sucks, and no-one wants someone whose life sucks; and if I don't write truthfully, I can just as well forget about the whole thing.

Yeah, yeah, I know - I shouldn't be fixated on finding someone; I should not appear desperate; I should try and concentrate on being happy and successful and self-reliant, and then when I would not need anyone any more, they would appear. It's such an unfairly perverse logic, and the terrible part is, it seems to be true. But it's not fair. Not fair that I have to become someone else to be loved.

Anyway. The game weekend was okay, and parts of it were even very, very good. The game was well planned and - it seemed to me - well written. The world worked. The only problem was, as I applied for substitute places, I got the last one they had, and it was very much what I don't prefer and very little of what I do. So most of the game for me was stress and frustration (and not in a good way; not in-game). All in all, though, the atmosphere was great (though of course it suffered a bit from the common problems of a campaign: plots tend to congregate around the continuing characters). And it was so good to play with grown-ups for a change... people had prepared properly and were mostly very credible in their roles.

As for anything else - well, it was nice to see many of the people there, and especially lovely to spend time with some friends, such as Tomi (thank you for the chats under the moon, you dear person). The general mood was cheerful and ...well, nice. I know it's an overused word, but it is good when something that includes a crowd of people can be described as nice.

But. There was someone there I probably should have talked to. Properly, that is. Naturally, I didn't. I didn't even make a casual note of how he never answered my last email. It was just that... well, it was easier not to dare, not to risk polite (or even non-polite) rejection, not to risk embarrassment for being a bother and thinking too highly of oneself. And not to be a bother anyway, as this person did not seem too inclined to talk to me either. Which, of course, made me feel even lower. And emptier.

The funny thing is, for once in a long time, I actually would like to get to know this person even if in friendship and never anything else. It is strange and I can't figure out what it means; what it should mean, if anything. As I seem to remember explaining before, I am not generally looking for more people in my life as such - most often, I have enough trouble trying to have something to give of myself for the friends I have. So, I don't lack friends, but I do lack love (or romance, sparks, whathaveyou). However, in this case, for some reason, it seems different. If no other choice was possible, I'd be willing to go through the trouble to know this person as a person, for the sake of knowing itself. Uh, I mean, for the sake of the person themselves, as they are. Really, don't ask me why.

And it will probably never happen anyway. Either they got scared of me (even though they said they wouldn't) or they just don't plain much find me worth it. Which, frankly, feels awful.

Not that I can do anything about it even so.

And yes, yes, I know it's no wonder if they are scared if they happen to be informed of this fuss I am making of the whole non-existent deal. We go back to the beginning: never reveal what you want and how much, for then you cannot have a chance and will furthermore look like a fool for the attempt...

I think I have a lot of work to do to learn to dare.

12 Sep 03: Away For The Weekend

Leaving for Kristuskeisari V about now. Seeya, I suppose..

11 Sep 03: Irony And Guilt

Lissu had sent me the words to Dido's newest yesterday while I was still refitting my chains:

Well I will go down with this ship
And I won't put my hands up and surrender
There will be no white flag above my door
I'm in love and always will be

And when we meet
Which I'm sure we will
All that was then
Will be there still
I'll let it pass
And hold my tongue
And you will think
That I've moved on....

Well I will go down with this ship...

This is so spooky it isn't funny, what with the re-read of Passage and all. If fate isn't trying to rub my face in it, it's making a damn good effort to appear so.

And naturally, I should not be concerned with my own little nonexistent-relationship concerns; I should think of things with wider significance, especially today... But, you know, 9/11 was a monstrous thing and a terrible tragedy, but first, what about all the children dying of starvation or AIDS or mindless destruction in the wars of Africa? What about the ghettoes of Latin America? What about the street children in St. Petersburg? What about the international prostitution from the Balkan etc. to West Europe? What is so much less in these that one day of destruction gives the US the right to hit mindlessly around in revenge?

The one tragedy that does make me feel sad and helpless is the death of Paula's grandmother only a couple of days after P&P's wonderfully joyous wedding. She died of the complications after a stroke, and she had lived a long and fulfilling life, but it still is a great loss - the loss of a piece of identity for a whole extended family. I know exactly how it is; it was the same with our Mamma, our father's mother, twelve years ago. I only met Paula's grandma at the wedding, but my heart is with them and their family at the funeral this weekend.

Death is everywhere. We come here, we go. And nothing is left. One individual is nothing at all, except for the love and memories, and those only last as long as those who remember. Soon it is all gone.

So why pretend that I have any particular meaning or reason here?

...I also wondered that maybe it's simple biology, and nothing else. Libido is biology, naturally, and so is the fact that we all go for the beautiful ones, which of course results in the beautiful ones getting each other and the rest of us being left pining and settling for "second best". But maybe the self-sacrifice that is so gloried as a show of true love is also biology: those less fit, less of the alpha rating, are willing to throw themselves in the fire so that the alphas can survive? It's just herd instinct, that's all. My need to bend backwards to prove my devotion is the need of a follower, and must be fought against.

Yeah, right.

Plus side to today? Lots of Faerun IV plans: it's finally coming to be! My players may expect mail and other action pretty soon.

10 Sep 03: Meeting People

Do you know that feeling where you need to be kissed so badly that it burns inside your head all the way from throat to eyes? Not kissed by a particular person, just kissed (it is a separate matter to determine who the acceptable kisser/s might be)? No? I thought so. No particular reason; it just occurred to me.

Who am I kidding?

I didn't get to my therapy on time yesterday. Borrowed a phone to call Liisa; got another appointment for the afternoon; went, but managed to be spectacularly late for that one, too. When getting back, realized that the money Topsu transferred to me on Monday had not arrived yet, and having no cash left, had to walk from the farther tip of Lauttasaari to the Ruoholahti tube, in heels. Not fun. Consequently, was even more spectacularly late from meeting Ari and Mikis, but luckily, they were patient enough to wait.

We went to see Identity. It was okay, I suppose. I knew before going what the "twist" was (only the basic gist of it), so I could concentrate on that and not react hysterically to the suspense elements; better that way. And as I've said, I'll watch John Cusack in anything, any time, any which way.

After the movie, we came to hang out at Lummetie and had quite a fun evening, talking this and that. This time, I won at Scrabble, which was not at all as much fun as losing. I drove the guys home at night and then went to bed with Passage.

I know this seems a very superficial description of the evening, but it really is difficult to write about one's thoughts on people when they are mentioned by name - especially since I know both will read what I write about them. And then again, not mentioning names would feel silly.

Perhaps later. Need to get moving now.

(Later, at night) Oh, fuck. I'd add several other profanities, but they don't seem to fit. Just that one. It says it all.

Hello familiar cell, familiar wallstones, familiar chains. Hello bloody desire. "Need to be kissed", indeed. And why am I not madder? I'm not, not really, I'm just sad and ironic and "silent, and dark, and cold". No room to flare, therefore, no flame.

No, no, nothing has happened. Nothing happened, which of course is what bugs me, as usual. As before. I just had to face the fact that I am still in love with a Certain Someone... What's there to add to that?

"How do you know when your fate turns?" I clearly don't, except as a negation. But then again, that should have been clear: there is nothing in my fate to turn to; nothing has changed for years, so where should it change now?

08 Sep 03: *Shrug*

Went to the SCA event. It was okay, but mainly for the people - both current and very old friends. As such, one couldn't really much find the illusion of Middle Ages, and I know I can't really get myself so interested in the details in medieval studies that it would give (or receive) much in this context. So maybe for the people, every once in a while, yes. (I just have to steel myself for the courts and remember that recognition there is given for work, and that it's not about popularity at all.)

But oh, it was lovely to see Cormac, or for once, find time to spend with Moira and Dubghall (and yes, I know I still don't know how to spell it properly), or after such a long time, with Kerttu, Pietari, Tofa etc. And to see Anna as Queen, of course. I fear I was not as much help for Tofa as I had planned to be, being so excited about time with friends (mainly Moira and Dugi)... but perhaps I helped a little.

Didn't do much else. Got lots of ideas for costumes that I know I will never realize... Got home, was tired, slept.

Getting to the scary parts of Passage by now. Don't know if will keep up. We'll see.

Should start emailing my players about their Faerun characters in preparation for number IV sometime in the winter.

(Late at night) Went to see Pirates of the Caribbean with Topi and Heli. It was great fun, and I'm again all aflutter about Orlando Bloom. (Okay, some parts of it were not fun - those with sunken wrecks, or the part where Will almost drowns inside the ship... I was trying very hard not to become sick at that one...) Afterwards, we sat in a cafe for a while and talked. Nice, very nice.

At home, I took the dog for a walk. Not bad. The moon is nearly full, competing for attention in the southern sky with the spectacularly bright Mars. I took the route through the artsy "fairy circles", and noticed on the way that for a moment I actually - nearly - believed that they might let me step through to Elsewhere. Or at least that it might be possible. I wonder if I'm going certifiably crazy out of despair.

Again, had the most incredibly detailed adventures in dreams last night... anything and everything from Greywolves that were axe-murderers in their early teens (though not really, it was only a story written by the father of one of them) to our family living in Lauttasaari and going through a traumatic event with a big brother I had in the dream who had had everything go wrong in his teens, when I was still very small... to a LARP where I played Caladnei and/or a spy who needed to get away from a demonic ritual with another spy, through long, long caves and then later again, by swimming over a lake (that earlier, had been a lake at which Olli's summer cottage stood and which Mom and I had to cross with a raft)... to me hiding in a luxurious new hotel where Mom was staying, after all, and lots of adventures in trying to navigate through said hotel and the fabric stores and jewellery and accessory shops in its basement, and a sixth floor that was under renovation and full of movement detectors that I had to wave this key at, and then w e got a room that was not a room, but a funride with a moving balcony that was full of shoes... and more adventures with the poor Greywolf hangaround who had to escape after his friend committed those murders... It ended with said youngster becoming a taxi driver to get some money for his getaway, while the whole thing turned into a porn movie, and I was woken up by experiencing a guess-what. The first time ever that has happened to me. Huh. Weird. And much, much weirder if I told you all the details of all the storylines. There were lots. And I can still remember them (though not, it seems, recount them in any sensible manner).

Going to bed now. Want to make it to therapy tomorrow, and to meet one of my loyal knights after that.

04 Sep 03: Limited Resources

My sincere apologies to everyone who waited for me today. I woke up after five, and my phone got closed again.

It seems we're back to not managing to leave the house, or get dressed, or anything. How am I going to make it to the SCA weekend? Especially since I was going to use the car, but forgot to get the extra key from the trunk, and now Kalle and his key are unavailable for the weekend?

I hate my life.

Or this meaningless drag that passes for it.

I had the most incredible sci-fi dreams. They would have been really cool, except that I and someone else had adopted these alien babies that were completely non-human - they mostly looked like a mix of a stingray and a squid (or, most closely, colourful versions of that amphibian alien in the later Valerian comics), though they were altogether capable of breathing air, intelligent and able to speak human languages, and would develop hard outer shells later in life. Now, however, they had absolutely nothing to support them, and it was almost impossibly difficult to carry them around. We still tried, because they were just as curious and social as any babies, and this was some sort of an intercultural celebration on some far-distant earthlike planet where the main culture was a human colony of Andalusian gypsies, and so there was plenty to watch. And since this was a dream, we weren't sensible parents who had come up with some reasonably safe way of carrying such creatures, but were carrying them around in our arms. And - naturally, this was me, after all - when I tried to carry the girl-alien long enough, I dropped her. From a hillock. Of rocks.

And there I was, scraping baby alien parts off the ground and off my hands and trying to gather them all to put them into this healing thingy where by hibernating together in some sort of a uber-healing solution, the boy alien might perhaps be able to save his sister.

Then the dream went back to other plotlines of the story - such as trying to find anew the secret of faster-than-light travel and the true history of Earth etc. etc. There were also big, green, intelligent snails. And we did find the secrets, though I didn't get to read the history before time ran out and we had to leave, and the dream ended.

And the baby alien? Died, of course. And this was not just a baby alien, this was my child. A living, breathing, thinking creature whom I had killed by being just as careless as I should have remembered I always was.

I hate even my dreams now.

And I don't particularly like being alone in this house, with no-one, not even the dog, at home, and no phone.

(Later) I suck. Everything sucks. I can't get anything done. I have not found a solution to the no-phone-no-carkeys problem. It's late, and I need to do a load of stuff. I really, really need to.

I don't want to go out of the house at all. I'm fat and lazy and a loser.

03 Sep 03: Back To Existential Crisis

...I mean, what's the point of it all? Really?

I don't think I'm ready for normal life yet. I feel too alone and too scared and too... everything.

I've just slept and slept, and last night, when I tried to make a light joke about another existential crisis to Lissu on the phone, I ended up in tears. In a big way. Again.

I planned to get up at a reasonable hour today, but as usual when I really plan to, I slept like a log until half past two. If nothing else, I have loads of sewing to do - money won't walk to me if I don't give it something to walk to.

I felt temporarily more energetic last night, but it passed safely by today, and I could not drag myself up and out of the door in time to go and see Pirates of the Caribbean with the Greywolves, like I'd planned to. Too much hustle and bustle. Not enough energy.

I'm also seriously bugged by the fact that I have not received an answer to a particular email last week - I'm afraid that the recipient either saw through my chattiness or has heard roundabout hints about my showing an interest to their person, and therefore is not going to answer for fear of encouraging me. And it irks me so - not because of lack of encouragement (hey, this is me, so that's only to be expected), but because the idea that I might have caused discomfort to someone, and especially on something like this, is unbearably embarrassing.

I reread the new Harry Potter because I had nothing better to do, and I started on a re-read of Passage. However, I find myself highly disinclined to revisit the empty Titanic imagery, so I don't think I'm going to keep up with it. Besides, I'm bored with the constant misunderstandings and misdirections of Willis's slapstick mode.

So, what else could I complain about today...?

Oh, yes: every single time I manage to make an appointment with friends for anything, it ends up being on top of something else.

And "Black Hawn Down" seems interesting and has surprising amounts of hunk content in it for the first half an hour, but I know I'd just feel awful if I watched the rest, with the endless fighting. And I'm already bored with "Moulin Rouge". And Stockmann's autumn ad leaflet was photographed in Paris - the bastards...

And I know I should not complain about these tiny, tiny matters when other people have death (imminent or already happened) in the family, and stuff. And it makes me feel even more miserable.

01 Sep 03: Turning, Turning...

A full year has passed: I must start putting numbers in the file names. As I said a few days ago, less has changed than should have - but at least I am still here. For what good it does (I still can't see much in that).

So, Petri and Paula managed to marry without a hitch, and much fun was had by all. The bride was beautiful, the groom was handsome and courageous (let's just leave the "Mallusjoen Miesvoimistelijat" demo to the imagination...), the guests were a joyful lot, and the food was fabulous (all planned and mostly made by the couple and Paula's age-old friend Kaisa). Goodwill prevailed among all sides of the groom's family, which was a relief, though not completely unexpected (we were in public, after all, and my Mom is nothing if not conscious of good manners). I was up and running all day and survived my tasks; didn't collapse until close to midnight, when decided to skip the afterparty and get a ride home with Mom and Olli after all.

I made Paula's bouquet and all the corsages, and they turned out pretty nicely - at least Paula was ecstatic about the bouquet. The theme of the decorations was rowan berries, so I built the bouquet around those, and by good fortune managed to put in everything good: rowanberries for blessings, hawthorn berries for protection from evil; roses (fiery red-yellow double colour) for love; carnations (red and peach-orange double colour) for wisdom; goldenrod for prosperity; and raspberry leaves for fertility. The groom had rowanberries, a red carnation, and rose leaves, and the Maid and Matron of Honour, the Bestman and mothers had variations of rowanberries, carnations, goldenrod and a small pot plant with orange flowers that I don't know the name of. I got a lot of praise on them, and it's again one of those things that I find really weird - I mean, it's really not that difficult to tie together a bunch of plants in a moderately pleasing manner.

I'm not saying I'm not happy they turned out well. I just mean, it's really not that great a skill.

Anyway, I've mostly slept after that, to combat the flu. It's Monday now, and so the school year has not started quite in the best way, but I hope to be well enough tomorrow to get moving and working.

Why did I pick blue for September? Just because.

I think I've managed to grab myself by the collar in that infatuation thingy, which seems to be all for the best anyway. It's not that I would mind if that particular person, or even someone else, in some parallel universe, ended up showing interest in me - no, as I've said several times, I'm all up for being swept off my feet and off the old chains - but I don't think I'm going to get myself worked up for another impossibility. Better the devil you know...

Off to read "Paradise Lost" 10 and 11.

I really ought to get up enough courage to email Ebony one of these days.

(Later in the afternoon) Too much coffee and sugar (hard candy brought by Anni's dad for the Friday party), as I don't really have much else to eat in the house. Tired and bored, and still pretty flu-ish. I wonder if I could manage to do some sewing while watching a video or something.