Well, it's been a time.
Back in the day, I was on LiveJournal, under Demi-God Elysium, for anyone who may remember that. Astrid seemed to think the social interaction would do some good. Yeah, about that.... Riiiight.
I just went to log in again and had a hell of a time with the passwords and it looks like LiveJournal has gone the way of MySpace and the Hunter boards I used to troll. So I updated here on blogger. If the last few times I've actually paid any damn attention to it has any indication, my posts won't be frequent. It's much easier to lose track of time on The Mount since time works differently there. I keep thinking "eh, couple weeks" and a year has gone by. It's been a long time for all of you.
I have no idea what anyone has been saying about me -- if anything -- of late. The last time I heard anything about what was being written about me, I had to go look for myself (I think it was the highly romanticised, vomit-inducing, mostly fictionalised --thank the gods-- account of my unfortunately-semi-resemblant half-sibling, Valerius). I called Astrid over to take a look at how nonsensical it was. I couldn't remember the last time I had laughed that hard -- or if I had ever laughed that hard. She was horrified. As if I would ever care that much to lighning bolt Valerius' sorry ass just for the hell of it. Granted, payback is a bitch, but I've got better things to do. At the time, I was still a newlywed. Honeymoon? Sunlight? The beach? Hmm, let me think, Bora Bora vs. Valerius.... No damn contest. I'm sure it would have been a devastating blow to the ego of that poor dumb bastard though to imagine he wasn't exactly a priority. Surprisingly though, we're more or less getting along now.
...More or less. I'd say less, although it's more than I had EVER anticipated. I'd have even fewer quarrels with him if he stopped living in the past. Granted, living in the past is one of my (many) flaws, but I'm an internalist. That stuff stays inside me. I own it, I live with it, I have been working on making peace with it and healing, but I don't run around calling him "General." Dude, two thousand years ago. Not your fucking slave anymore, okay?
Not too long ago, I had another of Those Dreams. I don't get them that often anymore, not like I used to, but when I do, it's even nastier and more vivid than they used to be. Astrid later suggested, when I was composed and much less surly, that I think about seeing someone. Under normal circumstances, I think I might have been amenable. I don't open up to people. I value my privacy. Being married hasn't changed me fundamentally. I am silent or I growl. That's just how it is. But things change. My life changed. I found myself with the luxury of time paired with opportunity and a very real need to heal, if not for my overall health, for the sake of my wife. If talking with someone would have benefitted Us, then I would have done it. But I couldn't exactly sit down on some shrink's couch and relate over two thousand years of experiences without being considered a prime candidate for a well-tailored straight-jacket and a full-fledged membership to the finest mental health facility in the area.
I could just see it, sitting down, being asked what I was there for and going off about being the universe's scapegoat and whipping boy for two thousand years, starting with my mortal life, and ending in a nine hundred year banishment over something that wasn't my fault during which I suffered extensively because I thought I had a fatal sun allergy when I didn't. I'm sure that would go over well. About as well as if Valerius tried to give me a hug (I will try not to be sick at the thought). The immortals who understand how the universe works for the rest of us are impossibly judgmental and even others big into the justice (who judge but impartially so), yeah, my in-laws, so no damn way that's happening. So I haven't been seeing anyone, understandably.
There has been much introspection though. There has been much re-framing. Re-phrasing. Re-evaluation. I shaved off the goatee for it. I feel naked without it. But I make myself look in a mirror every day. I hate what I see there. I hate looking like people I have spent all my natural and unnatural life hating. I hate knowing that we share(d) blood. But I also know that this is my face, my appearance, and remind myself to be grateful -- to have two good eyes, two good hands and arms, two good legs -- for being strong, for being resilient. This is not Marius or Valerius or the asshole who sired me. This is me and these are the looks I have passed onto my son. I tell myself I have some worth every day (whether or not I believe it). I remind myself that, whatever I see there, I have a wife and child who have put their faith in me, who have given me their love and trust, and I have to be worthy of that. I have also stopped using the designation of "slave" when I think of myself. It's not been easy. Even if I don't let others get away with calling me such a thing anymore, my formative years left more of an impression upon me than all my hunter-years combined and I have always despised "victim" as it denotes a sense of pity-seeking. Instead, I've embraced "survivor." It has been empowering to redefine my life.
The kid has gotten big. In my thoughts, he's still "the baby" but there's no way to hold onto that comforting illusion when he's running around wearing my claws attacking upholstery in the misguided efforts of emulating what he imagines his dad used to do. I'll still go out on occasion when my particular skill set is needed, but that's to me what Super Bowl Sunday is to most guys in the States, consistent but infrequent and always extremely gratifying. I haven't had to explain my hunter days to the kid in great detail. Being raised among other immortals, he is still at the age when he takes everything at face value and the DHers are just like any other faction. But he has started asking questions about family, about me. I'm sure I'll have some of Those Dreams the day I have to explain things to him, but for now, the questions have been easy to dodge.
Not much else. I've been working on life-sized scenes from the Little Prince, a commissioned installment planned for a new skyrise in Chicago set to be completed in 2015. They let me choose the subject matter. I must have carved twenty different sheep and one crate, and had the child chose the oldest and the sickest of the lot for me. It renewed his interest in the book, apparently, since I later found him curled up with Simi, reading it aloud to her... in Atlantean. Only my son.
Arsenic and vomit to all,
Z
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