Some Entries From the Past Few Weeks, Woohoooooo

June 23

I finally told my sister about my struggles to get myself to write in my diary because I know I'm behind and I know I take forever to write, even if I cut down how many things I write about. She was very, very irritated with me. I'm just gonna write about what comes to mind and see how that goes this time.

Starting two Fridays ago, Mom and I have been at Abuelita's house (and Sis arrived last Wednesday).That's right, I finally came back to write because we're on vacation. One of the reasons I look forward to coming to her house for a while is that it tends to be easier to get myself to just write or draw or whatever. The fact that she doesn't have Internet is one of the main things, but besides that there's something calming about the vibe her house has and Mexico in general. It proved true back when we lived in Querétaro, especially, since we hardly had to go hang out with other relatives and we didn't really go on trips out of the neighborhood besides going to the Centro Histórico every once in a while. It just makes you feel like you are in less of a rush. People usually describe it as living a simpler life, but it doesn't sound quite right to me. Different, yes. Simpler... usually, no. 

This trip is different, though. It's the first time Sis and I brought our phones, and the first time any of us actually get to use mobile data- and it's a decent amount, too. I've still been fighting against using much of it because it feels wrong and like I'm not actually taking a break from my normal life. I've still ended up doing a few things, like look at Tumblr for a while (then suddenly realize and go "DANG IT") or read fics. I read DP all day yesterday, which was actually very relaxing, but I still felt a little guilty because, if I hadn't had my phone, it's likely I would've been writing DP instead... I'm hoping (once I finish reading the fics I started) I'll be able to keep myself out of the Internet again for a while, even though it then starts feeling like I'm wasting the money that went towards us having data in the first place. Mom and Sis use it plenty, so maybe that can help me feel less weird about it.

Oh, can I mention that this was the first time I'd gone on an international flight by myself?! I'm quite glad that my first times on a plane alone had been going to visit my family in Pittsburgh last year. Oh my gosh, I didn't write anything for that, did I?

I had been pretty dang anxious for that even though I knew, logically, it'd most likely come out all perfectly fine and routine. I had been praying a lot and even asked Human for a blessing the night before the flight, and I certainly think it worked because I suddenly felt perfectly fine once I had made it past security. (I'm never going to forget that dude behind me in line teasing me about holding my unopened bag of limón chips like a teddy bear. I just wanted it to make it through this ordeal in one piece, man! I did think it was funny when he then saw the flavor and he was like "Oh, I understand now" as if one really should protect this flavor with their life. Which is, you know, true.)

This time around, I felt much more chill. Like, I got a spike of panic when I didn't remember where I was supposed to go for security (actually, I think they moved the area) and then when I hadn't been sure where my mom was. I was supposed to meet here before the Mexican end of security, but we didn't see each other so she texted to just go through alone. (Thankfully, the security lines were really fast and unproblematic for me on both ends.) Then, she figured out we were in different terminals. It was killing me to just wait there, so I took the little airport train to Mom's terminal. Yeah, she was not happy about me moving around like that.

Even if I've been using the Internet more than I wanted to, I've still done pretty good about just hanging out. I usually eat without looking at my phone and try to be... present, I guess. And I've been talking to Abuelita more than ever before! And watching old movies with her!

Okay, this is a little dumb, but... This year marks the first time in a long time I've OCed or self-inserted. The first was the "ghostsona" (autocorrect thought I meant "ghost soba"... An idea for a different time?) trend in the DP phandom that I technically entered pretty late into but wanted to take seriously. It took a long time for any kind of idea to come to me, so I'd thought I wouldn't bother. One way or another, though, I eventually got an inkling of an idea of what I would do as a ghost... 

Scare people.

It was somewhat original, actually, considering how ghosts in DP are very different from the normal ideas people have about them. There aren't horror movie ghosts in there at all. If I was a ghost, though, I absolutely would want to be more on that end of the spectrum!

I ended up basing it off of how I had dressed for Halloween. I had 3.5 costumes last year, and on the actual day it was a ghost girl costume that I'm pretty proud of. We had found at the DI a while earlier a white nightgown-looking sort of dress that reminded me of what Wendy wears in Peter Pan. It was a bit big on me, but it worked fine and provided the inspiration for the costume! I wore it with (essentially) white-base makeup, dark red and purple around my eyes, and a bit of blue on my lips. I walked around campus holding my old teddy bear, Daisy, trying to creep everyone out by just staring at people blankly. It actually worked! My favorite reaction was one guy who had just barely passed me with a nervous smile on his face (he might've waved a bit too?) and I heard him mutter to himself, "Well, that was terrifying."

ANYWAY, the idea behind this character is that I had died somehow on Halloween while dressed as a ghost girl. I suppose it was a very sudden sort of thing where I had been in the middle of just trying to scare people, so that was what kept my form together and became my obsession.

The difference between this and the typical scary ghosts is that the motive is literally to just scare, not actually hurt anyone for revenge or anything. Therefore, I think she would just be a neutral character rather than being classified as a good or evil character. She's more of a prankster, all in for the reaction and personal satisfaction of a job well done. Though she actually likes humans (even if they're real dumb), the absolute best is when she manages to scare or creep out other ghosts, and I absolutely want her to pull it off. 

For her visual design, I just kinda did a simplified version of the dress I actually wore, and wanted to make it the kind of thing where everything under the dress is just unstructured, blobby ectoplasm, so her legs have no form past the socks. Her face doesn't really like to stay in one place, either, and tends to twist around. That's why I'd done my best to purposefully set the face off from the rest of the head in the first drawing.

I couldn't decide which color choices I liked the most, so I ended up just copying the drawing onto the other side of the page and using both palettes. Basically, both are "canon". I think she would just switch between them depending on what worked better for the situation. The white-haired version would probably be used more often for scaring and purple-haired version for when she's not.

This was the first drawing I'd done in nearly a year! And I'd worked real hard on it! I actually did show it to some of my friends, though I always called it a mere ghost girl or me as a ghost without full context so I'd feel less embarrassed.

Here's a doodle that I legit posted just a day or two after involving phandom shenanigans:

And here's another drawing that I actually completed the weekend before coming to Mexico! One of the friends I'd shown the first drawing to had said she really liked it and wanted a drawing like that for herself, which completely blew my mind. Like, she didn't know Ghost Lily (yeah, that's what I call her) was a trashy OC, but still! I didn't actually do good on making it for her until a long while later- literally a couple months later, so she'd forgotten by this point- but I still wanted to do good on my promise. I also wanted to make the second drawing as different as I could from the first and make it dynamic. This is the most dynamic I've ever gone!

More recently I actually started at it again, though it's still more in the brainstorming stage, I suppose. This time, I started thinking about My Hero Academia. This was after I binged the first two seasons of it in three days last month. Kinda difficult to explain what happened there, but...

Okay, remember how I watched a couple episodes with Terra aaaaaaaaaall the way back at the start of freshman year? That ended up never happening again with her, and then more people started talking about it and telling me to watch it and it reached a point of popularity where I just had no interest anymore. 

Coatrack was actually the first recommender on one of those rare occasions we had been texting. One of those rare occasions happened again, and he told me to watch My Hero Academia- again. I ended up telling him the only way I could really get motivated to watch it is if he challenged me to binge it. He told me to watch two seasons by Monday, so I finished Saturday because that's how this works, obviously. I then proceeded to go through the third season over the next week, and now I'm caught up and have to wait for the new season like everyone else.

I was- actually, I'm still salty about how much I liked it. I didn't want it to live up to the hype! I guess so I had a reason to be wary of its sudden popularity, ya know? So now I'm angry with everyone and with myself for being a butt and yeah.

I think one of the natural things someone does with these kinds of shows is picture what their own superhero powers and persona would be, even though it's also cringy. I started to do the same, but it's not all coming together as easily as it did for when I worked on this kind of thing at 13 years old.

First of all, even back then, I didn't see myself being a full-fledge, full-time superhero like you're supposed to be. For example, Beast Girl was a part-time kind of girl that would only be brought in as backup. Of course, I can't speak for how different I would be about heroics if I grew up in the kind of environment like in My Hero Academia where it's so normalized, but in most universes I don't think I'd be adventurous enough or determined enough to try for that kind of career. I just don't think I'd go into a hero program like the one in UA. (Unrelated, I think the name's amusing because it reminds me of the University of Alabama.)

Nonetheless, I brainstormed different powers that could fit into the BNHA universe and were at least kind of unique. I'm just gonna copy down what I sent to Coatrack in a feverish, intense fangirl manner (this is why I tend to avoid talking to people about shows I like, man):

Okay, I'm gonna propose some ideas to you for what my Quirk could be.

1. If I could pick my own own power, it'd 100% be shapeshifting, but it looks like that isn't possible in this universe. The closest would be body stretching and manipulation, probably? Two tracts my brain has gone to do this without being too OP is A. Be able to stretch and shift similar to ElastiGirl, but retain the same body mass (sometimes it looks like she doesn't have to); or B. Essentially have very pliable skin and muscles, but bones and organs still exist and must retain same body mass. The second one's grosser and more limited, but I kinda think it fits more into the limits of Quirks and is more interesting. Like, as long as I keep track of my bones I could stretch my limbs a decent amount, maybe make faux wings out of my arms if I figure out how to build the closest structures with what I've got (at least to glide), I could move around everything inside my meatsack to whatever's advantageous (like Jake the Dog moving all his internal organs to his thumb because the rest of his body was about to be crushed), I could mend my body up much easier after dislocations and broken bones (bones wouldn't immediately heal or anything, but I could put the pieces back together immediately so there's no complications)... I dunno, a lot could be done with it too.

2. I think it's no surprise that I consider myself an airbender. If it was more based on personality, a Quirk that allows air manipulation of some kind would fit well. This one I have less of a solid idea for how it might function, though, because I think it'd have more limitations than airbending but I haven't pinned down what they'd be. I do know I want to clarify it NOT being the similar power about air coming out of my body (Gran Torino, the girl in Ms. Peregrine's). 

3. Remember how most of the time my hands are cold and I get too hot/cold pretty easily? I'm pretty sure I already told you about how it's a thing that runs in my family called Renauld's disease (hope I spelled that right). If I consider Quirks from the perspective that they're mostly hereditary, then there's the chance that the Quirk passed to me would be similar to this. Or, well, I guess the opposite. My idea is being able to change my body temperature. That'd mean on a regular basis I'd unconsciously be able to regulate my body temperature when currently it just can't really do that! It'd also mean, though, that I could consciously make myself REALLY hot or cold. It wouldn't be the same as shooting out ice or fire (I guess, if the range I'm able to do is really wide, I could conceivably make things catch on fire or melt or freeze over, but with limitations). The part that I'd have the easiest time doing that to would be, surprise surprise, my hands and feet, but I could probably isolate it to other parts of my body or the whole thing.

A little before coming to Mexico, something else came to me. Even though I talked about not seeing myself as a hero, I got an idea for a costume. It's based a bit on these overalls I wore recently that were olive-colored, light and baggy- and, admittedly, also a bit based on the Beast Girl idea, with being orange and more of a leggings-under-shorts kind of deal, but the similarities end there.

I liked how the show has a wide variety of costumes people use. Some are more on the traditional superhero end, some are purely practical or purely for show (*coughcoughBakugobesidestheglovescough*), and some are rather casual. I don't go particularly often for the athletic kind of look that is still mostly prevalent in the costumes, so I wanted to try a costume that was still more on the casual end but still didn't really get in the way. I also wanted to hide my chest and butt, which is what would make me self-conscious in a bodysuit. Light, baggy shortalls over a tight shirt and leggings seemed to do the trick! I don't have hair on these, but braids also seemed like a good idea to be casual but practical.

Don't ask what the rings are supposed to do. They add a nice touch, but I don't think they'd be useful. Well, if it was the version with the rings on the hands and feet, maybe they do have a use for whatever power I had, but I can't imagine what the use would be. Maybe they're metal and so good for punching and kicking? Or good to do magnetism tricks, growing/shrinking tricks, throwing tricks... I dunno, I tried to not think about that just so I could finish the idea first.

Real fast, I also want to point out that it's been an interesting experience diving into BNHA and also watching the new second season of One Punch Man as episodes come out. They both have similar universes but they treat some of the same concepts quite differently... It's monsters vs. villains (both have their own organization at some point in the shows!), one hero agency vs. a ton of agencies, not necessarily needing to be born with a power to be a hero vs. Quirks being mandatory, how you train and obtain a hero license and climb the ranks... Something strikes me as really different about the fights in both shows, too (not counting Saitama's, since his are different for obvious reasons)! It'd be fun to lay out these comparisons in detail once both shows are over, though I kinda doubt I'd have the patience to do a full analysis like that.

June 30

Last night, I was thinking about how grateful I am to have my online friends. I'm always grateful to have them, and have gotten to steadily talk to a couple old ones (Darkrai, the Smiling Crow) and make a new one every once in a while (BKS was the first during college, and getting to beta/translate for her and chat was a dream come true), but I especially needed a new one last semester that I could talk to more often. 

I became friends with kiri in... March, I think, basically an answer to a prayer, and though I did have to hope for a little that it wouldn't just be a temporary thing, it looks like I don't have to hope or worry about that anymore. We've been talking less consistently the past few weeks just because I don't want to be on the Internet too often on the trip, as talked about before, but otherwise we talk at least once a week, typically more!

I have been aching to talk to people online more for a while, but it hit especially hard second year of college. The more "real-life" friends I had, the more I missed my online ones. The more social I somehow became, the more I missed being anti-social (in the sense of how I talked to people in person less but still talked plenty online). I tried to explain this to a few of my newer friends (Aubs and Firefly), but they just didn't understand in the slightest. I guess it's because they are more extroverted than me and so have never felt the need to make friends online like I did?

I mean, I started making online friends in 9th grade (besides Anna in 8th, but I technically saw her in person once?), but they are the reason 10th grade didn't suck as much as it could've. I knew full-well that I was talking online way more back then because I didn't really get to hang out with anyone outside of school or church stuff, but I think it's more recently hit me the... scope of it all, I guess. How much I really needed that. How I needed that even when I had more "real" friends the year before. How I still need that now and probably always will.

I don't think anyone can actually get it unless they make an online friend themselves. Human had a friend he'd gamed with for years and was one of his closest friends. He'd tried to defend/explain when he first told me about his friend, I believe, but I was like "Bruh, I get it." Hearing the two talk  (and even talking to him a bit myself) was a different experience because I've usually just messaged my own friends and rarely heard their voices, but they were definitely really close and it warmed my heart.

I don't know if Human would agree with me that it's just... a different kind of friendship regardless of how you communicate. It's the kind of thing that I've rarely felt like were replicated in real life. (I think the best example of it actually happening in person was my friend from last semester, Ann, who I could genuinely talk Ninjago with for hours if we hadn't had to worry about making it to our classes... It was such a new experience to me to do that kind of thing but with actually talking instead of scream-texting, and I will admit it was disorienting but nice.) It's a friendship built on mutual interests more than usual, and- in my case- usually it was one in which we would often talk about our mutual creative pursuits and beta each other's work and stuff like that. That's what happens when most of the people you talk to you found on FFN, I suppose. The exception: Carter and I used to talk with each other about our work (him DoH, me WFAM), but it was almost all over text, so it's... kinda closer to being online friends than in-person friends, isn't it?

July 3

Didn't finish earlier, but I went on this tangent because I gained extra gratitude for my online friends... and in the process ended up missing some of the ones I haven't talked to in a long time. Like, I always have, but it's just hit extra hard lately. 

I haven't talked to author since college started. Well, more accurately, she hasn't talked to me. She totally disappeared on me, and I have no idea how to contact her now. My only form of communication with her was through PMs on FFN and she hasn't responded.

There were other people who disappeared from the conversation(s) before, of course, but hers hit the hardest because we were much better friends, for longer, than the other people. We knew each other impressively well for remaining nameless and faceless to each other. It was practically throughout my entire time in high school that we talked, and now I can't talk to her anymore. Of course I hope to talk to her again, but mostly I just want to know she's okay. I have no clue what happened to her.

I... I think I talked a bit about Mirror and Merm back during my senior year, right? Merm had to go just a couple months after our trio friendship formed because her parents weren't letting her on the internet anymore, apparently? Mirror and I talked a lot during and after that and we became quite close too, and she disappeared last October (I honestly didn't realize just how long ago it'd been until I checked the timestamp while writing the previous entry). I'm a little worried about both of them, too.

I want to see ("see"?) all three of them, at least to know that they're okay and alive and preferably happy, wherever they are.

I tried sending out a Tumblr post to see if I can try to find them through people there, because I just really don't have other useful options. It's barely useful, though, because I'm such a small blog that hardly anyone will notice me... and I really don't know who to ask who would have a wider audience and care to help.

I'll be really happy if I manage to make contact with my dear friends again, regardless of how it happens.