#Randomthoughtsw/P

[zephanofthewind]

Every so often you see a widely circulated post and you take a look closer and realize it’s from a mutual and go “HEY! I know this one!” Extra trippy when the post was from 6 years ago back when you two were friends in university. Like wow. I know the person whose words got repeated 100,000 times. I hope they’re ok these days, I miss them.

[zephanofthewind]

Beloved tumblr mutuals, please pray for me this Friday and Monday. I have a total of 6 interviews in the morning basically back to back all for one associate scientist position. Please give me the strength to open up and be known by basically the entire department. May the power of god and anime be on my side.

[zephanofthewind]

8 People I’d Like to Get to Know Better

Thank you for tagging me @harukowitch !

Favorite Color(s):

Purple by far! I think I decided on purple when I was in middle school. It was during a time when I was trying to grow my own personality because I was always a quiet, do as your told kid. I think my reasoning was “What’s a color that’s pretty that I don’t see enough?” And thus, purple. Very satisfied with my choice. Currently typing on the keyboard and my keyboard cover is a purple ombre, my blanket is a dark purple, and I’m working on getting purple sea serpent armor in RLCraft (minecraft). If I had to pick a secondary color...hmmm...maybe today it’s light blue.

Last Song I Listened to: 

I believe it was this one. Was trying to sing along to it in the shower. Found it while watching a twitch stream of X33N. I’m really digging the techno beats of Scandroid and the story they’re telling.

Favorite Musician(s):

I think this one changes a lot as I continue to slowly explore and re-listen to songs. But one that I consistently hold on to is Daft Punk. Scandroid has captured my attention more recently. Oh, also Fall Out Boy! There are several others but those three come to my mind first.

Last Film I Watched:

Uuuummm...may have to think a while. Oh yeah! Saw Zombieland almost a month ago on Netflix. It was funny, I’d say it’s a decent choice. I always enjoy crass humor.

Last Show I Watched:

Does anime count for what you mean? If so, then it was Sword Art Online: War of Underworld. I’ve enjoyed SAO for a long time, and read quite a bit ahead in the light novels. It was really nice seeing it get animated, especially this season. Best girl Asuna is back!!! (Not to disrespect Alice or Eugeo, they’re favorite characters too.)

My Favorite OC:

Huh...seems like I really only have the one choice. My D&D character who is an Aarakocra Monk. He’s really friendly and a bit bird-brained (pun intended).

Sweet, Spicy, Savory:

All things equally and not to an extreme. Recently some godly, overly sweet cinnamon rolls have been on my mind. They’re about a five minute walk from my house so it’s hard not to give in all the time. But then I go to the gym.

Sparkling Water, Tea, Coffee:

Mmm, I think either tea or coffee. It depends. For tea, something soothing and herbal or sweet and zingy. For coffee, something overly sugary and with cream/milk.

Pets:

Never had a living pet. But I do have a family of plush otters and twin plush umbreons (Penumbra and Totality).

I tag @storybookprincess, @haltraveler, @jinxjinn, @ajeneration, @bonsoirpunpun, @strayninja, @kirsty-kiddo, @shooshopath

[zephanofthewind]

An exercise I want to try more when I’ve been in a depressive mood: listing things I’m thankful for in the moment that really do elicit some joy.

The presence of @storybookprincess . We’ve done so many fun things together and I look forward to more!

My family who love and support me. Yes even my grandmother who is a shitty human sometimes.

Therapy on Monday. It’s been over a month, so this will help me.

Messages from @kirsty-kiddo. It’s kind of illogical of me, but it’s just reassuring that we can still stay in touch.

Lots of entertainment. Whether it’s anime, youtube, twitch, netflix, shows like the Mandalorian, it really is a boon that we have so much great media. And I’m glad that I can take for granted entertainment as a constant even when life changes. It’s fantastic for allowing me to connect with my friends.

People to hangout with occasionally online and offline. Both groups are technically dnd. Perhaps it will grow beyond just dnd in the future.

Friends from University who welcome me and hype me up about RWBY. @ajeneration , @bonsoirpunpun promise I’ll catch up and geek out. I’ve just unfortunately been in a funk.

Being able to pause life in terms of academics. I shudder to think of what would have happened if I stressed out senior year to apply to places and panicked about having a direction in life. I honestly still am wandering aimlessly, but I can do it without having this crushing pressure.

This nice red and black, checkered hoodie I’m wearing. Helps my touch-starved body to have a hood on for some reason. 

[zephanofthewind]

RIP DnD Character: Zephan of the Wind

So this past Sunday I was at my usual dnd group, setting up and also leveling up my character. He’s a friendly birdbrained Aarakocra monk named Zephan of the Wind (I use that name for all accounts and games and things that I try for the first time). SO the things is...we run Tomb of Annihilation and my god was I lucky to survive this long.

At this point he’s solidly been incorporated into the party and is friendly with all and continually seeking more things to be friends with. We reach the entrance to the big dungeon and Scottie, our DM, announces that when we enter, do not teleport and try not to die. We only get to roll up one more character if we die in this dungeon.

Ominous warning taken in stride, we approach the entrance cautiously. Our two tanky members scope out all the mechanisms and statues and things, and we finally try to open the door we see in front of us with the puzzle pieces we collected. That last one slides in and suddenly the door is closing behind them. 

Mistake #1: Getting the rest of the party to run in behind them.

Well...never split the party is a good adage and all, but not when a poison gas chamber is at play. Everyone makes the CON save except our tiefling wizard. But wait! There’s more! This gas is going to continue for TEN rounds. So naturally, the tiefling tries to escape with the closest party member...which is me...because I dragged him in.

Mistake #2: Teleporting in a no-teleport zone.

Naturally, when he cast dimension door and brought me with, he didn’t think we were actually in the dungeon yet. Right? WRONG, even just the tip counts. So now Scottie sighs and says this is bad. Really...r e a l l y bad. And he draws up a 30 ft by 30 f room of near darkness. We’re faced with a stone faced grinning devil the full height of the room. We appear in the room among a sea of rotting and broken bodies. A voice tells us “I told you that teleporting is forbidden. Now you must suffer the consequences” and then we hear some aberration type monster scream and move through the bodies. The two of us spot levers in the nostrils of the face so I grab our wizard and fly him above the bodies and over to the levers. 50-50 chance to make it. Right or Left? He pulls left and suddenly a huge sphere of endless black expands from the mouth sucking everything in. We roll Dex saves and I barely make the cut but our wizard doesn’t. On top of that, the aberration holds his leg and drags us both into the sphere of annihilation. No one will know what happened to us. Our souls trapped in the nothingness.

So yeah...I’m excited to say my next character will be a gnome, druid lvl 8 named Zook Fiddlefen. Anyone got ideas for a background?

[zephanofthewind]

Tagged by @storybookprincess

“A Few of My Favorite Things” Tag

Tell us 2-3 things that make you smile. (Big or small, doesn’t matter as long as it makes you smile.)

Tag people. (Could be 1, could be 20, just tag someone. Or no one. Whatever floats your boat. Tag backs are allowed.)

Things That Make Me Smile

Feeling connected to friends. Whether it’s spending time with them or chatting about fandom things. The HxH and RWBY chats have been a lot of fun.

Going through my collection of fanart and Pop figurines. It brings a lot of joy to look at and sometimes I spend some time thinking about the stories behind them, the various cons I’ve gone to with different friends, or the feelings I get from the characters’ stories. One day I’ll display them all properly.

I get a really devilish smile when I’m reading certain Wuxia/Xanxia novels. It’s really refreshing when a protag that has been oppressed all their life gets to slap their oppressor in the face, literally or figuratively. 

For anyone who sees this, feel free to post your own. I’d love to hear about what makes you smile.

[zephanofthewind]

You know...I think this might actually be a good place and time to start a tag for things that frustrate the hell out of me about my grandmother. The absolutely unforgivable shit she’s done...it’s hard for me to even figure out where to start.

The instance I most recently discovered is tied very closely to my own culture and religion. Btw, Happy Diwali everyone...

SO yesterday was Dhanteras which is a part of Diwali. You do a ceremony where you wash all the coinage you’ve kept in the temple as a way to honor and welcome the goddess of fortune into your home. (I’m sure there’s much more meaning to this, but sadly I’ve grown very separated and alienated from my Indian heritage.) So I’m sitting there drying the coins off from the milk, water, and ghee we bathed them with, and I notice that there are a lot less coins than I remember volume-wise. I mean I actually felt like I could finish drying all of them in less than an hour which has never been the case. Not to mention, a lot less silver coins and a lot more quarters. Hmmm....

So I bring this up with my parents and we quickly deduce that grandma must be the one taking and exchanging coins from our little temple we have. I mean there’s no reason for any of us to touch these coins otherwise and the only possible person who would have the opportunity rarely would be her. And as soon as I realize this I’m filled with such inflamed RAGE.

It’s incredibly maddening because you need to understand, these coins represent more than just monetary value. They represent our house’s fortune for the new year and are a connection to my family’s past generations. They’re approaching heirlooms in importance. They came from my grandparents and great grandparents on both sides of my family and each generation adds a few coins. This lineage of coins was a strand of heritage I could actually grasp, I can see the dates: 1940s, 1910s, 1880s. You wouldn’t take them away from the temple unless the family is going through some really bad times and needs the spare money. And then...then I find out my GRANDMOTHER is robbing it. 

Why? Why the fuck!?

We default to the same reasons we always use. My aunt was the favorite child and was always privileged with more rights to things than my dad. Where could the coins be going? To my aunt most likely. So then...are we going to fucking tell her to stop? Maybe ask for them back from my aunt?

And this is when I hit a brick wall. I look at my parents faces and I do not find the same fiery rage, I just see powerlessness. They say, “What’s the point? It won’t stop, just like every other time we tried. Let them have it.”

Shit is fucked, man. My last question to them was quite irreverent: “So tell me...is my grandmother going to die as my grandmother, or a parasite on our home?”

[zephanofthewind]

The fear of being forgotten...

is known as Athazagoraphobia. I finally took the time to look that up tonight. It’s surprising I didn’t research anything about it earlier, even just a little bit, considering how much I feel it at times. It also means the fear of forgetting, but of that my fear is marginal on average.

Yes...right now it’s the feelings of anxiety and depression and terror over my friends having forgotten me. That I have slipped their minds as I fade out of existence from their worlds. Some cases feel more legitimate than others depending on how long it was since we last spoke. I miss them all dearly.

One thing that I abhor about this dynamic? complex? that I have is that it also seems to limit or prevent me from reaching out. I hate how it worms into my mind and tells me that I should wait for them to seek me first, to invite me into their life, their conversations. As if the bond of friendship we have wasn’t forged mutually.

My birthday was about 1 month ago. Typically this fear dramatically increases into what I dub “the birthday blues.” For maybe 15+ birthdays I spent them fundamentally lonely. I see birthdays as a day of recognition, one day of the year to celebrate you and your existence. And for as long as I can remember, I never truly felt like I had spent that day with anyone other than my family. For various reasons (mostly the start of school) the people I chose to share my life with and have them involved with me, my friends, were never able to spend time with me on my birthday.

The logical, more reasonable parts of me struggle a lot against this fear. I try to keep in scope what the reality of the situation is and not go to awful conclusions. Some days it’s an uphill battle and every particular day in August no matter how firmly I think I have a grasp on it, the fear just resurges to the forefront of my mind. So at the end of this miserable confession, I want to acknowledge the sunshine that is @storybookprincess . Thank you for listening and chatting with me about this difficult subject. I’ve actually never mentioned it before to anyone to this extent. It makes me overjoyed to have made a friend like you and let’s hangout next birthday.

PS for self: For god's sake man, send the damn texts. You miss everyone.

[zephanofthewind]

Sometimes I ask what the point is if I can’t sit down at the end of the day and goof around with friends.

Twitch streamers can only fill in the gap for so long. 

[zephanofthewind]

I just want to say that whatever mental health problems I have really fucking suck. Feeling like I’m isolated from everyone is not ok. Feeling like my precious friends don’t have time for me is infuriating because I know better. I mean, it’s only been 8 hours without attention and yet. AND YET. I feel so needy and somehow this feeling has only intensified and my brain just keeps telling me “Of course there’s no time for you. They have lives to live”. 

I hope sleep will reset this. And that my therapy appt. comes quickly.

[zephanofthewind]

to counteract the bad vibes of the last ask, have an ask w GOOD vibes: i adore you & am so lucky we're friends. thank you for bringing so much laughter & joy into my life every day. here's to many more adventures when the world is back to normal

I love you too Liv. You are a wonderful friend and I’m glad to have befriended you in this phase of my life. 💖 Yes, here’s to more anime hangouts and finding places with good food and chill vibes and cons that overwhelm our nerd senses.

[zephanofthewind]

Hey, uuuuuhhhh, I would reread that "Boiler Theory of Men" with a more self-critical eye. Just, you know, saying. Apple and tree

Gee thanks. You know it’s not the first time I’ve examined myself. I tend to be the kind of person who reads these articles and snippets and asks, “Does this apply to me? Do I do this? If so, what can I do about this?” Ultimately, I’ve determined I do that so much that any real action I make may not be what is needed because I get so wrapped up in my brain that it may be distanced from reality. So I’d like to ask: do I perhaps know you? As an acquaintance or friend? Do you think we could talk if so? Because if these two lines were supposed to help, to encourage some self development....well it doesn’t. I’m sorry, it just seems silly to say it like that. I’d be more receptive if we had concrete experiences to talk about. Isn’t part of the problem the lack of considering other peoples feelings and thoughts and just baseline existence? I try very much to make every effort with my family and friends, I’m still thinking about a situation a few months ago where I lost a friend and couldn’t understand why or what lead up to it. I was just left with gut feelings that still don’t complete the picture. I’m not sure I can do all that with an anonymous. The point: Please take responsibility for your words. Make sure you’re not affected by the same thing you’re commenting on. Or that you have wisdom born from experiencing it yourself.

[zephanofthewind]

Halloween...the last bastion before the rising tide that is Christmas and X-mas music. I will enjoy the last day of spooky season while I can. We lost Thanksgiving years ago to the jolly red wave, hold strong Halloween.

[zephanofthewind]

There comes a time, once in a while, where I wonder what would happen if I just faded away. If my presence was erased and I became invisible and permeable and ghostly.

I am told by each person I confess this morbid thought to that I would be greatly missed. Terribly and horrifically missed by each and every person I value as close to me. As close as kin. Which is to say quite a few. I think this is true; I’ve imagined it and it’s never something I would wish for even a moment. Not even in my darkest and most despairing of times. I could never hurt my precious friends and family intentionally like that.

But the missing afterwards doesn’t help with the now. 

A stupid “what-if” deserves an equally awful answer, I suppose.

[zephanofthewind]

It’s super disorienting to watch the Big Friendly Giant for the first time...but in Hindi.

It’s like the Twilight Zone.

[zephanofthewind]

Consumerism is stupidly obnoxious around holidays...

My family went shopping last night for a few things so they could avoid the Black Friday rush....

....Which is happening TODAY ?! at 4 pm....

Wtf, it’s called Black FRIDAY

Guess people are having Thanksgiving at the mall...