Role models…

One of the things I’ve appreciated about Bioware games is there has never for a second in all the years I’ve played has there ever been the slightest hesitation at offering a female protagonist. And never did the female protagonist ever lack in any way.

This isn’t entirely unique to Bioware either; I played the original Golden Axe games, and the Amazon was always one of the most kick ass characters. Gauntlet Legends, my Valkyrie/Falconess was nigh unstoppable. The Diablo series has never made any difference as to what gender you are, highlighted more aptly in D3 where you could pick either gender by class (my Demon Hunters and Witch Doctors are equally brutal, regardless). The original Fallout games offered a breadth of characters who could be anything you thought possible, and while reactions to you may vary by gender (which frankly added elements of realism- more on that later). I could go on for ages.

But then you really get into the story based games.

Did it ever bother me that some characters in Mass Effect or Dragon Age were only interested in you if you were a certain gender (or race, for that matter)? Not in the slightest. Why? Because just like real life, sometimes it’s not about you, but about the preferences of someone else too.

But take Shepard. What was important was that even while someone might make a crack about the stripper auditions being down the hall, it in no way compromised my ability to kick ass. Just like jabs that I might take in my professional life, characters like that showed me that someone can throw every bit of shade at me, make all the snarky comments they like, but at the end of the day?

I’m the bad ass bitch who’s going to save the world, and it’s up to me to decide how.

I should go…

Karma…

Sometimes, we are the architects of our own misery (or happiness frankly, you can’t discount that). We make dumb decisions, and we take risks and those risks don’t always pay off, especially when people and feelings are involved. But we take risks about work and life and relationships, and sometimes, we fuck things up. Sometimes we think we can have it all and it all blows up spectacularly

Other times, you can do everything ‘right’ and your luck just sucks.

And then, there’s the third option; being on the outside of someone doing either of those things. In the latter case, you just try to help them not lose hope.

In the former, there are two versions; being an observer or being one of the casualties of poor decisions.

When that happens, queue the ‘I told you so’ and try not to look too smug when things bite them in the ass.

Viewing gallery…

People confuse the hell out of me. Maybe it’s the background in Sociology and Anthropology (and hopefully less so the Criminology one), but I tend to relate to people in an abstract sort of way.

I can rationalize what they do to ‘understand’ it, I can put myself in their frame of reference and ‘live’ it (insert your own unflattering comparison between myself and Will Graham here).

I get it, but yet at the same time, I don’t. I constantly have to remind myself that self-awareness isn’t that common (most people who think they possess it… don’t). Friends have described me as ‘irritatingly self aware’.

So then I start to look at what they’re doing from the lens of ‘well, if they’re doing this, and they thought this way, then maybe they were thinking this, but weren’t aware of this…’. The sad thing is, I don’t even really care. I’m just a trained analyst who isn’t particularly adept at picking and choosing what I over-analyse.

In short, I spend most of my life observing others as if I’m an alien anthropologist. It’s easier on my brain.

And the narration is far more entertaining that way.

Resolution…

The cold, hard, truth that movies, television and books leave us poorly equipped to deal with is the fact that as we get older, more often than not, we don’t get answers.

If you’re lucky, you may get a resolution, but that assumes enough communication at the time that the issue is dealt with, you thought of every question you wanted to ask, the other person is self aware enough to answer honestly and maturely, etc.

Or that you, or they, even are capable of articulating the whole situation.

Frankly, there are a host of things that end like this; relationships, friendships, jobs; humans are messy, screwed up critters.

One advantage to being a writer is you can always write your own resolution. It doesn’t solve anything, but somewhere in the back of your mind there’s always the ‘if I ever publish this, maybe they’ll read it and understand.’

It’s never going to happen, but convincing yourself it could is often better than playing it over and over in your head until you drive yourself insane.

 

Super…

I tend to add elements to my stories that are out of the norm. Regular fiction can get tedious to write, so I opt for the “if someone could set things on fire with their brain, how would this affect regular life?”

Which inevitably translates to “what would happen if people I like/dislike/know/am acquainted with/want to sleep with impress/etc. had superpowers?”. While often these musings never make it into an actual book, I have several scenes that play through my head at various times, most often associated strongly with a particular song or score which had a close affinity with the way things played out at the moment.

Someone’s ability or affinity is often associated with my perception of them. Are they calm and rational? Impulsive or cunning?

If any of this stuff really happened, I think some of them might be amazed at how likely I think they would be to survive an apocalypse based on my observations of them alone.

Mantra…

Several dear friends, on a regular basis, remind me when I’m feeling overwhelmed and stressed out that all of this situation is temporary. That in the near future, things will work out, things will get better, and all the crap I’ve put up with will pay off.

It’s all relative.

But some days are better than others. And at the end of those really tough ones, you pick yourself up, stand tall, put on your best pair of heels and channel my favourite drag queen…

Falling…

Fall having finally arrived is a nice change. Having 34C temp spikes in September, while not unheard of, is not normal (at least not where I live). Especially not during the last week of the month.

Having the temperature drop 20C or more in the span of a dozen hours leads generally to me lying on the floor, feeling like my brain is going to explode, sick as hell and hoping for a swift death as a reprieve from whatever migraine I’ve been struck with.

So am I sorry it’s been cooler for the past week? No. No I am not.

Will it stop me from bitching incessantly in February? Also no.

Dear past Steph…

You’re an ass. A lazy, procrastinating, pain in the ass.

And I’m super pissed off that you left this mess for me to deal with.

Just in case you were wondering.

Love and kisses,

Current Steph.

Focused…

I tend to focus mostly on work, only because it seems to be one of the few areas of my life I have some modicum of control over.

At least in the sense that if I put more effort in, find a new source of funding, write a proposal response, draft a business plan, write up requirements for a new product for us to build, etc. something may actually come of it which makes me feel like I’m moving, if not in the right direction, at least in a direction. (not at the day job obviously. My strategy there is ‘be cool, be calm, this too shall pass’ because… yeah.)

People are complicated and I don’t do people well. I prefer machines and books. Sadly I haven’t managed to achieve the financial security to move to a desert island and not have to deal with any of it yet.

Yet.

Indecision…

One of the drawbacks to really liking food is you usually want to try ALL OF THE FOOD.

When you end up making a meal that will likely feed you for an entire week, it takes some of the excitement out of making a new dish.

Some of them, like curries, tend to freeze well. So do a lot of the pasta dishes.

But eating my tuna casserole for a week straight, while tasty, gets really tiresome.

So then you start to wring your hands about making something you really want to try, versus making something you can eat for a week straight without wanting to cry.

I need to have more friends over to pawn food off on…