- Man am I the greatest or what? I'm so good at writing, in turns witty and profound. Really have a control on my ideas, taking them into interesting places, and articulating them wonderfully well. People should just like give me money or whatever. Or at least give my old posts more hits, because, there are some gems.
- I allow myself to get super vulnerable, on here, sometimes.
Just now, I hear roommate Jonathan talking from his bedroom (probably to someone over VOIP, but he argues politics with himself in the bathroom all the time, so...?) I transcribe everything he says word-for-word, which means that I miss half of what he says because keyboarding makes a noise, and so I'm really hoist by my own petard here. "I think the fact that weeaboos and bronies, as well as furries, are [illegible] alt-right (?) is [illegible.] [Illegible.] It's not terrible. No wait it is terrible."
My mom laughs from the other room, anyway, again, a year ago, as I'm, probably on the floor, in the master bedroom. It's over the caption to the photo where I'm posing excitedly with my Scootaloo card. ("Epiphany of the day," the caption reads. "I am a full grown man.") "Why is that your epiphany of the day?" she asks through the wall. And I feel so accepted. Here I am, a 24-at-the-time year old, getting excited over a cartoon filly pony pegasus, and my mother doesn't find anything un-full-grown-manly about it.
And may I just take a moment as a graphic designer to say that right now I am being driven bonkers by these inch and foot marks, instead of quotation marks. They're, all, straight. No curves or angling to them- they're not real apostrophes! They have no business here marking out my quotes possessives and contractions! Hold on, one of the old posts I went through was the one where I experiment with Verdana. Let me see if it's--argghm, it sure "the heck" still looks like just inch and foot marks to me. And the em dashes just refuse to form either way, and no matter how many double-en-dashes I try it just won't be the same.
Oh well. Anyway.
So I let myself be vulnerable. (The random tangent there wasn't an attempt to avoid a potentially awkward subject, it's, argh, it is, just something that I've, um I have, noticed, and which we talked about in graphic design class today in dealing with last-minute pre-publication adjustments to the Outlet before it hits the presses (which it did, this afternoon!) and now cannot forgive as easily as I used to.) I do, let myself be vulnerable, discuss vulnerable things. But it's just... I'm just... accepted. I had no trouble making friends in Kindergarten, first grade, any grade, anywhere, even up till the present. Because maybe I didn't know I was supposed to be bad at making friends? Because I was never afraid of being myself? Because even now I don't know how it's possible not to be true to yourself, but it's something that people say is not only possible but freakishly common, so I have no choice but to take their word for it? Autistic Mormon Hipster Furry Brony Manchild, blah blah blah, whatever... is, all just, whatever...! Maybe it's because of letting myself be vulnerable like that.
Holy bleepamole, that's probably it. Maybe it's because of letting myself be vulnerable like that. People refuse to let themselves be vulnerable, and thus refuse to truly be "themselves." Someone genuine comes along, and no matter how true or false you yourself are, you can't help but like them.
...This isn't the direction I'd expected this post to take, honestly. Originally it was going to be, more vulnerable admissions on top of the vulnerabilities of previous posts, like, I can't stand lesbians because seriously who the heck isn't attracted to dudes even just a little bit?, that kind of thing. (Because seriously have you seen Colin Farrell man, that dude's got the most pouty lips and you just want to boop him right on them...) Though I suppose I could still swing it back that way into intimate-detail-subject-matter territory, and still cover all the bases I'd meant to, while still making everything I've said so far make sense... I do see an option for that. But it involves vulnerabilities that I wasn't counting on sharing. The path is there if I do choose to take it... And I'm taking it.
There are still other vulnerabilities I could share, like this: sometimes my guard slips, sometimes temptation overpowers me, and I look at porn. I'm not sure why I'm using the present-tense there, since it's been a while, but I don't think anybody can speak for their future actions. I hope I'm done with it; I've got prayer, to guard against temptation, of course, but really...
Put a rat in a cage alone, and then give him the option to take drugs (or engage in any sort of addictive behavior,) and he'll do that. This has been tested and proven. But they repeat the experiment when the rats have social company, and the rats don't need the drugs or want them. It's the exact same neurochemical path in the brain, drugs and society. Both just, endorphins, in the opioid system. Society isn't a drug; drugs replace society. That's why junkies withdraw, because they don't need human interaction as long as they've got drugs. A rat who has its friends doesn't need the endorphins from the druggy water, and so drinks from the normal tap almost without fail.
I'd forgotten about Mom laughing at the blogpost till I was going back through the archives and reread that post; I'd forgotten about the effects that that had until just now writing about the importance of having genuine loving interaction with others. But, Mom reading that post, laughing at it and wondering why it'd be such an epiphany like there's nothing unmanly about liking the littler of the little ponies, that called me back from a dark place. I was watching porn like crazy, last Christmas, but after Mom just accepted me as a person, over there from the next room over, I no longer felt the desire to engage in any kind of addictive behavior like that, anymore. Wasn't even tempted to.
And so another thing, some deep dark whatever like the lesbian thing above, which no longer seems so deep and dark when compared with what I've just admitted. Sometimes I feel guilty about being a furry. Not from any whatever-the-heck people view it as, any kind of deviancy or anything, sexual or otherwise, but because it's just such a major thing. A major thing. 6-2-1 rule and all that, it's so easy to let that become a preoccupation, that I sometimes feel like I'm worshipping that over God, though I try not to. That's another vulnerability that I had been going to admit.
But as long as we're down this road--and it's 11:58 right now Pacific time, whatever just let this post go on past midnight and backdate the timestamp; I'm on a roll-- maybe I could bring up the other things, the how-people-view-that things. The sexy things. The kneejerk "when I think the word 'furries'" stereotypy.
Whatever the heck Jonathan was probably talking about an hour ago; what Izaak et al down in the computer lab were talking about last Saturday when discussing the weird crap on Second Life. Heck, June 26th, Zootopia viewing #26 (DVD viewing #3) where one of the women I'm watching with has to clarify "not that kind of furry" when she's talking during the movie about furry friends of hers and gets an "eew," over just this husband-and-wife team who like to go fursuiting in the park and brightening up kids' days (it is unclear whether she herself was a furry; at least for sure she rivaled me in number of claimed Zootopia viewings and ability to quote the movie backwards and forwards.)
I realized in the bath yesterday, well, the day before yesterday, now, that it's a lot like the political crap that went on earlier this year, was it, with the Confederate flag? Ryan served a mission in Louisiana, and he knows what it means. And it's not what it seems from the outside. Racism, the Civil War, slavery, that may be a part of it, but if anything that's just a facet. Home. Community. Pride. It's not just rhetoric (maybe, to be sure, it is rhetoric, but it's not just rhetoric,) that the American Civil War was the War of Northern Aggression, that the Civil War was fought over "states' rights" instead of slavery. Because all those things are pretty darn accurate. In the South they don't see the Confederate Flag as standing for racism or whatever; it stands for the South. And maybe racism is part of that. Maybe of course racism is part of that. So maybe of course sex is part of the furry fandom. But it's not as big as it seems by half, from the inside. It's not what it's, "about."
Though maybe it can be about that to some people. And maybe it can deal with that, to me. Because, you know, the reasons above, acceptance leading to mental physical emotional independence, away from slavery bondage addiction. Even when I'm feeling accepted, I can get, physically tempted, sexually. So I disappear into furries, deeper and deeper, and look around the real world, and people still accept me, and so I don't feel the need to act on temptation or engage or indulge in addiction.
I said I feel guilty sometimes about my own furriness? That's what I fasted about yesterday, now the day before yesterday, Fast Sunday. Some people, most people, would probably fast over finals approaching or whatever, but I don't really have those, in basically any of my classes. So I fasted instead over, well the issue's been pressing again anyway, whether it's okay to do this or be this or whatever, however I'm going to choose to define or not define my very self, when it's so easy to let the whole thing become a preoccupation. I'd say "get addicted to" it, use that over "let it become a preoccupation," but it's the thing I use instead of addiction, like I said; but hey, sublimation of impulses is still a use of those impulses, and it still feels good, so, heck maybe it is just "porn" even when and even though it isn't (I mean seriously, it IS all about their bodies....) It's an interesting conundrum. So that's my fast and prayer, whether that's "okay," whether it's "okay" to be a "furry."
The Church happens to have a website, https://mormonandgay.lds.org/, dealing with same-sex attraction issues geared toward members, how they can/should live with this, what the standards should be. Hey, you figure, that's close enough; not too distant actually, and plus, I mean like I said with the "can't stand lesbians" thing, I do like dudes a bit (seriously! Josh Holloway without a shirt on!) so it is somewhat à propos already generally.
Or, well, maybe. I read through the "Understanding" pages during opportune moments during Sunday School. There's just, a bunch of stuff about moral transgressions, jeopardizing eternal happiness through disobedient acts. It's no sin to be tempted... Christ himself was, that... committing adultery already in your heart pertains to, you know, actually committing adultery already in your heart. (It's nice having the gospel, an eternal perspective on stuff. Sometimes I just want to convert people, just to show them, "see THIS is why, see, SEE," instead of just coming across as anti-LGBT bigoted jerks; I think the Supreme Court thing last year was actually a good thing, because up until then whenever anyone expressed their support of same-sex marriage it just felt personal, like "ooh, right in the Prop 8...," whereas now they're just good citizens upholding the law...)
Oh wait, well there was something, in the last section there. "Sexuality is an important part of being human and is also a source of passions that need to be bridled. Despite these intense feelings, there are Latter-day Saints who faithfully adhere to the Lord’s moral law over many years. These individuals have made a determined commitment to live a chaste life and avoid anything that will reduce inhibitions." Well, what's this? Inhibitions reduced, can be a bad thing? "Passions that need to be bridled," as in "bridle all your passions, that ye may be filled with love" from Alma 38:12, gee thanks I never would have thought of that (heh, "bridle" and "gee,") but there's a start at least. It's like any other passion. Bridle, just like, all of them.
I mentioned the 6-2-1 rule above; that's something they always remind you of at cons. At least 6 hours of sleep, at least 2 meals a day, at least 1 bath/shower. Having so much fun CAN be a preoccupation, not an addiction. Passions unbridled, you just, forget to do basic functions; it's not, I can quit whenever I want, it's, shoot yeah there is such a thing as quitting isn't there, I should probably grab a bite to eat. Preoccupation. Like gremlins-- it's said that if they have to choose between eating and/or sleeping, and mischief, they'll choose mischief every time, and so there's a pretty high burnout/mortality rate. It's not that they're addicted to it; there's just not always mischief to be done, and they're fine with that when that's the case. But when there is mischief to be done... there ain't no gremlin 6-2-1.
Bridle your gnats. Great. We've answered the very question I already had an answer to. It's a passion alright. Could've guessed that one for myself. But it doesn't answer the deeper questions.
My particular mechanism that it (the furry urge) sometimes comes about because of, mentioned above... engaging in harmless but socially misunderstood-thus-frowned-upon behavior, being accepted in spite of it, and getting a social endorphin "fix" because of said acceptance (regardless of societal views on behavior, but feeling like I can be myself)... well, that may be just a particular keen understanding of neurochemistry and psychology, some kind of thing that most others would engage in without really knowing why. Like how people act on impulse then justify their actions later putting them into their alleged system of morality (and everyone does that,) only mine partially comes about because I'm so aware and self-aware of the very process.
I'm not quite Temple Grandin level, being able to track every level of my conscious thought patterns, but I can at least track most of them, and fathom out the deeper levels; that ability apparently takes me to some interesting places behaviorally. (Why am I vivisecting myself so thoroughly? Is it to gain pity? To reveal my secrets masochistically before, not just the world but more painfully my family and friends, and thus "punish" myself for every perceived wrong? Or is it to have all these bare, but still be accepted for who I am whoever or whatever that is, and get a rush to my opioid system pull-the-lever get-the-fish-biscuit I-am-my-own-Skinner-box?)
I don't know. It takes a lot of guts to spill a lot of guts... I had that phrased better in my head... It's 3:17 in the morning, Mountain Daylight Time (2:17 Pacific) and Ryan's awake. I should- 3:18 now- I should wrap up. Sheesh, I think that's everything I meant to get to. Lesbians, guilt complex, deep psychosocial issues underlying that- 3:19- yeah, I think that about covers it. 3:20. It's a good thing I got all the readings done for class this morning already, because I don't think I'll be doing any of that when I wake up in 3 hours 10- make that 3 hours 9, now- minutes...
Or, following the 6-2-1 thing, 6 hours. Yeah, I like the sound of that a lot better...
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