Belated thank yous for my natal day celebration

[thrihyrne]

Edit: today's post brought even more gifts, now added!
For all here in the ether who wished me greetings and cheers on my birthday (the 15th), thank you! I do have a whole caboodle of thanks, to:
‡ stuckinsea and sexyscholar for the virtual LJ gifts
‡ koshweasley and wolfiekins for the lovely collection of purple, lilac-scented votives and purple glass votive candle holders. Yay Ikea!!
‡ liriaen for the incredible Draco art, shared here at her LJ.
‡ euclase for her gorgeous, astonishing drawing of Rupert Grint, available here for your viewing pleasure. I got the original safely in the post yesterday, BTW.
I've never received that much art for any day! Thank you both for sharing your tremendous talents!
‡ matildabishop for the Eowyn toy (with slashing action! Sword-slashing, that is) and Ravenclaw Head Girl pin.
‡ risiepookie who was so put together she'd sent me Christmas and birthday gifts way back before the first holiday. The truffles are divine, and the leather-bound journal is gorgeous, and the pen with Thevina etched on it made me all teary. I've already decided to begin writing my non-fantasy original fic in that book. I don't journal anymore after the incidents with my wasband, but I love the idea of a work-in-progress being permanently housed with its scratchouts and drafts of scenes and writing in it for posterity. Edit: got your card/letter today, as well, so now I can write you back this weekend!
‡ lena3 for the tender card and the notecards, which I'll happily be writing in.
‡ fungus_files for the lovely long letter and beautiful hand-made journal. More stories will go in there, for sure!
‡ snottygrrl for your kind and sparkly thank you note/letter.
‡ eccequambonum for the copy of Maurice. I'll be indulging in that wonderful film soon. You're so kind!


Work stuff first; I've applied for both a writer and general editor position. My internal application was strong enough to get a response back a couple of hours after submission to answer a second set of questions, which I did by Friday, but our weather has been really funky this week. I'll keep you all posted.

I'm really caught up in this Wraeththu stuff now, as you all can officially tell since I've made my own icon, always a sign that I'm fully committed. ;) It's strange, though, to be posting any kind of fanfic both into a new fandom (scary!), but also a smallish one, and also one that is perhaps more wrapped up in role-playing than fanfic. I do hope that people enjoy my current WIP which is planned out, most of it, in my head and will probably be pretty darn long. But aside from a couple of readers, it's like dropping it into quicksand. I'm not used to that, but the writing process for it is so much fun that it's reminding me that I write because I'm compelled to do so. It's the writing process which is the point, and not whether or not anybody reads it, much less comments on it.

I know I've been indicating this more and more, but it remains a continual point of tension in myself between working on the original fic stories I have and fanfiction. Even if I did publish something 'original,' the chance of me having more readership than I have here in the fanfiction world is, really, quite slim. I think that's part of why I don't care more; that and that I'm pretty sure with just one novel I can't convince the Scottish government to let me in to live as an author because my earnings wouldn't be enough on which to subsist. That'd be my primary drive to actually become An Author. I do hope that I can get either the editor or writer position here, as I'd really like to get those words on my resume in an actual titular capacity.

Just a last snippet about writing and my new fandom since nearly all of you here on my flist who have been with me for a while, whether a couple of months or a few years, don't know what I'm talking about, which might be strange. I'm writing a gap filler, set back in the early years of the sudden existence of this post-human race. In hearing from a few people I've found at raythoo who do know about the Wraeththu fanfiction scene, apparently what I'm writing hasn't been done before, with this particular pair of characters. This excites me, because I like writing in realms that other authors don't, and it's reminded me of how I felt when I first began writing fanfiction at all. I'd been cleaning my bathtub and literally felt as though a whole group of mostly original character Rohirrim wanted me to write about their lives, and how they interacted with Eowyn and co. up in Meduseld. Now I'm writing about the genesis and early time of Vaysh and Ashmael before one is killed and resurrected, but within the author's canon material, there's no happy reconciling. I'm not sure why I'm so fascinated and want to create dozens of pages of what their meeting and relationship was like before that from one of their PsOV, as well as gap filling afterwards from the other's POV. And I don't think I'll get a large readership for it, but it's like writing "Daughters of Orome;" it's sitting there, fully-fleshed out, full of original characters and geography and love and loss and maturity and fighting and all of that. Except that now I've been a slash writer for years, so there's a definite adult element to this which "Daughters" didn't have.


Enough. Need to get home and write. I've spent all day in town for my Saturday day #2 of training for the Skyline Literacy Council. Yes, I'm going to be a volunteer here pretty soon.

Comments

[eldritchhobbit.livejournal.com]

Sending best wishes your way on the potential new position!

[rickey-a.livejournal.com]

Hey sweetie, I wished you a happy birthday Here:
http://rickey-a.livejournal.com/55203.html
but I will do so here again.

thinking of you :)
hugs

[lena3.livejournal.com]

I'm glad you had a happy birthday. ♥

Gah! Maurice! Wonderful.

And who is your flister that drew the GORGEOUS Rupert? I must stalk!


And as for volunteering...YAY!! :D

[snottygrrl.livejournal.com]

oh! am glad you got the card. i know it wasn't a happy bday card (as a matter of fact i think i neglected to say happy bday anywhere on it though i meant to), but i really wanted you to know how much i needed to thank you for being you and being here and the wonderful things you send along.

and it was so pretty!

[kaalee.livejournal.com]

Happy Birthday!!! Sadly, I totally fail at LJ and had no idea.


I'll be thinking good thoughts for you in the writer/editor positions! ♥

*love*

[wolfiekins.livejournal.com]

Oooooh, look at all the pretties you received!

How cool! Congrats on the new job application.

Let the excitement of your new fandom carry you, despite the current activity level of that fandom, and the possibly small potential audience. Your point that the writing is primarily a manifestation of your creative need to express is spot on, and should be enough to sustain itself.

I agree wholeheartedly, but being the materialistically grounded Virgo that I am, it is at times very difficult to continue if there is a lack of feedback (either real or perceived) given to the fruits of our labours. One of those things that's easy to say, tougher to do.

Yowps. *steps down from soapbox*

*grins*

[fungus-files.livejournal.com]

Thanks for your email, K. - don't know how I missed this post, esp when I'm sorta kinda back on LJ (well, more than I've been for a year or so!). *hangs head* Glad the pressie got there and that you liked it - that notebook was in danger of not being sent when it arrived. I saw the cover and just thought, "mmm, do I have to give this away now?" ;)

Sounds like you had a wonderful b'day and it's gorgeous to hear of your strong networks here. *HUGS*

Oh, and good luck with the application!!

[verdenia.livejournal.com]

Yay, glad you found a suitable volunteer group! ;D