01-23-2012

[vaalski]

Helloooo.

So I was going through my livejournal looking for a poem the other day (shut up), which involved trudging back through the archives all the way back to the beginning, because I was pretty sure it was an early piece of writing. This was like two weeks ago, and I noticed idly that hey, January is when my livejournal started ages back, I should totally mark that occasion. Today I was sitting at work, writing dates on things, and thought, hey, the 23rd sounds familiar, why is that? Took a look on my phone at lunch, and confirmed what I'd already suspected.

I do love anniversaries. 

So it's been eight years since I first started. I would have been about sixteen; if you're at all interested, the first post is here. I hadn't quite learned to drive, I spent a lot of time with my horse, I was a less than a month away from my whole life cracking down around my ears. I went by Talia, and I picked this username because none of the other ones I wanted were available. I originally write on melodramatic.com, which I never properly learned to use, and switched over to follow Cristina and Heather and also because I was totally hopeless at using the system. 

My pony has since been sent to retirement; in the end, he was mine for a little over eight years and I love him still, and miss him like I'd miss my heart. I plan on a tattoo of his brand come spring, once I've gotten the dermatillomania I've struggled with since I was a kid under a sort of control. I don't drive, but that's because I don't have a car these days because I live in Somerville, and my partner drives me where I need to go. (If I ask nice.) 

I'm still small, still five feet, and my hair is brown and just brushing my shoulders. I've grown into a stocky young woman, broad across the ribs and shoulders by genetics and a little curvy by good living. I'm called Grace, mostly, or Edie, or Mama Hyena or Boss Mare or Bones. I sing less than I should but better than I used to. I dance contra with skill and grace and a sincere and total joy, have learned waltzing and blues and a little bit of tango. 

I sidled my way out of the closet starting not long after I joined, part by coaxing and part by being dragged, part by manipulation and part by my own free will. I identify variously as a dyke, a queer woman, and a lesbian; I've been through six partners of varying seriousnesses and genders, and am currently living with and crazy for a transguy named Mitch. He's my world. He's my femme and I'm his butch. 

I don't talk much to Sean anymore but I miss him; formal dances are now an opportunity for hilarity and to dance with pretty girls. I'm currently read The Kingkiller Chronicles, Lord of Light, and the Shoebox Project. I still love Pratchett and Pierce, but Lackey and Atwater-Rhodes are increasingly obvious as the semi-schlocky fantasy they are. 

I'm graduated from 4-H (and high school and college), but I still teach and judge public speaking, supervise horse bowl and hippology, regularly work with members of my old club, and help run and judge horse shows. I'm over a year into my first job, at a medical journal; I commute to work daily and probably don't sleep enough. I do aerial acrobatics and am learning to paint. I'm a poet, and finally starting to examine my work for the best of it to send out to literary journals. 

I am almost eight years past Cristina, who was my first girlfriend. I didn't call her that at the time, but looking back, I can accept that's what she was. I'm probably as close as I can come to peace with what happened, and how shattered it left me. I've gotten some good poetry out of it, at the very least, and I suppose that's good. 

I'm settled as a female spotted hyena, I am horse-hearted. My totems are Cougar, Badger, and Bear. Inside my head, I talk to a Utahraptor named Red and a genderqueer person named Ruth. 

I currently live a life of Sherlock and Skyrim. 

I'm very happy.