history_gurl

First: the icon.

I've had this icon for a few days now. It comes from one of my favourite scenes in Oz. It's Keller, Beecher and their usual angst and I love it.

I suppose it can be seen as aggressive. Or even passive aggressive, if you make a nicey-nice post and use this icon. But I'm still trying to figure out if it can be passive. Can I use it with no intent? Or am I fooling myself?

Second: the zen

Which, really, you'd think has nothing to do with the icon, but you'd be sorta wrong. See, I'm not a Zen Buddhist. I truly don't have the requisite respect for all living things. (I point you to my total belief that anything with more than four legs is unnatural and deserves to die). But Zen is a lot easier for people to grasp than if I'd written "Wu Wei and the art of fandom".

See, wu wei is the Daoist principle of non-action. And if I identify with any religion (and I use the term loosely), it's Daoism. Wu wei means not striving. It means peace in the face of adversity. It means being content to follow the Dao, the way, as it unfolds before you without trying to make it go the way you want it to.

And that comes back to the icon. If I use it to express where I am, is it without the intent to influence where I am going? Or without the intent to comment on where I've been? Can "Fuck you, ya fuck" ever be without striving?

Third: the fandom

Wherein I discover that I'm happy on the periphery of fandom. Nothing like fandom wankery to make you take stock of why you do certain things.

I write because I have to. It's not something I can avoid. Even when I have no fiction muses, I write poetry or take pictures and scribble random words to go with the pictures.

I read because I have to. It's something I've done constantly since I was four. Hell, I read the back of shampoo bottles and cereal boxes.

Sometimes, I am sarcastic, snarky and mocking. Okay, for those of you who know me ... often I am sarcastic and snarky. This seems to be my default setting, and I guess I forget that sometimes. I also forget that others don't know me and won't attribute good motives to me.

Trying to defend myself, or my motives, or my intent, smacks of striving to me now. I've had many thinky thoughts the last few days about striving and what I want. When I write, I do so for myself. If others enjoy what I write, that's great. And it's not because I wrote it, but because they enjoyed it. That, to me, is not striving.

I really don't think I need recognition for what I write, but I could be wrong. Maybe I'm fooling myself. But for now, I'm just gonna keep writing, and reading, and being my sarcastic self.

If you need me, I'm gonna try to stay out here at the edges of fandom.