oddness and rambly on many things

[permetaform]

am in a wierd post-period state of wanting to *break* something. It's like some vague unease wherein every post I start and don't finish seems to be a rant on something or other and there's this sense of jitteryness and I haven't been drinking tea since this feeling's started (so it's not the caffeine) and I'm not ticked off at anyone insofar as I consciously know.

I'm wondering if it's because of the post-periodness. am wondering if it's because I've been reading too many wanks. am wondering about the state of being a fen and of being a squeal-y fangirl, about the use of the glomp and the hugs and the fannish flirtatiousness that may or may-not be uncomfortable to people and yet. and yet what is fandom sometimes but a group of people who've found a specific outlet to be mentally and emotionally touched?

It took me until senior year HS to realize that I was touch-starved, and whereas physically that was easy-ish to accomplish (with glomp friendly close friends) and yet sometimes in other ways it was hard to connect, because even as I've made peace with the fact that my mind worked in very strange ways and with the idea that I'm a bit of a freak (ie. not the same; ie. don't think the same; ie. don't communicate the same) and even as I can mostly tamp down the strangeness in mixed company, well...it makes communication difficult, yanno?

what is a ::glomp::? a ::hug::?

I think about this:
http://www.livejournal.com/community/100_roadtrips/51810.html#cutid1

and about this:
http://www.livejournal.com/users/fannishly/17777.html?mode=reply&style=mine

and in specific this paragraph:

I'm thinking again of Ed Norton's comment that the modern world has "dark cool irony disease." I don't discount anyone's genuine eye-rolling response to this movie, or to any particular movie or whatever, but in general I do agree that there's a common distaste for earnestness, a tendency to dismiss all sentiment as sentimentality, and an instinct to temper all gravity with humor or with its more mean-spirited incarnations. Humor is like a trump card -- you can always play it and trivialize what someone else finds precious or even sacred. Being able to laugh at something puts you in a superior position to someone else who can't. Cynicism is the most defensible position -- to care is to be vulnerable, not to care is to be impenetrable. To laugh at, however gently, is to consider yourself superior to.

...and I've HAD the "dark cool irony disease" and am every day trying to step away from it. I would rather squee and thus invite others to be silly with me than to forever be cynical, made a very very determined decision several years ago to STOP being...laid back? vague? to stop being *completely* agreeable and mellow and cynical and vaguely sniping. And instead to be willing to be a bit more rash, to state my opinions, and to let myself be ticked off.

But that leaves the underbelly exposed. And I'm not quite comfortable with that I suppose, or perhaps strong enough. and... it's so EASY to slide back into that mentality. so. so. fucking easy.

Norrington hurts me. The putting myself in his POV hurts me in that way that's like watching someone place the key to your cell in a place always unreachable to you. Like letting go of the guy that I loved (thought I loved? I still don't know) to someone that'll probably be better for him than I (and I the better for not letting him have a chance to tear me down) and yet watching them kiss and interact and being *happy* for them and knowing that I'm better off without him but godDAMMIT he was MINE.

It's tricky. And a complicated mess. And if you've ever been weirded-out by a coolish response to a norrington or sparrington comment made in my journal? that's why.

I still don't know completely my thoughts, this is unorganized, maybe I can get some perspective on this with some more objective viewpoints.

But, at the end of it? I will ::glomp:: and ::hug:: and try to be emotionally touchable and squee over stuff in shameless piles of happy because I've noticed, both online and off, that smiling first causes other people to be less afraid to smile.

And I guess that can be considered my fannish manifesto: share the love, so that it grows.

::hugs flist::

[edit] Which I guess, in a way, explains why I get pissed off at the permanent my-policy-is-to-not-feedback-lurkers, who then complain about their fandoms being small. Feedback = more inspiration, and I can only shake my head at the people who don't get this...

[edit2] upon thought, this could be considered an addendum to The Mom post I had a bit back.

Comments

[guede-mazaka.livejournal.com]

Oh, second part spawned from you linking to fandom_wank. It's just empirical, but from what I can tell? They all spawn from someone trying to stamp out a particular section of a fandom.

there's tamping down your own joy in order to appear cool and collected. The latter is what I'm referring to

Ah. Yes. Okay.

Well, honestly? It might be a counter-current in culture. Dunno about you, but where I am, part of regional culture is to appear happy and friendly and touchy-feely to the extreme, especially with teenage girls. Like, in my high school? The halls are narrow, and the school's a little too small for the 3000 students it holds. Yet one day I walk out to see a group of thirty freshmen girls kissing and hugging each other. As in, each member of the group had to hug all the other members of the group and say v. loudly how much they were going to miss each other.

They were just going to go to their first fucking class. In November, not on the first day of school. They blocked up the entire fucking hallway and made God knows how many people late for class.

And the whole thing's like, you feel as if you have to be overjoyed with everyone. I don't particularly like hugging people unless I am seriously overwhelmed--think funeral or wedding--but I do it a lot anyway because it's expected, even with just, say, a passing acquaintance you haven't seen in a few months.

[permetaform]

Dunno about you, but where I am, part of regional culture is to appear happy and friendly and touchy-feely to the extreme, especially with teenage girls.

::boggles:: er. where exactly are you again? That's definately wasn't the regional culture (or is it sub-culture?) I grew up in. I'm not sure if it's the general asian-ness of the area or if it's because I was basically a loner until freshman year HS.

[guede-mazaka.livejournal.com]

American Midwest. It's standard practice all over here, the whole very friendly polite facade, and it's what everyone on the coasts mock like mad when they're talking about earnestness, I think. Sometimes it's a good thing--unlike what all those comedians think, Midwesterners are generally more likely to smile and nod and then go home to bitch if you insult them as to get physical. Sometimes it grates.

[permetaform]

huh. I guess that makes sense.

also, it throws light on Smallville! =D

[guede-mazaka.livejournal.com]

*snorts*

I can't get into that fandom. My sister watches it, I've glimpsed a bit and browsed some fanfic, but a lot of it just sounds like the more rural areas by my hometown.

[guede-mazaka.livejournal.com]

It actually probably varies according to population density, and it just so happens that the Midwest developed more towards small towns and medium-ish cities than the coasts did. I see much less of it now that I'm on a large uni campus than when I was in high school.

[teleute12.livejournal.com]

[Fandom_Wankers] all spawn from someone trying to stamp out a particular section of a fandom.

Eh, not so much. Some of us just like to point and laugh at the stupid.

I mean, okay, the atmosphere can get a little witch-hunty at times? But that's not really representative of the whole of FW.

Aaaaand I'm shutting up now.

[guede-mazaka.livejournal.com]

*facepalm*

I mean, the fanwank incidents themselves spawn from someone trying to do that, not the members of fandom_wank. Sorry.

[teleute12.livejournal.com]

Ahh, okay. S'cool.