Shake Your Foundations (Ei Ei Oh)

So where are we now? Let me sum it up. I'm bored. When I say that I don't mean that I'm sitting around here with nothing to do, no. I'm working on the book, coming up with tons of ideas for this here blog, watching movies, reading books, working on my various lunatic projects, and smoking cigarettes. I have plenty to do. I mean I'm bored with the status quo, such as it is. I'm lonely. It isn't so much that I'm longing for a girlfriend so I can get laid and relieve some pressure, although that would be nice. What I really miss is having a companion, somebody to go out and do stuff with, and someone to hang around with. I'm lonely. Because of those two things together, I'm feeling a little crazy. As you know, a lot of the bizarre things I do come not when I'm bitter and depressed (I'm neither of those right now), but when I'm bored and lonely.

The entire Libbyverse was created out of boredom and loneliness. But wait? Wasn't I in Vermont with Jude when Beth was first created? I was. But that was a loveless relationship if I've ever seen one, and as soon as she got what she wanted out of it I was pushed to the backburner and forgotten. And when that happens, I start looking for ways to entertain myself. And thus the Libbyverse was born. I never intended for her to 'get over', but she did, and she got over *huge*, at which point things started to spiral slightly out of my direct control. Over the last week or two, I really started to miss ol' Lib. She was fun and popular, and her blog had a pretty decent following, which gave me a level of confidence in blogging enough to explore whatever I felt like, and I knew people would tune in.

When I started Stray Bullets I did so in a particular way. I tried to distance myself from the Joyride and the Libbyverse as much as possible, and even though she and I both share some identifiable writing tics, my SB style was different by a fair degree from my NHJ style. But as tends to happen, Lib cast a long shadow over Bullets that it's taken me until recently to shake off completely. The same thing happened when she started her own Delphi forum -- it took a long time to escape the shadow of the Delphi forum that came before it. I realize this shadow is only in my mind. Guinevere, for one, has always preferred this blog to the other. But whether in my own mind or not, since I'm the author of this darn thing the shadow is something that hindered me from doing my best work.

Yes, there are a lot of Stray Bullets posts that are really, really good and that I'm proud of, but only lately do I feel that I'm starting to really stretch my muscles and bring this blog up to its full potential. At first there were a few disciplines I adhered to as far as what I could make into a post, which have since been thrown right out the window. Now anything is fair game. I've reached a new level of comfortability in posting here, and the sky is the limit.

So what about that shadow? Lib did a lot of things very well. Probably the one thing she still has over me is her absolute confidence in herself both as a writer and as a person. That's important. I'm prone to doubt and sometimes lack self-confidence, but she *believes*. Because she does believe, she was always comfortable writing about anything she wanted, discussing her various obsessions (all of which I share), and wallowing in her interests in some of the geekiest things in the world. Of course, an attractive young lesbian probably gets a lot of leeway from her (mostly) male readership that some of the rest of us don't have the benefit of, but what can you do?

However, Lib and I do overlap in some important areas: strength of artistic vision, meticulous attention to the smallest detail, a rigid perfectionism, the tendency to be a complete control freak over that which we create, and adherence to a high level of professionalism in whatever we're working on. Those are all things I place a lot of value on. And when Lib is dead and buried once and for all, those are the qualities that I'm taking with me.

So what then? Something that Lib did in the Joyride more than I've done here is worldbuilding. She was endlessly creative. The concepts of Calliope and the Nice Lady as we know them today originated there. The first kernel of Lori Morningstar ("Little Miss Responsible") was there. The Kudoverse (which I intend to continue with) exploded there. She could, and would, do anything to entertain or better explain whatever point she was making. She'd throw any idea out there in an attempt to get it over and make something worthwhile out of it. And that's what I need to do more of: worldbuilding.

I've taken Calliope for my own, obviously. She was my first shot, with the pirate radio show, at worldbuilding in Stray Bullets. I've taken the Nice Lady and given her a place in my theological mindset. I took Little Miss Responsible, gave her a name, added her devil sister, and started them chattering in my ear. I've put a face to Eris Discordia. I haven't touched the Kudoverse here yet, but I'm getting back to them. There's more to do.

I've already bettered the Joyride in my use of pictures to better illustrate some of the ideas rolling around in my head. The Badass Hall of Fame is something Lib totally would have done in the Joyride. My use of Captain America as a sort of Magic 8-ball (well, as soon as I find more than his "Yaaah" response) is something she might not have thought of there, however. The casting call posts are something she couldn't have even done, because "the book" existed in the Joyride without any details at all. And I have so many more ideas.

Meanwhile, the deconstruction of both the Joyride and the Libbyverse overall continues in earnest. I've been headed that way slowly for several months, but it's ramped up this past week. She's done a lot of good for me, especially on the creative end, but her time in the spotlight is done. Now it's my time.

The end of her era is extremely fucking nigh.