Tag: letters

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I may have been a little too excited in firing off a hasty fangirl-y email to an address that probably isn’t even monitored anymore, but I was so happy that I found the site I’ve been alluding to since college. All I had to do, all this time, was to browse my old middle-and-high school files for a certain animation with a certain username on it.

A cursor of Chibi Usa's attack

 

Blink and you miss it: http:// members. aol. com/ chibiusa97.(1) The pieces fell into place from there. So I sent an email. …Well, less polished and rushed than what you see here, perhaps, but the sentiment is the same.

Hello,

As I tend to do as Web 3.0 breathes down our necks, I sit back and reminisce about The Old Web… when everyone built their own little piece. I remember your website dedicated to Chibi Usa, who was also my favorite Sailor Scout. You had one of my favorite web pages in the late 90s, so I was always a little saddened that I could never remember the URL or who you were.

So, imagine my delight when I came across one of your old .ani files in my archives! A quick search of your username later and I navigated to your CS100 assignment. It’s still up, after all these decades. Coming across sites like that is like peering back into time.

The Internet is/was a very cool place, and I’m still amazed at how information is communicated on this medium, and how it has grown.

And how sites have inspired me, such as yours.

So I want to say, thank you. As a kid in 1997 browsing the Web in middle school Computer Club, to the almost-40 adult who still has a passion for this sort of thing. I hope you’re still in it, enjoying anime, and I hope this email reaches you well.

Take care,
“me”

I propose a toast for ChibiUsa97, and all the ChibiUsa97s still floating around, coding and enjoying what they love.

Chibi Usa, looking lovingly at a soda with her face on it.

 

(1) That link no longer works, natch. However, you can view the page on the Wayback Machine. That hyperlink points to the version I’m most familiar with, but do slide around the timeline and see how it changed over the years!

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This is a rough month for me. I associate it with not enough Good Memories and too many Bad Memories.


This Friday, October 11th (or is it Saturday?), is .


I came out once, on Facebook, a few years ago. Under a filter to people I felt would accept me. I still miscalculated.


I lost a friend.


It could’ve been way worse, but it still hurts a little. She was dear to me.


Here’s everything I couldn’t say in response to her last message to me… because she needed the last word so badly I was blocked. (You can infer what she said).


A little cleaned up, of course. But not by much.



Funny thing, about silence. It’s like an empty spot on a Mad Libs sheet. You can fill it in with whatever you like. But let’s set the record straight: I did not unfriend you out of jealousy.


I left quietly, because I’ve not a lot to say. We cannot go back to what we once were; I cannot continue our superficial banter, and you’ve proven to me that I cannot open up to you. I’ve tried, for what’s another acquaintance on the kiddie pool? But I’m older, and I grow weary of too much of that. I left silently, because I’ve little nice to say about people who can’t see beyond what 4chan and Reddit hate. I was silent because out of all the options, shutting my mouth was the kindest. Better you think we just grew apart and were a casualty of my biyearly FB cleaning, as it happens sometimes. And I remained silent because if you actually gave a shit, you would’ve asked how I was without the unfriending to kick your voyeurism into overdrive.


Another thing about silence is…
sooner or later, someone will start babbling to break it. Then you’ll
know how they really are.


And you just had to be a _________.
(Put whatever you like, there. I love Mad Libs!)


My initial thought was “Was that fucking necessary?!” But… You know what? I’ll let you have that. It’s on me for forgetting the maxim “hurt people hurt people.” And while I was merely taking a break from FB, I also guessed that you not knowing what I was up to would’ve driven you nuts. So I’ll own that.


Clearly, I struck a nerve. And I’ll no longer commend you for your maneuver; looking back now it was just straight-up pathetic, though calculated:


  1. You really are that shallow, using superficial insults against the people that stood up for me. And you knew that any slights against the people I care about, no matter how grade-school level, is one of the quickest ways to get a rise out of me.
  2. In addition to said shallowness, you managed to land a critical hit. All I’ll say is I’m not on a trajectory that’ll not pass people’s rigged expectations of me, and I’ve yet to de-condition myself of comparing my life to others. You really know how to twist the knife in one’s insecurities!
  3. You’re the very troll you accuse my friends of being. Try not to choke on the irony; now that my anger is largely dissipated I actually want you to live.
  4. Despite all of your warnings, turns out that the person that has done the most damage to me was you. You broke my heart. Even [name redacted] could not have accomplished that on her most destructive day… and no one else ever could. So take solace in that.


I assume I’m not giving you too much credit– you’re fuckin’ smart. But I gotta dock points from your final score for unoriginality. Oh goodness, sizism/lookism and a line borrowed from /r/TumblrInAction? Haven’t heard that before!


I’m just… reeling over the fact that someone so talented, so beautiful, and so capable of good things can be so… needlessly ugly and hopelessly shallow.


I guess we’ve mutually disappointed one another. I’m fine with that.


I’m not jealous. I pity you. As you continue to stagnate, only growing in your circlejerk of a sheltered pond, you’ll hurt more people like me and sabotage any potential happiness you may have with others because they’ll fail your narrow and short-sighted criteria.


And I’ll keep doin’ me, whatever the fuck that is.


There’s no point in wishing ill will, or gunning for friends. Besides, that’s not my style; I tend to default to the classics.


I’ll do better than you and wish the opposite: be well. Have a nice life– and you will. People like you always do, anyway.


But you can also go fuck yourself.



(I gave her a 7/10, by the way. She got me to reply. And I still think about it sometimes.)


I’ll write a more recent coming-out post this week. A happier one. Later I’ll reflect more on the positives:


I learned who my true friends were and realized what tangible support I needed, going forward. And I know that if people can’t accept me, I must lose them no matter what we’ve gone through together; it’ll hurt for a while but that is fine. And sometimes closure doesn’t happen and I have to accept that.


But I can still rant on the Internet. (: