*light synth* hey whats up

"Everything's cool today," I've been told.

Sure, there's "stuff" to do.

But nothing is pressing. No deadlines. No time sensitive tasks. Not even a Hurry Up And Wait.

I'm getting better at establishing boundaries, I'm getting better at telling people "No thanks, not today," and not immediately imagining the friendship will implode over a missed chance to chill.

My creative outlets have been opening back up and new ones have been popping up as well. It has been fun to get back into collab+creative writing again, especially with people that actually put in the work and can keep a steady narrative rather than always fearing the looming concern of other participants getting fucking weird and/or gross about it.

It's an odd feeling I've got with this, like there's no weights on my shoulders for the first time in ever. I knew this moment would get to me someday back during Febs ice storm, it's so neat for it to finally arrive.

Having my previous experiences with writing projects be centered in XIV and WoW, it's a VERY different experience.

My bestest friend in the whole world invited me to play on some ASOIAF themed roleplay sim, and since I've been super fed up by how... "vocally online" the communities of both previous platforms have been, I figured I'd dive into this new thing to give it an honest look. I've never been super huge into ASOIAF but it could be high time to give a fresh look at it.

The first thing I notice/remember though, before I ever get to the SIM hub or discord or anything else, is how difficult the Second Life learning curve is, and I love it.

It has taken me 5 days, 2 phone calls with 2 different people, and $40 to get my avatar anywhere remotely close to what's in my head for the character in question. There's no gear or leveling grind or farming to find what you want, you just gotta go through the various virtual malls to find the right department store.

But this serves as a barrier of entry for people that would otherwise flock to MMOs, because there is a definitive time (and money!) investment that must be met before you can even think about joining some of the more established sims.

In my mind (and so far, my experience) this means there's more overall communal investment, because everyone has some manner of stake in the project and everyone is trying to make it a functional group effort rather than some self-serving asshole feigning a "DND campaign" so he can craft up some masturbatory self-serving fantasy with everyone else filling in as "supporting characters"