Jenova

Because eRosaries are Serious Business

Sun, 10 Sep 2006 20:55:16 GMT

There's an anime called MariMite, or Maria-sama Ga Miteru, which loosely translates as "The Virgin Mary is Watching Over You". It's a cute little show about Catholic schoolgirls and lesbian overtones, wherein older girls take younger ones as their "little sisters" and give them their rosaries and basically act as a student council.

There is, as one might expect, an LJ comm devoted to discussion of this series. Associated with that LJ comm is soeur_system, wherein people can start their own "rose families" and pick "boutons" (little sisters) and give them little virtual rosaries and be happy friends forever. No stranger than people getting sorted into Hogwarts houses and taking that seriously, I suppose, except that there's a distinct imbalance in membership. Apparently there aren't enough "grand soeurs" (older sisters) to go around to all the boutons, and some of them have been waiting quite a while for the honor of being chosen as somebody's little sister.

Among some members, there appears to be a sense that things should change.

frozen_plum suggests in a now-deleted post that:

Silly question:

If the ladies on the "potential" list (the ones here, under "Petite Soeur Requests") are all waiting for soeurs, then why isn't a subgroup formed for their own support too? Some of these potentials have been waiting for a long time - it would be easy to get impatient, or depressed, and feel like you're never going to be chosen for anything.

Besides. Even in Japanese high schools, the "class" is one unit; the teachers come to them. So if a second or third year doesn't accept them as a 'kouhai'/'petite soeur', the first-years still have a unit they belong to, ne? Maybe they should have lilies. Purity~

What do the potentials themselves think about not having a soeur? Why do they stay? (And why does nobody seem to act? Though, the revisions to the application might help with that...)

(Of course, I could be entirely mistaken, or others have asked these questions too many times before.)

This is immediately followed by a no-comments-allowed post by mod mushii saying that all posts about the community's organization should actually be emails to the mod.

... And then EVERYTHING WAS DELETED and I MISSED IT ALL. Sorry.

Wed, 03 May 2006 03:09:11 GMT

Kain is at the top of Mount Ordeals.

He has been here for three months now.

I've been watching him for most of that, but he doesn't know.

He broke his leg last month, during a fight with a particularly nasty revenant. He never saw the blow coming. If Cecil or Rosa were here, he'd have been fine, but they're not, and he ran out of potions a week before. If I were a better man, I could have saved him.

I'm not. So I killed the revenant while he was doubled-over in pain, and I've killed everything else that's even remotely threatening and come near him, and other than that, I'm just watching.

He's walking -- limping really, with an improvised splint and a crutch -- and I'm guessing it hasn't sunk in yet just what a leg injury will do to a Dragoon. Or maybe he's ignoring it. It's a bad break, probably in more than one place in his leg, and must have been difficult to set. As soon as he can put weight on it, he balances and practices with his lance and with the sword Cecil left behind when he came here.

He's started talking to himself. It means he's lonely.

One night, I hear him call Cecil's name in his sleep, and finally I cannot bear to have him think of anyone but me any longer. Only then do I slip out of my spells and my shelter and crouch close, taking his outstretched hand.

His eyes are open in an instant, but he hesitates before pulled away. Does he think he sees Cecil? But Cecil is back in Baron with his wife, and no one else is going to come for Kain. I smile at the thought that I have him to myself, and do not falter as he puts his sword to my throat.

"What are you doing here? You were going to sleep," he chokes out. He doesn't want me to hear the fear, and I wouldn't if I didn't know him so well. I can tell by the tense muscles in his good leg that his instinct is to jump up and pin me.

"I came to the temple to see my father, and to seek peace with myself," I answer and he doesn't seem to question it. It's true enough, though I left out the months I spent watching him. I ask him the same, as if I don't already know.

"I came looking for... something. Forgiveness, maybe. But I ended up like this." He gestures to the splinted leg. I start to lean forward, but the sword's blade presses against my neck again.

"Let me help you," I whisper. "Let me take you back to Baron, at least, where someone can tend you."

He hesitates. "You, show mercy?"

"Were you not also under mind control?" I ask and immediately regret it when he winces. "I'm sorry. But I wish to make up for my actions just as you do."

Again, he hesistates, and then the sword drops. He's broken, though he doesn't realize it yet.

I tell him that I can show him mercy. "I'd like to," I promise. "It would let me make up for what I did."

Kain nods, and hold him a little closer than necessary as I cast warp to take us from the mountain.

He wishes to limp into Baron under his own power, and I let him. I know he'll remember who came for him when he was alone on the mountain, and it wasn't Cecil, who greets him with moving concern, nor was it Rosa, who busies herself healing his leg. I was the one who showed him mercy, and they are both too-kind souls who hear me out and forgive me over tea and roast chocobo.

I'm the one who supports him emotionally as he heals, when Rosa becomes busy with her child and turns the care over to another white mage. I'm the one who walks beside him as he learns to walk and fight and run again, though he can no longer jump, while Cecil is busy with kingly duties. He seems satisfied enough to teach the next generation of knights, and to let me stay with him.

And my mercy is that I never tell him I'm the one who shattered his leg.

NaNoWriMo Wank

Mon, 07 Nov 2005 02:23:06 GMT

http://www.livejournal.com/users/dasein_fiasco/43715.html

I thought about making this clairvoyant, but the OP seems to be typing with one hand already.

So then it's a personal endeavor, where the pleasure goes to the participants, not posterity. Okay, but who wants to write 50,000 words of tripe just to prove themselves and buck their lazy habits? No writer I'd ever want to read, that's who. Good writers will gladly trade up ten pages of shit for one powerful sentence, and National Novel Writing Month is a phenomenon encouraging the exact opposite approach.

He also seems to be trolling the LJs of Nano participants, so I'm sure there'll be more wank in the comments later.