Decadance Final Show Rehearsals

Lots of writing from me recently, I guess!

Tomorrow will be the 3rd day this week that I need to work from home in order to get to Decadance rehearsal on time.  Our show is this Saturday -- only two days away!  (tickets still available) It's been a weird mix of relaxing and stressing, as working from home is nice but the rehearsals are mentally tiring.  On the plus side, since I'm only doing 4-5 pieces they aren't so much physically tiring for me (thank you, past me!).

The show is really coming together now (and not a minute too soon), and I think it will be a really fun performance, and a fitting end to the group that has really done so many things over the years.  As I drove back from rehearsal tonight it really struck me how much this all reminds me of the old days of yore when I was in marching band.  The stress, the performing, the camaraderie, all of it.  Even though it's really tiring mentally, at the same time I'm actually really glad that I have this opportunity to relive a little bit of that feeling one more time.  And hey, as a plus side: I'm not part of the leadership this time!  So, no super stressing out for me, haha.

Let's hope for the best in getting through these next two days!

Art is Nourishment for Living

I have been watching a few, mm....how would you say...."heartfelt" (?) things recently.  I finished watching Uchuu Yori mo Tooi Basho (A Place Further than the Universe), and also watched Caracol Cruzando, (which my friend was an assistant animator for!).

A Place Further than the Universe was very slice of life, very heartwarming.  I think to me, now having watched through the entire thing, it didn't really feel like a story that was about one thing necessarily, just a slice of life / coming of age / journey story, more in general.  I think as a whole the show felt a little...unfocused because of that.  There were a couple of issues and/or themes that were revisited a number of times, like of course Shirase-san's feelings about her mother, but I think in comparison Hibike (my favorite love and gold standard for slice of life now) really drilled down into specific things in more depth, like different plot points that spanned several episodes, combined with very overarching character development, especially with Kumiko.  Ahh, Kumiko's arc throughout the whole show is really so amazing.  I really can't....ok, hold on, going to stop myself from just fangirling here.

Anyways, I think I expected more of that from Uchuu Yori mo Tooi Basho, so I think I got something a little different than what I anticipated.  But I did like some of the things they went through, especially the interactions between Hinata and Shirase, I think that was pretty real for me, seeing these two characters try to work it out despite having really different approaches to how they handle life.  I think that's something that's really important to be gained from these types of friendships, and also just in general spending time together with someone during trying situations.  Megumi and Kimari's relationship too, I felt that was really interesting.

I quite appreciated Shirase-san's relationship with her mother, I think it didn't really resolve in one concrete way or another, and was not heavy-handed, which I think is very real.  There were those few moments when Shirase really came face to face with her feelings, and those felt very real, I think.  Like the part where Shirase says she felt really "futsuu", almost too ordinary, about being in Antartica -- how she realized she didn't particularly feel anything super special, and was wondering how she felt about that, even though this was something she really wanted to achieve for so long.  But in the end when coming face to face with her feelings all over this time, it really hit hard.

I think it's really common to make stories about loss and the past that I just don't approve of how they get resolved, so it's nice to see yet another one that treats it with both the respect and the honesty that it does.  Shirase-san really shares quite some traits with me, like her "I'm just going to prove everybody wrong by working even harder" attitude, her combination of skill and clumsiness, competitive nature, and especially her dilligence in the way that she thinks about her goals and her past.  Despite that, her story surprisingly didn't feel like it was something I super related to, somehow.  I'm not sure why, really...I think it's quite subtle differences.  I think Shirase's story is about her chasing after her past, and needing to come to some sort of understanding about it, wanting to change things from the way they are.  Ultimately she needs to realize her own feelings -- not only the feelings she has, but also what feelings she would like to have towards the past.  I think it is less about her letting go or not letting go, or how she comes to terms with it, and perhaps more about figuring out what she feels, and how she would like to go on from there.  I don't know if what I'm saying makes sense or not.

But really the show is not about Shirase after all -- and I think it would be a quite different show if it were.  It's about a shared journey of these four girls, and I think it does that quite well.

Anyways, especially right now during some slightly stressful times for me, watching these things really reminds me of important things in life, about what I should not be taking for granted, and about people that are really important to me.  I think when you are just trudging step by step through the daily struggles of life, it is really important to have these stories and feelings in your life to remind you of really what is meaningful and what is not.  Because sometimes we would get too focused on putting one foot in front of the other again and again, and forget to look up at all of the beautiful things that are passing by all around us.

Happy times, yet stressful times.

I have certain been stressed over the past few days...no denying it, really.  The plus side is that even though there is stress, there is light in my life as well.

Our Decadance finale show is coming up in less than a week!  (tickets still available at https://decadance.yapsody.com/)  At this point I'm pretty grateful to past me that I only signed up for a small handful of pieces; it's a good amount for me to be performing.  Some of the rehearsals have been quite hectic so I am glad that I didn't bite off more than I can chew!  Apparently I am still stressed out about it though, because I definitely dreamed about being in the show / dress rehearsal last night with all sorts of things going wrong, agh.  I guess it didn't help that I was thinking about it a bit before bed, haha. *sweat*

JaSmix logistics are all done with, finally, so I can kick back and just look forward to enjoying the event!  ...and by that I mean stress out about the workshops I'm helping to teach.  It will be OK!...but it's hard to not fret about it until I am confident about exactly how I am going to cover everything.  It is going to be super fun though, especially the glowsticking one...actually all of our workshops this year should be really fun -- please come out and stop by! :D

I still have a little more tweaking to do for the setlist for that night -- mostly finding room to fit all the good stuff, lol.  But not so worried about that part, really.

Tactics Ogre: Let Us Cling Together!!!  I have started playing it in earnest, playing it on PSP.  Important note is that I am actually not playing the vanilla version of the game -- instead I'm playing it with the "One Vision" mod, which basically rebalances the entire game and comes pretty highly recommended from fans of the game.  For all zero of you who can actually understand it, a consolidated changelist can be found in the post at the top of this thread.  Note that I have never played Tactics Ogre before, so reading through the changelist meant pretty much nothing to me at the time, but it seemed to be a good idea and nobody really recommended NOT playing with the mod, so it was a no-brainer.  From what I can tell, it basically rebalances the classes in a major way -- archers used to be really overpowered in the original game, apparently, and some other classes like terror knights were close to useless.  There are a lot of skills and such that have been switched around, which is a bit confusing when trying to read up on strategy because many of the tips that apply to the original game may no longer apply.  But it's all new to me anyways, so it's pretty fun discovering what all the different classes are about and all.

Tactics Ogre: LUCT is...really complicated, lol.  I'm not sure how much more complicated it is because I'm playing with this new mod, but compared to FFT it has been a lot harder to wrap my head around just what I should be doing and how damage and stats and status effects work and all.  On the plus side, it has been really fun slowly learning about all of the workings of the game and getting my footing around everything.  The battles and unit management definitely have significantly different feel from FFT, and that was definitely disorienting at first.  Battles are much more large-scale and terrain and unit formation really matters quite a bit more -- which is pretty cool actually.  The battles do drag on for a bit longer in general but you do get the sense of a war of attrition which is kind of cool.  And yeah, building units is really quite different.  There's less of the whole FFT aspect of "build your own combos" which I think is a net loss, but it's still pretty interesting anyways and I'm sure I'm doing a ton of things wrong already haha.

Overall though I am really happy I started playing it; it seems like it will keep me engaged for quite a while since there is just so much stuff to explore.  Not only in terms of the mechanics, classes, equipment decisions (which are very nontrivial!), but also there are branching story paths which you can replay in a sort of newgame+ style sense, etc etc.  So, look forward to more updates as I learn my way around the game a bit more.

I'm finally starting to get the hang of Peach in Melee!  I'm still sloppy as all heck, but I can at least play neutral of some sort and I have been understanding some more key interactions and such.  She's really quite fun!  One thing that I realize I need to focus on is threatening more tricky grabs as different characters, so I think that should be my focus at the moment.  That includes just running up and raw dashgrabbing them as Peach, but also shinegrabs as spacies, and empty hop grabs as well as wavelanding onto platforms and grabbing.

This week will be perhaps a hectic week for me with all the stuff coming up.  But I am thankful for the light in my life.  Whether it is friends, or meowmies, or just some simple moments spent alone by myself.  These things will carry me through, I know.

Slowly beginning to find myself again...I hope.

For those of you who do not already know, Princess Kaguya is the film that has affected me more than any other, and has a special place in my heart for the meaning it has.  It is in a sense, a difficult movie to explain, how it affects me so deeply, and how it really feels like it reaches you to the core.  It also seems to be rather hit-or-miss with people; some really get it, others may not.  It's certainly been responsible for a lion's share of crying, in any case.

Somehow despite always saying that Princess Kaguya is not a movie I can watch lightly, I found myself watching it for the =fourth= time the other day.  I am really glad that I did, though.  This movie, more than perhaps anything else, really reminds me of what is important in life.  On this particular viewing, especially, not only did I feel sad in this indescribable, soul-crushing way, but I actually felt compelled to really take responsibility for those things that are important to me, and to do a better job, lest I keep running away from them forever.

There have been other works, of course, that make me feel similar things.  As cliche as it might be to some, Undertale really did make me think about....well, maybe not so much "being a better person", but rather, relations with others, developing friendships in different ways, and forgiveness.  And of course Brave really forced me to confront family issues -- issues that before then I was convinced had no nice solution...so I shoved them into the corner best I could, since I could not see how else to deal with them.

But Princess Kaguya really affected me over the past few days, it feels like.  That it put even daily life things into perspective, and I realized just how silly it was to worry about certain things, when there are so much more important things for me to think about.

Recently I think the things I have been thinking about the most are regaining my "former self" -- "being Timm[ie]" -- as well as the way I interact with others.

Regaining my self is something that is long overdue, I think.  But I think I'm really ready to try living up to it.  It is not something that can be flipped on and off like a switch, but rather an ethos to live my daily life by.  But I hope that I can think about what I have done with these fleeting days of my life, and think to myself, "yes, this is me, as I should be."

It is easy to think of yourself as the best, and to pretend, to act, that you are invincible.  But it is just as easy to think of yourself as the worst, and to act as though you have nothing to lose.  But neither is true.  Both are lies, and in the end they would still hurt you, just in different ways.  Not just through self-deprecation, but the denial of honesty and vulnerability, in the name of a false sense of humility.

The first step towards improvement is acknowledging that you need to improve, yes.  But the second step towards improvement is allowing yourself the grace to fail and learn.  To want to improve, not because you are tired and afraid of failing, but because you would like to learn.

It's something that I am only now really beginning to confront.  I'm really not sure why it suddenly became more important to me.  I think, after all is said and done, regaining my former sense of self is more important to me, of course.  But I really think it would be nice, to be able to truly communicate with others, honestly, and to help each other in this shared human condition.  Whether it be West Coast Swing, Melee, teaching, socializing, planning...just anything.  I hope that someday I might have the courage to put myself forward and say "This is me; all of me.  And I accept you, as I hope you will accept me."

A third Meowmie -- Butternut -- has been added to the family, though she has not properly "joined the pride", as we say, haha.  Together with the fat baby quails, it has become quite a lively place.  These Meowmies have really taught me immensely about life; it's really amazing.  Lavi, Kaya, Mocha, and Goodnight Meowmie...I really have started to think about and value things differently because of these cuties.  I used to always maintain a safe distance.  But I think finally I am ready to face the world without this shell of mine.

I'll always keep it safe with me, though.  Always.

Mm, yes, it's time for another update.

After being "interesting", work is actually going fairly well for me at the moment, which is really nice, actually.  I'm grateful.

I've put FFTA to rest, haha.  I went through and finished off the main storyline missions (while doing random other missions here and there), and there's no real reason for me to go and complete any of the other content in the game, as I already outlined in my previous post.  A bit of a shame, really, but that means that it's time to move onto something like Tactics Ogre, or even Baldur's Gate 2 (lol!).  Or, I could always be good and actually just continue dev work on Rhythm Quest, too...

Finished up another song!  So that's good.  Always good to get things done...it is nourishment for my life, I think.

Speaking of trying to get things done, JaSmix planning continues!  I think we've got our workshop lineup set, and yesterday I basically finished putting together the set list.  Since last year I've forgotten just how exciting it is to play music at an event...I guess I just have strong feelings about what makes good dance music.  As for my own workshop planning, it's coming along...I hope I can do justice to what I am trying to cover.

I've finished watching Houseki no Kuni, which was pretty cool, though not overwhelmingly so.  That means it's time to get back to Sora yori mo Tooi Basho, which I sort of left hanging midway through (whoops).  I'm excited!

Life is...in an ok place.  I think the day-to-day grind is getting better, potentially even enough to not be called a "grind" anymore.  I definitely feel a sort of spiritual and emotional discontent, but that is not quite so uncommon after all.  There are still some deep issues that I still carry with me...and I don't mean the ones that I never want to let go of, either.  Being the person you really want to be is a slow process that takes time, failure, and the willingness to embrace that failure.