I'm not dead!

I think.... It's been awhile. A long while. I needed to step back and examine my life a bit, something that is really hard for me to do. I've went back to the game on and off since my last post. Never staying long, just liking having it around in case I felt like playing/talking to the two friends I have left who play. I haven't seriously played in over a month (August 15th). After stepping back and looking at why I still played/wanted to play/was having a hard time quitting I finally realized that I had really started quitting over two years ago. In the beginning, I was a hardcore raider; I played to group up with people and down big bad bosses. The end of BC was the last time I seriously raided. I did a few runs in WOTLK, but nothing past Ulduar, even in the newest expansion. I stopped caring as much, I enjoyed playing and leveling characters but I stopped really caring. That's when I started quitting. I'd been holding on to something that stopped mattering to me a long time ago, and man it felt pretty silly. The friend I really enjoyed talking to finally quit as well and now I keep in touch on xbox so I uninstalled again on September 15th.

Now that I have that out of the way! I'm working on getting back to who I was before everything seemed to fall out of place. Goal number one is changing my diet. I lived on pure crap when I played, heck even before then I never really ate well. My whole life pretty much was filled with crap food that made me feel good but made my body all kinds of sad. Do you know how hard it is to eat food that isn't processed? Especially for someone who is pretty picky about certain fruits and veggies! I'm getting better though. I'm trying to be a lot more open minded about stuff like that, though I still refuse to eat fish and probably always will (ew). I'm doing my best to keep to a five ingredient rule, or at least the least amount of ingredients as possible. It's kind of shocking when you look at how much junk is in "healthy" foods. I'm also trying to cook more, although I hate the extra dishes it's amazing actually wanting to be in the kitchen again.

I've started getting passionate about writing again. I want to find my old poetry so I can see how angst ridden I was in my teens :) I've been developing a new story about a shapeshifter. Fitting considering how I used to play druids :-P I'm also helping my sister with her latest book idea, and she's helping me. It's fun having a sounding board. I've been slowly working my way through the pile of books that were sitting on my kitchen table for way too long. I'm down to four or five left!

My gaming now consists of playing xbox every few days (mainly red dead redemption, I love riding the horses lol) and playing Sims 3. I watch a lot of TV too, but I make sure to ride my exercise bike every day for at least part of the time I'm watching. This weekend the husband and I are planning on converting the upper shelf of our closet to a cat area, and building some stairs for the less agile cats. Two of our cats already go up there, unfortunately by way of using our clothes as a ladder. I figure this way we can save our clothes, and the cats that can't climb/jump that high get a new sanctuary from the dogs. The dogs don't mess with them, but cats love high places that they can sleep without worrying about having to move. It's nice having weekend plans that don't involve sitting down all weekend!

Clean

At this point I'm over two weeks clean. It's honestly the longest I've ever not played WoW in years. I've only stopped playing for longer periods of time when I had no choice in the matter (moving, ect). Some days are a struggle, I can see myself playing and remember the good times I used to have. But then I remember that those good times were about 10% of the time I played. The rest of it was frustrating, grindy, and almost boring. Other days I don't even think about it. I like those days better :-P Thinking about how different I am when I don't play keeps me strong. I've always been somewhat of a dreamer, and I love that I can lose myself in a video game or a novel or a movie for a few hours. The problem with WoW was I was never able to turn it off. There's no beating it, no end, no last page to read. I crave that, that ending that makes everything make sense and finishes the story. I can read a book in one sitting if it interests me enough, or watch a series of movies, or do a video game marathon for a few days. Then when it's over, I'm not interested anymore. I might revisit it at some point, but I can go back to the real world again. I feel like the real me is coming back to life. Sort of like a robot that was forgotten and left rusting in a garage. I'm scared of losing that feeling, of feeling trapped and like a zombie again. That's why I know I won't ever turn back to WoW. Nothing is worth feeling that way.

Time is starting to feel normal again. Whenever I quit for a few days before time seemed to go really slow. I was used to rushing through everything to get more WoW time in, so I'd rush through everything then wonder what to do with all my time. I used to ignore my pets while playing, even worse sometimes I just saw them as a nuisance. Something that got in the way and annoyed me while I was trying to concentrate on my game. I'm starting to really love them again, and treat them like the part of the family I used to. It's like waking up from a bad dream, I can't believe how stupid I was when I used to play. It makes me cherish every second I have now. Life is too short to waste years on a video game!

Sick

I have a crazy cold right now. I couldn't sleep last night because of it, and I used up a box and a half of tissues in a day! Ick, I finally passed out around 2 PM. When I'm sick I feel like an alien in my own body. It doesn't do the things I want it to do, and I feel like I'm trying to tell it to do things and it seems like it takes a lot longer to do them. I hate that feeling!

Osama bin Laden is dead. I remember 9/11 pretty clearly, I was in high school at the time, and the whole school basically stopped working and everyone just watched the news. Most of my family lives in NY, most upstate not the city but it still hit close to home. Was Osama bin Laden actually behind these attacks? I don't know, most people will never know. He admitted to them, but it seemed like he just gave up denying it and went along with the story. I'm not saying he wasn't a bad man or didn't deserve to die, I'm just not sure if he's the one really responsible. I'll never know, and he very well may have done it, but I'm not foolish enough to accept what the government says as the truth just because they say it is. I'm not sad that he's dead, but I find it hard to celebrate his death. It doesn't bring back those that were killed, it doesn't even end the war on terror. It doesn't end the ignorance of people, people hating Muslims because they mistakenly believe that he was their leader. Most of all his death just makes me think about all of the people who have died. From 9/11 to those who died searching from Osama bin Laden to those who died in the "war on terror." Life is something precious. I will never understand why people use religion or money or ideals to kill people. Well I guess that's not true, I understand believing in freedom and fighting for it. I don't understand killing someone because their religion is different from yours, despite most religions advocating peace.

Sorry if most of this doesn't make sense. I should go lay down again but I know I'd just lay there. Sigh!

A Confession

I haven't been totally open. I've had a problem stepping out of the World of Warcraft and into the real world. I know that I don't want my life to be centered around video games anymore. But for some reason every few weeks I think that I want to still play WoW. So I'll log in (resubscribe if I have to) and play for a day. Then within the next few days I totally regret it, and uninstall the damn thing again. Then a few days later I transfer it back to my computer from the husband's (he never gets around to uninstalling!). I don't know why I do this, I think it's because I panic about failing in the real world and want to go back to my crutch, even if it's just for a day or a few hours. It's especially bad if something stressful happens, I freak out and the idea of losing myself in a fake world seems pretty tempting.

My last trip into WoW was this weekend, Saturday night I transferred it over and by Monday I had uninstalled it again. This time was different though. I met someone this month that I became pretty good friends with in game. She's a lot like me personality wise, but a few years older. She shares my feelings about the game, but she's not ready to leave it yet. Seeing her was a lot like seeing myself a year or so ago. Hating the game, but still wanting to play all the time for some reason. She's nearing 30 and has no plans for marriage or kids, despite having the man and the desire for both. She's educated and jobless. A huge part of all that I know, partly from experience, is from playing. It's obviously her choice to do what she wants, but it made me so sad to see someone who could be doing amazing things stuck in this game. And the worst thing is that I knew if I stopped playing, I'd probably never talk to her again. It's so hard to talk to people who are currently playing. It's like trying to communicate with someone in space, what can you discuss? "Well, I went to the store today and bought milk." "I floated around in outer space. Isn't that awesome?" It's two different planes of existence.

By Monday night I knew I was done. I was so tired of disappointing myself, and all the stress that quitting and then playing was putting on me. I logged off fully intending to quit. I called the husband and told him, and he said it was fine because he was bored already himself. Usually when I would "quit" I wouldn't inform anyone. Most of my in game friends have quit, or I've just lost touch with them. So I'd just log off quietly and plan on never coming back. This time I thought of my friend. I logged back on, and told her I was quitting. She told me that quitting was one of the best things you could ever do, although she was sad to see me go. I traded her all of my stuff, gold and everything and exchanged e-mails (although I doubt I'll ever hear from her!). The most important thing I did though: strip my account of all of my information that I could. And remove my authenticator, and change both the e-mail and password to something I'll never remember offhand. Then I tossed my authenticator in the trash. Every other time I quit I never got rid of my stuff or changed my email address. It was like I was expecting to come back, or just wanted my stuff there in case I did want to come back. But now I know that gold and gear are just pixels, and once you realize there's nothing special about them it doesn't feel like a big loss to get rid of them.

So, I confess that I hadn't really fully quit WoW yet. I thought I had, but I kept going back. Monday, April 25, I quit for real. And I've never felt so free in my life. The best part? I had a terrible, stressful day on Tuesday and I didn't even feel an urge to go back.

What I missed

Things I missed when I played WoW:
-eating real, fresh cooked food
-the simple joy of listening to music that touches your soul
-spending time with real people
-feeling the sun, rain, or wind on my skin
-being alive
-dressing up for no reason
-pampering myself
-giving my pets the attention they deserve
-giving my husband the attention he deserves
-talking to people who aren't WoW zombies
-painting
-reading
-writing!
-time not flying by me

More to be added if I think of any :-P What did you miss the most when you played?

In-Laws

I don't have the best relationship with Jake's parents. They don't understand me (fair enough, sometimes I don't either!) and have different priorities than I do. My family was never that close so I'd see them maybe once a year, the in-laws want to see us every holiday. It would be fine if it was just us, but it's a headache to load up all the dogs and take them with us, and then they have to stay outside the whole time we're there. It's also extremely expensive to board three dogs their size. So most of the time I get Jake to go alone, I hate being away from him but it's just the easier choice. His parents don't get that our dogs are part of the family, we don't want to leave them outside all the time. Every time they visit us they seem to mention that our dogs are too big to be inside and they should be outside dogs. Sure they're bigger than most inside dogs, but there are advantages to having big dogs. You can actually hug them, they bark loud enough to scare away any potential robbers, they don't bark constantly like little yappy dogs, and they tend to be easier to train just to name a few.

Last weekend the in-laws came to visit us. Surprisingly it didn't go horribly. Jake's mother was actually nice and we chatted for awhile, not just sat in awkward silence. The best part about them coming to visit is Jake's father fixes stuff around the house. This time they fixed our outside faucet, pulled two bushes out that we wanted removed, and gave us their old fridge (which was still about 20 years newer than our old one). The new fridge is awesome, we have an ice maker! I've never had one before haha. All said it was a decent visit for once. It makes me think maybe his family might actually accept me. Or at least put up with me because Jake doesn't plan on getting rid of me!

Video games

When I played WoW, I played on a few RP servers for a time. I never really RPed but I have always had an RP mindset. When I played WoW, or any other video game for that matter, I sort of see myself as that character. I'd keep outfits that I liked the look of, have a mount that matched my character... I think that's why I've always had such a hard time turning off the WoW. My characters were like part of me, or maybe I was part of my characters. The first time I ever remember feeling like that was on Zelda for the Super Nintendo. Link was male, but I felt connected to the character. I was out to save the world and the princess, I was the hero! It's hard to be a hero in the real world. It's hard to do something so noteworthy, to do something that no one else has done. It's a lot harder to save people in the real world. And some of them don't even really want to be saved.

I'm kind of a control freak. I'm not bitchy about it, or at least I try not to be, but I like when things are just right. What makes them just right? I have no idea, I just know when it feels right. Like snapping a puzzle piece into the right place. You ever watch a movie or read a book where someone does something so just wrong? And you want to scream at the TV or book and tell them they're doing it wrong. But you have no control over those people, or people in everyday life for that matter. I think that's one of the things I like most about video games. Sure, you have to follow a story line, but you get to decide how you do that. I like games where you can be evil or good, and it effects the world around you. If only you could see that happening in the real world more often, it would make our decisions feel more important. But the best thing about video games outside of WoW is that I can turn them off. Only WoW seems to make me want to play all day, every day. That's not even the worst thing about WoW though; when you play it, it makes the real world seem dull. Like putting on a dark pair of sunglasses, or blinders. It makes me sad to think about all of the people still lost in that maze. There's nothing even waiting for them in the middle or on the other side besides a whole lot of wasted time and energy. I talk about WoW a lot in my blogs. I guess it helps me to think about where I'm going when I ponder where I'm coming from.