Welcome to Gaia! :: View User's Journal | Gaia Journals

I don’t remember ever posting a journal, which is strange and a bit of a bummer because I would have loved to see a longform of what my thoughts were in the late 2000s here…

Anyway, wow.

The last time I was here was in 2021, but that was a “check on the site out of nostalgic curiosity” (as well as change my username to an alias I’ve used for over a decade now) visit, rather than a solid return—which is similar to say for this visit as well. Based on my inbox, it seems I stopped playing in 2012, so I must have gotten busy with high school.

Not much happened after high school. I really didn’t have any idea what to do with life, which was largely due to the fact that I couldn’t imagine the future and therefore couldn’t make any goals. I couldn’t get a job no matter how much I tried, and I didn’t understand how college worked nor what I should have been doing. Financial aid has let me attend for quite a while now though, and I meandered about, trying to find stuff to do.

Eventually, theatre production found me, and I have found such passions in being a carpenter for theatre and otherwise. I’ve been doing a huge variety of things and learning stuff all the time, which has been so awesome. After going 25 years of being stuck, not knowing what to do, and feeling rather miserable—then suddenly it all came out of nowhere and launched me into all kinds of work immediately—it’s hard to easily describe how it all feels, other than, “It’s great, and I finally get a chance to move on in life now.” All this stuff is honestly quite recent, yet it feels like I’ve done more in these past two-ish years than anything before that.

It’s been fun, and I’ve barely scratched the surface.

Still, I find myself thinking of my life in the past, and that’s how I ended up logging into GaiaOnline to look through my old stuff—thinking of my time roleplaying in the Guilds and hanging out in the worlds. It’s sad to see how dead and unplayable it all has become. I would have loved to at least be able to walk around the virtual town or the city and whatnot. RIP to Flash, and all that. emotion_heartbroken

I was never great at designing things and didn’t go out of my way to come up with interesting avatars, but I absolutely loved those “I am” animal items that allowed me to be a skunk, wolf, cow, fox, and whatever else. It really was such wish-fulfillment getting to walk around places as a little animal (I’m a furry now, who would have guessed). It seems that there are actual customizable animal avatars too, which is pretty neat. I don’t remember that being a thing back when I played.

Not entirely sure what inspired me to write a journal, but I figure it’s just a “I’m still here” note for the world. Although I can’t remember all the specifics nor who I used to talk to, I just remembered having such a good time on this site. I don’t plan on returning, as I’ve just no time to be on the internet anymore, but it’s a nice time capsule of a part of my life I enjoyed. With that said, I’m lovingly leaving my profile as cute and silly as it is—it’s just fun for me to see and reminisce.

Hope you’re all well,
Kludge (formerly last known as CandySkunk, and many other usernames I had)
gaia_nitemareleft cat_emo gaia_nitemareright