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Vigilo

thought i was batman
543 Watchers110 Deviations
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So I logged in because deviantART sent me an email about account security and password-changes and blah, blah, blah, and. Hey.

I haven’t been on here for a while, and I wouldn’t have thought twice about it, but silvernium happened to write me a stunning comment-poem on a poem of mine and it made me emotional, and it happened to be on the day I logged in again, and I just felt like saying something to let you know what’s happening.

I've been keeping up with some of you on Facebook or Tumblr (or both!) but that's only like, five people, I think, so to the rest of you I probably just fell off the earth or something. I don't think I'll be on here anymore at all, so if you want to, I don't know, keep up with me or just know that I'm still around (because I want to know that you're still around), and if you think we know each other well enough, send me a note and we can be friends on Facebook?

I don't post a lot because I usually don't have anything to say, so I don’t seem very active, but I chat with people all the time there. I'm also theywhosawthedeep on Tumblr and also recently thecityoftomorrow (a blog for everything — everything — related to (mostly DC) comics and my feelings about them, specifically, because I've lost my mind) if you'd prefer that. 

I'm just not that active — actually, I’m not as active anywhere as much as I used to be on here. I’m looking back on everything that’s happened here and it’s just... amazing. I haven’t written poetry in a while either. I don’t know why, maybe academia’s eating my brain as I write this.

That's actually pretty possible, because it’s my last year of uni and I have to write assignments and a 10,000 word (not as many words as you’d think) dissertation (it’s going to be on linguistics, literacies, and comics — the working title is 'Holy literacies, Batman!'). I also have a semi-regular job working for my university (as a student subject ambassador), and I have to finish my applications so I can get into a Masters programme next year, and it's all very ... surreal, but cool.

In other news: I turned twenty last month, yay! I'm still having seizures, boo. I've been in and out of three countries (China, India, England) this past year, not sure what emotion to put here. I watched The Get Down (an amazing quality show that I can recommend to you with complete sincerity and faith) and am watching Smallville (an amazing trash show that I can't in good conscience inflict upon you) and I love both of them very much. Pokemon Go is really good for exercise and when I'm stressed and I'm Team Mystic. My plants are still alive and beautiful. I make a delicious carrot cake. Life's gone on.

That's about it. I just wanted to say — sorry, and thank you, and I miss you, and I hope you're well. Diwali's in a week and a day, so — happy early Diwali. Lots of light and love.

Batman out.

Heart

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Alright, I have too many daily deviations, this is going to go to my head, and it's all TheMaidenInBlack's fault, and I love her to pieces for it. Thank you, for the daily deviation on pilgrimage! This has also resulted in a lot of watchers, and I'm... not sure why you've gone through with this, seeing as I'm barely active, but, hey, who am I to tell you what to do? So, hi, you lot.

OK, time to cram all of my news since -- August? July? -- in bullet points; here you go:
  • I got a tattoo! It didn't hurt, and I changed my mind last minute about the design. It's gorgeous. I want another one, stat.
  • I'm becoming a gardener extraordinaire; look at two of my gorgeous terrariums.
  • See the background of that photo? That's the balcony of my flat, which is gorgeous.
  • Some of my bedroom decorations: a giant Batman and Robin poster, a postcard that says "Satan Was A Lesbian", and Wonder Woman.
  • I'm also becoming a master chef of Indian dishes and desserts; my flatmate's my witness.
  • I've not been at my healthiest lately, but I'll live, I hope.
  • I've started university! I'm the student rep again, and occasionally make money from student rep duties. Neat.
  • I know a lot of my professors, and they know me, by name. Is this networking? I feel like this is networking. 
  • I love my course, I love linguistics, I love language. You knew that already.
  • What you didn't know is that I'm making a mermaid sign language for my constructed languages module.
  • So, to repeat: I love my course, I love linguistics, I love language, and I also love mermaids of the deep.
  • Twenty more lines were discovered of the Epic of Gilgamesh! I'm so happy.
  • In other news, there was the summer school in August, and I also made money from that. 
  • I'm going to be a paid tutor too, soon, starting November; for a year five student, for English. 
  • I guess that means I'm officially employed, which is strange, and not something I expected to happen so soon!
  • Also, if you need shows to watch, try The Flash and How to Get Away with Murder.
  • If you need books to read, try Rivers of London. It's a practically perfect urban fantasy series, and I love it.
I think that covers everything. How are you? 

The title is from Postcards, by Wendy Cope:
At first I sent you a postcard
From every city I went to.
Grüsse aus Bath, aus Birmingham,
Aus Rotterdam, aus Tel Aviv.
Mit Liebe
. Cards from you arrived
In English, with many commas.
Hope, you're fine and still alive,
Says one from Hong Kong. By that time
We weren't writing quite as often.

Now we're nearly nine years away
From the lake and the blue mountains,
And the room with the balcony,
But the heat and light of those days
Can reach this far from time to time.
Your latest was from Senegal,
Mine from Helsinki. I don't know
If we'll meet again. Be happy. 
If you hear this, send a postcard. 
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Apparently this is what all the cool kids do now.

(I'm fighting a losing battle with my Internet, but I should be properly online by 20th August. At the latest. I hope. I'm sorry, I love you all, have this as an apology. Also, if you're reading this, haven't done this, and want to do this, I choose you - by which I mean, I'm tagging you.)

How long have you been on DeviantArt? What does your username mean?
Five years (yeah, okay, I lied on the 'you have to be [x] age' to be on deviantART, but only by like a few months or a year or something). "vigilo" is "vigilant" (or "to be vigilant", or "watchful", or "I keep vigil", or variations thereof) in Latin. I think 'vigil' was taken so I went with a weird Latin form. (I don't actually know Latin.) I don't know, I've just always liked the idea of vigils. Or I'm Mad-Eye Moody. 

Describe yourself in three words.
Tall*, dark, handsome.

* relatively. I'm tall compared to, say, anyone who's 5'2.

Are you left or right handed?
Right.

What was your first deviation?
Oh, god, it was either a retelling of a Greek or Arthurian tragic myth (ugh) or, more likely, that ridiculous poem, if you could even call it that, which was really just about a mirror, but I thought it was so cool and so subtle, it even had the Corinthians quote on it, oh, god, I'm too embarrassed to check.

What is your favourite type of art to create?
It's definitely not poetry, why would you think that? No, but, honestly, it really is. I love writing poetry. I love everything about it, even the wacky interpretations some readers come up with for it. I mean, writing poetry is basically controlling other people's minds with words, essentially. If I'm doing it well, they feel the way I want them to feel. I'm a super-villain, is what I'm saying here.

If you could instantly master a different art style, what would it be?
I'm a little torn between prose and digital art, but it's probably going to be prose. I mean, digital art. It's gorgeous. I like pretty pictures, but freaking prose, you know? It's so annoying. It's not like poetry at all. I mean, poetry is difficult, but fun difficult. Even if I end up with something terrible, writing poetry is always fun. Writing (non-academic) prose is like going to the dentist. Nothing ever gets done and everything hurts.

What was your first favourite?
Animator vs. Animation by alanbecker

Huh.

What type of art do you tend to favourite the most?
Literature.

Who is your all-time favourite deviant artist?
I started answering this and ended up with a list of too many people for the singular implied in the question, so I'm going to move on. If I'm watching you, I more than tolerate you, so there you are.

If you could meet anyone on DeviantArt in person, who would it be?
I've already met VFreie (who is an actual fencer, what even) and Solarune, and they're both fantastic. I'd like to meet the rest of theWrittenRevolution crew (past and present). Also, zebrazebrazebra, whom I could have met when she was in Shanghai / when I was in Beijing, but didn't. Oh, and, I also want to meet ClioStorm because she's the only one who understands my feelings about comics and particularly DC.

How has a fellow deviant impacted your life?
I mean, I've been shamelessly exploiting my exploits at the theWrittenRevolution for reasons, but I'm assuming you mean something less mercenary - okay, no, jokes aside, everyone at theWrittenRevolution, past and present, has done something for me. TheMaidenInBlack, doughboycafe, Carmalain7, VFreie, HugQueen, the rest of the army.

There've been a few people on here who've inspired me a lot, but I'm not mentioning any names, because then they might find out, and they're too cool to ever know I said anything like that, ever.

Also! Solarune's amazing, she's not around here now, but she's easily one of my closest online (and now kind of IRL) friends. She's the sort of person I can talk to on an irregular basis (because let's face it, I talk to everyone on an irregular basis - even people IRL) and still feel like I'm keeping up with. Also, she makes me playlists with folksongs about women at sea. 

I'm not mentioning a lot of people, but that doesn't mean I've forgotten them. I've been (briefly) in other groups like Expose-Lit and others, and in chat events, and in (sometimes accidental!) contact with people who work in entirely different mediums, and they're all important to me.

What are your preferred tools to create art?
All I need is a keyboard and a word processor.

What is the most inspirational place for you to create art?
As long as I'm on a chair and indoors, I'm good. Probably better than any other place, I don't usually write well in front of or around other people (except for my parents, but they're different).

What is your favourite DeviantArt memory?
Maybe my now-ancient, super-secret, induction to theWrittenRevolution. Maybe the times I got daily deviations / lit deviations / watchers / any sorts of comments and critiques (which, always wonderful, always going to be wonderful). Maybe every single NaPoWriMo. Maybe when I first joined. Maybe every time I write a Writers of the Revolution article, because I freaking love those. I can't actually think up all of them, I've got too many. :heart:
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The thing is, I have been (sort of) around, mostly for theWrittenRevolution if at all, but not much elsewhere here (or on Facebook, to prove a point - at least when I neglect my online friends, I neglect them everywhere and equally?), and this isn't to say I will be because I don't want to jinx myself, but just to say where I've been.

I have also been writing, as you've probably noticed - I completed NaPoWriMo, with The Found Poetry Review's PoMoSco project! Incidentally, I'm not touching found poetry again for ... a while. Found poetry poets (found poets? are the rest of us lost?), you have my complete and utter admiration. Anyway, so, I'll be posting a few poems - from NaPoWriMo and otherwise - from now on, but not all at once. Hopefully you'll like them.

Also, speaking of poems, three poems of mine are up on The Kajal Collective, and Idiopathic is now up on Wordgathering (with an audio recording done by Jill Khoury), which is a journal for and about disability literature. (Thank you all again for your advice re: my editing dilemma!)

In other news, I got a pretty medical bracelet! Actually, well, my neurologist gently ordered me to get a medical bracelet after all the complete nonsense my brain and body've been pulling lately, so. (I'm on so much medication, you guys, I have a morning and night routine. Apparently I'm severely vitamin d deficient as well as everything else, so.) Apparently there's an epilepsy society that has free ones, but I figured if I was going to get a medical bracelet, it was going to be a medical bracelet with style, so, therefore, this is my early birthday present:

11295758 10206724408607895 1551159215261177143 N by Vigilo


It's pretty gorgeous. 

Oh, and, I'll have the job in August, I think! I'm pretty sure, anyway, because they called me up about the tutoring and there's a summer school in August, and it sounds good. Also, about August, my housing arrangements have changed because of flighty flatmates, but not to worry, the new place (now a flat instead of a house) is equally gorgeous and has a super spacious balcony where I will put all the plants, and it also comes with the benefits of a) being much more similar to my place in Shanghai and b) having only one flatmate, who is a very close friend of mine and absolutely wonderful. 

I'm in Shanghai now, actually, I have been since the start of June (because my mother missed me awfully and whisked me off as soon as she could). I got to see and do so many wonderful things before I left, though: I went to an Alexander McQueen fashion exhibit, which was absolutely gorgeous; saw an opera - The Rise and Fall of the City of Mahagonny - for free as a part of a study (Alabama Song was my favourite - you can listen to Angel Blue sing it beautifully here!); saw Punch and Judy live at Covent Garden; etc, etc. Exam results and whatnot are coming at the start of July, so that's scary, though hopefully it won't be too bad. Still, I was completely right: linguistics is easily the best thing in the world, don't let anyone tell you different.

Apart from that, I've been reading and watching a lot - I have this friend, actually, he's like a drug dealer except he gives me free comics and takes me to free movies and plays (he's the one I saw Treasure Island with at the National Theatre!), so not like a drug dealer at all, but the point is, I've now read so many comics and watched - well, not as much, but I've dabbled in anime and cartoon shows more than I did previously. Don't worry, though, it's a mutually destructive friendship: I've given him who-knows-how-many books and made him watch equal amounts of anime and tv shows.

He also gave me a Batman notebook, which had stickers, and now I have a Bat-Mac!


Anyway, I'll stop now. Oh, before I do - the journal title is from In Jerusalem by Mahmoud Darwish, which is an absolutely sublime poem that I highly recommend, by a poet who's quickly becoming one of my favourites. How are you, what are your plans for the summer? :heart:
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Adulting is exhausting. How have all of you been doing it for so long? I'm not even a year in this whole business and I'm tired. I want a gold star. All of you get gold stars.

In other news, I've also gotten my living situation for next year sorted and gotten myself and three other friends / future flat-mates of mine a really nice place. It has a garden! I'm... too excited about the garden; it's actually the first thing I tell anyone when I tell them about the place. I have my reasons, and they are primarily nostalgia, because I had a garden of mostly marigolds when I was six - it was a lovely little rectangle thing next to our house (we had a bungalow at the time, which is weird, because I can't imagine living in a bungalow now) and it was the best thing ever. I have no idea how I managed to grow those marigolds but now that I have another garden, I'll figure it out. Maybe not marigolds, though. I have no idea what works in the weather here.

Looking back, that's really strange. What sort of six-year-old grows marigolds? Maybe it's because we didn't have flowers on the ships? I don't even know.

Anyway, when I said "I've" way back at the start of that second paragraph there, I mean that, because this wasn't like, a collaborative experiment or anything. I looked for the places, arranged the viewings, and signed the most forms. I'm not a tyrant friend, either (just terrifyingly well-organised, which is similar) - my friends were 100% okay with this and very kindly treated me with cold sugary drinks after, because they're fantastic. So, anyway, it's a great place, with a lovely garden and a living room and, most importantly, double beds in all of the (lovely) bedrooms. I mean, there's nothing wrong with the bed in my dorm, right now, but if I try to sprawl on it, I fall off, so.

Moving on, I'm going to be pretty busy until 19th May, because that's when my last exam is. After that, I'm free for ... months. 'til September, actually, because that's how university holidays work, apparently. That is ridiculous. University life is ridiculous. I have plans for the summer, though - I mean, I'm going to Shanghai in June, and coming back to London in August, but I've got things I want to do, like learning sign language and figuring out how to preheat normal ovens rather than touch the terrifying metal monster machine / oven we have in my current dorm so I can bake all the things. Basically, language and cooking, and maybe reading up on gardening.

Speaking of language, NaPoWriMo is ... going. I'm behind, but I'll catch up eventually, probably after I finish my assignment, and probably through really short micropoems, but, hey. I'm not going to break my track record. I really do like some of the results so far, though - one of my favourite particular phrases is "people of a pharmacy", which really works, considering I have a huge bag of meds sitting in my dorm right now:

  Untitled by Vigilo

Speaking of poetry, and meds, thank you to everyone who responded to the poll I put up; your advice was really helpful. I was a bit all over the place with it, because it was a journal on disability and while I'm not strongly attached to the journal, the quality is usually consistently good, and I am strongly attached to the whole - disability in literature thing, you know what I mean. I ended up working it out with the editors, and they have a poem of mine that I'm happy with, so it's all good. But, seriously, thanks for all your help, I don't know what I'd have done without you.

Finally! (At last, I know, I know.) I was talking with a Polish friend the other day, and she brought up Zbigniew Herbert, and the title of this journal is from a poem of his, Report from a Besieged City, (translated by Alissa Valles), which has been a favourite of mine for years, so, you know. Read that. It's good.

That's it from me, I think; how about you, how are you? What are you listening to? :heart:

Skin by SimplySilent
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