Letters to God

 

Welcome back! Good to see you! We're going to listen to me rant about a long-standing problem today.

I have never, not even once, doubted that God exists. It's never been a question for me. I know there's people who are like "Well, there isn't a compelling reason to think there's a God." I have never had that question. Dunno why. I just haven't.

My question is a different type: if God is real, does He really love me? Can He?

This past week has been hard. I thought I was done with flashbacks, with PTSD. I even had said goodbye to my therapist in that capacity. All had been well.

Welp.

It's been a week of flashbacks, all the old self-destructive impulses, and the crushing realization that everything I have ever written on this blog is true... and that's not necessarily making me happy. I don't know what to do with myself. With my life. The realization that it's all true and I am somehow all of it has crashed in with the sickening epiphany that I'm still riddled with nervous tics that aren't healthy, moral injuries I can't even see, and a sense of fallibility that's frankly floored me.

These are all bullshit words to try and communicate a deep panic. Imagine some poor kid on a merry-go-round, puke flying out of his mouth, as he begs everyone to let him get off for a moment... and then collapses on the damn thing as it spins and cries. And it just never stops spinning. Even as he goes catatonic.

I came home today, trying very much to ignore these things. And found myself snapping at Maria. She'd done something small, and instead of just shrugging and going "Well, nobody's perfect," I went "WHY AREN'T YOU PERFECT WHEN I NEED YOU TO BE." I mean, why not? I put in the work, why shouldn't I have some demands.

The young and stupid are nodding along.

The older and happily married are going "OH SHIT YOU DIDN'T".

I almost did.

I sorta struggled through the rest of the objectively pleasant evening. It is amazing how damaging your own sins are, to your ability to enjoy a simple evening. But man, it almost ruined me this night. I just... sat through it. Let myself simmer and stew. I gritted my teeth and was present as best as I could be. I later tried telling Maria I was sorry, and that almost started a fight, but finally I just said "It wasn't small to me."

And her response?

"I know, but I couldn't do what you wanted. I can't just be what you want."

Rage came up.

Was swallowed.

And I really looked at this poor woman who had been blindsided with a battle neither of us anticipated. I felt, for just one moment, that quiet and tired thing that kept her coming back to me, radiating off of her.  The small, still Voice was in her tiredness. It always seems to be. He always seems to be in those moments when she's just trying to love me and I'm fighting her with every last bit of strength... and still she persists. What a saint. She's way too fucking good for me.

I nodded. "No, you can't. And that's okay."

She relaxed. She could tell I meant it.

And for one second I could feel something resembling peace.

It was short-lived. It isn't always, but tonight it is. Oh well. God knows my warring heart needs something to do, I suppose. Here we go. So, I'm sitting here, later, banging this out on my keyboard instead of cleaning the fucking kitchen, and I am saying, loudly, angrily, with more hope than I ever thought I could: "I'M NOT FUCKING DONE YET. IS THAT ALL YOU GOT??? I GOT A LOT MORE IN THE TANK, AND I'M STILL YOUNG. LET'S GO!"

Is that the wisest thing?

Probably not.

But I can only be what I am, and right now I am pissed off and want to take all that's evil within me and get rid of it. And I can feel that it is obliging me in the appointment. I am going to win.

So I get up, eager. Rage sparks through my bones, getting my muscles to work again... I see the incoming wave. I know that I am going back to the war. I will need to swim through this next tsunami of exhaustion, trauma, and moral damage. It's coming right at me.

Oh, Defender, if only you could see what I see, as I see it!

I can't run. The wave is too big. I wonder if it'll take me out. For one second there's a twinge of fear.

It turns to aggression, raw defiance: if I go down, it's going to be charging. Let's go. I start a run. Right into the darkness. Again.

Who knows? Maybe the eagles will come in time, this time. I keep seeing them, circling. Hopefully those aren't vultures. That would suck. Oh well. Only one way to find out. Hopefully God does love me, and those are eagles.

I suppose God loves vultures too. He gives them food, too, specifically those who don't make it. Even the bones of the fallen are used to benefit someone. Should I despair of God's love as He provides for the vultures?

Fuck it. Time to go live.

It is here I leave you, until next week. If I do not see you again, I do not blame you. It is no easy road.

The Dragon's Fire: Epilogue

 

The Dragon's Fire: Chapter Eleven

Rappa 21-25

The Queen, King Melny's wife, and their child have escaped to Sota City. Sota Fortress is fallen. Her honor guard surrounds her and the child jealously. They demand an accounting of where the king and his companions have been. The Argentum overlords are putting up with this "visiting" queen, but only because of the strength of her honor guard... and the viisuulas insisting that King Melny's family is to be protected. The Argentum general is compliant with the wisdom whales' wishes, for now...

Chapter Eleven (Rappa 26)

Moving Forward: The Crescendo Clubhouse

Welcome back! Today, we talk about turning the Crescendo discord server into a clubhouse.

It is always a question of what your goal is. Always. When I first started designing Crescendo the goal was raw: never leave that feeling I had at the end of Book of the Short Sun, and the rest of the Solar Cycle. I labored with that goal in mind. I have accomplished my goal, admirably even. But the problem shifted even as it was solved, and now I find myself at another crossroads: now that I have this game, what do I do with it?

That's a flawed question, as we'll see in a minute. Put a pin in it.

The biggest things that I got out of my time working on Crescendo have been threefold:

1. Gaming allows a form of vulnerability with people I find necessary.

2. As long as I stick with people, the project expands.

3. As the project expands, people will come on board who will want to do "more" with it, and may actually want to take point.

I do not think most people are naturally comfortable with being vulnerable with each other. I also think that people need to be vulnerable with each other. It is vital. It is not negotiable. Our culture is so bad with it, and the rift between what's expected of human beings and what's needed is now so wide that it's a wonder there aren't more suicides. Crescendo's helped with that problem, in a way that's a lot of fun, and I couldn't be prouder of what it's accomplished.

The more important point, however, has been that I simply do not have any ambition... because I like just playing with people. I like designing games and playing them with people. I don't particularly care for the business end of it. And I have found that, as long as I am playing with people and enjoying the time with them, things grow. And that's a nice byproduct of the one thing I really care about... playing the game.

The thing is, the other day one of the players just out and out suggested a mechanic that absolutely improves Crescendo. I never would have thought of it, but the idea was utterly correct. So, it's going into the 0e draft, which I'm currently working on. We'er going to playtest it, and make sure it works the way we thought it would. Now, if he can just show up and come up with an idea that I frankly could never have come up with, on my own, then someone better suited to this whole business bullshit may. I don't care, I just want to play the game with people.

And that, I think, is the real answer to the question I pinned earlier. I set out to chase a feeling I got from Gene Wolfe. I caught it. The game exists now, and it does what I wanted it to do. But the goal was never really to "have" the game. The goal was to feel that thing again, and then to share it. 

Turns out the best way to keep feeling it is to keep playing with people who make it better than I ever could alone. So maybe the next question isn't "what do I do with Crescendo?" 

Maybe it's simpler: keep showing up. Keep the table open. Keep making space for the next person who walks in with an idea I never would have had, or the next quiet player who finally feels safe enough to speak up. 

The game will keep growing, or it won't. People will run with it, or they won't. Business stuff will happen, or it won't. 

None of that is the point anymore.

The point is the table. The point is the moment when someone laughs, or cries, or leans in and says, "Wait… what if we did it like this?"

As long as that keeps happening, I’m exactly where I want to be.

Crescendo isn’t something I need to "do" anything with.

It’s something we get to keep doing. Together.

And that feels like a pretty good place to be.

So, with that in mind...

I am going to put up everything I have been developing, on Itch, and I'm going to start running them all, talking about them all. If we can get people trying these ideas, they'll help develop the philoisophy more.

So, c'mon over. Let's play some games!