a simultaneous post

my home computer is broken but will be up and ready within a few days.

Surprisingly enough, I seem to enjoy the peace the lack of internet means in our home.
In the meantime, let me draw your attention towards my other blog called The Copper Moon Project, which is about writing only. I set that one up to monitor my way towards finishing a short piece of writing of the same name, needless to say only to interrupt it when the online game got me.
That was about the time when I started writing Halo, so my attention is turned towards that project instead.
Some of you are familiar with this blog, some with the other one, but there should not be such a separation.
That other one is about writing, in particular and in general, while this one is basically about anything I face. Whenever I have anything to publish is getting published here. Poems, writings, photos and musings about everyday...it's all here, while all topics more related to writing are over there.
Thanks for your attention.

Snow covers it

Snow covers it

Memories of us -
Clapping with one hand only
Never having given yourself all
You had me

My yearning's a tree that bears no fruit
Yet I cherish and return for the sake of
Your being and your spirit
It was not really you
...were you?

I gave myself all
And snow covers it
Silence entombing like
An empty pot, left broken, to the will of the winds

Snow covers my tears
And the memories of us

The what?

The photo was made in The Netherlands October 2008. I was visiting a windmill in one of the small cities in the country. I climbed up to see what's there is to see within a windmill in work, when I came accross this sight. I was forced to look and perceive a sight not so special and perhaps, not so intereseting. I made some other photos of this abandoned building. I don't know the reason. I just had to. It sucked me in.
My forewords are to remember this situation. The words beneath the photo I gathered today in an attempt to turn this something I feel inside out. It is definitely borne by the photo, and perhaps something I still have inside. Enjoy. Or whatever.




The smell of mould. The touch of aluminum. Cold and tough beneath the inside of his broken palm.
A cigarette might help.
A car turned around the corner down on the street. He lowered himself on the gravel. Each and every little stone in the concrete reached to his leg. Some of them felt smooth, some had shrieking edges. Too much information.
He forced the paper between his parched lips and took a long sniff. It was not lit.
Behind the curtain of my eyes a howling approaches.
Numbing illusions to minimum, screwing up perceptions to maximum. Too much.
If I could only break the bars.
Out of the cage.
His stomach shivered. The scree attained his flesh, his tendons, his bones underneath.
The lighter in his pocket. With hands shaking the let the little dancing flow of fire meet the end of the roll. A tip of flame kissed his fingers, piercing dry skin. He hardly noticed the smell of burning flesh.
Finally. Out with you all.
The flow took him up and above. Out of the cage.

the cage - in or out? part one

As I promised, this is a post about the online game I was involved in between mid March 2008 until last Thursday.

The photos I'm going to use are completely unrelated. All were made in The Netherlands, and I'm using them on purpose to honor our great time with Bart - since our discussion involved the problem of addiction...this is a confession...

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The name of the game I leave unrevealed now. It is unimportant and I don't want to get any hits from random internet searchers.
It all started fine like any other computer game...A fun to spend my empty minutes with, a source of fun...
But it crept deeper. It wanted more. More of my time, my thoughts, my mind, my being.
I'm not being dramatic here. Okay, well, maybe a little bit.
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In this game the player has a village, builds resources of raw materials to get wood, clay, iron and wheat from and starts developing the inside of his village, too. During the course of the game the player establishes new villages of his own, conquers special oazises to get more raw materials; builds an army to defense his villages and/or to attack, destroy and/or conquer villages of other players, too.
Most people gather into clans to help each other and to defeat other players.
As I've said, it started like a little fun in March.
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Somewhere along May I realized that cared about the villages I built/conquered more than I should have.
In my pre-game era, I had thoughts and ideas running through my head. There were inspirational moments, which resulted in some pieces of writing. But as I found out in horror around late autumn to early fall, these moments of inspiration have almost completely gone. And I have begun to terribly miss them, yet I was unable to escape from the game to re-claim my fantasy and inspiration.
It's not the quality of my writings I think highly of. It's the fact that there were moments of inspiration, the fact that I used my creativity to reflect my thoughts.
Yet, I don't think the game stopped me completely from thinking or being creative or even inspirational...
I have created a circle of friends among some of the other players, and most of the time we stuck together. There were times when I was a leader of a clan. Most of the time I used my diplomatic senses either to get something or to smooth conflicts.
Furthermore, three of us got involved in writing a fiction about the game in Hungarian, set in medieval surroundings. I mentioned that in my other blog sometime October. I actually wrote three instalments titled 'The Amazon 1, 2 and 3'. These pieces received positive feedback. Perhaps I will translate them into English one day.
I enjoyed writing, I truly did.
Among the members of my clan, I have become (in)famous for my long and sometimes, emotionally stirring letters. I poured my attitude towards the game and my fellow-players into my letters. For my letters, my views I have both been praised by some and scowled away by some, too.
I learnt a lot about myself and about the human nature in general.
I found friends, I suppose. As for the length of such friendships and their durance once the game is over....that's another issue.
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And now the server is over as it is the nature of this one special game.
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My husband and family tolerated my playing quite well - although sometimes I became unhappy and even mourned over my virtual losses. Sometimes I would flee away from a family dinner because of a timing an important attack. Sometimes I would stay awake for the same purpose. Finding my virtual soldiers important involved switching the computer on being the very first action of the day so I could control my villages to avoid any loss due to a potential lack of wheat. For the same purpose, for most of the time the computer was the last thing I said goodnight, too. Sounds crazy, doesn't it?
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Last Thursday, when the server ended we opened up a bottle of wine with my husband to celebrate my return to the normal world - and he's right in seeing this game as an alternative world to the real one.
Not a really ground breaking idea to call an online game a world alternative to the real one, I know, I know.
But you see, understanding the concept of virtual vs. real is one thing and actually going through the whole thing is another.
I think there were moments when the virtual felt real and the real fell secondary. Perhaps, those moments would actually add up to days or even weeks. It is harsh to look upon the way I lived through these months like this.
Sometimes my husband would say that the garden is missing a good gardener. Sometimes he would say he would do the cooking. Sometimes he would say he would not be able to work on the renovations alone as he would need me nearby so the renovations would halt for a while. Until at least the battle was over. Or the village was conquered.
And for what?
Among the 10thousand something players playing simultaneously I finished in the top 500. I established 11 villages on my own, while conquered 8 from other players.
My enthusiasm inspired some other players. On one occasion I have been called 'the spirit of the clan' I was in.
But what are these advantages and disadvantages? Can I measure them up? By putting the successful battles and all the collective actions, the praise and acknowledgement gathered, all the friends I make in one hand … while putting all the windows left unclean, poems left unread and unwritten, the number of occasions the kids left unembraced and uncaressed in the other…?
Can anyone measure these?
Is there a punishment for all the things I missed actually doing, all because of being so deeply involved in a virtual world?
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My husband accuses me of running away into the virtual. He thinks this is more than a game for me, this is an escape from reality. Like a drug. Unfortunately I don't see any reason to call him wrong. Because he's right about that.
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Well, more on that, perhaps, later on,
Yours truly addicted *grins*,
SzF.

new duties

Dear all,
these days we are still waiting for the exam results and once we have them the next step of the application starts. As I have informed you my son is trying to get into a secondary school. Final results are to be expected sometime mid April.
He is either accepted - in which case he would probably need more help from us with learning. This is a tough school, you know.
But if his results are low and he stays out, we should try the same thing next year, as we were advised.
If that were the case (=no admission for the year 09/10) he would either be homeschooled OR enrolled into another (Catholic) school. Only to try the entrance exams to the same school in January 2010 once again.
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In the meantime we are waiting, keeping his mind occupied...
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Some of you might recall the long post I wrote about the local women's club last March. Here's the link for those who wish to care...
Well, I did not quit but restricted my activities to the minimum.
In fact, I withdrew from the management completely and turned my attention towards other activities the club took.
One of them was making mosaics.
Here's my first ever job.
A number plate for our house, displayed on the kitchen floor.

Also, being the member involved attending a film club, where once in a month we watched and discussed a non-mainstream film. One of them was Friends and crocodiles, more on the later on...
So, time has passed, the organization has changed again, for the better this time...and there I'm back again....

I've been given the task of writing articles for the monthly online magazine the group wishes to publish. Lifestlyle, traditions, gardening, herbs, environmental issues are my main areas of writing here, but I am there also as a watchdog to make sure feminism does not get carried away to the extremes...
Well, this is a title I gave myself, but I'm not doing it secretly. I'm open about being an advocate of diversity among the members of the group. As you know they used to speak diversity, but used to act the opposite.
We'll just see how it works out.

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The online game I mentioned a couple of times here, has ended yesterday. I was sad and happy at the same time. More on that later on, too.
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In the meantime, we are still working on our house... This is my husband and a friend laying the tiles in the kitchen.