#(again... oof. I’m too wordy!! agh)

[thewindbloom]

Didn't want to add on to that post, but you definitely don't have to feel bad about changing your mind on selling a dragon! You laid out your terms and it was pretty clear they didn't really respect. If they keep bothering you, you could totally report them for harassment because wow they are excessive.

Thank you, this is a comfort to hear and be reaffirmed in, and I’ll definitely keep harassment in mind if it escalates at all in the coming bit of time. ^u^/

I guess I’m mostly just conflicted out of an obligation to follow through on my decision even after and through the annoyance of a bad day, before learning the behavior that irked me so was a pattern/repeat offense. I mostly just feel guilty about letting that taint my decision here? Like, heck, Sobek would be sold off at fodder price anyways after I was through with him / when I got a better breeder out of him, which I guess I now have a few from the recent clutch that would work, though properly unrelated mates are hard. Maybe I’ll just politely set up a CR with a note and my “higher” (as opposed to cheap fodder level) price tag, and block if things go horribly wrong? I made the decision a long time ago to stick by what I say and commit to and this is... one of those things that I halfway did, though never defined how. Left myself a loophole I guess, never set a price.

They seem perfectly reasonable and delighted to sell to others inquiring about their dragons, just a bit ill advised on how to go about asking - whether or not that approach is a strategy they’ve purposefully adopted or one born out of immaturity or through the example of others asking the same of them, who knows? I mostly just feel like I’d be a little unfair by shutting down out of the blue without a proper explanation or a hey, next time, maybe don’t? Like that’s a bad rap of me from their perspective if they really don’t get that they’re not approaching things properly... But it’s clear there’s already been a message like that. It was ignored, and then that evidence was erased before poking at me, I’m the evidence of that part. Why they left any of the previous messages at all is one thing that leaves me puzzling, though. My story-driven brain is wondering what purpose they could have fulfilled by being left behind. What appeal do those even make?

In all honesty, I don’t want to be the sack of lit dynamite here. I know I can be, and I’m prone to being that, but honestly I’d rather just be kind. I put up a pretty good front here, on my blog and in my interactions, but in all reality I am absolutely too easily the little ball of rage I don’t really want to be. Rose bushes have a butt-ton of thorns, Y’know? They can be pretty and smell nice for a time, and the buds dry well, but they always have thorns. I always have to disarm the cuttings. Same goes for me. Always have to chill and take a step back and be cold and rational and maybe push myself through a cheery disposition when I’m thorny and angsty. I can do and make nice things happen in spite of it.

I wouldn’t be wrong to decline now, and change my mind, I know this, but... if they *are* just a kid, I’d rather leave the door open to them learning to do better by others, Somehow. Instead of letting them continue on as the “flashing some cash will get me what I want when I want” kind of approach without at least a word on how better to do so.

I don’t want to act solely on my annoyance, or even on the knowledge that just prior to me, they were bouncing around trying the same thing on others. I know I was having a bad day the day they approached me, and gosh, half of my irritation stems from the giddy push in how they messaged, but half of it was just in how easily my mind took those messages and warped them into some other image/characterization in my memory of the events. Maybe the effect of thin slicing and the part where they felt a little like that one HTTYD spammer in tone just threw me off, I dunno. If I didn’t see the evidence of others prior, I wouldn’t have as much of a conflict in whether or not I would send Sobek over. If I didn’t know about any of that, I would be a lot nicer, a lot more willingly, after I finished. I cooled off. I know I did. My irritation was replaced with a cold anxiety about how many messages I would get once I reached out again, or once I hatched Sobek’s nest, a quiet fear of interaction. It only relapsed into irritation once I saw the DR post, and frankly, I dunno. It’s a struggle of the internal sort. I’m already cooling off again as I re-examine it rationally for the fourth time.

But... I think I’ll try the CR. Give a price tag with the explanation that yeah I‘m having a hard time finding a replacement for him still and that’s a cause for reluctance even after breeding him. Give them some pointers, say hey, this wasn’t so cool, be more chill, and then move on with my life. If they don’t like it, kick up a stink, big deal, I move on and block. If they’re excited and happy about it, great, I’ve done some good. It’s not like they could do anything with Sobek that would really impact me: I’m not attached, it’s a multi-gen breeding project in its infancy, I’ll eventually find another Coatl, I’m sure, his parents are a dedicated breeding pair and I signed on to a hatchery pinglist in prep for finding a replacement, plus his kids from the recent nest are still pretty cool. A double orange and a double bronze, with primaries that are closer than Sobek was. The double orange in particular came out as a great stepping stone onwards, if there was anything compatible out there rn. One day.

We’ll see how it goes. I guess majority of my feelings were in the bit where I was quite pent up and allowed it to run off freely and grow out of proportion.