#i feel like i had a tag for these taggy things but i can't remember RIP

[briteboy]

awesome anon tag 🌞

i don’t have any posts today so i’m doin’ this!! i’m not really sure why this is called that? but it is. and here it is. thank you for tagging me @treelinesandpoppyfields (idk why it won’t let me tag you) and @seedlingspirit! i love to go on wild tangents about my characters and my weird writing process. enjoy

How did you come up with such unique & fascinating characters?

pls don’t gas me up like this i promise i don’t need it. but um...hmm. i’ve said this all before, but my characters are just extensions of me and different parts of my personality (as well as people i know.) they are characters that have existed for a long time, latently, and they didn’t take shape until i was able to actualize their forms in the sims. it’s weird and i don’t know if this will make sense, but when i really started to get into my story on here, it felt like everything i’d ever written had been leading up to it. like my own personal magnum opus. they were characters that took other forms before this in my other works, but finally came into their own on here. i talk about them like they’re real people, i know, but i think it’s because...i speak and put a lot of energy into my characters, and that’s what draws people to them. i appreciate all that makes a human, and that’s all they are...just very HUMAN, flawed and beautiful and all. i’m frankenstein

When you started writing your story, what did you take into consideration?

WELL. as an 8th house mercury, i think you can all tell i like to explore the taboo and push the limits of what’s acceptable, especially if it’s a delicate subject that will be worth illuminating and starting a conversation about. one of the biggest reasons i put off santi’s story for so long was because i was worried that y’all weren’t ready for it lmao. i knew when i committed to it that i was going to really have to go about it carefully, because suicide, depression, mental illness and trauma are...a lot. and again with lou, i was sooooooo nervous because i knew i was going to be writing about an age gap and the power dynamics and manipulation that come with it. i anticipated going into it that people would get all of these things misconstrued and think i condone them just because i’m writing about them, so i had to prepare myself for that. it’s fine, there are some things people just don’t want to understand past surface level and i get why they’d be put off by it in the first place. but i knew if i wanted the stories to really convey something, i’d have to bite the bullet, research and plan and write accordingly to make something powerful and meaningful. 

How did you shape each character’s background/family?

slowly and over time, that’s all i can say, really. i love studying other cultures and featuring them in my writing, so you can see how that’s been the basis of much of the expansion of my characters. story stuff aside, my favorite part of the sims is the family dynamic and raising up generations, so that’s kinda the backbone of my story? little details just took shape over a while and in turn it helped me shape the plot.

Do you plan everything before starting, or are you more spontaneous?

oh i am a planner through and through. i have to know every big event and the in between details (roughly) before i can commit, otherwise it feels directionless. that being said-- as i go along, things do change, i take out some things and add in others as it feels right. i was actually a bit more spontaneous with santi’s story at first because storytelling through the sims was a whole new thing for me and i had no idea what i was doing and early on i just winged it...i went in with a rough idea for molly’s fate and i was juggling a few possibilities but it didn’t actually click for me until like 4 months into the story. sometimes it just be like that!! now that i’ve been doing this for a while tho i know what to expect from my own progress and with my past experience planning stories, so it’s a lot more formulated this time. 

Does reality inspire you, or do you rely more on your imagination?

reality definitely!! i just think the intricacy of human life is fascinating, everyone is going through something different and on the surface you’d never be able to tell, but each individual has their own story, things that they’ve been through and survived, etc. and i love exploring that concept

When did you KNOW you were going to make this story?

oh. oho...this post. when i first made santi i was like...oh...this fucker. like...on some level i just KNEW i would get attached to him. and i stuck with girooni and didn’t play with him for so long because i was like...i can’t...this isn’t what my followers signed up for...and then he moved in with girooni that summer and i started playing with him and i was like...oh.............oh...........i don’t even know where it came from but ideas kept popping into my mind and nagging me, and i was reading a storm of swords at the time and jon’s storyline with ygritte...just..........ok..........i read the cave scene and i was like...“oh. haha...great. so i’m really gonna have to do santi’s story aren’t i.” and that night i stayed up writing out everything i knew about santi and his back story and it just came flooding out. lou’s story...i never intended on doing anything with her in that realm until maybe like...i think...may-ish? of last year? when things were about to start poppin’ off in santi’s story...and it was just vague ideas again like it started with santi, and THEN...lorde’s melodrama came out and i was like oH.............yeah so like that’s happening then. it’s funny, the pattern seems to be: 1) vague ideas, 2) fighting those ideas, 3) consuming a piece of media that reminds me of those ideas and gives me an epiphany, and 4) finally giving in and doing the damn thing.

What has shaped your story into being the way it is?

i mean, not much other than what i’ve already said here. it’s interesting because i feel like i actually grow with my story. it isn’t JUST a piece of fiction, it’s a process and an experience, and as it grows, i grow with it, and my freaking...pisces mercury...makes me absorb all the emotions that the characters experience so it’s just a huge commitment for me. i know i sound crazy saying this but...lmao i guess the story and i shape each other. i treat it like a living, breathing thing. also all the amazing responses DEFINITELY influence it as well. it’s weird to think how different it might’ve been if i’d never posted it on here, if i posted it in another form or just let it rot inside my head forever. so being on here in itself has shaped both me and my story a lot, and i thank you for that 💕

i tag @moonsyrups @bananahut @inquietant @dreambot and @astrasouls