#just really sick of having unstable job situations and being in this stasis

[kingofthewilderwest]

Note: This personal vent post (though it’s about my own current personal Stuff) contains massive Mass Effect 3 spoilers.

I’m a bit of a latecomer to the Mass Effect franchise... played the first game at the end of 2015 and the second at the start of 2016. I decided to play the full trilogy in anticipation of Andromeda’s release, and I finally had the opportunity to purchase and play ME 3 for the first time these last two weeks. I knew about a lot of the spoilers, but it’s still profoundly impacted me, and made me feel something more deep, unsettling, real, and pressingly painful than the typical recreational feel I get with a bittersweet story. This hurts.

There are a number of reasons it hurts, but the thing that hurts me most is Mordin’s story. I think it’s the best character story hands down in the Mass Effect trilogy - I could talk for a long time about that freakishly amazing characterization and retribution arc. But the point is that Mordin’s story HURTS MAJORLY because, even though I love it, I relate too much to it.

I’m not the same as Mordin, but I found a lot of... identity comfort... and an ability to relate... to the character. I can relate to the hyperactive mind constantly doing ninety side projects. I can relate to dabbling in a lot of different areas... where he might be creative writing, music, theatre, genetics, and the like, I’m things like creative writing, music, linguistics, philosophy, theology, and the like. I can relate to using data and logical analysis as the point of choice over other factors to the point it’s ridiculous. I can relate to being outwardly smooth and confident about my choices while inside being eaten away by what I’ve done. I’ll even admit I can relate to his eyebrow-raising ethics. I can relate to ever wondering if I made the right critical choice. I can relate to being introverted but willing to converse or open up, relate to loving the sciences and the arts, relate to not being the best at socializing or showing it but still obviously caring about the people in my care. Screw it, even the asexuality thing. I guess the whole point of this rant paragraph is that I can find a lot of excitement, happiness, and comfort in Mordin’s character because I can relate to it.

And I can relate to the... success thing... I guess. The great, esteemed Doctor Mordin Solus. Pretty important guy. When he was at the top of his game working with the STG on the genophage, he had top secret clearance, worked with the best resources and team, had an extremely active life filled with excitement and companionship, and found it satisfying. I’m not trying to sound cocky or anything... but I had those years, too. Not quite as monumental, but still... that sense of self-confidence and everything going right around me and being successful? Yeah that was there. High school years, especially senior year - first chair All-State Orchestra flautist, highest GPA valedictorian in the school’s 120 year history, soccer player on the best team in the league, all sorts of awards and recognitions coming my way, great friends to stay by me... I was the TOP and I knew it. And I was thrilled and I loved it.

But life goes forth, and as it does, the consequences of our actions catch up to us. The year 2011 started as my best year. It ended horribly and led to a terrible 2012. I don’t need to explain what happened, except that things came crashing down on me everywhere. Everywhere. And over the course of the last five years, I continued losing. I couldn’t even stay in a PhD program because my depression took too hard of a toll on me for me to stay engaged (I will NEVER return to that program).

So here I am, in the middle of nowhere, some no-name graceless location, feeling like the rest of my life is going to be spent here.

Mordin’s story felt so real. After he left Omega, though, with the sleepless nights and the spiritual soul-searching... he made a comeback. Entered the Collector base. Worked with the STG again to help ‘Eve’. Even created a cure for the genophage to undo that which gave him so much ethical struggling in the first place.

I want that so badly. To get out of this mire of uselessness I’m currently in, where I sit around like a lump of potatoes doing nothing important at all, not even getting decent human contact. To get back to a state where I can be productive and impactful again.

But while there are some moments that Mordin’s story can inspire me... Mass Effect 3 also crumples me.

Fuck it, that was one of the big things that got spoiled to me before I played the game anyway. I KNEW that Mordin was going to die (yeah yeah I know there’s a way for him to live, but that requires some hoop jumping I hadn’t done). I knew that the Renegade route was literally you shooting him right then and there. I managed to piece together a lot of the rest because plots are predictable - I predicted it had to involve some sort of betrayal, that it involved the genophage, that it likely involved some sort of retribution arc where he created the cure, that it’d be a Kobayashi Maru. But I still bawled when I saw him in my Paragon route implement the cure. 

I’ve never been NUMBED and... sort of traumatized... by a character death before. In truth, I tend to adooooore these things. And I STILL will argue with you guys for centuries to come that this scene on Tuchanka is the most incredible and impacting moment in the entire ME franchise. Fight me. So I do adore it. I can’t stop thinking about it. But I *did* legitimately feel horribly, painfully numbed for two days after seeing the Paragon death with my own two eyes from my own actions in the game. It’s like I was literally mourning a real being.

Yes, I know that they write characters really well, and that Mordin was extraordinary writing even on top of that. But it wasn’t just losing a fictional character that I’d attached to. It was.......... somehow, somehow... hitting at the struggles I’m currently in. And basically telling me my life was going to explode. Whatever I do, it’ll end in a “death” - maybe I’ll accomplish something, but it’ll be my end.

I’ve been terrified since leaving the PhD that I am at a dead end. That I’m not going anywhere, that I *can’t* go anywhere, that I’m stuck in a stasis no matter how hard I fight to get something better. That I’m going to be in dead end jobs with no progression and little companionship and no sense of satisfaction. That I’ll never again feel the thrill of what it was to tackle academia in my heyday. Where getting a Masters and three Bachelors and a Minor and a Certificate in four fucking years from a university was TOTALLY doable with an extremely high GPA and a bunch of awards and scholarships and.... where I could LIVE and be in my element. I’m afraid I’ll never get that sense of element again. That I’ll just be in something lackluster, unfulfilling, unappealing. I’m afraid I’ll never leave Omega and never be able to get that peaceful night’s rest. And I’m afraid that even if I make it to Tuchanka and reach the top of the Shroud... I’ll just get shot down... and never get the returned fulfillment in my life I wanted.

Mordin surviving in ME 3 requires two bad decisions to be made in the previous games, and frankly, while it does mean he lives, it’s not a satisfying ending so much from a storytelling perspective. The story was MEANT for him to die. And it just comes as a crushing blow to me... making me feel as though my story is meant to die. I’m not saying literally - I’m not saying me dying - but me having any good experiences in life dying. No matter what I do, whether I’m shot in the back or not... it ends.

Sometimes I can look at the scene and feel inspired. I can see how fucking nervous he was to implement the cure. How he took those attempted deep breaths, how he hummed under his breath to try to comfort him as the tower was falling apart around him, how we could see how scared he was that the next fiery blast would be the one that took him out. That’s inspiring and amazing, to see someone be brave and do things despite them not feeling brave. To see him make that successful redemption in the Paragon route and become a hero that will be sung about in the generations to come (ballads about him! theatre kid Solus would feel so honored), to see that the first born krogan prince is named after him... I mean, that IS the story of a hero. That’s inspiring.

But so often what I just feel is....... a sense of loss. A loss of *me*. That I’m lost and never coming back.

And that’s not quite it either. But I don’t have the words for what I’m feeling or why I’m feeling it or why some stupid instance in just a video game (albeit a very good story) is hitting me so hard. Usually I’m like, soaking into dramatic death scenes. They’re my catharsis, weird as it sounds. I seek out recreational pain so that I can get a sense of emotional relief in my own life. But this? This was raw pain. I’m so happy I experienced it, but at the same time, I’m struggling with this. I can’t fully articulate why. I know this long vent is only part of it. 

I’m just... so sick of being nowhere.

And even if I can’t point out “why,” I just feel so... afraid... pained... hurt... to end up as he did. That I could end up like that. That a character I aspire and adore so much ended up as he did. Don’t get me wrong, it was so fitting, it was so good... but I just... emotions... I can’t.

It’s not about the game. I’m not having problems with the GAME. I’m having problems with something in my heart, resonating within my own life.

It’s the problem of seeing your own hero come crashing down I guess???

Yeah.

Seeing one’s own hero - and through that one’s own ideals and hopes and dreams - come crashing down with a bullet in his chest and a hand that never reaches the console to disseminate the cure.

Mordin’s death.

It’s somehow an attack on my own sense of hope and dreams and goals.

I just... I don’t know what more to say. I don’t even know if this is coherent... crying too hard and too lazy to reread for edits. How many times have I cried about this now?

Friendly reminder that sage all-knowing advice, “It will be okay,” or “I believe in you” responses do *NOT* make me feel better. Non-obtrusive suggestions of what’s going on in my head, saying you relate, or something like that is welcome though.