(no subject)

[raven]

Hello, new people. I'm pleased that people are coming back to Dreamwidth and I hope it's an ongoing trend.

I have been in this type of fandom since 2001; I was around at the tail-end of Usenet and mailing lists, just before we all moved to LiveJournal. I moved to Dreamwidth with everyone else back in 2010 or so (or whenever Strikethrough was!) and I have not really -- gone anywhere else. (Ye gods. How you know how old I am - I find it momentarily jarring when people call it their Dreamwidth "feed" and not their flist.) I have a Twitter, which I do use, and a Tumblr, which I don't; the form of interaction never worked for me very well because I'm really verbose and I like comments. I also found it quite disturbing that I had been very young for Usenet and LJ fandom, and then suddenly I was very old for Tumblr fandom - somehow I never got a fandom adulthood? (But I'm still into things. Star Trek and Doctor Who (again just recently) and the Vorkosigan series and long ago, M*A*S*H, and really, a lot of other things.)

Anyway! Pleased to meet you. If you have heard of me before, it's probably is because I have written a whole shitload of fanfic over a period of seventeen years. (Most, but not all, is on the AO3.)

About me otherwise: I'm a thirtysomething lawyer and civil servant (and because of the job, a portion of what I write here is locked; I don't mind people reading it if they want to and you should feel free to ask, but I don't like to have it in public). I like languages. I'm a pro writer under another name. I'm brown and nonbinary. I don't really know what else you'd need to know about me! Hi.

Comments

[rmc28]

I had not realised you were nonbinary, so the obvious question from me is what pronouns do you prefer?

[raven]

Thank you for asking! She or they are both fine.

[sewn]

Hi. :D

I'm also having a bit of a hard time adjusting to DW lingo -- I keep wanting to say "friended" or "add," although I guess we are subscribing now?

I've had my account for years, but I haven't been an active user so far. After my Livejournal life died down, I haven't had a fixed namespace identity, and now my brain apparently thinks we're back to LJ.

I also had that suddenly-too-old experience with Tumblr. I never got the hang of having discussions over there. So, I'm pretty excited by this turn of events, even if it comes on the heels of fannish turmoil.

[raven]

Yeah, me too. I'm trying not to be super super excited about it, because people are losing a lot with Tumblr, but there's a lot of me that's glad. I never was going to get the hang of Tumblr even if I lived to be a hundred (which I basically was already in Tumblr years).

[velithya]

but there's a lot of me that's glad.

I AM FEELING THIS SO HARD

[lieu]

I had been very young for Usenet and LJ fandom, and then suddenly I was very old for Tumblr fandom - somehow I never got a fandom adulthood?

Oh man, I feel this from a certain end; I was very young for LJ fandom (I think I was... 15? when Strikethrough happened, but I had been on the site for a couple years by that point already--I wish my 13 year old journal entries were still around, I am so morbidly curious, lol) so I segued into Tumblr fandom fairly easily but I think I've been able to romanticize the halcyon days of LJ fandom in my head because of being sort-of-there-but-not-really. Which platforms we use really do shape our fandom experiences, I think in ways that aren't always obvious at the time. Hm. Anyway.

Also: oh wow! You're a lawyer! That's so neat. I wrote the LSAT a few months back and am planning on applying to law schools in the next year or two, depending on how long my current, fairly tenuous job situation sticks around. If you don't mind me asking, what kind of law do you practice?

[raven]

Yep, me too - I was 13 in 2001 and, uh, lied about it a lot. I tend to think of LJ fandom as halcyon days also but honesty, they kind of were. :)

So by training I'm an agricultural property litigator, but these days I work for a central government department as a legislative draftsman. It's a hell of a job a lot of the time but I do love it (and if you want to know more about it, I have a tag - "law: on her majesty's obvious service"). I'm British btw and English-qualified - many years ago I did the LSAT but never went for the JD in the end. What kind of law are you interested in?

[lieu]

Oh wow, agricultural property litigation! That sounds interesting to me, genuinely, because my family has had to engage with agricultural property law quite a bit more than the average person due to some peculiarities of our province. (Thanks for the pointer to the tag!)

I'm Canadian, so our system is sort of between the American and the British, though by now most schools offer JD only (though not all, not even of the big ones). LSAT is required for all of them, though. My main area of interest is penal law, actually. I am not wedded to that, however :p

[hopelesse]

Hello! I was sent in your direction by my friend (and sometimes-commenter on your posts) elanid. She thought that a hilarious, thoughtful queer law/civil service person would be a great person for me, a queer person interested in law and civil service, to add to my budding flist.

(Do we still call it a flist? I'm part of the Great Tumblr Exodus but I more or less remember my LJ manners.)

Anyway, hi! Once upon a time ago I read a Doctor Who fic by you that made me tear up! Glad to see that there's still fondness out there for M*A*S*H!

[genarti]

I feel like consensus has never really been reached about what we call our reading lists/pages. I've seen flist, I've seen dwircle, I've seen feed, I've seen others I'm blanking on right now, and I'm pretty sure I use at least half of the probs according to my whim since I've never really found a satisfactory one to settle on myself. But I use flist most of all, I think.

[raven]

Hello! How lovely to meet you! Tell me about your interest in law and civil service! (and M*A*S*H, fandom of my heart :))

[hopelesse]

Well! I have a background in nonprofit work coordinating with social welfare program administration but after doing that for a few years I figured that I needed to get a little more active in fixing.....all that. So I decided that I needed to go to law school. (Admittedly, this is a slightly long-term plan because I'm waiting for at least another year or two while my wife finishes her PhD, but there's no harm in doing some more background reading!)

And M*A*S*H is my sweetest darling, my forever home, my comfort DVD. The first fandom I check for on Yuletide every year ;) And the reason that some day I'm gonna end up foster-failing and adopting one of the cats we take care of because once we run into a scrappy black cat with blue eyes it'll all be over for me.

[raven]

Awww, M*A*S*H is just the same for me! It's honestly had more influence on me than almost any other tv show, film or book, I love it so much.

[jamethiel]

Hi!

I too prefer Dreamwidth. I like the room to expand on thoughts and tease them out fully, and I enjoy seeing other people's TL;DR. I like nuance.

[raven]

Me too. I really miss the glory days of LJ fandom.

[espresso_addict]

Not an exile from tumblr, but would you mind if I friended you anyway? We share interests in DS9/TNG, Vorkosigan & Le Guin (I've recommended a number of your stories in the past), but what is making me bounce in my seat with glee is tripping over your post about SMO and realising that you're a Gaelic learner! I moved to the Highlands & Islands four years ago but only started learning this summer, and am extremely keen to connect with fellow learners.

[raven]

Math dha-rìreamh, 's math do choinneachadh! Of course you can friend me, it sounds like we have lots in common. How are you finding your learning?

[espresso_addict]

Fìor mhath do choinneachadh cuideachd! Gaelic's the first language I've tried to learn since school (a very long while ago), so a lot of it at the moment is me slowly trying to feel my way into exactly how I learn language; also getting used to how differently Gaelic works from English/French/German. I'm finding the grammar relatively easy so far but still in the You Pronounce That Like That?! stage, not to mention the Just How Many Words Do I Have To Learn before I get the gist of a BBC Alba programme! After some self-learning, I'm doing an evening course but jumped in at level 3 (because that was all that was being offered locally) which was a bit of a culture shock; I'm not used to being the class dunce. It did push me to work rather harder than I would have done on a beginners' course though.

How did you get into Gaelic? I notice that you commented above that you're a Brit -- are you Scottish, or did the language just appeal? (Ah, now poking round your Gaelic tag a bit I see some elucidation in a recent locked post; I'll respond there so as to avoid giving the internet my address...)

[velithya]

Hello, lovely to meet you & I hope to get to know you :)
I'd be interested in reading your job things if you'd be okay with adding me.

I totally feel you about tumblr, when LJ fell apart I shifted over to DW and it felt like most other people I know happily zoomed over into tumblr and I could never get the hang of it. It moved so fast & I could never keep up, and there was no chance for a dialogue. I know that tumblr now is a lot different to tumblr ten years ago, but it's still kind of impenetrable to me.

I hope this new trend on DW continues, it's so lovely to have my reading list be so full! (I find "feed" a little odd, and I used "F.list" over on LJ but it was never super comfortable for me. I try and stick with "reading list" but it's not the shortest title.)

[raven]

Hello! Yes, that is great. I'm so out of touch, I don't even know how Tumblr has changed in the last ten years. I think it will be great to see how things develop now, even if I am genuinely sorry people are losing what matters to them on Tumblr.

[velithya]

I think they added a lot of user interaction things that made it easier to communicate with people, but I'll be honest, after a few months I just ghosted off the site entirely so I only heard about it second and third hand.

It's always hard when the first place you really call home, the first place you find a community, gets hit with something like this. I hope that communities and friends can stay together and manage to find a new home somewhere welcoming.

[tau_sigma]

(Basically just commenting to say I have noted your pronouns, but please let me know if you have a preference, or anything you want me to do differently, if that doesn't sound ridiculous? And if you ever want to talk, I am always happy to listen.

But otherwise it's been too long since I've seen you, and I'm really jealous of everyone who's geographically nearer.)

[raven]

Thank you for noting them! And I am still thinking through if I want anyone to do anything differently, and if so what, but thank you for your love and support. <3 let's make a plan to meet soon? I'm so annoyed I've been randomly away the last couple of times you've been down.

[schneefink]

What is "fandom adulthood" even? Not sure I ever met someone who qualified.

I would be interesting in reading about your job :) I currently study law and it's fascinating.

[raven]

In my case, it would have been a period of time where I was the same age as most other people in fandom, rather than a decade younger and then a decade older.

Law is indeed fascinating! What sort of law are you working on?

[schneefink]

I'm doing my bachelor's degree in Business Law. This semester it's mostly tax law, which is way more interesting than I originally thought, and criminal law. I only just started a year ago so there's still a lot left.

[sea_changed]

Hi; I’m a bit late commenting here, but I too am one of the people jumping from tumblr to dreamwidth, though my original fandom experience was on lj and I too have a significant nostalgia for it.

I’m friending (adding?) as I realized recently that I’ve accidentally and independently run into your fic no fewer than four times over the course of 2018--S&A, then Lord John, then Society of Gentlemen, then Lynes & Mathey--and loved all of it, particularly to Lord John timetravel one (and the Dominic/Silas one, which was written in such a different style then the books and yet allowed the characters to shine through with extraordinary clarity). After accidentally following you around through various fandoms since January, it seems only right that I follow you in some sort of official way, and you seem like a lovely and interesting person to have on my reading page.

[raven]

Yay, I'm so pleased you like my stories! Thanks very much for telling me so. A pleasure to meet you- I'll add (friend? idek) you likewise.

Waves

[jesse_the_k]

I’ve just finished your wonderful Sherlock story, “and the rivers shall give up their dead,” and discovered that you’re one of those Yuletide savants and I’m so thrilled to be able to Kvell in person.

I’ve tried to institute “d-roll” for flist but with not the tiniest bit of traction.

I hope your snowy Indian adventures continue to delight!