Monday, November 28, 2016

Six Years

November 28, 2010

Can you believe it's been Six Years since I opened up Caitlyn's Masks?  So much has changed.  What I do, how I share it, how I display it, how I create it, how I feel about it.... all of that has changed.

When I first started, I thought my feminine self was me.  I made caps and shared them on Rachel's Haven, and then eventually posted them here too.  I was still making caps with a tilted image over a text containing background (the cap I made on November 14, 2010 Idealized is a prime example).  Almost all of my caps were created for people at the Haven using their preferences as my guide.  And I felt that most of my caps were nowhere near good enough.  Good... but a far cry from good enough.

Now?  Now I feel as though my feminine self is a side of me, but not me.  I make the occasional cap but mostly make obscuras and post them all exclusively here.  I haven't logged onto the Haven in months, and the last few times I've gone there it was to get preferences for a cap I was making.  I don't do much design work at all and when I do it's almost always with the image as a background and a floating text box and title (my most recent cap made on November 17, 2016 Monthly Inspection is a prime example).  Almost all of my obscuras are created for myself without any particular target subject in mind.  And I feel that the obscuras are fine.   They're not art per say, but they're fine.

Most of my feminine energy went into capping with only the occasional role playing.  Most of my feminine energy now goes into role playing at D+X with only the occasional obscura or cap.

I was a poor student with a lot of free time on my hands.  I'm now a working professional that tries to eek every bit of free time from all my commitments.  

I was pushing to get readers over to the Haven.  I'm now pushing to get readers over to D+X.

I was reading dozens of cap blogs on a daily basis, many times catching their new caps within an hour of it being posted.   I now rarely visit any cap blogs, and will sometimes find caps that are new time but were posted weeks ago.

I had trouble commenting enough even though I had the desire to... and that's really still the same.  I probably comment less now and that includes here on my own blog.

I hadn't had a lapse of feeling like Caitlyn when I started this blog and thought she'd be part of me forever.  I've now had several lapses including one for a couple years. I no longer count on Caitlyn's presence to be part of me on a daily basis, and wouldn't be surprised if she left to never return again.

The blog itself has gone over several makeovers.  I'd actually like to make it more dynamic and interesting now, but I've kind of reached the limit of what I can do with Blogger, and I don't have an interest in learning more or moving the blog to a new platform.  So now it's just a minimalist style that let's all of you focus on the pretty pictures.

I've met so many friends here at the blog.  I've lost touch with more than I can count, and most of that is my fault for not being more present here.  But some of that was those other friends backing away.  Jennifer, Smity, Rauk.... three people whose opinions I treasured are now gone.  But I still have friends here.  Dee, Ian, and Erin are people I adore hearing from.

If I've learned one thing that matters through this six year journey, it's this:  Live In The Present!  I have no idea what the future will hold.  I look forward to living all of those wonderful future 'Now's to their fullest.  If that includes making more art (or pseudo art) here, then yay!   If that includes me leaving and never returning... then yay to that too!  I'm going to let the future take care of itself as it always had and always will.

Lastly, I want to really thank each and every one of you that's reading this.  It means the world to me that someone who doesn't know me... someone that wouldn't know me by sight or sound... cares enough to read what ever is rattling around between my ears.  Thank You!

11 comments:

  1. Congratulations on your anniversary.

    Brittany7

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  2. Congrats on the milestone! Thanks for the shout out too! I always enjoy seeing whatever you put out, regardless of the format. You do you, Caitlyn, and we will always be eagerly waiting :-)

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  3. Congratulations. It's been quite a ride so far!

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  4. Happy sixth birthday. Jelly and ice cream. In our party dresses and bows in our hair. Can I play with your dollies?
    Excuse me I am Caitlyn's Mother, would you please leave. Why! you are scarring the other guests and you are fifty years old and erm,,, and a man,,, in a dress! Very well you may take some birthday cake home in a napkin, no you can not have all icing you well make yourself sick.

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  5. 6 years goes by so quickly eh? You've evolved so much since when you started. Glad you still pop on here. Thought we lost you there for awhile again. Miss your conversations on my blogs and others but I can understand. Nice to have you around when the alternative is ' gone for good!'

    I tried D+X a long time ago and it just seemed so damn structured, detailed vignettes that take weeks to play an hour in D+X time, earning pins and all that, with punishments up the wazoo, etc .. makes my ADHD rear its ugly head and is pretty much the antithesis of everything I do at the Haven and on my blog. I am surprised that Jennifer wasn't on D+X a lot, as she was really good at RPing. Maybe she is and we just don't know it!

    So yay for six years! Hopefully the future (or whatever is left of it!) involves the mind of you interacting with us somehow!

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    1. Oh, at this point I'm sure I'll go missing every once in a while. It might be a day, it might be a week... it might be a couple years. No more guarantees.

      Yeah, D+X really is quite structured. But if you know what you want and can express that to the right people, they can move and bend the main story to mesh their backstory with your unique one.

      As for Jennifer, she did play there for quite awhile. I helped her by playing her sponsor so that she'd always have that villainous powerful patron to lord over her. She stopped about the same time she stopped blogging though. My only contact with her has been through her blog.

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  6. Thanks everybody! I think I'd still do this without any participation or responses, but these give me all the more reasons to keep on going!

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    1. Miss Caitlyn, your works are unbelievable and sooo appreciated by more people than you know. I adore your writing. It's so purrfect and goes right to my deepest fantasies I am frightened at how much our tastes match. Your obscuras (obscurae?) never fail to make my head all dizzy. But then I've been accused of being that way already. ;)

      I made an account just so I could post this. I've wanted to reply to so many of your posts for awhile but it actually isn't easy if one wants to remain anonymous. So now I'm on the radar I guess, but this is worth it to me. Please don't leave. I'd hug you so hard and not let go if I thought you were going to. I'm too smitten *blush*
      hugs
      --kitty

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    2. Tygress, I can't tell you how happy this comment made me! As you may have read here, I started in a similar way and made my first account at Rachel's Haven to meet an artist I was admiring from afar... I only hope I can be as good to you as Dee has been to me!

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    3. And that comment from C made me feel awesome too! Whee!

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