Inkstained

I grew up believing my world was defined in words and text.

It's taken eighteen years, a shattering transition from home to college, a realization that a change in majors is imminent, and an intriguing English discussion to discover the fallacy of that belief.

I've always been a bookworm, and since the age of eleven, I've been an aspiring writer as well.  My hobbies, my dreams, my aspirations, and my lifestyle have always revolved around a long romance with language.  I've been trying to write a novel since the age of eleven, and poetry since two years after that.  My version of gaming is roleplaying, from forum-based novel-style roleplays to text based MUDs online to pen-and-paper.  I used to read enough books to fill the public libary's reading contest list in the two-week period between the beginning of summer and the beginning of the actual summer reading program.  Foreign languages, while difficult for me, were fascinating simply for the beauty of their words.

Naturally, then, when my English teacher asked in class for us to consider what language was most inherent in our thoughts, whether images, like her, or words, or sounds, like her musical nephew, or sensations, my immediate thought was words.  What else?  I'd been dreaming in text since I started playing a text-based roleplay game, the multi-user dungeon, Achaea, Dreams of Divine Lands.  Text was my medium, and words were my first love.  It seemed perfectly natural to me, then, that this was my language.

Alas, the perfect beauty of words is a second language to me, though it be my favorite.  My choicest words, I considered, were carefully picked to describe something--to translate something, I should say.  I did not know a word was right by the definition, by the appearance, by the sound--but by the feel.  Every word for me carried an emotion--or a blend of emotions.  Every image an association of pleasure, or pain, or frustration.  Every sound had a feeling to it, of disturbance, or satisfaction, or beguilement.  When introduced to a new word, I felt more than sounded the spelling.  When shown an image, I understood it in terms of the medley of emotions the images woke in me. 

For about a week, now, I have basked in the new awareness of this facet of myself--this emotion-driven entity that describes the drama, the hysterics, the highs and lows, and the need to find exactly the right word for everything in my life.  The words I surround myself with are not mere words--each is laden with the feeling I associate with the meaning.  Chair means not simply an object to sit on--it carries with it trust, security, a dash of indolence and fatigue, and the wash of relief that greets me at the end of a long day.  Erudite does not simply mean learned, but drips with emotions of accomplishment, passion, and a dash of the levity and glamour of Cyrano de Bergerac.  Chemistry is a puzzling mix of hatred, admiration, disdain, inadequacy, frustration, and a sort of scarcely-contained tension.

I've decided I need a sort of notebook to tuck away the tidbits of inspiration, the quick phrases, the nets of words created to capture the essence of a stray emotion.  A place to sort out and translate this aspect of myself.  Ideally, I ought to rise from this place with a deeper level of self-discovery, but also with tendrils of inspiration hastily captured in the most aptly expressive words I can muster, in hopes of eventually weaving a tapestry.

Hence, Inkstained.  So mote it be.