Restless

[whogeek]

Every so often, I get this restless feeling.  It's like an itch, deep under my skin, down in my bones.  And I can stave it off, at least for a little while, and when it gets too bad I can usually work it out by doing some exploring, but that's not what the itch is about.  There's only a handful of times that I actually managed to satisfy the itch, giving in and scratching it as hard as I can.  But aside from those few times it's always there, building quietly, until it's singing under my skin.  So I explore, walk around campus, or up to wander the shops downtown, but it's never quite enough.  It's this need to fight, to pit my strength against someone else.  All muscle and movement and god, it makes me feel so alive when I can let that part of me out just a little.  Because I know what can happen if I don't.  And I don't like losing time to the beast inside myself, the more primal, possessive, protective version of myself.  Because she's fierce, and reckless, and dangerous, and she doesn't know when to stop.  And god, the first time she burst through scared me so much, because I lost control, and I barely stopped her from doing anything, and that was only because my friends stopped me.  And sometimes she prowls so close under the surface I don't feel like I can touch anyone without putting them in danger.  Because if she breaks free, I don't think I could stop her, when it takes so much to contain her, to satisfy her need to fight.

And it's getting harder and harder.  I can't hold her back nearly as well as I used to, and I'm lucky she seems to genuinely like some people, but she doesn't like my roommate.  And that worries me.  Because I'm having to go to classes, and do homework, and go to football games with marching band, and fight to keep her in line, and I'm exhausted.  And I'm worried that my roommate will say or do something, and I'll snap and yell and shout at her, because the beast thinks she's utterly selfish and inconsiderate.  And she liked my roomie from last semester.  She always makes the happy, contented cat like noises around my previous roomie.  And I don't get this bad when I spend a lot of time being extremely physically active, or if I'm around the people the beast likes a lot.  Which is kind of disconcerting.

And I think, if I had grown up just a little differently, I might have been something like a berserker.  Which is scary as fuck.

Comments

[jetpack-angel.livejournal.com]

Are we talking just a much-repressed part of your own nature, or somebody else entirely? Because that'd be kinda scary, I think.

I think I might have one too, or at least I'm not sure because if I do, mine's awful quiet. But I'll be trucking along and every now and then something will make this fierce protective urge jump out, and in the most menial of circumstances, somebody might jokingly malign a group I'm affiliated with and then all of a sudden I just get mad, but very calmly mad, sort of a quiet boil like a tiger who hasn't bared her teeth yet or a swordsman who hasn't pulled out his sword. Or every once in a while I'll just get these feral moods where I want to stalk around and snarl and hold my hands like claws. It calms itself down whenever I get to do a lot of physical stuff, like starting to haul pallets. Nothing quite so pronounced as yours, of course, or maybe I just learned to repress it really well.

Berserker urges, now that is a little frightening.

[whogeek.livejournal.com]

It's hard to describe. It's not like John, if that's what you're asking, but definitely a repressed part of myself that I think of as the beast. The primal urges that tend towards aggression that I had to chain up fairly early on, because when I got mad I would end up seriously hurting people, without any actual thought about it. It would just happen, so I had to stop it from hurting people. But some people do tend to make that part of me very content and easy-going. And it's not like I don't let that portion of me out at all, but I do tend to keep a very tight handle on it.

YES!! Oh my god, yes. One time I lost a few seconds to the beast was when some idiot in one of my 9th grade classes said that people with depression choose to be depressed, and I came very close to throwing a desk halfway across the room at him (The type not attached to a chair, and with the metal book-space underneath), which would have been no mean feat. And yeah, I get the stalking and snarling and hands-as-claws moods too. And that's where the exploring thing comes in, because I'm doing something. But it happens a lot, and the only thing that has ever really helped was the couple times I could wrestle with someone who I'm pretty evenly matched with in terms of a fight, because then I don't have to worry about actually hurting them, and who the beast actually likes, which is essentially two people from high school.

Yeah, the berserker urges are few and far between, but I've only ever had one where I thought I was going to totally lose it, and I was twitchy for weeks after. Very scary, because apart from the times where I've lost time to the beast, the berserker thing is hugely worse. I know the beast wouldn't do anything to hurt the people she likes, but the berserker urges have no such compunction.

[jetpack-angel.livejournal.com]

I would suggest quitting marching band and join the wrestling team, but as bloodstains would be hard to get out of the mats... (<--- weak attempt at humor) We need to find you an occupation that could safely allow you to let it out more often. And suddenly I feel the urge to write more in my incubus!Victor fic (yes, I've been talking your ears off about that lately, I know) where Victor's instincts are acting up and Michael has to calm him down mostly just by refusing to be scared. And yeah, I was kinda thinking about John when I read this entry. I suddenly realized why you liked him so much, like you were really glad that he was who he turned out to be. I never thought about how people with multiple personalities (or just people with very pronounced feral sides) might perceive my fic. Suddenly I feel a little self-conscious about it.

One reason I don't hear from mine very much, I think, was that in the sixth grade I got mad at somebody and said something I really shouldn't have (it's a long story, but it was an off-the cuff remark and very, very stupid) and the only reason I didn't go to juvie was because after I said it, I spent an hour in the principal's office bawling my fucking guts out while getting stared at very sternly by the principal, vice principal, and the school corrections officer. This was while I was attending Heath Middle School. Yeah, that Heath. But anyway, from that day on, any time I get really mad at somebody and feel the urge to lash out well up, I also get a huge adrenaline rush of almost fear. I've made myself scared of being angry, and also scared of mouthing off to people I don't know. Now, being cranky or in one of my 'my battlefield is hauling a whole bunch of the heaviest pallets I can find in a short time period' moods is one thing, but I don't get any anger-spikes, or at lest not for very long.

[whogeek.livejournal.com]

Lol. Yeah, that's part of why I'm not doing chemistry anymore, because that part of me would be even more restless if I spent all day cooped up in a lab somewhere, and restless plus possible explosives equals not good. Don't worry, I enjoy getting snippets from you! And yeah, I really like John, because despite the beast not having an actual separate personality, she's amazingly similar in some respects(sudden almost-reflexive block/attack moments, and liking some people(I tend to trust her on that, she's good at knowing who's trustworthy) and getting protective). And don't feel self-conscious about your fic, because it actually made me feel like I wasn't crazy with this feral thing inside me.

My first real experience with the beast lashing out, before she started making me lose time, was in eighth grade, when we both snapped because this guy had been harassing me for months and I hit him hard, right over his kidney. I was lucky I didn't actually use my stronger arm, because I could have done some serious damage. But I burst into tears and went and hid in the bathroom for about 5 minutes, curled into a ball in the corner. And the beast was both satisfied, smug, and comforting all at once. I actually don't think I could have faced talking to the teacher about it after if my friend hadn't been behind me, and if the beast hadn't been snarling at the guy standing on the teacher's other side. Course, he tried to do it to one of my friends in ninth grade, and I lost a couple seconds to the beast then but he was already out of the building at that point, so she couldn't do anything but settle back and let me be rational about it. And then there was the flashback triggered by a guy in my senior year, in the middle of the band room, where I lost a couple of minutes to her.

Now I try to let her out often enough in some sort of controlled way that I don't have so much trouble keeping control.

[jetpack-angel.livejournal.com]

Losing minutes and realizing that you've really hurt somebody has got to be fucking terrifying. I don't really have anything else to say about that, since I have no personal experience with it. But I've noticed that it tends to be a theme with my fics that a character will be repressing a very pronounced bestial side. I know that sometimes I get characters' voices so accurate because I can see a lot of myself in them at certain moments, like Mac in just about every way, or Danny's jumpy-sympathetic side, or Flack being wry yet levelheaded, or Michael because of the way I can blend in with different crowds of people just by thinking a certain way (and I love his inner monologue like whoa and sometimes I get the same thing going within myself, or Victor because... well, why not? Sometimes you need a crazy side. But the repressing a beast-side, it's like I've got some sympathy for that, almost like I know how it feels even though mine must be locked up pretty tight. I like characters with pronounced beast-sides. I understand them. It's almost as though I feel like they're kindred spirits.

I also realized the other day that I've put a history of being the victim of a nasty sex crime in the past of at least two different characters, in two different stories; mine was not nearly so dramatic as these, but I still have a bonafide panic attack every time I see somebody who looks like The Bastard Ex-Boyfriend. One character/story you're aware of (vamp!Mac), and the other I think I'll be sending you fairly soon even though I'll need to put in more Cliff's Notes (which, by the way, reminds me: 1, another reason for you to like Eliot so much, and 2, what'd you think of that BN/Leverage thing I sent you the other day?). But for the second, I'm hoping you started watching In Plain Sight after I kept pimping it during the CSI:NY review days.

Is she calming down yet, or is she still cranky? Just curious.

Hm. Just thought of this, as I was about to hit the Post button: Maybe that's a reason you like werewolves so much? They feel like kindred spirits of a sort?

[whogeek.livejournal.com]

Yeah, freaked out like woah the first time, until I realized that the beast wouldn't hurt people she liked, but I still try to let her out enough she doesn't steal time from me. And yeah, I can see myself in a lot of characters too.

Yeah? I did that with some of my stories, where people had some bad shit in their past, but I've gotten better about it. Plus, a lot of what I watch, the shit is already there. (And yeah, definitely part of why I like Eliot so much is the berserker/beast-side aspect of him, and loved the BN/Leverage thing. It was awesome.) And no, I haven't started watching In Plain Sight. Despite your pimping of it.

She's a lot calmer now. Gone from pacing caged tiger to resigned caged tiger. I did decide I'll be making a good bike ride tomorrow.

And yeah, the werewolf thing is definitely a kindred-spirit type thing.

Well, the roommate is going to sleep, and she doesn't like me typing so...... **Smiles tightly** the beast is grumbling at her a little.

[jetpack-angel.livejournal.com]

Your campus needs, like, a 24-hour gym or something. You could always jog around the campus or something, and woe to anyone who might try to prey on the 'defenseless' little woman all by herself in the dark. *evil cackle* But hopefully my 'voices' will be good enough that they'll sound like the characters (when you get a moment, here, start from the pilot. And if you don't love Marshall and Mary by episode 5 then I don't know you. But I do know you, so you will like them. You already do like them, in fact, and just don't know how much yet.

:D I'll let you try to go to bed now.

[whogeek.livejournal.com]

Yeah. I need to learn how to actually fight, because mostly I just have the how-to-beat-someone's-face-in-until-they-let-go lessons from my mom and a class I went to before I came to college, and the natural instinctive block/attack moments the beast sometimes supplies. You're killing me! All these shows you keep managing to get me into! Dark Blue, Burn Notice, Leverage, White Collar! I kinda blame you for Covert Affairs too, but I can't really, because honestly, that one is my own damn fault.

[jetpack-angel.livejournal.com]

I still can't believe I used to take Kenpo, Judo, and a little bit of Aikido. It was damn near a decade ago, and the only reason I advanced to orange belt in Kenpo was because my instructor was kind of a pushover. Just a really nice guy. But I haven't practiced, and I might remember how to do some of it if I was given a chance to try to let my muscles remember (though that endlessly repeated kali drill, I'll remember that one 'til the day I die: 'parry-brush-trap-punch, parry-brush-trap-punch, parry-brush-trap-punch'). I tell myself nowadays, "I remember just enough to be stupid." Although as strong as my legs are nowadays from all the hauling I do at work, if I roundhouse'd somebody with my steel-toes, I'd probably take their fucking jaw off or something. :D

Sho? You wants a Marshall plushie too, yet? At least go here and click on Marshall's Greatest Hits.

*needs to make a Marshall icon* I'm thinking some kind of bewildered face, and maybe a caption that says "You keep using that word. I don't think it means what you think it means."

[whogeek.livejournal.com]

Yeah. 8, almost 9 years of figure skating, plus marching band, plus fencing means that if I really kicked someone, I would probably break some ribs.

I haven't had time!! **wails** I've had to write stuff for classes, and go to classes, and people all want me to hang out, and stuff, and I just haven't had time!!

[jetpack-angel.livejournal.com]

Stupid stuff interfering with TV time! *commiserates*

Whoa, crap, I need to go to the bank and run a couple of errands before I go do laundry. But I don't wanna get out of my chair!

Stupid stuff interfering with my computer time.

[whogeek.livejournal.com]

Oh, and now I'm rushing for the co-ed marching band fraternity. :D

Yeah. Stuff. Interfering with TV time. Sucks.

[whogeek.livejournal.com]

Ok, yeah. haven't even finished the pilot, and I already love Marshall.

Hate you. :D

[jetpack-angel.livejournal.com]

What the--dude, are you drunk or stoned or high or just plain messed up in the head? What about this entry makes you think of Twilight or Harry Potter or what the hell else tweens get obsessed with nowadays? What song? Whogeek didn't list any current music for this entry. Seriously. This is a journal entry about a legitimate psychological freak-out and not some, some... I have no idea what the fuck is going on in your head, but this isn't that. Go drunk-post somewhere else, because your stumbling in here and teen-ANGST!!!ing all over the goddamn place is pretty fucking rude.

[whogeek.livejournal.com]

The fuck? I don't mention harry potter anywhere in this post, so why the hell are you posting something like this here? Who the hell are you anyway? How did you find me, and why did you think I'd be interested in you whining about shit? And what the fuck is up with your spelling and grammar? Are you drunk? High? Generally fucked up? Go whine somewhere else.