"Taking Stock"

This is an out of character, 'real me' post.

Dear Diary,

The days are getting short. With only 4 days left on the rental box at Somersley, I've tried everything I can think of to get in touch with Mommy. I have to face the unpleasant possibility that she may not be back before the rent is due.

Tick tick tick

 I've tried everything. Notes on the message board in our home, notecards sent directly to her inventory, but she hasn't logged on since March 4th. I've tried sending offline IMs in hopes that they'll hit her email, and I've even tried using the "Private Message" function on my.secondlife.com.

No responses.

The last time I saw Mommy in person was, I believe, February 22nd. After Mari's rezzday party. Mommy sent me a notecard on March 4th, and that's the last time she logged in, which means she hasn't even received my reply.

I knew her life was super stressful in RL.. and she'd made it clear that unusual circumstances had come about for her. I won't go into too much detail here, but suffice it to say that there were family members needing to go to the hospital, surgeries, complications, etc. She hinted at wanting to work on her blog posts, and was hoping that the coming weekend would afford her some time to log in to SL.

Obviously it didn't. Nor the weekend after.

Now don't get me wrong.. I don't blame her for the time away, or even the silence. She's made it clear why she's been absent, at least in part.. and I can certainly understand why she needs to spend the time in RL dealing with RL things and people.

But. There's always a "but" right? Things haven't been so peachy rosy for me. Those few of you who read this blog, most of you probably know that I have an adult "alt" account. Her life hasn't been perfect of late, with one relationship collapsing, and her circle of friends becoming smaller and quieter, and less available... and 'me' having no one I could really turn to for support. My store (with that account) hasn't been doing too well.. and even though I embarked that account on an avatar makeover, I've mostly buried myself in scripting work to try and deaden the pain and isolation. It's helped, but it never works completely.

I haven't been taking good care of myself in RL either. Working myself from the moment I wake up, til my eyes shut at night. Screwed up some paperwork deadlines in my depression.

They say that time moves faster in SL.. and that a week in real life is like a month in SL. Imagine then what it's like to bury 12-16 hours in SL a day, mostly alone.

Mommy referred to my other account as her "Best Friend"... and the feeling was honestly quite mutual. She was the person I could tell everything to.. share everything with. She knew both sides of my personality. She's the person I would have turned to when all this other adult stuff went kablooey..  and she hasn't been around.

I feel terrible admitting all this here, because I know she will eventually read it. I haven't updated very regularly while she's been gone, but I still suspect she checks the site every few days, hoping I'll post something. Maybe from a cybercafe, or a computer at a library.

There's been two pageviews from Australia this week..

I like to think it was you, Mommy.

I miss you.

I've spent the last few days alternating through panic and worry.. Mari's put up with so much.. far too much.. of my angst. And I feel super guilty for turning to her with it.. I know it brings up unhappy memories for her. but my friends list has become intimidating again.

I've logged in every day for the last week and a half. Usually via text, usually I'd log in, check the hovertext on the rent box, check the "last logged in" date on Mommy's profile, then log back out and go back to my scripting.

But now it's 4 days left.

I could certainly understand if Mommy decided there was no point in keeping paying the rent.. especially since no one's using the place. I log on to see if she's been on, then I log off. It's an awful lot of land for 'a place to keep prim babies rezzed', and at 4600L$ per week, *I* certainly can't afford to pay the rent on this place. At the current going rate, that would be around $80 per month. I just don't have that kind of money.

I've struggled since camp.. with Mommy's absence it's been easier to put this account into stasis, and just 'not log in' on a daily basis, waiting for her to be here. There was talk of entering school, but on some level, I really wanted Mommy's involvement in that process. So I've basically been 'waiting'... with everything on hold.

Somersley Estates is an AMAZING RP environment. Unfortunately, it's terribly quiet and boring if you're not RPing with someone. And with my personal shyness issues, I'll avoid people due to shyness, and never get into what little RP is going on at any given time. Sadly, my license to play here also expires when the rent does.

So I'm facing hard possibilities. We could lose the house.

I've started taking stock of my situation, and trying to wrap my head around what that would be like, what it would mean.. what I would do, where, and wondering if Mommy is ever going to come back.

I worry that you're sitting out there with a little time here and there to get online.. and maybe you're wrestling with these very same questions, and you're overwhelmed by guilt.. in some mistaken idea that it would just be better, or easier if you didn't log back on, rather than coming on with bad news.

If we lost the house, would I rebuild? Build some semblance of a family home on a tiny slice of land someplace? Or put together some kind of kids playhouse or hobo trailer on some land someplace, waiting for Mommy to come online so we could rebuild properly? Would I just live out of my backpack and wander the grid without an official "home"?

Would I just turn off the lights on Anwenn and go back to my other account?

I promised Mari I wouldn't do that.

Would it mean the end of our family? I hope not.
 
Tonight, I wandered around the house.. looking at the few things rezzed out that belong to Mommy, that I'd miss if they were gone. Mostly the only items I'm that attached to are in my room.. My bedside lamp, my bookends, the pillow fort. I really only JUST moved in to this room, and just replaced all my furniture. Very little of it means anything to me.. other than a couple of pictures, and that trophy and geode from camp.. it's all just 'stuff out of kits'.

Mommy's pictures all over the house, unfortunately, would be lost to me. There's no way for me to copy them, or buy replacements. The frames, but not the pictures inside. She'd have them tho.

When all is said and done, Second Life is just a game. The house, the pictures, the prim brother and sister sleeping in their beds.. they're just pixels on the screen. The friendship, relationship, familyness between Mommy and me, is more than that. Even if we do lose the house.. I hope that she can get past any guilt she feels over that, and come back online.

Houses can be replaced. Awesome mommies are a bit harder to come by.

I'll probably take the opportunity of these few remaining days, to take some (sad) pictures around the house. If Mommy comes back and saves the place, and everything goes back to normal, then there's no harm done.. but if we do lose the place, or worse.. then in the future, looking back on this time, I'll regret having had the opportunity to take some poignant sad memory photos, and not doing it when I had fair warning.

And I'll still have the weekend open to me, if I decide it's gotten too heavy and I need to go run around and chase down Mari and see what she's doing.

And who knows.. Mommy might log on.