Author: indigoshell

The 10 Horsey Commandments

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(Totally ripping off infamousdolphin)

Hello all equestrians and non-equestrians alike.

To the equestrians; these are some rules and/or commandments that I am very sure you follow already. If you do not (guilty as charged), then you should start following them.

To the non-equestrians; I’d like to, hopefully, open a little door to the world of the horse people. Some say we’re a different species. I sure have been called that before.

1. If thy horse poops in the barn isle thou shalt CLEAN IT UP
2. If thy horse is a sporadic nutball in the arena thou must LUNGE THY HORSE
3. If thou aren’t wearing tough leather boots prepare to have thy toes RIPPED OFF by thy horse
4. Cleaning thy horse’s hooves before riding is a MUST
5. If thy horse bites you BITE IT BACK
6. If thou falls off thy horse ye must GET BACK ON
7. Horses will try to buck thee off so thou must EXPECT THE UNEXPECTED
8. Unless thou wants to clean thy stall twice, cleaning thy stall BEFORE LEAVING is the wise choice
9. If thou feeds another’s horse expect to be SHOWERED WITH FLIES
10. Saddle soap and saddle oil are the best smells ever

Accidents

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That time you found me on the ground, reaching for my inhaler, you picked me up and tossed me into the car. We drove to the hospital and arrived at 3am, but had to wait until 7am until we could go inside. I struggled with every breath, and with every breath I would think “finally…”

The times I was in a speeding car, watching the door handle, wondering whether or not it would open by some luck of fate. Perhaps the turn would be too sharp, or maybe my dog would jump onto it.

I lived on a tall building all my life. I often liked to look over it and wonder how long I’d feel the pain if I fell down. The window was tall though, and it would be difficult to trip and fall through.

Sometimes I’d walk through my woods. I called it my woods because nobody else bothered to explore it. I saw wolves, bears and mountain lions, but they all ran from me. Why would you run from me? Couldn’t you easily kill me? Wouldn’t you want to?

Old buildings were also fun to explore. The floors were old and rickety, and I often found myself stepping on particularly thin boards hoping to fall through. I was too light, that’s what everyone said, and the boards would creak and moan but I never did fall through.

I kept waiting for accidents. My aim is to disappear off the earth completely with no trace to follow or mourn over.

Guess I’ll have to keep trying.

Unison

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You stay up late the night before, preparing a presentation for that class you hate.

Everyone has to present. Everyone was assigned one section of a rather specific topic, and was told that they would be presenting on that specific day.

So the day comes and all your classmates quietly meander in, as if reciting the material to themselves.

Then the teacher comes in and starts the class.

You exchange a glance to the classmate to your left. What about the presentation?

The person to your right catches your eye. Did I read the homework sheet wrong? Were we not supposed to present today?

Eyes wander the room and relieved grins are held. Everyone almost telepathically nods at each other, thinking in unison with each other, you say nothing, I say nothing, we will all say nothing.

And thus, the presentation deadline has been extended.

You Will Never Be a Team Captain

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So I finally got into League of Legends.

I pretty much suck, but of course, nearly everyone sucks at their first few times playing a new game. I got it Tuesday, March 4th.

My roommate’s an early sleeper, and so last night I sat in the hallway to play one last game before sleeping. It was near midnight or so, and I was playing alone, randomly matched with other players.

I suppose I shouldn’t say their usernames, but they were obviously acquaintances. It was 3v3, so I was the outsider.

I usually die 2-6 times within the first 10-15 minutes depending, and this time I wasn’t doing so hot, as I was quite tired.

And these two users began to comment on me.

“First time playing as Volibear?”

I said no, I was just tired and in a funk because I had SATs the next day.

“I hope you don’t test like you play.”

“The world always needs more janitors.”

“Volibear: How not to play.”

I ignored them pretty easily, as I was thinking these guys either didn’t know that they were being total butts or they were trying to make me mad in some way.

In the last stretch of the game, when all the opponents were gathered around our Nexus and were trying to destroy it, I realized that two players were nowhere to be seen on the map. Yet they were still commenting on how horribly I was playing. I asked them to come back and help me defend home base.

And then, more comments on how badly I play.

Their comments really didn’t get to me too much. I reported them, closed the game, then tried to focus on something else as I tried to sleep.

Yet today I felt reluctant to open up the game.

Yarn to Life

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I like to knit. I like how you can never forget how to knit. I like the idea of creating something through your knitting.

What I don’t like though is rolling yarn. I got a large box of yarn for Christmas and spent about a week rolling all of them.

Yarn comes in many shapes and sizes, all varying in difficulty of rolling-ness. The easiest way to roll them is to pull out the yarn end from the middle of it and pull – and commence the rolling.

In my many hours of rolling and many hand cramps, I have realized that rolling yarn, the act of rolling it, and the yarn ball itself, is a lot like life.

Yes, life. I’m comparing a ball of yarn to life. Just hear me out.

It starts off small, and rolling it is quick and easy. It doesn’t matter how you roll it now, because since it’s so small it doesn’t matter.

Eventually you’ll start getting impatient, right? So you’ll start rolling it faster, faster, faster, until your hand slips and a large ribbon of yarn falls off the ball. Then you have to pause, untangle the ribbon, and re-roll it, kind of like fixing your mistakes after plowing through life too quickly.

If you start the ball off too loosely, the ball of yarn will be really big, and it gets hard to hold. Of course, you gotta get the job done, so you gotta keep rolling that ball of yarn. Your hand will cramp, all that nasty stuff, and the process is slowed, kind of like trying to live with the wrong start in life.

But you can’t roll it too tightly for too long, as your hand will cramp anyway. See, no matter what, your hand will cramp, so it’s best to anticipate it with a warm towel or something (I just played some computer games). Just like how you need vacations in life or else you’ll just be crawling through life, suffering every inch of the way.

I think the point I’m trying to make is that when you spend two hours a day rolling yarn covered in dirt and horse hairs you start to see life differently.

The Right Stars

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Up on a large hill, or a small mountain (wars have been fought), you would expect the view to be utterly amazing.

And it is.

The mornings can surprise you; you may walk into a cloud of mist with the sun shining through powerfully and cloaking the campus in gold. Some days the sky is a magnifying glass to a sun, blinding white, and permanent sunglasses are needed by everyone.

Nighttime is difficult. The campus lightly shines in yellow, star-like lamps that scatter almost randomly across stairs or walkways, and often overpower the stars.

To stargaze on campus means you must search high and low for the best, unlit spots. There are two areas that I have concluded to be the best spots for the right stars.

The first spot is the lower field, or the big field, while we’re playing glow-in-the-dark capture the flag. I have found out that, if I just stop what I’m doing and lay down on my back, the rest of my team will follow. If you lie down on the right spot the campus lights will not hinder your eyesight, and the stars will shine to their full extent.

The second spot, an easier spot to reach, is the newly built staircase. At night when the sun has fully set and things are quiet, perhaps at 9pm or so, there is a particular step on the staircase that you can stand on and the trees around you will block out the campus lights. Then, if you look up, it looks like the stars are framed by the trees.

No I did not sneak out of the dorm at 9pm to watch the stars.

Green Tea Ice Cream

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The following is a fictional story.

Our first kiss was on Christmas.

A few days after I had flown to China I went to dinner with some family friends. I had wine with them but I was definitely not drunk.

His phone had no reception, so he called me using his friend’s phone and asked me to go hang out with him.

We had ice cream together. I think we were both nervous about it because it was technically our first date, not to mention the fact that we were both going through jet lag.

Everything was so wintry and Christmassy around us, behind that real fancy mall, with the real whiny lights. That’s all I could remember, even though I had closed my eyes.

Yes, it was freezing on the street but we still had ice cream. Well, he did, but I was too full from dinner.

He had green tea ice cream, which is my favorite.

There weren’t many cabs around, so we stood around waiting for a while. Then, all of a sudden he kissed me.

It was the little one, the little kind of kiss, and I remember he had his eyes closed. He had glasses, so it was difficult to see, but I think he had his eyes closed.

It was just there, the taste of the ice cream on my lips, and I could feel it even though I didn’t see it.

I’m even jealous of myself of that kiss. He’s so tall that he had to bend down to kiss me, and his jacket was open, so it’s like I was literally surrounded by him. It was freezing on the street, and he was warm.

But his friend was there too, but he probably didn’t pay attention to us. And we didn’t feel he was there.

It was 9:30 at night. To me, it felt like my first kiss. I felt the green tea ice cream.

I was nervous and didn’t know how to react, so I just closed my eyes. I think I was thinking, “ahh, we finally kissed.” And all I knew was that he was there, bringing me warmth in this freezing winter.

And our kiss, ok, it was on the 29th.

Nightmare

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It’s a horse. Can you guess what colors plague their minds the most? It’s black. The dark color that overpowers all, that can swallow up anything lighter that dares to power through.

This horse is all black, smoking, shimmering, not hidden like Conscience but not sharp like Shadow. Her socks are grey, her hooves pulse, she plods along, following me, aiding me. Her name is Nightmare but she is Hope. She is Beauty. She is Power.

She, in her huge Gypsy form, is difficult to see. Hope shows up the least and they can see no Beauty in this world. This world is destroyed. Corrupted. Shattered. Gods know what plans the world has for lowly humans.

Nightmare lives on. She, in her huge Gypsy form, fights Shadow and Conscience and will never let Hope and Beauty die. Her Power is immense, never weakening, but one day she will die.

She feeds on Hope and Beauty, and they are on their way to extinction. The good powers of this world, the bright sunlight, the clear winds, are being swallowed by the seething black haze that eats all.

Nightmare has left me and begins to die.

Shadow

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It’s a snake. She’s black too, but the kind of black the night sky is. She’s dark. She’s vivid. She’s powerful.

She’s real. She can never leave you, and sometimes, you want her to leave you. She can be your strength, and she can be your weakness.

She speaks your mind when you lose it, she’s there when your sibling’s a bother, she’s there when you don’t understand something.

She fights. She will fight hard, and when you think she’s done fighting, she will fight even more.

Her enemy is Conscience. Conscience makes her mad, and Conscience makes her strong. She fights Conscience with all she has.

The longer she fights, the less control she possesses. She looses herself in an effort to protect, she grows stronger and out of control.

Fangs, venom, whipping tail, flared hood, she fights Conscience and eventually she fights you. Your body turns from heavy to angry.

She is Anger. Anger must be held back. She must be held back. Nothing can hold back Anger.

She rises, hissing, spitting, glowing, menacing, fighting Conscience and fighting you. She’ll fight you and everyone and everything around you.

DESTROY

Her Anger will infect you.

ATTACK

You will be a danger to be around.

KILL

You can’t fight fire with fire. You must drown it with water.

Imagine never finding water.

Conscience

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It’s a butterfly. It’s black, all black, with misty, soft, glowy, fuzzy edges, like the edges of a shadow.

You can’t really hear it, it’s there. You begin to let your guard down, it’s there. You let your mind wander, it’s there.

It speaks to you. Stop trying, it says, you don’t need to be with others. Just go, it says, just go alone, sit alone, eat alone.

So you go alone. You sit alone, You eat alone. Then you leave alone.

It flies next to you. You don’t need to look up, it’s just there. It grows. It always grows. It lands on your shoulder, your head, your chest. It’s heavy, too heavy. Don’t fall, you tell yourself, don’t fall. Just fall, it replies, just fall.

It’s a heavy load, it is. In class it keeps your head down. In walking it keeps your shoulders hunched. In sleep it keeps your body curled.

The others, they try to keep it away. They fight, claws, fangs, hooves, venom, they fight hard. It keeps coming back. It keeps speaking.

You’re not good at this, it says, you’re not good at that. You’re good at being bad, it says, that’s a better way to think about it.

It still grows, it’s still there. It covers you with it’s wings, it pushes you down. You can get back up but it pushes you down harder. Stay down, just stay down, it says, stay down, stay low, then you can’t get any lower.

You can still get lower, but man, it doesn’t know that.