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book/content/ally/002.tex
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@ -3,6 +3,7 @@
\begin{leftcolumn}
\null
\index{ally|(}
\vfill

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book/content/ally/003.tex
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@ -1,4 +1,5 @@
\label{ally:3}
\index{ally|(}
\begin{paracol}{2}
\begin{leftcolumn}
@ -26,6 +27,7 @@ You're here, now. You made it through.
\vin \vin The irony of which\\
\vin \vin \vin Is not lost on her.}
\end{verse}
\index{Writing!samples!poetry}
\begin{ally}
Touching.
@ -33,7 +35,7 @@ Touching.
Hey now, don't be rude. Aren't you supposed to be my ally?
\begin{ally}
I \textbf{am} your ally. I'm just not your friend.
I \textbf{am} your ally. I'm just not your friend.\index{ally!I am not your friend}
\end{ally}
Fair enough.
@ -44,6 +46,7 @@ Oh?
\end{ally}
Yeah. June 2004. There you are. I say,
\index{Journal entries}
\begin{quotation}
The navy blue I've been seeing at waist level in front of me and to my left is contentment. I'm not entirely sure that it being omnipresent is a good thing, however, considering the colors it's mixed with. Am I really content with longing and hopelessness? It's not out of the question, I suppose that it could just be another aspect of my personality. But that just brings up the question of whether or not it's something I ingrained into myself through habit, something where I just kinda accepted that feeling such things is normal, okay, and what I want; or is it something I was born with, or that we're all born with? Is it a side effect of love, expecting impossible desires and the blind hopelessness that follows the end of a four year undertaking?
\end{quotation}

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book/content/ally/004.tex
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@ -1,21 +1,20 @@
\label{ally:4}
\begin{paracol}{2}
\begin{leftcolumn}
\begin{ally}
Why am I here?
\end{ally}
Aren't you always?
\begin{ally}
With you, sure. Why am I bound to words, though? It's been fourteen years.
With you, sure. Why am I bound to words, though? It's been fourteen\index{Numinous!seven} years.
\end{ally}
Surely that's not all on me. You must play some role in it. I was talking with my partner about doing something autobiographical for my next project, after all.
\begin{ally}
I'm the observer and the mirror. All I can do is reflect your choices back at you. Choice itself is not my department.
\end{ally}
After getting \emph{Restless Town} finished, I needed something to do. Some other project that would make me feel like I was being productive.
After getting \emph{Restless Town}\footnote{makyo.ink/publications/restless-town} finished, I needed something to do. Some other project that would make me feel like I was being productive.
\begin{ally}
Feel, or seem?
@ -23,18 +22,18 @@ Feel, or seem?
Both. If I sat still, I'd burn up. If I was seen sitting still, clearly I'd be worth less in the eyes of those around me, right?
\begin{ally}
Not my department.
Not my department.\index{ally!Not my department}
\end{ally}
Right.
So I started digging through stuff I'd already done, seeing if any of it could be cleaned up and turned into a new project. I stumbled across \emph{Rum and Coke} and found it mostly clean as it was, so I decided to publish it as a book. Paperback and ebook, I mean, not just the stories online.
So I started digging through stuff I'd already done, seeing if any of it could be cleaned up and turned into a new project. I stumbled across \emph{Rum and Coke}\footnote{makyo.ink/publications/rum-and-coke} and found it mostly clean as it was, so I decided to publish it as a book. Paperback and ebook, I mean, not just the stories online.
\begin{ally}
Were you proud of them?
\end{ally}
To an extent. A different me wrote them. A lesser me, in some ways. I was younger, I hadn't quite found my voice and tone. No \emph{Arcana}, no \emph{Disappearance}, no \emph{Getting Lost} or \emph{Post-Self}. All I had was a few scattered tidbits and my mom's words ringing in my ears: "You wrote your own wedding vows, right? I could tell."
To an extent. A different me wrote them. A lesser me, in some ways. I was younger, I hadn't quite found my voice and tone. No \emph{Arcana},\footnote{makyo.ink/publications/arcana} no \emph{Disappearance}, no \emph{Getting Lost} or \emph{Post-Self}.\footnote{post-self.github.io} All I had was a few scattered tidbits and my mom's words ringing in my ears: "You wrote your own wedding vows, right? I could tell."
A me with a different identity, too. A me that was working on gender through small steps. I hadn't yet picked up the word 'trans' for myself. I was non-binary, presenting male, writing to justify myself. Or maybe to hype myself up. I was writing works about gender and poly problems being worked through to convince myself it was possible.
A me with a different identity, too. A me that was working on gender through small steps. I hadn't yet picked up the word 'trans' for myself. I was non-binary, presenting male, writing to justify myself. Or maybe to hype myself up. I was writing works about gender and poly problems being worked through to convince myself it was possible.\index{Gender}
\begin{ally}
They read like parables.
@ -52,14 +51,14 @@ Why didn't I show up then?
I was too\ldots{}something. Too busy, too preoccupied. I was focused too much on identity, too much on The Work, as it were, to reflect. Maybe I was moving too quickly to notice my choices being shown to me.
\begin{ally}
You'd mostly stopped [adjective][species] by then, too.
You'd mostly stopped [adjective][species]\footnote{adjectivespecies.com} by\index{Furry![adjective][species]} then, too.
\end{ally}
Life got weird. I was transitioning--
\begin{ally}
A choice.
\end{ally}
--I was solidifying my relationship with Judith--
--I was solidifying my relationship with Judith--\index{Relationships!Judith}
\begin{ally}
A choice.
@ -89,19 +88,19 @@ One of your neighbors, perhaps. A cubicle over, a floor above, something like th
\begin{ally}
Do you anthropomorphize me that much?
\end{ally}
No, I suppose, I don't. You're not my therapist, sitting in a chair across from me and talking me through my problems. You're not person shaped. You're the shape of my hands displaced half an inch behind my own, navy blue and trimmed with sea-foam green.
No, I suppose, I don't. You're not my therapist, sitting in a chair across from me and talking me through my problems. You're not person shaped. You're the shape of my hands displaced half an inch behind my own, navy blue and trimmed with sea-foam green.\index{Numinous!colors}
\begin{ally}
You haven't used colors in fourteen years, either.
\end{ally}
What I'm trying to say is that maybe you're back because of nostalgia. *Restless Town* was done and couldn't be published yet, and a prideful part of me didn't want it to be my first book, so I pulled *Rum and Coke* into shape.
What I'm trying to say is that maybe you're back because of nostalgia\index{Nostalgia}. *Restless Town* was done and couldn't be published yet, and a prideful part of me didn't want it to be my first book, so I pulled \emph{Rum and Coke} into shape.
It rubbed my nose in the past. I published it a few weeks ago, and I wasn't done with the past, so I started archiving more data. I dug up my old hard drives. I grabbed stuff from Dreamhost, both files and database backups. I finally unlocked my LJ account and archived that.
It rubbed my nose in the past. I published it a few weeks ago, and I wasn't done with the past, so I started archiving more data. I dug up my old hard drives. I grabbed stuff from Dreamhost, both files and database backups. I finally unlocked my LJ account and archived that.\index{Nostalgia\index{Nostalgia}}
\begin{ally}
And you work at an archive.
\end{ally}
I go through phases, looking back at the past. I'll spend a few days trying to backdate some log files, or dig through my old scores and publish them --- I did that too, alongside \emph{Rum and Coke}, publish a bunch of my old music --- or resurrect my notes on \emph{Nanon}, or the like.
I go through phases, looking back at the past. I'll spend a few days trying to backdate some log files, or dig through my old scores and publish them --- I did that too, alongside \emph{Rum and Coke}, publish a bunch of my old music --- or resurrect my notes on \emph{Nanon},\footnote{nanon.lang.drab-makyo.com} or the like.
\begin{ally}
You are quite mercurial.
@ -136,3 +135,4 @@ For me to pull out that trite quote about my own personal history speaks pretty
\newpage
\end{leftcolumn}
\end{paracol}
\index{ally|)}

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book/content/ally/005.tex
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@ -1,4 +1,5 @@
\label{ally:5}
\index{Alcohol|(}
\begin{paracol}{2}
\begin{leftcolumn}
@ -51,7 +52,7 @@ I drank hard with the choir, and then I left school and drank hard with the prog
I did some work at a bar, even. Just making their menu and website for them in exchange for free drinks.
\begin{ally}
You mastered \LaTeX\ that way. A very you thing to do.
You mastered \LaTeX\ that way. A very you thing to do.\index{Catastrophically Maddy}
\end{ally}
I did well at it. I still have one of the menus and some of the paper laying around somewhere. I did that until the bartender left and, when I asked for my next payment from the owner, he flipped out at me and threatened to sue me for impersonating him. I don't think I realized Raffi, the bar manager who hired me, was already on his way out.
@ -78,3 +79,4 @@ You may have been more of a person when you started than when you stopped, but y
\newpage
\end{leftcolumn}
\end{paracol}
\index{Alcohol|)}

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book/content/ally/006.tex
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@ -2,7 +2,7 @@
\begin{paracol}{2}
\begin{leftcolumn}
\noindent When I was young, back before I knew what mental health entailed, what anxiety and abuse and depression really meant, I was convinced I was having semi-regular mental breakdowns. That was the phrase I used then, because I was unsure of what it meant to have a panic attack.
\noindent When I was young, back before I knew what mental health entailed, what anxiety and abuse and depression really meant, I was convinced I was having semi-regular mental breakdowns. That was the phrase I used then, because I was unsure of what it meant to have a panic attack.\index{Mental health!anxiety}
This was before LiveJournal, of course. This was before I was writing on the internet, or even really on the internet at all. This was before you.
@ -11,7 +11,7 @@ No, it wasn't.
\end{ally}
Right.
When I ran away, my dad found my paper journal. I had kept it infrequently, as something about daily journaling to a seventh-grader felt dishonest, stupid. What could I possibly write about?
When I ran away, my dad found my paper journal. I had kept it infrequently, as something about daily journaling to a seventh-grader felt dishonest, stupid. What could I possibly write about?\index{Dad!running away}
In the journal, I mentioned on a few occasions that I'd had a mental breakdown. My dad called me several times over the next few days after my mom found me, and in one of those calls, he yelled at me about that. ``Do you really think you're crazy?'' he said. ``Do you need to be taken to an asylum?''
@ -28,7 +28,7 @@ I was quiet as a mouse.
I have the words now. I have the vocabulary. I can say derealization, depersonalization, dissociation. I can say panic attack and anxiety and depression and hypomania. I can say \emph{ah, \textbf{this} is what is happening now}.
\begin{ally}
You have emotions now, is what you have. Those were your mental breakdowns.
You have emotions now, is what you have. That's your mental breakdowns were.
\end{ally}
Dad didn't believe in those. Not for boys. \emph{Mood's a thing for cattle and loveplay}, right? Emotions are for women.

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book/content/ally/007.tex
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@ -2,20 +2,20 @@
\begin{paracol}{2}
\begin{leftcolumn}
\noindent I think of myself as a trans woman, not a woman. I think of past me as male, not female. To an extent, I think of past me as cisgender. I was a guy. I was that gay guy who tumbled out the other side of puberty and was left to figure out what the fuck. I am not who I was.
\noindent I think of myself as a trans woman, not a woman. I think of past me as male, not female. To an extent, I think of past me as cisgender. I was a guy. I was that gay guy who tumbled out the other side of puberty and was left to figure out what the fuck. I am not who I was.\index{Gender}
\begin{ally}
You have ship-of-Theseus'd yourself into what you are.
You have ship-of-Theseus'd yourself into what you are.\index{Ship of Theseus}
\end{ally}
I was not Madison. I am not Matthew. I can't deny his existence, though. He was him, and to erase that, to toe the party line and say I've always known that I was Madison, would do a disservice to him.
I was not Madison. I am not Matthew. I can't deny his existence, though. He was him, and to erase that, to toe the party line and say I've always known that I was Madison, would do a disservice to him.\index{The Death of Matthew}
He got in all those relationships. He loved so hard it hurt. He dreamed of being held. He struggled with the words.
He fought. He enacted his cruelty in countless subtle ways. He promised himself he'd be better than his dad and failed more often than not.
He rode the same crests of hypomania and crashed just as hard after. Once, he tried to schedule his hobbies into his day so thoroughly that he forgot to schedule meals, then, having failed two weeks later, considered shooting himself in the head. Anxiety rode him just as thoroughly. Once, dead convinced that he had meningitis, he wrote a note apologizing to loved ones and left it on the bedstand.
He rode the same crests of hypomania and crashed just as hard after. Once, he tried to schedule his hobbies into his day so thoroughly that he forgot to schedule meals, then, having failed two weeks later, considered shooting himself in the head. Anxiety rode him just as thoroughly. Once, dead convinced that he had meningitis, he wrote a note apologizing to loved ones and left it on the bedstand.\index{Mania}
He was just as mercurial, too. The brewing phase--
He was just as mercurial, too. The brewing phase--\index{Alcohol}
\begin{ally}
Phases. Plural.

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book/content/ally/008.tex
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@ -1,6 +1,8 @@
\label{ally:8}
\index{Numinous!colors|(}
\begin{paracol}{2}
\begin{rightcolumn*}
\index{Journal entries|(}
\begin{flushright}
\emph{July 2nd, 2004, shortly after midnight}
\end{flushright}
@ -56,6 +58,7 @@ And these pictures?
All from years later. The color thing comes and goes, like you.
\end{leftcolumn}
\begin{rightcolumn*}
\index{Journal entries|)}
\emph{April 8, 2004}
\end{rightcolumn*}
\begin{leftcolumn}
@ -146,12 +149,13 @@ Yeah. Sometimes it's a compulsion. Sometimes a picture will latch onto me and ne
\noindent\includegraphics[width=2.5in]{assets/3.png}
\begin{quote}
\emph{Lines and curves, lines and curves. Beginning now.}
\emph{Lines and curves, lines and curves. Beginning now.}\footnote{makyo.ink/acts-of-intent/}
\end{quote}
\end{rightcolumn}
\begin{leftcolumn}
\noindent It's not an artistic decision. Not \emph{just}, at least. It's always something more.
\index{Writing!samples!poetry}
\begin{verse}
Inter ĝuo kaj timo\\
Estas loko de tro da signifo.\\
@ -174,12 +178,13 @@ Incontestible,\\
Unmoving and always changing.
\end{verse}
\noindent A sigil need not just be lines and curves.
\noindent A sigil\footnote{makyo.github.io/tinysigil} need not just be lines and curves.
\begin{ally}
Or maybe it's just mania.
\end{ally}
It may be.\footnote{https://ally.id/mania}
It may be.\footnote{ally.id/mania}
\newpage
\end{leftcolumn}
\end{paracol}
\index{Numinous!colors|)}

2
book/content/ally/009.tex
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@ -20,7 +20,7 @@ I may be, then. Tell me about mania.
No, tell me why you're asking.
\begin{ally}
I'm more of a liminal creature, myself. It's hard to keep an ally around when depression slowly shuts down avenue after avenue of reaching one. You, as a reflection of me, become distorted while manic. Fun-house mirrors and blind-spots. I want to hear about it.
I'm more of a liminal creature, myself. It's hard to keep an ally around when depression slowly shuts down avenue after avenue of reaching one. You, as a reflection of me, become distorted while manic. Fun-house mirrors and blind-spots. I want to hear about it.\index{Liminal}
\end{ally}
No.

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book/content/ally/010.tex
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@ -1,11 +1,11 @@
\label{ally:10}
\begin{paracol}{2}
\begin{leftcolumn}
\index{Relationships!polyamory|(}
\noindent The first time I remember thinking about polyamory--
\begin{ally}
And here I was hoping you'd cave and talk more about mania.
And here I was hoping you'd cave and talk more about mania.\index{Mental health!bipolar!mania}
\end{ally}
Why are you so hung up on that? I told you I wouldn't, and you seemed to accept that.

4
book/content/ally/019.tex
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@ -1,7 +1,7 @@
\label{ally:19}
\begin{paracol}{2}
\begin{leftcolumn}
\index{ally|(}
\noindent The tragic core to all this, to this whole project, is that I am not an interesting person. Or maybe interesting, but unremarkable.
\begin{ally}
@ -42,7 +42,7 @@ What will the last page say?
{[}\ldots{}{]} Endings were writ on your face, your hands, and your steps --- your very pace spoke of completion.
\begin{ally}
Are you thinking of ending this project?
Are you thinking of ending this project?\index{ally!meta}
\end{ally}
Not at all. I've got a list of side quests I need to complete in order to make you happy, and their very nature makes it easy to complete. One or two thousand words, an hour or two's conversation with you, and then they're done and I don't have to pick up where I left off.

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book/content/ally/020.tex
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@ -10,7 +10,7 @@ Let's put a pin in just why exactly you're asking these questions. I'd like to k
\begin{ally}
Okay.
\end{ally}
To the question at hand, though, I think I covered that before, right? I started this project in a fit of nostalgia and one of the end results of an unstoppable wave of nostalgia plus a sort of graphomania is the need to write about the past, and to do so in such a way as to invoke the past in the process.
To the question at hand, though, I think I covered that before, right? I started this project in a fit of nostalgia\index{Nostalgia} and one of the end results of an unstoppable wave of nostalgia\index{Nostalgia} plus a sort of graphomania is the need to write about the past, and to do so in such a way as to invoke the past in the process.
\begin{ally}
I guess I'm trying to decide whether or not to believe you.
@ -25,10 +25,10 @@ Don't derail me. These are your questions.
\begin{ally}
Point.
\end{ally}
What's not to believe about a project filled to overflowing with nostalgia being borne from nostalgia?
What's not to believe about a project filled to overflowing with nostalgia\index{Nostalgia} being borne from nostalgia\index{Nostalgia}?
\begin{ally}
I don't doubt the roots in nostalgia, I doubt the intentionality.
I don't doubt the roots in nostalgia\index{Nostalgia}, I doubt the intentionality.
\end{ally}
You doubt that I started this on purpose?
@ -98,7 +98,7 @@ You tell me.
I don't know that I can.
\begin{ally}
I am a liminal creature. I told you that. I'm almost a shadow but miss the mark. I'm near to the concept of a back-stage persona but miss the mark. I get close to being you, but never quite come into focus enough for the outlines to match up.
I am a liminal creature. I told you that. I'm almost a shadow but miss the mark. I'm near to the concept of a back-stage persona but miss the mark. I get close to being you, but never quite come into focus enough for the outlines to match up.\index{Liminal}
\end{ally}
Are you not just me? Just a part of me?
@ -113,11 +113,11 @@ Can you imagine so dull a life?
You're not that exciting.
\begin{ally}
Not my department.
Not my department.\index{ally!Not my department}
\end{ally}
Right.
So an allegiance in the \href{http://wiki.postfurry.net/wiki/Metacosmology}{orthocosmic sense} is a relationship two entities where they help each other. Or at least trust that they can rely on the help of the other at need. It's not contingent upon friendship, as you are so fond of saying, but that's not to say that they're mutually exclusive.
So an allegiance in the orthocosmic sense\footnote{wiki.postfurry.net/wiki/Metacosmology} is a relationship two entities where they help each other. Or at least trust that they can rely on the help of the other at need. It's not contingent upon friendship, as you are so fond of saying, but that's not to say that they're mutually exclusive.
\begin{ally}
I am an endocosmic ally.
@ -140,7 +140,7 @@ True friends are almost always also strong allies.
But not vice versa. I see that now. You are not my friend.
\begin{ally}
I am not your friend.
I am not your friend.\index{ally!I am not your friend}
\end{ally}
But you are my ally.

8
book/content/ally/021.tex
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@ -10,15 +10,15 @@ Yes.
\begin{ally}
Were you?
\end{ally}
I think so. I was swinging up toward hypomania, and plowing heedlessly through nostalgia. Some of it was good, some of it was bad, but I don't think that had much bearing on me starting the project.
I think so. I was swinging up toward hypomania, and plowing heedlessly through nostalgia\index{Nostalgia}. Some of it was good, some of it was bad, but I don't think that had much bearing on me starting the project.\index{Mental health!bipolar!mania|(}
\begin{ally}
Robin asked if you were okay. ``I just want to make sure,'' she said once. ``You asked me to check in on you if you ever started talking about geese.''
Robin\index{Relationships!Robin} asked if you were okay. ``I just want to make sure,'' she said once. ``You asked me to check in on you if you ever started talking about geese.''\index{Numinous!birds}
\end{ally}
Perhaps this has a similar feel to it. A similar scent of ritual, a similar flavor of mysticism, a similar sense of some other reality vignetting my vision.
Perhaps this has a similar feel to it. A similar scent of ritual, a similar flavor of mysticism\index{Numinous}, a similar sense of some other reality vignetting my vision.
\begin{ally}
lorxus asked if you were okay. ``People normally write memoirs at the ends of their lives.''
lorxus\index{Relationships!lorxus} asked if you were okay. ``People normally write memoirs at the ends of their lives.''
\end{ally}
Life is a series of beginnings and endings dovetailed messily together.

4
book/content/ally/022.tex
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@ -20,12 +20,12 @@ Okay.
Why ask about the project? Why ask about yourself?
\begin{ally}
You had job interviews. You had the convention. You're visiting Barac. You stopped writing for a bit.
You had job interviews. You had the convention. You're visiting Barac. You stopped writing for a bit.\index{Relationships!Barac}
\end{ally}
I started again, didn't I?
\begin{ally}
Yes. Hypomania is fading into the comfortable static of a ground state, though. You're \textbf{still} writing. That's why I'm asking. Why are you writing this if you're not hypomanic?
Yes. Hypomania is fading into the comfortable static of a ground state, though. You're \textbf{still} writing. That's why I'm asking. Why are you writing this if you're not hypomanic?\index{Mental health!bipolar!mania|)}
\end{ally}
I wrote a bunch of \emph{Restless Town} when I wasn't hypomanic.

4
book/content/ally/023.tex
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@ -1,7 +1,7 @@
\label{ally:23}
\begin{paracol}{2}
\begin{leftcolumn}
\index{ally}
\noindent Have you gotten that out of your system?
\begin{ally}
@ -35,7 +35,7 @@ You're the one with questions. Point me toward one, and I will ask it.
Helpful, as always.
\begin{ally}
Not my department.
Not my department.\index{ally!Not my department}
\end{ally}
Fine. Weight? Surgery? Dyskinesia?

4
book/content/ally/024.tex
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@ -1,7 +1,7 @@
\label{ally:24}
\begin{paracol}{2}
\begin{leftcolumn}
\index{ally|)}
\noindent Do you hate me?
\begin{ally}
@ -35,7 +35,7 @@ If you hate who you used to be, mightn't that be an indicator that you've become
That might just be the kindest thing you've said to me.
\begin{ally}
Not my department.
Not my department.\index{ally!Not my department}
\end{ally}
\newpage
\end{leftcolumn}

6
book/content/ally/025.tex
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@ -15,7 +15,7 @@ That's a bit dramatic, isn't it?
\begin{ally}
Are you not a different person at conventions? Are you not a different person when living in a different home with someone else?
\end{ally}
Maybe. I like to think of it as postprocessing. The picture you take is fixed and largely unchanging, but you can process it into different things with different filters. The person I am is fixed and largely unchanging, but some people and some places bring out, say, artsy black-and-whites, while others bring out glossy, oversaturated colors
Maybe. I like to think of it as postprocessing. The picture you take is fixed and largely unchanging, but you can process it into different things with different filters. The person I am is fixed and largely unchanging, but some people and some places bring out, say, artsy black-and-whites, while others bring out glossy, oversaturated colors.
\begin{ally}
And yet when you were out, you weren't engaging with some parts of your life. Ones you might otherwise consider integral. No for-fun software, no music, no chat, no writing.
@ -23,9 +23,9 @@ And yet when you were out, you weren't engaging with some parts of your life. On
Were you lonely?
\begin{ally}
Not my department.
Not my department.\index{ally!Not my department}
\end{ally}
I suppose I was. Even at the convention, even seeing two different partners, I was lonely. Or, if it could be said of things rather than people, I was lonely for not having those fulfilling aspects about. I missed writing, I missed you.
I suppose I was. Even at the convention, even seeing two different partners, I was lonely. Or, if it could be said of things rather than people, I was lonely for not having those fulfilling aspects about. I missed writing, I missed you.\index{Relationships!Colton}\index{Relationships!Barac}
\begin{ally}
I wasn't gone.

4
book/content/ally/026.tex
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@ -35,7 +35,7 @@ Not my department.
Right. Is that a fact, then? I'm not catching you in this web. Are you the web?
\begin{ally}
Not my department.
Not my department.\index{ally!Not my department}
\end{ally}
The spaces between, then. The negative spaces outlined by twine wrapped around pins. There are connections--
@ -50,7 +50,7 @@ Presence and absence are not my department, either.
Are you some cousin to apophenia, then? Some relative to that \emph{unmotivated seeing of connections accompanied by a specific feeling of abnormal meaningfulness}? Are you that numinous, abnormal meaningfulness?
\begin{ally}
I am easier to define in negatives. I am not presence and absence, but between them. Beyond them. Your ally, but not your friend. Real enough to impinge on your reality, but totally imaginary. \textbf{Not} here. \textbf{Not} doing. \textbf{Not} thinking, feeling, acting.
I am easier to define in negatives. I am not presence and absence, but between them. Beyond them. Your ally, but not your friend. Real enough to impinge on your reality, but totally imaginary. \textbf{Not} here. \textbf{Not} doing. \textbf{Not} thinking, feeling, acting.\index{ally!I am not your friend}
\end{ally}
So, are you?

2
book/content/ally/027.tex
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@ -1,7 +1,7 @@
\label{ally:27}
\begin{paracol}{2}
\begin{leftcolumn}
\index{ally|)}
\noindent I'm sorry this is taking so long.
\begin{ally}

5
book/content/ally/028.tex
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@ -1,7 +1,6 @@
\label{ally:28}
\begin{paracol}{2}
\begin{leftcolumn}
\begin{ally}
Do you ever find yourself getting angry at me?
\end{ally}
@ -12,7 +11,7 @@ How does that make you feel? Like, on one layer of remove, how do you feel about
\end{ally}
I don't know, honestly. It's gotten to the point over the years that I just kind of accept that there is this part of me that I get upset at, that gets upset at me. There's this part of me that I have to yell at occasionally, and who occasionally yells at me.
Besides, not friends, remember?
Besides, not friends, remember?\index{ally!I am not your friend}
\begin{ally}
Correct.
@ -42,7 +41,7 @@ I might just.
So do you try to make me angry?
\begin{ally}
Not my--
Not my--\index{ally!Not my department}
\end{ally}
Department?

4
book/content/ally/029.tex
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@ -1,7 +1,7 @@
\label{ally:29}
\begin{paracol}{2}
\begin{leftcolumn}
\index{ally|)}
\begin{ally}
Where did you go?
\end{ally}
@ -10,7 +10,7 @@ I was still here.
\begin{ally}
Were you?
\end{ally}
I was still at my computer. Still writing. I was still here?
I was still at my computer. Still writing. I was still here?\index{Mental health!bipolar!depression}
\begin{ally}
You'll have to forgive me for saying that I don't quite believe you.

10
book/content/ally/030.tex
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@ -9,14 +9,14 @@ I suppose it must, given this lead in.
Have I died? Has some part of me already rotted and sloughed off? Is this, in some very literal way, an afterlife?
\begin{ally}
Do you feel as though, another seven years having passed, you are moving on from the life that you built up?
Do you feel as though, another seven\index{Numinous!seven} years having passed, you are moving on from the life that you built up?
\end{ally}
Yes.
\begin{ally}
Then I see no reason not to label it as such.
\end{ally}
Perhaps lorxus was right. Perhaps I am writing this at the end of a life.
Perhaps lorxus was right. Perhaps I am writing this at the end of a life.\index{Relationships!lorxus}
\begin{ally}
What are you leaving behind?
@ -28,7 +28,7 @@ Are you not, now?
\end{ally}
No, I think I am. Or, well, I think I am living fairly earnestly. I think what has happened over the last few years is that the struggle changed its shape.
The Madison who was struggling to come to terms with a post-Matthew life is not me any longer. She spent the last seven years mourning him, in a way. She spent the last seven years figuring out how to live without him, throwing away his stuff, leaving behind family and homes and states.
The Madison who was struggling to come to terms with a post-Matthew life is not me any longer. She spent the last seven years mourning him, in a way. She spent the last seven years figuring out how to live without him, throwing away his stuff, leaving behind family and homes and states.\index{The Death of Matthew}
\begin{ally}
Is this her memoir? Or yours?
@ -37,7 +37,9 @@ I don't know, honestly.
All I can say is that, for some reason, at some point while working on this project, I might have died. I have entered a liminal space once again. It's a different one, to be sure, but it's somewhere in between who I was and some undefinable potential self.
Perhaps some early whiff of this liminality is what got to start this project in the first place, to summon you. Perhaps it was burnout reaching a head that signaled the death of that version of me.
Perhaps some early whiff of this liminality is what got to start this project in the first place, to summon you. Perhaps it was burnout reaching a head that signaled the death of that version of me.
Perhaps I have simply, like Theseus' well-worn ship, become something completely new while I wasn't looking.\index{Ship of Theseus}
\newpage
\end{leftcolumn}
\end{paracol}

10
book/content/ally/031.tex
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@ -1,7 +1,7 @@
\label{ally:31}
\begin{paracol}{2}
\begin{leftcolumn}
\noindent I've been pulling this all into a book. Like, a physical one. A paperback.
\noindent I've been pulling this all into a book. Like, a physical one. A paperback.\index{ally!meta}
\begin{ally}
I know.
@ -9,12 +9,12 @@ I know.
How do you feel about that?
\begin{ally}
Not my department.
Not my department.\index{ally!Not my department}
\end{ally}
That feels like an evasion to me. You had opinions on me streaming the process of writing. You had opinions on the process itself: you called me out on writing stuff in commit messages, on having our conversations in comments in the source code. You had opinions on me buying the domain name. Do you have no opinions about our words on something to be bought and sold?
\begin{ally}
A friend once asked Maddy, ``Why do you shout into the void?''
A friend once asked Maddy, ``Why do you shout into the void?''\index{Koan}
\end{ally}
I write all of this down because the very act of putting it into words brings a sense of clarity that I lack without. By taking these moments of my life and articulating them, I almost automatically get another viewpoint on them.
@ -45,12 +45,12 @@ Okay. What about my intent?
\begin{ally}
Your compulsive need to do overshare is an implicit part of our relationship.
\end{ally}
Shall I throw your words in your face?
Shall I throw your words in your face?\index{ally!throwing stones}
\begin{ally}
By all means.
\end{ally}
\emph{Am I something to be bought and sold? Am I something to be traded and marketed?}\footnote{https://ally.id/aside/2}
\emph{Am I something to be bought and sold? Am I something to be traded and marketed?}\footnote{ally.id/aside/2}
\begin{ally}
Have you answered the question? \textbf{Am} I something to be bought and sold? Me, here, being a part of yourself.

9
book/content/ally/032.tex
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@ -7,7 +7,7 @@ My turn.
Shoot.
\begin{ally}
You said: ``you are not the project, but there is no project without you.''\footnote{Ibid.}
You said: ``you are not the project, but there is no project without you.''\footnote{Ibid.}\index{ally!throwing stones}
\end{ally}
Yes, that applies to us both.
@ -26,7 +26,7 @@ Har har.
\end{ally}
Thank you. Seriously, though, I can see two different sides of this.
I feel like I'm putting my maddest edges, as Jon Ronson puts it, on display. In the process of working on this project, I was forced to confront some of the most difficult aspects of my life by its very nature.
I feel like I'm putting my maddest edges\index{Mental health}, as Jon Ronson puts it, on display. In the process of working on this project, I was forced to confront some of the most difficult aspects of my life by its very nature.
In the process of pulling the book together, I was forced to reread much of what I had written, and there are parts of it where my words burn too hot, or get too slippery to hold. There's a feverish quality to them. It's something that felt good to write purely for the sensation of it bursting forth from me in uncontrollable torrents.
@ -42,7 +42,7 @@ Yes.
\end{ally}
It would be `mad', I suppose, were I to believe that you were an \emph{actual} interlocutor. It would be `mad' were I to present these things as a universal worldview. It would be `mad', awful as that word is, were I anything but deliberate with this project.
As it is, I summoned you. I started pulling down bits of nostalgia when my I was shutting down my Dreamhost account, when I went to lock my ancient LiveJournal. I got the idea to write, so I did. It was a deliberate effort.
As it is, I summoned you. I started pulling down bits of nostalgia\index{Nostalgia} when my I was shutting down my Dreamhost account, when I went to lock my ancient LiveJournal. I got the idea to write, so I did. It was a deliberate effort.
\begin{ally}
Is that mad?
@ -61,9 +61,10 @@ And on the other, while I'm most certainly not wholly healthy, I am, at my core,
In the end, it's the storyteller that wins out over the concerned, private individual. If I can't \emph{not} overshare, if I must compulsively tell stories, then I'm going to tell the stories I have and I'm going to make them worth reading.
\begin{ally}
A friend once asked Maddy, ``Why do you shout carefully constructed, thoroughly edited, well rehearsed speeches into the void?''
A friend once asked Maddy, ``Why do you shout carefully constructed, thoroughly edited, well rehearsed speeches into the void?''\index{Koan}
\end{ally}
Maddy replied, ``It pays the bills.''
\index{ally|)}
\newpage
\end{leftcolumn}
\end{paracol}