imperatrice

I realized that I haven't posted here very much. And I think I know why. I've become very circumspect about posting personal things, even when only two people could possibly know about them.

/sigh

I have the strange feeling that I'm a sort of savepoint for my exes and ex-crushes. They all still care about me and ping me to chat. They're all very fond and kind, they want to know about my life and doings and chat about funny things and catch up with me; but I'm noticing a trend.

They never, ever, breathe a word about their wives/girlfriends. Ever. I usually have to nudge the conversation in that direction: ask how the family is, coo over the baby... I feel like if I don't do it, that indescribably uncomfortable intuition that hovers over me just gets bigger and bigger. And I start to feel awkward. And they answer in short little bursts, and then immediately go on to something else.

What kind of catching up is this?

I changed my profile picture today on the Tome of Faces. Someone wrote to say that my face hasn't changed since high school. And in a related note, all of my exes contacted me privately to tell me how good I looked, and to reminisce about old days.

I joke to a lot of people that I ensure my immortality in the same manner as Dorian Gray. In my mind, I've always linked that story to the intro to Roald Dahl's "The Witches", since I read them both at the same time. In Dahl's book, he talks about a child (Solveg Christiansen) who was cursed into a painting by a witch. His family could see him growing older as the years went by, but always locked in a sort of painting-imposed stasis when observed by the family.

I do feel like Dorian Grey, except my face isn't changing because of some foolish wish on my part to stay youthful. I'm staying exactly the same because people aren't letting me change, because talking to me lets them return to their youth.

The regrettable thing for me is that I always used to hope (in turn) that I'd get to grow old with each of them. Nowadays, I live in a painting that they come to visit every so often, to watch me stand absolutely still.

A river is never the same river twice, a person is similarly in flux.

I've changed my name, partly out of a desire to stay submerged and to keep writing openly for as long as I can. No one in my current circles reads anything outside of Facebook, so I have effectively no destinies to be entangled with here. The world finds me and makes demands of me, and the older I get, the harder it becomes to remember which mien to wear for which occasion.

I was a prince once, uncomfortable in my skin.
I am an empress these days, still quietly uncomfortable in my skin.
I sit on my throne on the frozen Mirror of Reason.

There are shades of imperious in the name, and tints of the cockatrice in the gaze.

I have broken a heart or two along the way. I assure the reader that it was unintentional. When they hopefully scratched "evighed" on the frozen pond, the mirror-shards lodged in my eyes and heart have already done their work, and all I can do then is give them their third kiss.