Otaku Wench?

I've always been a fantasy/sci-fi fan; anime was just too weird, and I never looked too far in to it. But one night while my sister was cruising the netflix instant plays, Howl's Moving Castle appeared. I don't know why she picked it. She thinks anime is even weirder than I do. When I told her she had to try watching Avatar: The Last Airbender, she was suspicious of it because it was an animated tv show, and she thought it would be anime. Why would she willingly choose to watch a movie that I told her was anime? I don't know.

But she did. And I watched it with her, and I loved it.

My god. What is this black sorcery?! Why is this so addictive?! I've now watched Nausicaa of the Valley of the Wind, Spirited Away, Howl's Moving Castle, and My Neighbor Totoro. I loved all of them, except the first one, which I merely liked. Next I'm thinking of watching Princess Mononoke.

Oh my gawd. Have I secretly been a closet anime fan my whole life and never known about it? Has this urge to watch anime continuously been lurking in the dungeons of my heart all this time? What's going on with me?! I'm not supposed to like this stuff! Aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaah....

It's always weird when you discover that you like something that you've never tried before, and it changes your perception of yourself. I mean, I'd just gotten used to being an Avatar fan. I feel like my tough girl persona is slipping away from me. No, don't go, tough girl! I need you! Without you, I'll start feeling those goddamn emotions. :/

Self Creating Personas

I read a lot. I keep track of the books I've read on shelfari.
I've noticed something: I am influenced by the people I read and write about. In Tithe (Holly Black), the MC Kaye doesn't like anything that's too sweet/sugary. For a few days after I read that, I didn't put any sugar in my coffee. When I created a character who loved trance music and chaos, and I felt an insatiable urge to crank up the volume and spend an entire night dancing. The next character I dreamed up had a lip ring and long blue hair. Now I have plans to get my lip pierced and dye my fringe blue (in my defense, a lip ring is something I've been wanting for a while, and I can't actually dye my fringe because I have a job).

Of course, the big one is my soul character, the Seeker. We share so much that she's pretty much a reincarnation of me. She has my hair and eyes, I'm planning tattoos similar to hers, she dresses like me, and she's quiet and thoughtful - like me. Her past and current situation, of course, were dramatized for plot, but she shares many of my fears. She also has my affinity for black chokers, although in her case, she only wears one, and it's covered in the symbols of her dead friends.

These characters are partially born of me, so it makes sense that they would influence me, too. It's a self-fulfilling prophecy: I make a character with certain tendencies of mine, and other tendencies come out of that which reflect back to me.