O-oh. Okay. Yes. J-just... friends. *looks away* *looks back* What, er, what did you m-mean by.... Oh nevermind. Ignore me. Sorry. So sorry. *extreme blushing* *avoids Sea Glass's eyes* *wishes she could be invisible, instead of changing her appearance*

And here I was not trying to friend-zone Sea Glass! Ha!

Also, I did it again! Aaaaaah! I did it again! I'm an awful friend, to keep ghosting you! Aah, why!

Oh, wow. A thousand pages, sounds hard. I've done it, but I wasn't doing a challenge and I didn't really do anything else that day. Nikolai is great. I won't rant about him either, but he's an amazing sassy smart prince and he's great. He's like, a tactical genius, but everything he wants the main character to do, she doesn't want to. He gets all the best lines. Comedy gold. Good luck with Jane Eyre!

Cool! I'll have to look for it, but I'm doing Book Wars, and I have to finish Arch-Enemies and the Ember in the Ashes series and Wings of Fire book 12 comes out in 8 days (!!!), so it might take me a bit. The other day I asked for a book that came out in 2000 (The Two Princesses of Bammare) and they didn't have it. They have nothing between, like, Narnia, and new things, but I love it anyway. And no, you're not being presumptuous. Thank you! What's your school like?

Hm, I might. I'm not sure though, I'm kind of busy with all of those other things and my Bat Mitzvah coming up and stuff, but I'll consider it. 

I think they could be related, under some circumstances. I'm not sure if I'd want to do them, either, though. Sounds messy. But it would be cool to know all about them though, and that's what you would get from the books. So now I have something else to add to my reading list. Did you find any of the books interesting?

Oh, it's ok, sorry for the misunderstanding :) Thank you!

Oh, cool. I'll have to get to know them. I might join the Discord, although it has confused me in the past. Maybe I'll just... Google it? Or get my friend to teach me?

Laylanie says tanf. Tan? Are you getting a tan, Laylanie? But it's December! I suppose it did suddenly get warm though (which is sad because I really wanted a white Christmas, and I got excited because of that random unprecedented snowday we got in November).

*blushes* I like coming here, to the beach, a-and eating strawberries with whipped cream... *blushes more* And sometimes, talking to people. *eyes run over Celeste’s hair* 

Aaaaaaaaah, the cuties! Oh, Sea Glass is planning to ask the same of Celeste, by the way, but I wanted to give her a chance to respond first. So, insert a stammered “What about you?” somewhere if you like. And yes. So much yes. Perhaps they become so enraptured by their scintillating conversation and the presence of their mutual crush that they forget all other worries, the hours evaporating into stargazing and talking, maybe baCKTRACKING ON THAT “FRIENDS” THING *cuts herself off* *copies Stardust* Or since staying up all night is hard, perhaps they fall asleep in the glow of the moon, lulled by the gentle hush of the waves... we started this in April, we can pretend it’s warm enough for that, right? Especially if they drift off in each others’ arms. *grinning like a fool* 

Magic! In her hands! She had green fingers! That’s fair. 

XD Yeah, you’d be in less trouble. Your friend sounds pretty determined. If she puts half as much into her studies as your books, she should be fine. 

Yep. I got the Six of Crows duology for Christmas, and rediscovered two old Barnes & Noble gift cards. Jane Eyre was fine, actually—it’s not like she’s out riding unicorns and slaying demons on her quest for the sun and the moon or anything, but she does manage to get herself pretty well into trouble and pretty well out of it. Several times. 

Ooh, congratulations! On both the excellent deadpan and the victory. I imagine your competition will be tougher after their loss, but if this was a story it’d just be heightening drama and you’d make it a hat trick. Then a later film adaption would frame each victory as its own movie.

It is cool! I still need a little work on time management, or maybe it’s motivation? Anyway, I’m definitely learning a lot about legal processes and perspective and learning itself. I think classes are a lot more casual than in public school. There’s a lot of discussion; people aren’t afraid to make jokes or ask questions, and the teachers often listen and run with it. We get off track that way sometimes, but it’s always interesting. And the teachers are always engaged, too (except in math, where everyone works independently with an online program and recieves support as needed, because even in the same age groups we can have very different levels and paces), which I noticed most when this terrible new teacher (now gone, thankfully) came and would give us an assignment, then abandon us for his phone, hardly even looking up, and then if we didn’t engage he wouldn’t do anything about it, just tell us to work. I could go on about him for a while, I didn’t like him at all (and I knew it on first sight). I dropped the one class I had with him after just a couple of months. Oh yeah, I can do that because I’m on what we call the Sudbury track, which is a system where each student chooses all of their own classes (or, the ones they’d like to take, and then it’s almost like a lottery depending on interest and scheduling) (class options are suggested at the end of every year by students and staff alike—we’re encouraged to submit things we’ve always wanted to learn and/or teach), and can drop them at any time as long as they notify the teacher of the class and the director of the school, who happens to also be a teacher. This is as opposed to the Academic track, where students are required to take a certain number of classes in every area and a few core classes, and can only drop extra electives. The price of being Sudbury is that while Academic kids get to graduate pretty much freely, a Sudbury student will have to write a thesis in which they talk about what they’ve learned in their time at the school and what they plan to do after leaving, and read it as a speech on Graduation day. And the plans are like actual, concrete plans with all the steps in place that you come up with under guidance. There’s a class for it. I think this year we have two or three graduates. Last year we only had one! He still visits the school sometimes. My graduating class is going to be enormous—I think there’s seven or eight of us. I don’t really keep track; we’re sorted into age groups rather than grades since the school is so tiny. The entire student body numbers less than 30. And people talk about schools with thousands of kids “small”... it’s nearly unfathomable to me. We get pretty well acquainted, as you might imagine. 

Then there’s School Meeting, Judicial Court, Mediation, Revision Committee, Clerkships, chores... I think that’s all the major thingies. School Meeting is just what it sounds like; a meeting of members of the school community. So, students and staff. Everyone gets exactly one vote, no exceptions. The director has as much power as a four-year-old, I and my classmates and teachers as much as either of them. It’s pretty cool. School Meeting is boring though, you just sit around while the SM Chairperson (a clerkship position) introduces subjects and calls on people. The worst is possibly debating new rules. Everyone has a point, and while most of them are very similar and good points, they’re just different enough that everyone wants to voice their own (and they get to), and we end up going in big aching circles for what feels like ages. And before Revision Committee, it used to be like that for changing old rules, too. Thankfully, not everyone has to attend either of those. There are a few clerks required for both, and then just whoever’s interested (mostly staff), and the rest of us only have to put up with the summary we get in Mandatory SM and whatever topics require the attention of all members. Revision Committee revises the lawbook, going through it and discussing each rule, occasionally writing a proposal to take to School Meeting (because only it has the power to actually change the rules). 

Judicial Court is, well, court. It’s what we have to deal with rule breaking. I was the JC clerk once; my duties included gathering or sending others to gather the people needed for each meeting and basically making sure everything ran smoothly. It also admitted me into what I jokingly nicknamed the school Illuminati, officially called Leadership, where a few clerks and the director gathered every week to sort and discuss JC complaints and SM agenda items before they happen/get done/get started. It sometimes helps to limit the going round in circles. Anyway. When a rule is broken, someone is supposed to write it up, meaning they get a write-up sheet that’s basically a form to fill out, and write down what happened, when and where it happened, who’s involved, etc., and put it in a box for the meeting. Then when the time comes around, the required people are summoned, the complaint is read by the JC clerk, and we go through a process as follows: Ask the person who wrote the thing up what happened, take questions for that person, ask the person who was written up what happened, take questions for them, take questions, comments, witnesses and more information, ask the person written up if they think they broke a rule and if so, what rule, discuss with the committee, and assign an appropriate consequence. The purpose of consequences, by the way, is not to punish; it’s to find a way to help the person who broke a rule stop breaking that rule, and to protect the community. We can also give warnings, strong warnings and warning pluses (warnings with light consequences attached that may be given while still allowing a strong warning to be given if the rule is broken again) (I worded that rule years ago and while I don’t remember my exact phrasing I’m still very proud of it) before consequences. Thusly, getting written up isn’t always a big deal, which we usually forget to tell new people. I remember squirming in my seat the first time I was written up, getting all worried and trying to wriggle my way out of it. People get written up all the time for not signing in/out. Those complaints tend to go fast, some even in less than five minutes. Nowadays I just avoid breaking rules or take responsibility with my head held high. 

This is getting really long... I should probably explain clerkships, though. Clerkships are positions held by students to fill roles in the community, in the workings of the school. A couple of them are running meetings; we also have one for calling meetings, for just sitting in meetings (so that the students get represented better), for making sure we have supplies like toilet paper, for doing taxes, taking out mail (I’ve held that one uncontested many times), running chores, taking attendance, doing fire drills, taking care of the guinea pig... there’s a lot, and we hold elections in School meeting every other month. They take a while. 

And lastly, chores. Chores are cleaning tasks that get reassigned weekly by the chores clerks, assisted by staff (it’s a big job), who go by sign-ups and then if there are chores no one has signed up for, following a list in a pattern that also changes every week (in a meta pattern of its own so that we don’t have to keep coming up with more), to ensure that no one gets out of chores all the time just because their first initial is towards the end of the alphabet. If people are absent, substitutes are chosen from the list, starting with anyone who doesn’t have a chore. Staff only do chores on rare occasions. Who has what chore gets put up on two big boards, one for the upstairs and one for the downstairs. Then when chores happen, people do the chores they get and then write their names on a whiteboard, and the chores clerks sort of go over what they’ve done, and if they didn’t miss anything they get checked off. Pieces of the system have changed a lot since I first came to the school. Chore descriptions have been reshuffled a few times, and both sign-up and getting checked off used to be a free-for-all. 

*looks back at the five walls of text she’s written* I knew it. I knew this would happen. Sorry for making you read all that. I hope it made sense.

Wow, that sounds really cool! I’ve always wanted to go through some kind of ceremony like that, honestly, though maybe not all that comes with it. XD I think I have a better idea of what it’s supposed to mean now than I used to. I’m sure you’ll be amazing. What I will give you is a secret. I like little surprises, I don’t know if you know. Or if anyone knows, for that matter. Anyway, my birthday is March 23rd. I’d prefer not to say my exact age, but it’s in the teens, around Sea Glass’. I know, I know, xe doesn’t have an exact age either, but measuring age chronologically is pretty arbitrary anyway. Sometimes I think I look older than my years and act younger. Oh yeah, speaking of looks, your image of me is nearly spot-on! I don’t have green hazel eyes, but my mom does, and we both wear glasses. As I always say, I’m tall and thin with long hair and nails, and usually wear T-shirts and jeans, sneakers and hiking socks, my watch, my ace ring and a pendant. I have a lot of pendants. I prefer cool and neutral colors. I’m told I’m pretty, and while I don’t want to take that too close to heart, I think I’m pretty enough. And to be perfectly honest, I do sometimes see a resemblance in actresses and models, apart from that I don’t wear makeup or have any piercings. 

Jeez, another wall of text. I guess I’m getting used to it?

Huh. I didn’t think of that. Oh, but being a witch wouldn’t necessarily mean leading a double life; I think about it like Wicca, which is a modern magical practice that’s sort of like a religion or philosophy, but with more spells. A lot of it is very small stuff, just rituals that I imagine serves as a substitute for prayers. In D&D terms, it’s like arcane magic instead of divine magic. Aren’t miracles a sort of magic, after all?

Mexi says iaed! Aeneid? Oh, or Illiad?

Hey, I think a little something from your last post got transferred to the end of your newest one somehow? I seem to recall seeing it before, and it doesn’t really make sense where it is now. 

a) Thank you!

b) Yes, I got a bit carried away there.

c) Thanks!

d) Isn’t it great? Who are your favorite characters?

e) I’ll have to get back to you on that. 

f) It is.

h) They’re pretty useful, though. 

Aw, thanks both of you! I don't find it creepy at all (I even think Rogue Wilding was on here a while ago) but I feel honored that you just decided to read it because it was good, and you don't even know me. It seriously makes my day anytime anyone on here compliments me. Thanks for enduring the text walls. I think it's funny that this started out with us posting paragraphs about our AEs, and nothing about ourselves, and evolved to us posting a few sentances about our AEs, and text walls about ourselves. I think we really got to know each other better, which was cool. (Never mind about the Hunger Games spoiler... I'm glad I remembered to attach a spoiler warning).

a) Thank you again!

b) I know, right! :3 I almost feel a bit guilty on account of the pages and pages of people clamoring to get just one on her picturing thread... Oh well, I love them all so much. You got one too, on GaloWon's thread, right? We can revel in our luckiness together :)

c) Thank you, I spent a lot of time thinking about it.

d) That might've been one of the first good fantasy books I read, I'm glad I finally found some other people who agree with me. It was really cool for me.

e) Yes, I know, right!? I'm so exited for King of Scars, but also slightly apprehensive. Leigh Bardugo better not ruin my sassy prince boi.

f) It does to me, too. I'm jealous.

g) Thank you so much (for the third time this post... am I gushing? Sorry if it's getting redundant), it has not happened, although it will in a little over a month now (!!!) Mazel Tov and good luck to you too. How is your portion? Mine is the last one in Exodus, with Moses finishing the Tabernacle. A word of advice-- it comes slowly, and for me I never seemed to make any progress, but when you look back, you realize how far you've come. It is by all means overwhelming, but it is doable. Wow, that was a bit of a ramble. Oops!

h) Eh. You can't really go wrong with lists.