116: Seven dog years (my first anniversary!)

It was one year ago today -- February 27, 2014 -- that I made my very first post to this blog. I've remarked before that a year in SL is rather like what we call "dog years"; every year in SL is like seven years in real life. I'll celebrate this as my first anniversary, but gee, it sure feels like I've been posting a lot longer.
   On anniversaries, it's frequently customary to look back over the previous year and try to sum it up, and I wanted to do a little of that today. I went back 116 posts to see what I had to say a year ago, and what I looked like, and to me it's quite amusing.
   I've changed my looks, of course -- like so many people do in SL. I stopped wearing my l'Uomo mesh body and went back to a shape that's shorter than most male avs, and more of what I'll call the "chunky hunky monkey" look; I just prefer myself that way. I've changed my hair a couple of times (no, you won't be seeing much of my huge Afro in the future, that was for a 60s look for a party). I've changed my eye colour at least twice, and gone through more chest hair than an Italian waxing salon ;-) I was a lot more fascinated with black eyes and bruises a year ago than I am today. I still have my trademark caterpillar eyebrows, though!
   More to the point, I've changed a lot about what I blog about and why. I seem to recall starting out with the intention of doing a lot more fashion blogging than I've actually accomplished; if you follow this blog, you know I'm not much of a fashion blogger. Occasionally I find a piece of clothing I really like, and that seems to suit me, but for the most part I think I do a lot better as an interviewer than a fashionisto, and since there are plenty of fashion-forward bloggers covering that ground, I'm okay with where I've ended up.

My first published photo,
taken at The Grindery a year ago today

   One of the things I talked about a year ago today was my intention to become a better photographer. And holy moly, was that ever a bad shot I published a year ago. I can see that somehow my chest hair got mixed up with my tank top ... I wouldn't even publish this shot today except to give us all a bit of a chuckle. (These days, I have a policy that I won't knowingly publish a shot where someone is having layering problems or alpha issues with their outfit; I've been too embarrassed too often by that myself to want to document it for anyone for the future.)

I went back to The Grindery this afternoon
and took a similar picture, just to illustrate
the differences a year can make ...

   These days, I have a little bit different philosophy about photography. I realized early on that I was never going to be as good a photographer as some of my friends, and nearly all of my fellow bloggers. Instead, I have decided that my philosophy is that, damn it, I take the same kind of snapshots as a lot of other people -- it's just that I take more of them. I'm a huge Andy Warhol fan, and, looking back at the early days of Interview magazine, that's what he did; he took a lot of Polaroids and published interviews verbatim. I don't know if it's the best policy, but it seems to be mine.
   I don't seem to have any instinctive talent for photographic composition, and I don't own a copy of Photoshop or anything like that; what you see is what I see, and the most I do is set the sun to noon so I can see the details of people and objects. Believe it or not, I don't use poses (well, occasionally, when I find them at a location, or they're built into furniture). I just snap away until I get a picture I like. Yes, it's frequently a bit awkward and a bit naive, but that's the kind of photographer I am.
   As far as interviews go, well, I always ask the same questions; I may branch out a little bit in the future, and I'm thinking of different kinds of interviews for the future, but for now, I think it helps my readers to understand people when they read how my subjects answer the same questions that everyone else has answered. I like talking to people who are DOING things in Second Life, because I think they are people that other residents would like to know about; I'll continue to do that. I'll also continue to try to find unusual places to go and take pictures -- think of it as me trying to find things that it will amuse you to check out on your own.
   I wanted to take this opportunity to thank everyone who's been supportive and enthusiastic about what I've been trying to do with this blog over the last year. Especially I want to shout out to my fellow bloggers, all of whom you'll see in the blogroll to the right. Some of those folks, like Eddi Haskell / Ryce Skytower and Ziggy Starsmith and Bock McMillan, have been producing intelligent, high-quality Second Life blogging for longer than my av has been in existence, and I owe them a great debt for leading the way. NakedCarl Paneer and I have become colleagues who seem to cover the same ground, and I thank him for keeping my nose to the grindstone to keep posting. Bloggers like Darkyn Dover, Richmond Damiano, Filippo Bergan / Chary Hera, and Carthalis Rossini spend their time and money making beautiful, intricate images, and I thank them for working at a level that constantly delights me. And bloggers like Ciaran Laval, Hamlet Au, Iris Ophelia, and Strawberry Singh have shown me that Second Life blogging can make people think as well as show them beautiful images. Thank you all, and I recommend that my readers check out everyone in my blogroll. Some of them have become friends as well as colleagues. Every single one of these folks has been an inspiration to me at one time or another, and they're all worth following.
   I also want to thank all my friends in Second Life. There are way too many to name, I'm already beyond my tag limit for this post, and (like an Oscar winner) if I name only a few I'll insult the rest, so -- if you're on my list of friends, in SL or on Facebook or both, thank you. It's your support and kind words that keep me blogging. Thanks for putting up with me pestering you for interviews and photographs and "just a few minutes of your time". Thanks for your comments and likes and thumbs-up on Facebook, and for passing around links on Google Plus, and all your interest and support. Thanks for being great DJs and hosts and designers and landlords and neighbours at 3Bears and everything else that you do. Thanks for telling me about cool things that you think I should check out. Thanks for teaching me how to do cool stuff. And thanks for reading my blog!
   Finally, as many of you know, one other important thing has changed in my Second Life in the last year. I first met Alex Thaub out dancing, and he seemed like a nice guy, and I interviewed him, and we went out on a date, and kept hanging out together -- and now we're partners and we're getting married soon. He's become the most important person in my Second Life and I thank him for his constant love, hugs, support, and understanding, and for realizing that when he pops into the house and finds me chatting with a stranger, it's for an interview ;-) You will all be invited to our wedding in the near future, and I'll be blogging about that whole process. Thanks, Alex, for making this a great time in my Second Life, and thanks for saying yes when I proposed!
   Here's to another year!

083: Memorial service for Avacar Bluestar

Avacar Bluestar died on November 14 from a heart condition. I wasn't fortunate enough to know him personally so, when I heard about his memorial service, I figured space would be at a premium and it would be more useful to drop in and pay my respects informally; I'd heard that after half-an-hour of encomonium, there would be a kind of dance or get-together. I figured I could slip in, say hi to

a few friends, sign whatever was there as a guest book and make my way back to my day.
     Well, an hour in, there were still people talking about Avacar's good qualities to a very, very large audience. The details of the memorial service have been covered by other bloggers, some of whom knew him as a close friend. Ryce Skytower (aka Eddi Haskell), a close

friend of Avacar, delivered some powerful remarks that can be found here. Bock McMillan's comments are here and NakedCarl quotes Ryce in his blog found here. Ziggy Starsmith's comments are here.
     The thing that was most extraordinary about this event for me was the sheer number of people who were present. Bock McMillan counted 101 residents on

the sim at one point; that seems in the right range of numbers to me, although I didn't know it was even possible to have that many people in one place in SL. The sim was so overloaded that people were popping in and out; as one crashed another would take his place immediately. There's a screen cap that Ryce captured that shows all the residents with their names over their heads that's also represented in Bock's blog; you should definitely look at it, I've never seen anything like it. I can't tell you how powerful it was to actually be there and to see that huge sea of floating names bobbing and moving like the ocean.
     My screen was so filled with names that it was all I could do to pick out a few green ones representing friends, but I didn't get a chance to say hello (I crashed twice myself). As I said, Ryce Skytower was there, and fellow blogger Ziggy Starsmith; Bock McMillan, Tomais Ashdene and Guyke Lundquist; Ezzie Mirabella, the new Board Chair of Second Pride; Crito Galtier from Terra Lascivus; Kahvy Sands and Garrett Smith; and a lady who's a mainstay of the LGBT community in SL, Kharissa Indigo. But there were so many people there, I'm sure I missed some friends and I definitely missed the great speeches. I only managed a few photographs and crashed twice before I decided to leave the service and yield my space to one of Avacar's many personal friends.
     My takeaway is that I've realized once again that it's possible to develop friendships and working relationships in Second Life that are strong and powerful and long-lasting -- and real. It's also possible to develop those friendships by working hard for the benefit of the community, and following the Golden Rule. The respect that Avacar Bluestar engendered in his lifetime, and the memories of him that huge numbers of residents have, will last until the death of the last person who knew him personally, and perhaps even beyond.
     My sympathies in this time to his partner Ricogenu. Let's remember Avacar Bluestar as a fine example of the way people can work for the betterment of others in Second Life.