Extropia, Extropia

Our first new arrival is not a person, it's a whole SIM!  While I've been flailing around ironing out technical details for a photo shoot, Gala and Vids have been hard at work on our new Extropian SIM, Extropia. That is to say Extropia the SIM, in Extropia the place...how confusing it that? Should I call it Extropia-Extropia? E²? E-Prime? E.E. "Doc" Smith? Anyway, the SIM is open and we're still accepting applications for Citizenship.  Check here for details and more great pictures taken by people with better graphics cards than mine.

Beginning Thursday

New land means new Citizens, which means people come to me for references.  Yesterday I got a reference request that was as unexpected as it was welcome.

Beginning Thursday is a fairly new entry to our world.  I'd been following her BlogHUD adventures since she started posting them, and read some entries about her on her partner CyFishy's blog.  I don't usually give Citizenship references to people unless I've met them in-world a couple times, but she has this polite and demure air about her that totally disarmed me.  It's odd...how her and Cy complement each other - she the bright winged day to his more subdued and pale night.



We sat and talked for a while in my lounge, comparing notes about our experiences here as Digital People.  As I've come to notice and expect, our experiences were as unique as our natures.  One thing holds true for all of us, though - from time to time we need the presence of others like ourselves to regain our strength and confidence. We need to remember why we chose to try on a new identity in a new world, and we need know that we are not alone in our choice.

So if you see her around, dancing at Technohenge, or on the benches at the next Salon, or hanging out with her partner Cy, welcome her.  You may be her neighbor someday.

'D'

He came down off the mountain in the dark of night.

The upper reaches of Tycho Island are largely a mystery to me.  The Chairman has been content to let the trees and the scrub run riot up there until now, and even with the weather control satellites this winter has been a cold and rainy one.  I like forests, provided they're not crawling with Terranists trying to kill me, but conditions up there are just not conducive to a little stroll in the woods.

His feet were sure as he picked his way down the slope.  He made so little sound I didn't notice him until he stepped out onto the beach and gave a polite but subdued "Hello."  He smelled like pine needles and earth after a long rain.  He was tall and lanky like a lone wolf or an ascetic monk.  Well, a lone wolf with glasses and a lip piercing anyway.

His feet were sure, but his face was not.  I'd seen that look before - a bit lost, a bit bewildered, trying reconstruct in his head the pieces of history that had led him here.  Trying and failing.



I knew that look because I'd seen it in the mirror countless times in my early days here.  Looking in the mirror, fascinated by a face that memory said I had always had yet seemed utterly strange to me.  Wondering.  How do people see me?  What do I sound like? What do I like to do?  Who am I? Too many questions, with only the faintest sense of purpose to guide me.

I'll be honest, strange men put me on my guard here.  They're usually either looking for some quick action, or trolling for atomic girls to take home, or both.  Strangely, my spidey-sense was totally quiet this time.  If you meet him, I think you'll understand why, and even if you don't I think his politeness and intelligence will disarm you.  It certainly did me.  Next thing I new we were sitting on the deck chairs and trying to make sense of his new existence together.



"D", as I will call him for now because even his name is in flux, had been sleeping up on the mountain for the past few days.  He didn't look any worse for the experience, either.  He had a good coat to keep him warm, and duck boots that looked like they had seen ages of walking.  He had that attitude towards nature of casual comfort coupled with caution that only comes from years of experience.  Something tells me he could have lived comfortably up there for a year and never come down.

Still, he did come down.  Apparently he's "always been like this" in his version of that timeless non-past a lot of us Digitals share, never venturing too deep into the forest, never straying too far into the great cities of SL like Saijo, and Suffugium, and the S.I.C.  He's been a lone wolf, hovering at the edges of man's domain.  Until now.

He says the Loas called him, the guiding spirits.  Papa Legba has asked him to come here to do some "great work" for him.  I've been sworn to secrecy on it, but I think he will share more with us as his work takes shape.

We talked until dawn, and I don't know what got into me, but I offered him the use of the tent I left down on the beach to give him a better place to sleep.  I haven't used the thing for weeks now that I've got housing arrangements taken care of, and it seemed the least I could do.  He seemed overjoyed at the prospect.  I guess sleeping in a bower made from pine boughs makes you appreciate the small comforts.

So, if you meet a stranger on the slopes of Tycho Island, don't be afraid.  He's as new to himself as he is to you, and he could use a kind voice and an open hand.