Return to Stardust

I'm re-reading Sailor Moon right now. I inhereted Gina's manga collection, and I meant to re-read them awhile ago, but various things got in the way. For one, we've been in the process of moving for several months, but most of all, it was hard to revisit things that were precious to Gina. It's slowly gotten easier, which is good, because I want to revisit things that remind me of them.

It's been a largely positive experience reading Sailor Moon again. Since these were Gina's copies, I keep finding little things of theirs in the pages- Scraps of paper, library reciepts, and even an envelope that Emily used to send them a letter in. It always catches me off gaurd when I find one of these things and hits me with a wave of emotion.

I like it, because it's a reminder that Gina once lived. They touched these books. They opened this envelope and read the letter inside. They returned a book to the public library on December 20th, 2012, at 7:39 pm. These things are so precious to me.

Sailor Moon feels like an old friend. I first met Gina at Anime Club in Middle School. They didn't know me, but they started infodumping to me about Sailor Moon. That was our first interaction. I recently got the Jupiter planetary symbol tattooed on my wrist to remind me of them. Jupiter was their favorite (senshi and planet).

Ever since they died, I've thought about Hotaru's arc. For one, they related to her in life. I can't help but feel like they relate to her in death, too. Saturn gets reborn and revived over the course of the series, but her story is a tragic one. She's alone, abused, and dies protecting others. Gina wasn't alone in the end, but they were a lonely kid. Bullied by peers and tormented by family. Then, they died young, putting others before themself, like they always did.

Reading Saturn's arc hurts a lot, but also fills me with love. I wish Gina could be reborn as a baby and that I could raise them myself, like the outter senshi did with Hotaru. Maybe that sounds like a weird thing to want, but the connection to that narrative is already there, and I would give anything to let Gina have a happy childhood.

It was their birthday yesterday, but I didn't have a single free second to do anything or even reflect on them really. It was very frustrating. But at work, I could think about them a bit, between dealing with customers.

Time continues to pass, and one of the things that scares me the most is knowing that one day I'll have lived more life without them than I did with them. Whether I like it or not (and I don't), I'm going to figure out who I am without them. That feels cruel. I haven't reached out to their mom in forever...it's a whole thing, but I know the right thing to do is to talk to her more often. It's just very difficult, for many reasons.

I'm so scared of people forgetting about them and moving on, I'm scared I'll do it, too. I know I won't, but the fear is there. Like I said before, they're in my dreams less, and I don't like what that says.

I want to try and reflect on what I wish I could share with them now, what they would think of me, and the kind of person they could have grown into today.

Immediately after their death, I started consciously and subconsiously taking on some of their traits. Nothing huge really, I could never be them, but I try to listen to the little Gina voice in my head and ask myself What Would Gina Do when I'm making decisions. I actually probably relied on them too much to make decisions for me when they were alive, but it was such a comfortable arrangement for both of us. They liked making decisions, and I loved letting them. So now I try to think about what they would say to me. I'll order food like they would, tell the jokes I think they'd appreciate, things like that.

Right after they died is when I became a cat person, which I did not do consciously, but they were very much a cat person in life so I hold that close. I wish I could think of more things right now, because I know there are more, but I can't.

Gina worried about how the only two people I was deeply close to were them and my partner. That's still true. But I never, ever want to replace them. I'd like to make more friends, or be better about making time for the friends I already have, but never have another best friend.

Sorry this journal is so disjointed. I'm trying to write down everything I was feeling yesterday, but my memory is bad and I'm not as deep in the feeling right now which makes it harder to access.

Anyway....another therapist told me that she hears people say "I don't know what they'd say now" about loved ones who passed, and she said she doesn't believe we can't know. If we loved someone that much and knew them so well, we should try to be more confident that we do know what they'd say. I'm trying to keep this in mind as I go forward. Gina would probably still be worried about me not having close friends. Marty's the closest, but even with hir, I'd like to be closer. They would be so proud of Ari for doing the damn thing and being amazing, they'd be proud of Arthur for his growth over the past couple of years. They might be sad that I struggle to keep up with our mutual friends, who I love so much. I don't know how they would feel about me quitting animation. I have a feeling they might have pushed back on that. I don't know if that's true, but I feel like they'd have at least been concerned about how quickly I gave up on my dreams. They would love some of the bands I've gotten into recently, and I wish I could share that with them. I think they might have been somewhat uncomfortable with the entirety of what queercore is, but not all of it. Also, by now they would have been a person with a couple more years of life experience and growth, so who knows.

I feel for sure they would have moved out by now. Ari did say she intended on living with them when she moved out, and she did that within the same year that they died. I wholeheartedly believe that Gina would have a better job and a better life by now. They were fucking robbed of that.

Now I'm gonna go crack open a Mountain Dew in their honor.

Turns out today is the 2 year anniversary of their death, which I hate. I hate knowing what day it was, I hate how much time has passed already, I hate everything about it. One day I'm going to have lived more years without them than with them. That's not how it was supposed to be. We were close to celebrating a full decade as best friends when they died, and I was looking forward to spending a whole life with them.

One of my old therapists told me that the bond I had with Gina sounded like a once-in-a-lifetime-if-you're-lucky thing, and I wholeheartedly agreed. Now what do I do for the rest of my life without them?

I want to try and get these webpages online today. I've definitely been battling myself this whole time; worrying that deep down I'm making all this stuff for selfish reasons, like, it's actually for me and not for them. I think the honest answer is that it's both for me and for them. I have to get myself out of this cycle where I tell myself that I'm not grieving correctly, or that I'm doing something wrong. These webpages have to be public, because the whole point was to share the memory of Gina with as many people as possible. I know I tend to keep things to myself, but this time I can't and shouldn't do that.

Like maybe the selfish thing would be to not put this stuff out there, y'know? Maybe there's no way to know! Maybe my obsession with "am I selfish for having feelings" is something I need to work on in general! Damn!

Today I miss them. Every day I miss them. Every day I love them.

I think I'm having dreams about them less frequently. That scares me! It makes me feel further away from them. I wish I could at least never lose that way of being with them, even if it's not real.

Last night, me and Ingram were going through the huge document of chatlogs about Gina's OCs that Jackie, Hap and Loge helped collect from old conversations they had with them. We're planning on taking the story Gina was always trying to write and making it into a videogame, which was their end goal for the story. It was Gina's Magnum Opus, and I want them to be able to finish it. So, we're staying as true to everything Gina wanted as humanly possible. Some things are going to be hard, because the story wasn't finished and a lot of details weren't worked out. I don't even think they had chosen a title for the story. It's a huge task, but I'm taking it very seriously.

Anyway...I'd been putting off doing this work, because it's still difficult to engage with anything about Gina without sinking into a grief spiral. But last night reminded me that engaging with this stuff also brings me so much joy. It let's me access a feeling I only ever felt when I was with them. Reading Gina's old chatlogs makes them feel close. I still react to their messages with overwhelming emotion. They can still make me laugh. I was so overwhelmed, I swear I could smell them for a second, as if they were in the room with us.

It does hurt. And I always want it to hurt, because the loss is that severe. But I hope it will start to feel a little easier to look at photos of them and read messages from them, because it let's me experience them again.