Topic: Heavy Lies the Crown

Alea

Date: 2018-01-16 17:26 EST
https://i.imgur.com/43ZNUOY.jpg

Call it what you will.

Torture.

Ritual.

Self-sacrifice.

It's cost is paid in sweat, blood and deprivation.

It is the burden of perfection defined by an intangible society born by those daring to be in the public eye. It's superficial, material, and yet crucial to those who crave the status of glitz and glammour, even when false.

So you endure the drag of blades across your skin a whisper away from biting into flesh. A little too much pressure and suddenly there is a splash of blood in the water. Barbaric. You rip hair from your eyebrows, slather on bleach, douse your hair in chemicals, because what you were born with isn't quite right.

It's hours spent in the gym lifting and straining every muscle so there isn't a single spot that jiggles in an unattractive way. Knowing exactly how many calories in that cup of frozen grapes you ate instead of breaking down and stuffing a cheeseburger in your face. You're the person Skinny Girl vodka was invented for, because god forbid you give up your Saturday night Cosmos at the club.

You know every plane on your face. The way your left cheekbone tapers just slightly different than your right and the fine hand it takes to fake perfect symmetry. One eye slightly higher than the other" Normal" Maybe, but there's a trick for that, too. Should that contour palette be unable to sculpt away structural flaws, there's always the slice of a scalpel. But makeup can veil most flaws at least at a distance, at least for the shutter snap of an iPhone camera.

At the end of it all you're finally wrapped in threads so you can be presented to an invisible audience that cannot possibly see through your Maybe She's Born With It armor. Clad in more faux than a fur wrap against the terror that isn't just fitting in—but standing out in a sea of other stand outs.

There is no point to it all. It's needless, self-serving, desperate cries to look at me.

I love it. If I turn even one head walking down the street I have justified the time, the money, the effort that I have put into crafting me. Good attention, bad attention, I crave it all.

So go ahead and look. Stare. Glare. Whatever. I know you're looking.

But you'll never see the real me.

Polyvore inspiration

Alea

Date: 2018-01-17 19:57 EST
https://i.imgur.com/fYe9wSo.jpg

I'd party all day, every day, if they'd let me.

Wiggle into my tightest LBD, strap on my favorite heels, and just get lost in the music forever. Not just anything, but you know that good stuff. The kind with a beat you can feel all the way to your soul that gets your body moving in ways you didn't know it could. Never ending so that it keeps you on your feet until you can't dance any more.

I don't need drugs to get or keep me on the dance floor. Though I know there is a rumor or twenty that I'm taking everything under the sun. Diet pills to keep me skinny. Coke to get me perky. Whatever the **** else exists. I don't even know. Coffee and booze are my biggest sins.

But shh. Don't tell anyone. Can't go ruining my street cred. Next people might just question whether or not its true that I drag a new suitor or ten to bed every night. The possibility of getting invited to one of my Bacchanalian bashes alone maintains my VIP status.

The sad truth is I'm sooner or later I can no longer avoid being yoked by a fate outside of my control.

There'll be no more dancing.

No more parties.

The gossip will never go away, but neither will the expectations.

I guess I just have to feed on the frenzy for as long as I can get away with it before I die inside.

Alea

Date: 2018-01-21 21:20 EST
https://i.imgur.com/Dzr05cL.jpg

You might think I want you to know who I am.

Close.

I want you to look back and think "Damn, who was that girl?"

Alea

Date: 2018-01-23 23:50 EST
https://i.imgur.com/FRdmRdd.jpg

I am running away from my responsibilities. I give myself endless, meaningless tasks because they make for excellent excuses.

Oh sorry, I can't be a princess today, I have to wash my hair.

I refuse to be locked into the life of boredom that is my destiny until I have no other choices. Earth is where I would rather be than this....crossroad of worlds. There is little stability here and I can feel it in my bones. Trouble lurks around every corner.

And it's not the kind I like.

But there is only so much time you can spend on a magic-restricted world before people start to notice things you don't want them to. They get a glimpse of the real you and I can't have that.

Here I am just another pretty face. I should really just lay low and blend in.

Like I could ever be okay with that.

Alea

Date: 2018-01-30 22:14 EST
https://i.imgur.com/5paBGnN.jpg

When will I realize that I can't find myself in the a strobbing light' That there's nothing for me at the bottom of a bottle?

Yet I keep looking, like the grasping, clawing, needy hands of strangers will mold my flesh like they are artists. But I am not made of clay, I am cold marble and they are no Bernini. Every time I realize I am Persephone trapped in winters grip waiting for a summer that won't come. It is a delusion to think that Hades might ever set me free.

I woke up for the umpteenth time singing praises to a porcelain god who is ever eager to hear my pleas. And just as powerless to grant the wishes seated deep in the secret place in my heart.

I am addicted to my own self-destruction.

Alea

Date: 2018-02-02 16:07 EST
https://i.imgur.com/4nu9G0x.jpg mask photo by tara mckinney

I should just keep my nose out of it. A part of me wants to help, even though I don't know what good I would be. I'm useless. I'm a silver-spoon-fed Barbie doll bimbo rebelling against privilege. Pretending to have a purpose in life so I don't get dragged away to my destiny. I can't avoid it.

But the other day I heard about these girls that are going missing and it has bothered me ever since. Wishful thinking was it might be some runaways banding together. I did that. I was always the ringleader, because I was bored. Why bother going to school when you have everything catered to you? I regret now not being more serious. I'm not stupid by any means but....

Anyway, these people talking about the girls brought up the possibility of sex trafficking. There is a good chance they are right, of course. It hurts my heart, because I know just how possible that is. I was very lucky that I did not get caught up in that. I had someone dogging my steps and making sure I didn't get into too much trouble. There was this one time where I ended up in a club, and then the back room, and then....It all worked out okay in the end.

I want to look, too. I'm going to keep my nose out of it, though. It's better this way.

Alea

Date: 2018-02-26 00:49 EST
https://i.imgur.com/fYzB4M9.jpg

I got myself a job. There is no reason for me to work. Everything I could want is paid for. I am practically choking on the silver spoon I was born with. It's taste is bitter in my mouth. Shouldn't I be grateful that I was never intended to find hardships in my life" At least not until it was time. An inevitable time that creeps forward with its icy fingers dancing down my spine.

I got my first job when I was sixteen. Waiting tables at a little diner in upstate New York. Yet again I had run away from boarding school, and this time I managed to give my watchers the slip for long enough that I needed to support myself. The owner guessed I was a runaway. Just thought it was all the wrong reasons.

After that I picked up things here and there. Mostly retail, which I hated. Ugh. Look, people think I'm some stuck up bitch. I never treated anyone helping me out like I was treated. Disgusting.

Actually, people get a lot of wrong ideas about me. When I say I am a dancer, they think I mean a stripper. And if they think I am a stripper, they think worse. Eh. No. I could say that no one could afford me, but even the thought of selling myself reviles me.

It's why I stopped modeling. That was a terrible idea, too. The glitz and the glam is ultra attractive to me. As much as I love the spotlight being on me, I don't want it to be the unnatural setting of catwalk or pole. All eyes should be on me because I am irresistible. Which is sort of how I landed this job to begin with.

Check it, I found this gorgeous lingerie boutique, Blush, almost by random. I was in desperate need for a little retail therapy, and what is better than some new panties" It was like walking into wonderland, really. This stuff is fab. I picked up a whole new arsenal of unmentionables that no one gets to see but me.

While I was there I was talking with the girl at the counter. She's about my age, and I find out she owns the place. How wicked is that' Makes me feel so unaccomplished. We talked for a good hour about this and that, mostly her telling me about all of the things she wanted to do. Like fashion shows and yoga classes. She really wanted me to model for her line, but I am not going down that road again. But I spent like six months literally living at a yoga retreat. I got certified for the hell of it, taught a little.

I think it will be good. I'm doing four classes a week, two on my own for a traditional class, two with Carmen doing partners. Tantra isn't my favorite style, but I'm proficient enough at it. My bread and butter is iyengar, but for personal practice I love the more vigorous styles, like vinyasa krama. Maybe if these classes take off I can ease into doing some of that.

But anything is better than feeling like a waste of flesh. Beautiful flesh, but wasted.

Alea

Date: 2018-06-01 19:59 EST
https://i.imgur.com/biy8J5u.jpg

I've been laying pretty low and it is killing me. I feed on people. No, not like that. I'm not a vampire. I guess. But being holed up in my apartment except for going to the work, tiptoeing to the market for groceries..."

I'm going crazy.

There have been all of these rumors about people getting arrested left and right, though. My boss, Carmen, said that these new Watch assholes even came into the shop to give her a hard time. Yoga class has been nearly empty, because people have been on edge.

If that wasn't bad enough, my favorite dance spot has been taking over by these crank popping douchebags. I don't know what they are actually doing, but it isn't anything I want to get wrapped up in. Getting arrested for any reason would get my ass hauled out of independence faster than a dress dropping on prom night.

I've been thinking about getting a cat. Isn't that lame"

Alea

Date: 2018-07-12 20:57 EST
https://i.imgur.com/8wTbVL6.jpg

From sane to crazy, just like that. A blink of an eye, between the beats of a hummingbird's wings every changed in an instant. Carmen, my boss, and I were talking. She had been wanting to throw a fashion show, but has been overwhelmed with the store. I wanted to run away to Coachella. I'm still banned from going to Earth for my last stint....but whatever.

We were chilling and drinking work champagne one night after yoga and it came about that one of her contacts runs some festival on another plane. It sounded such utter debauchery, I knew I'd never be allowed to go. I'm never allowed to have any fun. But I say, why doesn't Rhydin have something like that' Oh sure, there's Beltane and stuff like that (which I missed, because I'm lame), but no big festivals. I heard some rumor of a big boozey alcohol fest, but I guess it's not on this year?

So it came about that we set off this chain of events and now it's happening. I cannot. effing. wait.

It was Carmen's idea to do body painting. There is a festival rule about no full-nude, which I kind of get, because I have seen a lot more of the genitalia of people I'd never want to see than I can even get into. There is not enough eyebleach in the world.

She really is an artist. She did up like two dozen people the run around advertising and getting people excited, while I just sort of helped out.

https://i.imgur.com/ieMlV79.jpg

I'm getting better, though. I'm practicing every day. It's going to be a lot of fun.

I don't think I've ever put this much into anything. Ever.