Post by asia7 on Dec 13, 2008 13:27:23 GMT -6
MAKEOVER TIME.
good to see you back on your feet, Sammy,[/font][/blockquote]
[/size][/blockquote][/blockquote]funny enough, I’ve always loved that quote. The look on everyone’s face is kind of amazing, so I thought I’d use it. Although, in this case, there is no Sammy in question. In fact, quite the opposite. Astrid Coolidge. Anyone remember her? I deleted my first characters here on v-side to make her and her cousin back…eighteen or so months ago. Damn, I’ve been here a long time. xD Then I lost muse for my Coolidge’s, so I deleted them both for Renee. Time goes on…characters evolve…times change, blah blah blah. All that good stuff. Then, around last December, I decided I’d try her out again. I love her, always have, and probably always will. She is one of my older characters ( she was my main girl back on Woodhaven, my old forum, actually ) and has developed so much throughout the years. Really. Her original face was Keira Knightley, so I jumped for joy when she was re-opened. That was last December. Then I deleted her again, due to my life being all drugs-hospital-stress. Roleplaying is therapy for me, and I just can’t play characters who have similar problems to my own; it upsets me. So then, around last June or so, I brought her back for a fourth time. You heard me, fourth. Once more than Blake, and more than any of my other characters. I have a problem with deleting characters, remember. And then I like to bring them back.
If you had her health problems, you’d probably be destructive too. Let’s count them off, shall we? At age ten or so, she was officially diagnosed with the auto-immune disease, Lupus. Watch House, you’ll know all about it. With that, she began to abuse her medications before becoming addicted to other drugs as well, heroine in particular. At age fifteen or sixteen, while she was in New York still, she used a tainted needle. Someone else used it before she did. But, at the time, what did she care? She just wanted to get high. But that was tainted enough to infect her with, you guessed it, HIV. HIV Positive at seventeen, who wants that? While she hasn’t been positive for AIDS, meaning she’s pretty well fine ( people can live their entire life with HIV, actually o.o it surprised me ) but that doesn’t matter. Along with that, she’s got a history of depression, including bulimia and cutting. However, she just stopped one day. Around the time she moved to Valkyrie, in fact.
And that’s where we’re left.
Now, Astrid has been dead for the past few months. That’s all my fault. I just sort of randomly lost my muse for her, and left it at that. I know, I know, it makes me a terrible person. But I watched about four of her movies in my film class in the past two weeks alone. And we all know that watching your characters on the big screen ( of a lecture hall, but still ) is bound to give you muse. Lots of it. That’s exactly what happened to me. I just instantly discovered how much I really do love Keira, as well as Astrid. I was so mad when I couldn’t use her for so long, and look at what happens. I ignore her. Headdesk for me. And while watching all of these movies, a few thoughts seeped into my cement block head. A makeover for Astrid. I just felt she was a little too one-dimensional. I had trouble writing for her – besides, I get my sweetheart muse out with Max now, so something needs to change it up. Here’s where I take a leaf out of Anna’s book, like she did with Faden. Astrid’s going through a bit of a transformation.
The way I’ve planned it, she’s been in Valkyrie for her entire absence ( or my laziness, for accurately ). So she has been seen around the town a few times the past couple of months. However, I didn’t really play her outside of just arriving in v-side, and the days afterwards. So here’s the dealio: I want to say that she came down with a bad infection because of her HIV, and was forced to be hospitalized for quite a few weeks. Complications and all. Then, just before her release, she had another episode of her Lupus, and was put back into that hospital bed until she was healthy enough to go home again. During that time, she followed-up with her schoolwork just because the academy was sending her assignments along like they do for anyone not in school, but still registered. Like when I was in the whack shack last year – I still got schoolwork from my teachers. xD And being alone for all that time, with just boring dying people for company, Astrid just began to return to where she used to be. Angry, alone, confused…the whole nine yards. She was frustrated with how her life was always at a standstill because of all of these ass-hat things wrong with her. Even before she got really sick, her life had been boring. Her dad was a good person, in a not-so-good situation. Bad neighbourhood, good people. Good intentions, bad results. Story of everyone’s life, isn’t it? Either way, she was annoyed. Frustrated. Bored.
She had always been the sweet girl. The shy girl with no back-bone and no self-esteem. People could walk all over her, and they did. Always have, probably always would if she didn’t do anything about it. And sitting, quite alone, in a hospital room for weeks at a time gave someone a lot of time of think. It’s rather like being in prison, only the food is worse. Contrary to popular belief, Astrid Coolidge had a mind of her own. Shocking, I know, but it was definitely there. And, with all those drugs in her system, she found her mind was clearer, more concise. If she didn’t like her life anymore, why not change it? It was a simple solution, really – one that was very easily changed in a place like Valkyrie. Back in New York, see, Astrid hadn’t been exactly a ray of sunshine. She had been the poster child for a good girl, of course, but what goes on behind closed doors?
So, basically, here it is. I have her absence explained, which is when she did most of her thinking. Now, if I introduce her back right away, I’ll say she’s been around, going to school and such, for about a week or so. In that time, she’s moved back into the Shaks with her father, Jarome ( who just came from New York to see his sick daughter again ). In that time, she’s a changed person. The last few weeks of her hospitalization is to thank for that. She spent those long, boring hours getting new opinions and basically revamping herself for her “new life”. Which, really, is a bit of a return to her old life. She’s started to abuse her medications again, as well as return to her depressive antics of occasional cutting, not to mention she’s stopped eating almost entirely. And, really, her medications require food to not make her sick again ( ever had vitamins without food in your stomach? It sucks. ). With the lack of nutrition, she’s coughing up most of her meds anyways. Personality – she’s a sweet girl still. Nice but not really kind. Polite but a little ruder. The biggest change? Her self-esteem. She has confidence now. She’s partying more. You know how our Valk girls always say they despise those Shak parties because of those girls at them? The disgustingly drunk ones who throw themselves at everyone? Yeah, one of those. She doesn’t hide her medical problems anymore, meaning more people are bound to find out about her HIV. Basically, Astrid’s embraced her not-so-good background. A dirty girl from Brooklyn who is now one of those icky girls from the Shaks, hitting up at the parties with those icky guys. You know what they’re like.
She’s come back with a new attitude, new style, new everything. She chopped off her hair, started to drink and is rarely seen without a cigarette. That really the Astrid you all remember, Valkyrie?
So…did that make sense? I know it’s long and ranty and boring – what else do I do? – so it might have lost coherency a few paragraphs back, heh. I didn’t really explain everything I wanted to right, but you guys get what I mean, right? xD The Shak girls…we know them. Is it a good makeover? Lame as hell? Should I go back to the original Astrid? I need opinions, v-side.<3 oh and plotting ideas. I’m desperate for her to get involved in some plots, as its about time I used her again.
