update from sparkleup

writing/post-self/mitzvot/004.md

@@ -2,7 +2,7 @@
 
 Ioan half lay, half slouched against the headboard with May draped bonelessly up along eir front. She'd gotten up to make them both coffee to drink in bed, then proceeded to doze off again, using eir chest as a pillow and the rest of em as a mattress.
 
-Ey, meanwhile, had made it through most of eir coffee, resting the cup between the skunk's shoulder blades between sips. It was technically Christmas, and while neither of them cared much for the holiday --- Michelle Hadje had been raised Jewish and the Bălans had all but ignored the holiday that so pervaded western culture --- that did mean it was the day for the *tocană* and *mămăligă* that had become tradition for them. Ey hadn't learned to cook much prior to uploading --- just a few simple dishes for a poor student --- and it wasn't until ey had wound up on the System in eir current sim that ey'd gone back to teach emself all the things ey'd loved growing up.
+Ey, meanwhile, had made it through most of eir coffee, resting the cup between the skunk's shoulder blades between sips. It was technically Christmas, though neither of them cared much for the holiday. Michelle Hadje had been raised vaguely Jewish and Ioan the particular blend of spiritual humanism that pervaded Eastern Europe at the time, but both had been well-steeped in the broader secular Christian culture of the West. However, that did mean it was the day for the *tocană* and *mămăligă* that had become tradition for them. Ey hadn't learned to cook much prior to uploading --- just a few simple dishes for a poor student --- and it wasn't until ey had wound up on the System in eir current sim that ey'd gone back to teach emself all the things ey'd loved growing up.
 
 It promised to be a lazy sort of day otherwise, which felt necessary. May's spike of anxiety when ey'd gone out for eir meeting with True Name a few days prior had quickly tapered off, but it had not simply gone away. The days that followed had included a lot of asking em if ey was okay and taking breaks to sit and look out the picture windows, lost in thought.
 

writing/post-self/mitzvot/018.md

@@ -12,11 +12,11 @@ The mood throughout remained somewhere between anxious and remorseful.
 
 That evening, True Name requested that they eat dinner out at the lake rather than at home, saying, "I am feeling too cooped up by walls and yet more walls."
 
-Ey supposed it made sense, now that she had the competing memories of End Waking and however many personality traits that came with. He had only visited Ioan and May a scant handful of times, and then always out in the yard, always refusing to go indoors.
+Ey supposed it made sense, now that she had the competing memories of End Waking and however many personality traits that came with. He had only visited Ioan and May a scant handful of times, and then always out in the yard, refusing to go indoors.
 
 So, they packed up a simple dinner of sausages, zucchini, and potatoes to cook and stepped out to the lake.
 
-The tents were still set up and the second bundle of firewood remained untouched, leaning against one of them, so Ioan and May watched as True Name tiredly built and lit the fire. She left them sitting on one of the logs before it, watching the flames go from fast and loud to something quieter and hotter, while she disappeared up the hill into the forest. She returned some time later with a bundle of arm-length sticks, all nearly as straight as dowels, which she built into a spit on which they could roast the sausages while the potatoes baked near the coals of the fire. It was all done with a practiced ease from hundreds of years of memory.
+The tents were still set up and the second bundle of firewood remained untouched, leaning against one of them, so Ioan and May watched as True Name tiredly built and lit the fire. She left them sitting on one of the logs before it, watching the flames go from fast and loud to something quieter and hotter, while she disappeared up the hill into the forest. She returned some time later with a bundle of arm-length sticks, all nearly as straight as dowels, which she built into a spit on which they could roast the sausages while the potatoes baked near the coals of the fire. It was all done with a practiced ease borne from decades of memory.
 
 The food was pleasantly smokey and well cooked, though otherwise unseasoned. True Name remarked on this part way through the meal, saying, "If you call the food bland again, May Then My Name, I will call you lame again."
 
@@ -32,7 +32,7 @@ She shrugged. "Uncomfortable. Fractured. I have spoken to End Waking only a few
 
 "Thus 'fractured'?"
 
-"Yes. I must admit that much of my time spent while down and out was spent struggling to maintain a sense of myself as True Name. Had I simply accepted everything at face value and incautiously, I think I would have gone mad. As it is, I feel perilously close."
+"Yes. I must admit that much of my time while down and out was spent struggling to maintain a sense of myself as True Name. Had I simply accepted everything at face value and incautiously, I think I would have gone mad. As it is, I feel perilously close."
 
 May sniffled and looked off toward the lake in the deepening evening.
 

writing/post-self/mitzvot/020.md

@@ -4,11 +4,10 @@ While True Name continued to integrate the merge more and more fully --- or, as
 
 Though neither Ioan nor May were necessarily happy for this change, it meant that they *had* to stop talking about all these dire topics. It forced them to take a step back as well, and at least try to get some work done. Given all that had happened, no one was comfortable with them continuing to perform, least of all A Finger Pointing, so they were removed from the bill for the time being, with either their roles replaced or their shows canceled.
 
-There was still work to be done, of course. May still had her monologue, which she tried taking in a few different directions, some of which worked well and some less so. Ioan coached her in writing as best ey could, talking her down from fits of perfectionism that left her threatening to tear the whole thing up.
+And there was still work to be done. May still had her monologue, which she tried taking in a few different directions, some of which worked well and some less so. Ioan coached her in writing as best ey could, talking her down from fits of perfectionism that left her threatening to tear the whole thing up.
 
 For eir part, ey still had a few projects on eir plate, not least of which was the upcoming book project that had been requested by Jonas. Ey poked at this every now and then, outlining the events to date and throwing a few thousand words at it here and there.
 
-<!--ONLY IF SELECTED LETTERS GETS FUNDED-->
 Mostly, though, ey dealt in letters to and from the other members of eir clade. Vast, dramatic events were happening elsewhere --- as they always seemed to when an Odist was involved --- and ey couldn't simply put them away to deal with all that was going on at home. The break from dealing with the affairs of True Name and Jonas was a welcome one.
 
 The one conversation of note came on the fourth day after the merge, when the skunk asked, "How did you two get together?"
@@ -83,7 +82,7 @@ She lifted her snout enough to bump her nose against eir wrist, then nodded. "It
 
 "No killing skunks," ey mumbled, then stood and stretched. "Bit miffed she's out at the lake, since now I feel like walking, too."
 
-"If you were a normal person, we could enjoy perpetual springtime in the yard."
+"If you were at all a normal person, we could enjoy perpetual springtime in the yard."
 
 Ey looked outside, at the scant inch of snow left after the last storm. "It's not that bad."
 
@@ -133,7 +132,7 @@ She nodded, subsiding at the reasonable tone in eir voice. "Yes. Thank you for u
 
 "Is there anything we can do to help?"
 
-"Can you grant me ACLs to create supplies? There is nothing to hunt."
+"Can you grant me ACLs to create supplies? There is nothing to hunt and I do not wish to set aside the necessity to eat."
 
 "Hunt?" Ey frowned, then shook eir head. "Right, sorry. End Waking always did. You should...there. You should have them now."
 

writing/post-self/mitzvot/026.md

@@ -218,7 +218,7 @@ Ey blinked as the pieces clicked into place, then slouched back in eir seat, fee
 
 "You see now why I was so upset?"
 
-The thoughts wouldn't quite fit together in eir mind. Two puzzle pieces with no matching edges. "I'm sorry, I'm, uh..." Ey cleared eir throat, suddenly parched. "*He's* one of your old relationship forks? With True Name?"
+The thoughts wouldn't quite fit together in eir mind. Two gears with no matching teeth. "I'm sorry, I'm, uh..." Ey cleared eir throat, suddenly parched. "*He's* one of your old relationship forks? With True Name?"
 
 She shrugged again, sniffled again, looked back down to the table.
 
@@ -230,7 +230,7 @@ Ey frowned, but nodded for them to continue.
 
 "So, a few decades later," True Name said. "Secession is in the past, the council is heading towards dissolution, and I am starting to relax. More friends from phys-side uploaded, more furries figured out how to exist within the System as they would like, and I started to meet more people outside work. One of them just happened to be this fantastically well-dressed fox who was just as witty as I felt. We became friends, then we became a bit more." She shrugged. "That instance of Jonas had...well..."
 
-"Twisted. He twisted my fork into something that neither the me of today nor the me back then would have agreed to." May said bitterly and wiped at her face. "He turned that version of me into a way of influencing True Name."
+"Twisted. He twisted my fork into something that neither the me of today nor the me back then would have agreed to," May said bitterly and wiped at her face. "He turned that version of me into a way of influencing True Name."
 
 "Yes. It was a long game. He drifted in and out of my life, over the centuries, and then, shortly before Launch, he showed up again and we began to get close. A few years after Launch, they took me out to dinner and dropped the whole thing on me all at once. I am told they did the same on each of the LVs as well, just with different framing."
 

writing/post-self/mitzvot/027.md

@@ -134,7 +134,7 @@ She winced. "That bad?"
 
 "What about May's merge would've been easier?" Ioan asked.
 
-"Again, easier does not feel like the correct word. It would have been more comfortable. I would have understood the resentment that others feel for me if that was indeed a goal, but it would not be the defining factor of the merge."
+"Again, easier does not feel like the correct word. It would have been more comfortable. I would have understood the resentment that others feel for me, if that was indeed a goal, but it would not be the defining factor of the merge."
 
 "End Waking has mentioned that he defined himself by not being you, yeah."
 

writing/post-self/mitzvot/028.md

@@ -94,7 +94,7 @@ May tilted her head, blinking a cone of silence into place. "When I merged last?
 
 Ey nodded.
 
-"I had just forked the third time. There had been more relationships, of course, ones that ended before I had the chance, but this was the third time that I had settled into something comfortable enough to let it last. I was crushed and not particularly excited about merging down, but I had not diverged quite as much by then."
+"I had just forked the third time. There had been more relationships, of course, ones that ended before I had the chance or need, but this was the third time that I had settled into something comfortable enough to let it last. I was crushed and not particularly excited about merging down, but I had not diverged quite as much by then."
 
 "Not as much empathy?"
 
@@ -188,7 +188,7 @@ She nodded and looked to May.
 
 "Are you?" Ioan asked.
 
-True Name smiled lopsidedly. "So long as I can fork beforehand just in case, why the fuck not? I am already not what I was. There is already no going back."
+True Name smiled lopsidedly. "So long as I can fork beforehand just in case, why the hell not? I am already not what I was. There is already no going back."
 
 May scoffed and shook her head. "'So long as you can fork'? Jesus, True Name. Of course you can fucking fork. 108 instances with daily reconciliation, and she asks if she can fork."
 

writing/post-self/mitzvot/029.md

@@ -47,7 +47,7 @@ May nodded, still cowed.
 
 "I am of two minds," True Name said. "I remember having loved Debarre. I remember still loving him, and perhaps even I, even True Name, still love him in some roundabout way. However, I am what I am, and that is a being of two minds. That of me which is you, End Waking, loves him, and that of me which is True Name, respects him from a distance, respects his distaste for me, that feeling I engendered to minimize his impact within the council by making it purely emotional, as uncomfortable as it was to do so."
 
-"The same as you did with me and Codrin?" Ioan asked. "With the history, I mean."
+"The same as you did with me and Codrin?" Ioan asked. "With the History, I mean."
 
 She nodded. "It was-- it felt like a necessity at the time. I am not some cold, unfeeling bitch, it is just that my drive and my abilities, such as they are, outweigh --- or at least outweighed --- those feelings. I worked to distance myself from them."
 
@@ -153,7 +153,7 @@ The three of them stayed like that for nearly five minutes --- two skunks kneeli
 
 May shushed her quietly and helped her to lay out on her side before settling down with her. They curled together, still facing each other, nearly snout to snout and still holding paws.
 
-Ey stood and watched. Then ey sat on the beanbag and watched. Watched and waited, though for what ey didn't know.
+Ey stood and watched. Then ey sat on the beanbag and watched. Watched and waited, though ey wasn't sure what for.
 
 It was more than an hour before May forked beside em, took eir hand, and led em from the room. Neither of the skunks on the bed had moved or made a sound other than May asking True Name if she was okay at one point and the other skunk shaking her head.