Pinocchio escapes Samsara by giving up humanity. Except Pinocchio is a tenth stanza Odist and Geppetto is a seventh stanza Odist and the blue fairy is Dry Grass.
Notes
A version of Pinocchio told sys-side in reverse: someone unhappy with humanity endeavoring to lose it, goes through all the plot-beats in reverse order.
Question: how heavy-handed should it be? Should it be very little? Someone naming themselves Occhioni P.? Trying to turn themselves into a literal puppet? Designing sims to include the big fish? Finding their Geppetto (G from Oteppe, Belgium) who unmakes them, and then a blue fairy, a sympathetic systech kicks them into quitting? Or they turn into a tree? Told as a fairy tale? Quote the first lines of the original?
Once upon a time there was—
“A king?” my little readers will immediately say.
No, children, you are mistaken. Once upon a time there was a piece of wood. It was not fine wood, but a simple piece of wood from the wood yard,—the kind we put in the stoves and fireplaces so as to make a fire and heat the rooms.
More at https://nebula.tv/videos/jacob-geller-pinocchio-is-a-story-about-art-and-god
Epigraph:
At the end, devolves into graphomania with:
- And am I born to die?
- What will become of me? (end with a lot of this one)
Characters
- The Narrator (Rye) — falling into overflow slowly
- The Woman (End Of Endings) — suffering some severe mental health stuff, wants to rescind her humanity
- Her Friend (No Hesitation) — her companion striving to help her in general, accidentally helping her in particular
- Her Therapist (Ever Dream, up-tree of In Memory) — seventh stanza therapist
- Her Cocladist (Rejoice) — lingers in the identity of suffering
- Her Lover (unnamed) — on-and-off relationship over the centuries
- The Oneirotect (Warmth)
- The Musician (Beholden)
- The Poet (Slow Hours)
- The Child (Motes)
- The Blue Fairy (Dry Grass) — helps with the forking process
Outline
End Of Endings — 2403 / Rye — 2409
- 001 — The Woman’s life is too real, and she would like that to not be the case / Living forever waiting for time to come/as a real person — 2339
- 002 — The Woman runs into Her Friend, who is having a very bad day, and shares her idea / Saving Geppetto — 3292
- 003 — The Woman sees why Her Friend was having a bad day (seventh only ever says talk to a therapist rather than offering friendship, tenth does the same sometimes, narrator starts to peek through), has a similar bad day / Swallowed by the big fish — 4080
- 004 — The Woman aims for greater pleasure to try and re-ground herself, narrator questions pleasure vs productivity, and what of joy / Pleasure Island — 8081
- 005 — The Woman tries being creative (writing with Rye, painting with Motes, acting, music) to create meaning, narrator really showing through by now / Puppet show to prove no strings/earn money for Geppetto — 6697 (and counting)
- Warmth conversation.
- 006 — The Woman muses on the clade and her past, the ways she was taken advantage of, self-harm, the attack, narrator talking about obsessions and balance / Honest John and Gideon the cat — 3602
- 007 — The Woman begins to earnestly wish for an escape from the cycle, and Her Friend has feelings, narrator talking about urges to quit (both storytelling and suicide) / Comes to life after a wish
- 008 — The Woman talks with Dry Grass with her idea, who mentions Serene, they talk and she turns into a tree on a sidewalk in the city sim, unclear if she quits, the narrator struggles with how they feel about this, modern vs postmodern, earnest vs ironic, subversion vs playing straight, living vs not, devolves into repeated phrases as Rye overflows / Carved from wood
Notes
- For 008 — Where before The Woman and Her Lover, as the poet says, shared their oranges and limes, where they gave their kisses, where they lay on the grass and beach, now the woman lays underground and they share nothing, giving silence for silence.