laraF's nest

... to start the year in a productive way.
Ta-ttata-taaa:



So.
I think this is kinda sad, but after my father's untimely death four years ago fanfictions became pretty much everything. I literally wasn't able to function without them and I remember days when I didn't even get out of bed until at least 2 pm. Because I was in the middle of reading some fic. Because that was more important than anything. It kept me alive somehow and I'm not exaggerating.
Harry Potter and Teen Wolf are still my two most faithful companions.
After that tragedy I completely lost the sense of home (figuratively and literally). The world was a cluster of surreal shards thrown around haphazardly and I got caught in the hurricane. Coming back to normal - or as normal as I can possibly get - happened with strange little rituals, mostly, which helped me regain my footing. I created Happy Places out of very simple things, things, which has always been a part of my life and could still soothe the bleeding edges.
A cup of hot tea. Looking up at the night sky, euphoric when stars blink back at me. Reading Harry Potter and the Bartimaeus books from Jonathan Stroud - they are still  t h e   b e s t. Watching anime, reading manga. Cuddling my pet degu, (who passed away last year and after months of crying and feeling restless I adopted a hellish kitten - not as replacement of course, but I needed a best friend). Visiting my fav sites, burying myself in my profiles on various fic sites... Just listening some of my fav CDs - GazettE, Dido, Linkin Park, anime and other soundtracks for example - and not doing anything else besides looking out of my head, unseeing. Getting all lost in my fav bookstores&libraries, just browsing second-hand books in shady alcoves or among labile book-towers. Reading. Breathing in the stale scent of old paper and fabric, dust and faint memories of mildew. Spending all my - at the time - non-existent money on books that caught my interest.
I'm better now.
Still,
these remained my Happiest Places.
(but I'm still gonna buy a house of my own this year - or more...)