It's half past three here and considering it's only mid-June, the heat feels oppressive. By Danish standards, granted, which means it's 12 degrees Celcius, but I'm really sensitive to my sleeping spaces being anything but chilled, so I woke up feeling boiling hot, ngl. And thirsty. And needing the toilet.

Just that kind of night.

I'll make the best of it, though. When this entry is written, I'll sit down and see if I can't spit out a couple of scenes in my texting-style short story, I made a good indent into it yesterday. If I'm really good, I'll be able to finish it today, which would be great, because then I can send all three Marie-Claude shorts to my girlfriend tonight! That would feel like an accomplishment. Combined, there are about 15K+ words in there, just at this point, this texting short isn't done yet.



We had Thai-inspired chicken-stuffed tortillas for dinner last night. It's one of our favourite foods to make, not because it's easy to make (it isn't, the prep work is pretty extensive), but because it's so easy and smooth to eat, a real street food-style thing, greasy and tasty and soft. Yum. Lots of chili and garlic in it, too! I think I ate four, lol. I love when my girlfriend is in the mood to make it. I used to help her chop stuff a bit, before I fell, but atm I can't stand up for long enough to really assist much. It'll come back to that, I know, but with how I've had pains the past week, I've beaten myself over the head with it a lot.



Assisted living visit today. We'll be looking at some bank stuff, which always has my anxiety spike through the roof and I can feel it building already, although the appointment isn't until 11am, so a good few hours away. I've gained more control over my own finances since I fell, mostly out of necessity, but it still ignites a lot of old fears, insecurities and panic, which is something my assisted living person and I are working on, but it's currently an up and down learning curve.

Other than that one appointment, though, we only have some cleaning of the apartment to do (Friday is our cleaning day in this house) and the usual grocery shopping, all of which hangs mostly on my girlfriend these days for the same reason as mentioned above. I just can't lift stuff and move around as freely as I'd like. Especially not since I did talk to my physio therapist yesterday and she reckoned it was my Achilles tendon having been overworked that's causing the pains, so the only resolution not to aggrevate it is to relax a lot, "not to pull to a complete halt" as she put it, but slow down, fewer steps, less strain.

I really want this pain to go away, so there's nothing for it, I guess.



As I've been writing these Marie-Claude short stories the past few weeks, something has dawned on me. Since my conception of this character around the years 2012-2014, a decade ago(!), she has never grown or developed much. Marie-Claude has always pretty much just been Marie-Claude. There have been some details that have changed, like her relationship to her dad (probably a subconscious way for me to work with my own changes to the relationship to my own parents) and her relationship to Jean Louis (they've been through various stages of the 'lovers' category to their now much more sibling-like dynamic), but neither one nor the other has ever really caused her to move forward as a character.

Yet, I can feel her doing so now.

Why?

I fear the answer is simple, Sherlock. She came out of the closet. It's funny (or tragic or both) that for these past many years, I've always joked that Marie-Claude was my only really straight character, because I've always only envisioned her in relationships to men. Turns out, she is bisexual and, it seems, will end up in a relationship to a woman.

You have no idea how much this boggled my brain at first!! Due to her dynamics with her father, I always just assumed that she'd always be one of those women who tried repairing or recreating her relationship to her father in her romantic relationships, and only to some degree succeed, for better or for worse. While I still think she is pretty male-leaning (maybe for the above reasons, who knows), writing her with Sasha now has really opened my eyes to the potential for growth that Marie-Claude holds. How happy she can actually be (although, honestly, she isn't making it easy for herself) and I can't believe I'm basically having a big bi awakening on behalf of one of my oldest and dearest characters. It's like watching a dear friend finally find themselves after half a life of misery.



I'm happy for you, Marie-Claude. Go live your best life!