I'll phone Katie Bee in a bit. It's a little early for her.

I never knew why she left the board. I looked and never found anything in the notice sections, and concluded that I shouldn't ask, since no one seemed to talk about it (given my limited time on the board). Was it because of the migraines?

Yes, Kate. Posting is our way of holding hands

She was back on, Java, after that break. Had been posting just a couple days ago in the fanfic thread.

I texted Emily and called Cindy.

I started crying again while writing my LJ post. I prefer the numbness.

It's times like this I wish, fiercely, that this board were a real, physical place. There's nowhere else I want to be today but here with you all.

So much yes, to this. I keep thinking about the last physical-world funeral I went to, my aunt's, and how mourning takes on that weird unreality, where you can kind of stumble around in your haze mumbling "oh god. oh no." but at least when you bounce off other people they're doing exactly the same thing. And the bittersweetness of reunions, of "I haven't seen you in ages! But... we're here."

It's awful, but there's an in-the-moment quality to it that I'm really aching for right now.

I so wanted ita to have a chance to be ita again.

Oh god, yes. So so SO much.

I have no words. This is...fuck, too many words, actually. Unreal. RIP, ita. I'm glad you're not in pain any more. You'll be so, so, so missed.

Oh man. Oh. Fuck. I'm crying in my hotel room bed. Got in late last night and zonked out and was checking email...and suddenly saw this "buffistas must check in" thing. And you know my first though was that there'd been some sort of new horrible terrorism? It didn't cross my mind that it could be anything like this. Fuck.

Nilly, you made me cry and want hugs.

And I'm so glad to see all the old folks but so so fucking mad for the reason.

Where do we go from here?

There are a lot of great poems about death. The obvious fitting one is the Edna St. Vincent Millay one that ends "I know. But I do not approve. And I am not resigned." Which, no, I'm not, and I never will be.

But somehow this e. e. cummings one particularly works for me, for the glory that was ita. [praying that pre is one of the HTML tags we let through, because cummings]

 	Buffalo Bill's
 	defunct
 	       who used to
 	       ride a watersmooth-silver
 	                                stallion
 	and break onetwothreefourfive pigeonsjustlikethat
 	                                                 Jesus
 	he was a handsome man
 	                     and what i want to know is
 	how do you like your blueeyed boy
 	Mister Death