![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
bladesparkWe just did Halloween with the goober. It was adorable. We did not go plague-or-treating, instead we did a Halloween treasure hunt. So while I went up and got her dressed up, JJ hid candy around the downstairs for her to find. She found some of the obvious ones, they we played hot-and-cold for the rest.
She was a sparkly magic ballerina. She's definitely going through a Pink Pretty Princess phase, though red is still her favorite color, but pink is next favorite.
I never had a princess phase. I had a unicorn obsession instead. I never entirely lost it, really. :D But as I got older I spent more time on a dragon obsession. And then, of course, in late high school I discovered vampires. :DDD
Looking back, I think all of those obsessions were tapping into some deep shit, really.
The unicorn is a companion. A beautiful and magical creature that wants to be your friend. There's a reason Unico specifically is the unicorn I really fixated on. The alicorn-form Unico was beautiful and powerful, but the defining thing about Unico is that he wants to be friends, and he is loyal to his friends. Frequently-moving, mostly-friendless young me wanted a friend.
(Gee, I wonder why Friendship is Magic really did it for me?)
Dragons were about something else though. I didn't want to have a dragon, I wanted to be a dragon. I felt powerless, trapped, a pre-teen and teenager in an adult world where I had almost no say about what happened to me. And I also often felt completely ignored and overlooked.
Nobody could overlook a fricking dragon! And dragons are strong and have fire, they are a downright Jungian symbol of power. Plus they can fly! Nobody can trap a dragon either! They were everything young me wanted to be. Adult me still wouldn't necessarily say no to being a dragon, either.
But then vampires happened...
I was a late bloomer, I can't recall any early-teens stirrings of anything, but I started to at least notice that romantically interesting people exist around my late teens. And that's when I got into vampires, because vampires are sexy.
The thing about vampires, is that they're everything powerful and attention-drawing about dragons, but wrapped up in sex.
The other thing about vampires, though, is that they're needy, vulnerable creatures. To be a dragon is to have a wild dream of power, but to be a vampire is to be in some ways fundamentally human. Vampires need blood, and to get that blood they need intimacy. Neck biting isn't just because the vein is there, it's also an intimate thing. And while some books, like Dracula, may be more about rape and sexual abhorrence than anything else, Anne Rice knew where it was at, with vulnerable, desperately needy vampires.
I was beginning to feel that, to feel all the ways one needs connection and yet is made vulnerable by it, and so vampires were absolutely perfect for encapsulating that moment in my life.
I think that's also a bit why I keep having submissive, bottom-y vampires in stories, not just because it's a self-insert, but because to me, from the very first, vampirism was about that odd balance of invulnerable immortality and nakedly vulnerable need.
To circle back around, I think the princess thing with small children ties in to their needs in much the same way all this tied in to mine. The princess thing isn't just about Disney marketing. Rather the inverse. Disney figured out how to tap into something primal in children when they marketed their princesses.
Children are often ignored, and powerless. What is a princess but a center of attention and a person of power? No wonder little girls want to be them! (And sometimes little boys too, even.) A princess is admired, liked, obeyed, and showered in attention. What's not to want?
She was a sparkly magic ballerina. She's definitely going through a Pink Pretty Princess phase, though red is still her favorite color, but pink is next favorite.
I never had a princess phase. I had a unicorn obsession instead. I never entirely lost it, really. :D But as I got older I spent more time on a dragon obsession. And then, of course, in late high school I discovered vampires. :DDD
Looking back, I think all of those obsessions were tapping into some deep shit, really.
The unicorn is a companion. A beautiful and magical creature that wants to be your friend. There's a reason Unico specifically is the unicorn I really fixated on. The alicorn-form Unico was beautiful and powerful, but the defining thing about Unico is that he wants to be friends, and he is loyal to his friends. Frequently-moving, mostly-friendless young me wanted a friend.
(Gee, I wonder why Friendship is Magic really did it for me?)
Dragons were about something else though. I didn't want to have a dragon, I wanted to be a dragon. I felt powerless, trapped, a pre-teen and teenager in an adult world where I had almost no say about what happened to me. And I also often felt completely ignored and overlooked.
Nobody could overlook a fricking dragon! And dragons are strong and have fire, they are a downright Jungian symbol of power. Plus they can fly! Nobody can trap a dragon either! They were everything young me wanted to be. Adult me still wouldn't necessarily say no to being a dragon, either.
But then vampires happened...
I was a late bloomer, I can't recall any early-teens stirrings of anything, but I started to at least notice that romantically interesting people exist around my late teens. And that's when I got into vampires, because vampires are sexy.
The thing about vampires, is that they're everything powerful and attention-drawing about dragons, but wrapped up in sex.
The other thing about vampires, though, is that they're needy, vulnerable creatures. To be a dragon is to have a wild dream of power, but to be a vampire is to be in some ways fundamentally human. Vampires need blood, and to get that blood they need intimacy. Neck biting isn't just because the vein is there, it's also an intimate thing. And while some books, like Dracula, may be more about rape and sexual abhorrence than anything else, Anne Rice knew where it was at, with vulnerable, desperately needy vampires.
I was beginning to feel that, to feel all the ways one needs connection and yet is made vulnerable by it, and so vampires were absolutely perfect for encapsulating that moment in my life.
I think that's also a bit why I keep having submissive, bottom-y vampires in stories, not just because it's a self-insert, but because to me, from the very first, vampirism was about that odd balance of invulnerable immortality and nakedly vulnerable need.
To circle back around, I think the princess thing with small children ties in to their needs in much the same way all this tied in to mine. The princess thing isn't just about Disney marketing. Rather the inverse. Disney figured out how to tap into something primal in children when they marketed their princesses.
Children are often ignored, and powerless. What is a princess but a center of attention and a person of power? No wonder little girls want to be them! (And sometimes little boys too, even.) A princess is admired, liked, obeyed, and showered in attention. What's not to want?
no subject
Date: 2020-11-01 04:26 pm (UTC)I'm still kind of disappointed not to have the wings and the fire breath myself.
no subject
Date: 2020-11-01 11:15 pm (UTC)