Wow it's been a long time. This account is from 2011 but I've been around longer, I was just an idiot who would delete their stuff or whatever. Honestly I don't care, I just get this sense of nostalgia returning to this site and wanted to just... think back to everything that happened.
I first joined at some indeterminate time, honestly I can't remember that far back, and I was just this... weird and obnoxious teen? I didn't have any friends and hated myself and just found a place I could be whoever I wanted, and well I was a ton of different people I guess.
I introduced myself as Kat, fabricated this fake girlfriend for some reason, and then my age was just whatever I feel it to be at the time, honestly looking back it's pretty funny. I don't know why I lied so much, was it because I was insecure about myself? Was it because I just didn't know what transgender was back then? Well honestly I didn't, I'm not too sure how I would discover that being 12(?) in a poverty stricken southern town.
This was really a second home to me, I was highly active in the community (I made some of the map assets for TMJ) and even ended up in a huge variety of admin positions until one day I do as everyone does and... logs out for the final time.
Honestly I was scared, there was this whole community of people who knew I was pretending to be a girl my whole life and I knew that one day it would come back and bite me, and it scared me so much I left the site. I ghosted all the friends I had, and I knew plenty had tried to find a way to contact me after the end of the site.
Then I just decided to.... find the Paint Discord, well I got invited once, had a panic attack and left, but this time I went there myself, and came out.
I'm Sylvie now and that's all that matters.
And even now... 10 years later, my friends from this small weird site are still there for me.
What was the point of this blog? To say goodbye? Maybe just remind myself of the past?
I'm not sure myself, it's 6am and I'm tired.
If you ever need me, I'm on Discord and Twitter trying to get my art out into the world or something.
One of these days (very soon), I'm going to pop onto this "Discord" thing, and see what all of the hubbub is about...
In any event, it's nice to see someone from long ago pop in and take the time to write something like this, even though I (and there plenty of others who feel the same easy as me) personally wish you would actually try to revive this place, as you and the thousands of others who have "logged out for the final time" are essentially why this place is a ghost town, rather than the vibrant, active community that it was back in 2011.
(Or 2019, for that matter.)
MoldyLunchBoxx
12 Jan 2022 07:40
In reply to Draconid_Jo
I'd love to and I always find myself coming back and checking the place out, it's just that really I've mostly moved on. Transition itself eats up most of my time right now and I'm also trying to improve my art skills, but paint will always be kinda special to me.
Draconid_Jo
13 Jan 2022 18:39
In reply to MoldyLunchBoxx
That's certainly understandable, and although I personally cannot imagine a scenario where I would willingly leave Paint, it would be unreasonable for me to not accept that other people aren't as stubborn (and clingy) as I am, even if they still have similar sentimental feelings about this place to my own.
I can't find it in my heart to blame any specific individual for why this place is struggling to survive now, but certainly the combined effect of thousands of individuals like yourself (most of whom probably feel the same way that you and I do about Paint) just leaving one day and never returning (or as is often the case: almost never returning) has taken its toll, and I think that its kinda sad how I just happened to find this place right before everything started to fall apart. (HUGE difference between the Paint of 2019 and the Paint of 2020, and if I didn't know any better, I'd blame COVID-19 for it.)
Yeah Paint used to be a massive part of my daily life and I was really dedicated to pretty much every inch of the site. Then I just kinda poofed. I have two accounts and the other one was much more active but I just don't remember anything to login to it.
By @MoldyLunchBoxx
Draconid_Jo
