Well, this year was a pretty great year for me. Seeing as it’s the end of the year, I thought I’d go over some of the dragon-related things that happened to me this year.
First off, I wrote a poem (and a rather long one at that – it’s actually my longest poem to date) about my dragon guide, some of the dreams that I’ve had about him, and some of the messages that he has told me in my dreams. (Before I started writing it, I knew that I wasn’t going to write about all of the messages that my dragon guide has told me in my dreams, as some of those messages are trivial and I wanted to focus on writing about the messages that stood out to me and the messages that I felt were important.) I first had the idea of writing a poem about my dragon guide last year, but I didn’t pursue it then. Why? If I started writing it then, I would’ve wanted to have it done before the end of last year (a personal deadline of mine), and considering the time that I first had that idea, I felt that I wouldn’t have been able to finish writing it before the end of last year. So, I waited until the beginning of this year to write it. I feel that this helped, as this poem came together rather quickly and just flowed, even with me struggling at certain points, the revisions that I made to it while I was writing it, and the fact that it ended up being longer than I originally intended it to be. If anyone is curious, I will not be sharing this poem at all, as I value it a lot; I consider it to be my magnum opus and I feel that I won’t be able to top it in the future.
Then, the Magic: The Gathering expansion Dragons of Tarkir came out. I watched the trailer for the Dragons of Tarkir expansion and thought that it was rather good. Since I collect Magic: The Gathering cards every now and then, I bought a few Dragons of Tarkir booster packs and the card Sarkhan Unbroken. I also changed my desktop wallpaper to the wallpaper of Dragonlord Ojutai a little later on (and I haven’t changed it since).
Then, I got the soundtrack to How to Train Your Dragon on my birthday! It’s pretty good, but it’s hard for me to say whether that soundtrack or the soundtrack to How to Train Your Dragon 2 is better, as I like them both.
Later on, I had a How to Train Your Dragon marathon with two of my friends where we watched How to Train Your Dragon and How to Train Your Dragon 2 back-to-back. If you want to know how that went, you can read about it here.
A little while after that, I wrote a poem about my dragon guide and my centaur guide, some of the dreams that I’ve had about them, and most of the messages that they have told me in unison in my dreams. (I didn’t write about all of the messages that they have told me in unison in my dreams because a few of those messages are trivial and I wanted to focus on writing about the messages that stood out to me and the messages that I felt were important.) Like the poem that I wrote about my dragon guide, I will not be sharing this poem at all since I value it a lot (though I feel that it’s not as good as the poem that I wrote about my dragon guide, not to mention that it’s not as long as the poem that I wrote about my dragon guide).
Now, here’s a little bit of trivia. The three poems that I wrote about my guides this year – one poem about my dragon guide, one poem about my centaur guide, and one poem about my dragon guide and my centaur guide – were originally going to be one very long poem that had three parts to it; the first part would have been about my dragon guide, the second part would have been about my centaur guide, and the third part would have been about my dragon guide and my centaur guide. However, a little while after I started writing what ended up being the poem about my dragon guide, I decided to split it up into three poems because I didn’t want to take a really long time to write it as one very long poem. (For the record, when I write a poem, I tend to write it without taking any breaks from writing it – and when it takes me more than one day to write it, without taking any daily breaks from writing it – until it’s finished, aside from possible revisions that I might make to it later. I have left a poem incomplete for a while and finished writing it later before, but I did it only once and I haven’t done it since.)
A little later (although I don’t remember exactly when it was), I bought the three books of the Dragonvarld trilogy by Margaret Weis: Mistress of Dragons, The Dragon’s Son, and Master of Dragons. I read Mistress of Dragons and I thought that it was good. I do plan on reading the remaining two books of this trilogy, but that will wait until I have the time to do it.
This October was the six-year anniversary of me having dreams about my dragon guide. If you want to know how I feel about that, you can read about it here.
Later, I participated in both of the Berk’s Grapevine public chats where there were screenings of Gift of the Night Fury. One of them happened in November and the other one happened in December. For the one that happened in November, I participated in the chat but I didn’t watch Gift of the Night Fury while everyone else in the chat was watching it, as I was busy making revisions to parts of the poem that I wrote about my dragon guide at the time (though I did watch it later that day to make up for it). For the one that happened in December, I participated in the chat and I watched Gift of the Night Fury while everyone else in the chat was watching it, though I was a minute or two late in starting it due to being busy doing other things. Both times, I enjoyed chatting with other How to Train Your Dragon fans (Gh3ttoK!nG. and IcelandicEel, to name a few) though I didn’t say much, seeing as I tend to be a quiet person.
Also, on the day that I participated in the Berk’s Grapevine public chat that happened in December, I decided to try the yaknog recipe that Friend of Dragons posted a link to in a comment on one of my old blog entries – and it ended up being rather delicious. So, I want to say thank you to Friend of Dragons for posting the link to that recipe in that comment.
On another note, when I was making revisions to parts of the poem that I wrote about my dragon guide, there were times when I felt I was reflecting on more than some of the messages that my dragon guide has told me in my dreams. In particular, when I looked at one of the stanzas in it after I had finished making revisions to that stanza, I felt like part of that stanza was me questioning my spirituality in a way in addition to partially reflecting on a message about my identity that my dragon guide told me in a dream that I had about him.
In December, I watched Dragonheart 3: The Sorcerer’s Curse on DVD (and while I bought the Blu-ray, DVD, and digital HD combo of it earlier this year, I didn’t watch it until December because I was busy with other things). To say the least, I thought that it was better than Dragonheart: A New Beginning but still not as good as the original Dragonheart. I also wish that there was more focus on the dragon in it (it’s mainly focused on the human and his mission).
Also, in December, I got one of my friends the DreamWorks Dragons Deluxe Double Feature – which contains both How to Train Your Dragon and How to Train Your Dragon 2 on Blu-ray, DVD, and digital HD – as a Christmas gift (and for the record, he’s the friend of mine who said that he was going to have to buy How to Train Your Dragon and How to Train Your Dragon 2 when we had our How to Train Your Dragon marathon earlier this year). I was originally planning on getting him something else, but when I saw that while I was at Best Buy with him and a few other friends, I thought that he would probably like it and I ended up buying it (but not while he was with me). Needless to say, he ended up liking it. :)
Like last year, I ended up getting a few dragon items this year. I got a leather dragon bracelet, a set of three dragon figurines, a dragon hat (which I got to wear as a substitute for my other dragon hat, as I got my other dragon hat a long time ago from a store that ended up going bankrupt), a dragon box, a dragon head figurine, and the 2016 Dragons by Ciruelo Wall Calendar. (If you haven’t figured it out yet, I like the Dragons by Ciruelo Wall Calendars. :))
So, this year was a pretty great year for me overall. I would like to say thank you to my real-life friends and the friends that I’ve made through the How to Train Your Dragon fandom (you know who you are) for helping make this year great for me, even if it wasn’t in major ways. I would also like to say that I’m grateful for my dragon guide still appearing in my dreams and grateful that some of the dreams that I’ve had about my dragon guide over the past few years inspired two of the poems that I wrote this year.
I’m hoping that 2016 will be better than 2015. I’m also hoping that there will be at least a few new things in the dreams that I have about my dragon guide in 2016, as there weren’t any new things in the dreams that I had about my dragon guide in 2015.
I’d like to end this entry by wishing a happy new year to everyone who has read this!
No comments:
Post a Comment