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#wyrd

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Human friends are trickling in, understanding the gravity of this moment in history. The weight of it. Or maybe simply nudged by a soft subconscious whisper that says: "something new, please, someplace else."

I've been watching the most ridiculously uncurated and wild conversations on Substack. I've been trying to open a Pixelfed profile of a friend for days to no avail. Stuck in a glitch-loop.

And I don't feel irked or impatient. I feel relieved.

Oh, how fucking wonderful to be presented with IMPERFECTION. How gloriously sweet to witness the stumbling trial and error phase of a thing. How joyful to feel: YES! I AM ALSO THIS MESS! What a much needed rattling of the deep-conditioned meta-mindset.

Sweet ones, do show us your wyrd, wild, and wonderful selves. Imperfect and unchoreographed and uncensored. It's such a breath of fresh air. Thank you for your willingness to explore new territory with us in some open-sourced pixelated fediverse. Thank you for believing in something beyond that which has made us dull and unreel. REEL US OUT and REAL IT IN.

#metamigration #pixelfed #wyrd #imperfection #freaquency #metamorphosis #trialanderror #lichen #experimentalphotography

"Weird" comes from Anglo-Saxon "wyrd", originally meaning destiny and fate, also as an innate magical power that witches and warlocks drew their visions and artifice from. After spending all my adult life reclaiming the word, and feeling it perfectly describing me and my friends, I fucking vehemently dislike trying to associate it on right-wing losers.

Continued thread

One thing that the above post by Simon Reynolds highlights / hints at is that the period was brilliant for consolidating loose, often regional, tribal affiliations & then allowing them to cross-fertilise. Eg a shared love of #weird / #wyrd fiction (#Lovecraft et al) or #Deleuze or some #Techno artist or #PostPunk band was established but often the ‘tribes’ came at them from very different angles, so that the resulting work / #theory was hopelessly mangled…

What is #Wyrd?

The #OldEnglish word wyrd is the usual translation for the modern English "fate". Some see it as immutable as the classic concept of Fate, others see it as just a web of cause and effect, each action having one or more reactions, each becoming the action for a new reaction, and so on.

I use to hold this latter view, but my take on Wyrd has been evolving. I see it as being somewhere between these two extremes, similarly to the concept of time in the #DoctorWho franchise. There are certain fixed points that must happen no matter what. Some of these are simply the consequence of earlier actions. Others have been ordained by the gods, perhaps to ensure something in their bigger plans happen. In the Norse sagas, we sometimes see the gods ordaining some fate for an individual, but I believe it's generally events that are ordained and the actors and circumstances are fluid.

Within these confines, I believe there is much fluidity within Wyrd. Our actions influence our Wyrd and those around us.