Delays and resistance [Research 2.1]

Research Update, 2.1

Solid leads:
-the baubau (its own entry to come soon).
-Pagan and Early Christian sacrifice and appeasement rituals. (Horrific doesn't come close.)

Reminders:
-Respond to my advisor's email about initial compilation of the interviews and narratives. (Side note: remember not to agree to everything she asked for.)

-Start sifting through the historical perspectives and start matching them with the modern perspectives I've been gathering. (This corpus is so overwhelming, oh god. I have enough material for a series of papers. Maybe even a book.)

-Go through the Smith's Mills footage from over the summer. I know I have the field work logs somewhere, and the photos and videos. Now it's just a matter of seeing if any of it is usable.

And something else weird, and extraordinarily frustrating. So much of my data between the beginning of last Spring and the end of this Summer has been so irrevocably fucked. I have no idea how. Pictures are thoroughly distorted, text files can't be read.

I have a feeling it's just improper data storage methods, but holy shit is this a setback.

(Personal note:)It's been quite a while since I last came through here. And to be honest, trying to comb through what's here is pretty hard; trying to sift out what is research and what is crap will be almost impossible.

So, an update. I'm not dead. I am medicated, to some varying level of success. I am coherent, which is just short of miraculous. Brief ER trip last month. Which at this point is not unexpected, but necessary to note.

Progress of a sort

I've been to Smith's Mills. Video coming soon.

Started doing some preliminary research yesterday. Started to see some patterns emerging. Why these folk figures hundreds of miles apart seem so similar. It's eerie.

I plan on unpacking those stored rar files pretty soon. See what kind of things I was leaving for myself.

Housekeeping

I'm going to try to wrest this back in the direction of using this blog for its intended purpose, namely that of a research blog. It's helpful to sort of have an autoethnographic account of my experience while I'm researching this, but let's be real, it's not exactly helping me with my studies.

Speaking of which, I got an email from my advisor today asking me about progress on my topic, and I kind of want to light myself on fire. It's doesn't help that I haven't disclosed any of the... problems I'd been having. I mean, it's hard to be seen as credible when you admit to being so paranoid that you move your living situation every few months in any field, let alone academia. 

Aside from going through all of that paranoid locked up bullshit from those .rar files, I need to recollect all of the leads I'd been going through.

So far, for this project, I've looked into the folklore figures of Old Nick and Old Scratch, and how they originated from the ancient European folk figures of the water demons (nykyr/nicors, from which Nick is derived), and the wood demons (skratta, or skrat, from where Scratch comes from).

I feel stupid for missing it in the first place, but my advisor also pointed something out to me.

What about boogeymen?

Both Old Nick and Old Scratch had cultural connotations that hovered between the actual form of the Christian devil, but also more pagan and just as feared figures of nature gods. And there's another constant theme: the idea of taking children.

And what is the biggest threat of the boogeyman in any culture? Stealing children. There's definitely a link here to be explored. I'm going to hit up the library today, see what I can find.

Maybe I can find something to link The Man in the Woods to these boogeymen figures. It's pretty clear that the Millpond Man was considered to be a child-stealer. Maybe I can find some kind of regional or cultural link.

Unfortunate circumstances

I can't believe it's been over a month since I came here. 

I wasn't entirely forthcoming, in my previous posts. At least now, I think I can offer up a little more information.

Partly the reason why I've been so scarce lately is that within the past year, I've up and moved my entire life half a dozen times. Each time partly fueled by the fear that I've been followed. Stalked, I guess you could say, if that doesn't sound cliche or overly dramatic.

So I guess it would be understandable that my focus is a bit fractured. I thought I was being followed, I was under a heavy work burden, and dealing with personal issues.

Except no one was following me. At least, no person has been following me.

I really don't see how I could have been so willfully blind.

I'm continuing on, anyway. With my research, with my life. I've got a new change coming, and I want to be able to be equal to it.

I plan on doing maybe a findings meeting soon. Last time was pretty informative, for me anyway, and maybe this time I can get some perspective again.

Stay in touch, guys.

Archived files

Alright, so here we are. I've needed a chunk of time to sit down and sift through all this stuff.

There's actually not too much on the archive. Two pictures, a transcript of some kind, another archived file. The legend on the side says "the time has come". Okay.

The two pictures are somewhat more disturbing. Both are corrupted. One looks to be a picture of a
handwritten passage, and the other is another handwritten poem.

The second is my research journal, and it's my handwriting.

While this should surprise no one by now, I don't remember either of these. It's still disturbing to me, especially as I've apparently written something that I can't remember. I definitely don't know the handwriting in the first one.

Apologies and a data dump

I suppose I could extend apologies to myself as well, but mostly I'm offering apologies to anybody who's been following this.

I didn't drop into another fugue state or anything, I've just been kind of run ragged by life. In between school and other life things, I've barely had time to tease at this problem.

Anyway, the USB, and the numbers string. I misspoke earlier, when I said all the files were password protected, which would have been a neat trick for someone who's experiencing clouded thinking and insight to be able to hack a way into Windows and password protect individual files.

Unfortunately, my [edit] does not come equipped with fancy new computer skills. Just chunks of lost memory, and weird wounds on my body.

What I should have said was that there's a password protected archive on the USB drive.

I did a cursory check on the file-- the password, "thetime" does work on it, but I haven't had the chance to comb through it.

For now, I'm just going to upload it somewhere, and leave the link here, just so that I have it backed up.

https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B54jZHiorZmqdjJFMGROZE5CeG8/view?usp=sharing

Thoughts and progress.

“Hes calling me home.”

This is what bothers me the most. As though wherever this thing is, is where I belong. As though it has a say in where I belong. I mean, it could just be a delusion, and I could be getting angry at my own brain being sick, which is pointless.

The USB stick. I tried "theresamaninthewoods" as a password, and that didn't work. If I was the one to password protect these, I'm not one for making overly complex passwords, since I have a habit of forgetting everything. 

But anyway. The numbers string. 20 8 5 20 9 13 5.

I've tried the number string from the picture as a password to the other files on the USB stick, since  I tried the order from top to bottom, and then backwards. No luck there, either. 

A commenter mentioned yesterday that the string, if substituted for letters in the alphabet, become "the time". I'm making a note of it here, and I'll try it as a password when I get a few minutes today. 

I'll update with any progress I've made later. 

 The weather's been terrible here, but if there's a nice day, I'm going to try to make it to the old house from the video of me on the stairs.

The USB stick

Well this is irritating. While there's a number of files on the drive, all of them are password protected, aside for a single image file.

It's. Okay, it's unnerving. I don't feel good about it. That's my missing research journal. That is my handwriting, but I only write like that right before [edit].

So this means whatever this is, was important enough for me to write about, even while my brain was starting to shut down.

Repetitive thinking right before [edit] is pretty common, but it takes a lot of effort to write concerted phrases. Especially something as long as “there's a man in the woods”, which is horrifying in and of itself. I can't remember writing this, or what frame of mind I was in while I was writing it.

And the symbol-- it's the symbol that was on my hand, from the video of me on the stairs. It's the symbol from that scrap of paper from the research box. It keeps following me.

And those numbers in the margin. I feel overwhelmed. Did I copy them? Did I pick them out? It looks like I was having delusions or paranoia right before I [edit], if I thought that by “thinking” of something, “it” can read my thoughts.

What was I trying to hide? Are the numbers a disguise, like a code?

If anybody's reading, can you make any sense of this? Do you have any ideas what these could mean?

My head is killing me, and seeing what I was like, it's just really really difficult. I don't forget things by choice when ]edit], that's just part of the condition. Right now I'm not sure I would want to remember what I felt then, and why I felt it.

I seemed so scared. I'm scared now.  

This isn't fun.

Going back through these entries, trying to pick up on something that might be helpful. In retrospect a lot of it seems entirely insane. 

I'm lucid right now, thanks to my meds, and I don't remember ¾ of what went on. It's that memory loss thing, which sounds like a cliché, but my condition prevents my brain from writing new memories while I'm having episodes. And even when the episode is over, my brain is messed up, so when I get back to normal, it's like it treats my episodes like a reality glitch. Like they never happened.

It's kind of terrifying.

The video with me on the stairs is particularly weird, to say the least. I was definitely out of it, and whatever the hell is on my hand I have no idea how it could have gotten there. Maybe I put it there.

Anyway, getting away from that, I'm actually a bit relieved. I think I recognize those stairs. They're in an old house, near my hometown. I spent a lot of time there, when I was young.

I honestly have no idea why I was there. But it's possible I left something behind. I guess it's time to go pick up after myself.

Stay in touch, guys. I think I'll have an update about that USB drive pretty soon.

The backpack.

Still not okay.

Going from last night's post, I'm still pretty bothered.

I had been doing pretty well with my sleep schedule. I'd been getting a good 8-9 hours every night. But this whole thing had been eating at me all night, I think I got 5 hour max. Not good for my health; less sleep, more episodes.

You know, thinking about this objectively, it would be helpful to know where I was and what I was doing during the month I don't remember. Which would be mostly from late December to late January. I wasn't in contact with my doctors then, but if anything happened that could have made me worse, I should be aware of it. I say “don't remember”, but it's more accurate to say I have a very dim recall of the events. I have vague, general impressions of place, but not detail.

Months ago, before I got incredibly sick, I was having smaller chunks of memory loss. Emma suggested I record where I go so I don't forget. So I had a record of what I was doing.

I should look into the things that I brought back with me to school, like my travel backpack. And go back through these entries; maybe I mention where I am, where I'm going. If nothing else, I should make it explicit from here on out.  

Speaking of which, I'm headed to my hometown for a few days. If anyone's reading, any suggestions on what I should look for while I'm there? You probably have a better sense of continuity about that than I do. 

(Final note: still having problems with language. I apologize if this has made limited sense.)

Well

It's been a while.

I'd like to say that I had a good reason for disappearing on this project.

The problem is I just can't remember.

I wish I could say that it makes me excited, or makes me nervous, or makes me sick with fear. Or rather, I wish I could remember why looking at these past entries makes me feel this way.

Memory problems are pretty much par per course, if my doctors and the medication warning are to be believed.

But most of all, I wish I could remember between the last time stamp and this one.

Logically, I know what happened. I must have gone back to my hometown. Visited my family.

Then I came back to the city. Gone back to school. But all of my projects this semester aren't even remotely related to … whatever I was doing last semester.

I don't even know where to begin to look. I don't know if I want to try. I don't know if it's worth the effort; it would essentially be reconstructing a month or more of my life. Was all of this so important?

I think the medicine is helping. I'm having fewer problems remembering.

It's just the month before is kind of a hole. I'm missing my research notebook. I'm missing my camera. I still have my wallet, keys, and bag, though.

Things are getting better, and things are getting worse. I remember this month. But language and communicating is harder, and my coordination is shot. I'm sleeping better, I have fewer headaches. I'm not having nearly as many seizures.

I need some time. Maybe I can figure out why this seemed so important. Maybe I'll find my last work notes.

If any one is there, if anyone is reading … please, say something. Anything. Did I drag you into anything? Is everyone okay?