Anyhow, it strikes me, from time to time, how like a living thing a guild is.  It sheds cells and rebuilds itself over and over, a constant cycle.  It’s a bittersweet thing, at times.  I look around Aetherial Circle now, and I see fewer of our original faces.  The first that hits me, of course, is Sharvan.  The day I got that phone call from Diyami, it literally took me a full minute on the phone to even figure out who was calling.  After I realized what was going on, I literally dropped to my knees on the floor.  It was so sudden, so unexpected.  We were doing our damndest to get her and Diyami to the AC BBQ we held in Maine, which was a just a few months away at that point.  We were even considering springing for a ticket for them.    It’s a wound that I don’t think will ever completely heal.

Diyami and Bunnyfluff, Shar’s RL friends, ended up switching servers a while back, because they were getting so much lag on Drenden that it was mostly unplayable.  Immortus is still with us, though I don’t see him around quite as much as we used to.  Flesh and Vein, two of the guildies who made the jump to Drenden with us back at BC launch, popped back in a month or so ago, but I haven’t seen them since.  One friend (who shall remain nameless here) who was an original member, I had to gkick because of his temper.  I hated doing it, especially since he’s a RL friend.  He moved a while ago, and I haven’t been able to talk with him much recently.  Msbehavin, the warrior who was our main tank when we made the switch to Drenden (I laugh saying this now, as back then, I had almost no idea what the hell a MT was) still hops on very occasionally with his new hunter, but it’s been a while.

Then, there are those who stopped by for a time.  Pyroclasm, you nutjob, we miss you wherever you are.  I don’t care how drunk you seemed at times on vent, you were hands down the best bear tank I have ever seen.  Kyndig, despite the bad ending, you were still very much a part of the family.  Crux, you were an awesome healer, a grumpy bastard, and everyone loved you for it.  Dallin, it broke our heart when you left to raid elsewhere – I still don’t agree with your reasoning, but I won’t let that ruin the good memories.  Oz, I know you’re still around now and then, but we miss having you around more.  TJ, if you don’t hop on Owen more often I’m going to pummel you.  Laguna, you were with us for a while, and screw real life for interrupting.  Skingrad/Dokis, you were a fun couple to play with.  Nightscarab, not sure if you eneded up leaving WoW, but if somehow you ever find and read this, I hope you’re doing well.  Deoin, Jace, Hathorn, and many others.

And there are some that are still with us.  Celliana, who I think it the only remaning member of a guild we absorbed trying to get into Karazhan.  Francois/Jefferson, who I sold the Leggings of Beast Mastery to the day he joined guild for about a quarter of the AH price.  Demetria, Anarac, Lamaa, and the rest of the BBQ crew.  Doom, who is like MacGuyver, except instead of making bombs out of paper clips he makes crude jokes out of the most innocent comments.  Militades, who we picked up as a healer and who turned into an incredible tank.  Naki, who was the tank for the Black Morass run that finally got Cay and Fio their keys (I was literally at the trainer about to respec feral when Steph was like “Wait, I found a tank!”).  BRK, who isn’t around as much any more, but who still stops in and hangs out when he can.  And more, of course.

There are new faces in the guild today.  I don’t know yet how they will fit in, what memories will be built, what the future holds.

Can a guild be said to have a personality?  Can it be said to mature?  It feels that way to me.  So much has changed in AC.  I look back at our early days in BC as a young, struggling guild almost like I look back on my childhood.  Everything was new and exciting.  Downing Attumen was a major accomplishment.  Attracting prospective members was incredibly hard – we had no proven track record to show them.  We almost gave it up twice, when we’d recruit ALMOST enough to get going, and then lose one or two more to a guild that was actually raiding.

We were always close.  But (and I hate to keep coming back to it) Shar’s death was what really made it hit home.  Tragedy is like that, sometimes.  Those who remain behind draw closer together.  In a way, it felt like the first death I experienced in my family.  You start appreciating those you still have, because it truly hits you for the first time that they won’t always be there.

When WoW finally closes its doors, it will be a sad day.  I’m not sure what will happen to Aetherial Circle as a whole.  Will we go our separate ways?  Move on to the latest and greatest MMO?  Stage an armed takeover of a small tropical nation and establish the central state of a hegemony that will soon envelop the world?  I’m just not sure.  What I do know is that among the trade chat trolls, random pugged group members, gold spammers, casually known guildies, and fifteen year old basement-dwelling teenage boys, I’ve found a few gems laying hidden.  True friends who I am proud to know, and friendship that may have been built on the foundation of a game, but has transcended that and become something more.

It’s been a year today.

I’m not really sure what to think.

I miss her.  I love her, and I miss her.  A year is  a long time.  A lot of things could happen in a year.  A lot of things have happened in the year since she’s been gone.

I’m not really accustom to death.  When I was young, my family moved around a lot.  Life of a Navy Brat.  So I didn’t have the extended family a lot of my friends and even Jas were used to.  It was Mom, Dad, my bro and I.  The granparents lived a plane flight away, across the country, in opposite corners of the country from each other.  Aunts, uncles, cousins, they lived on opposite coasts and inner ones too.  So I never did the whole, weddings, birthdays, funerals thing that you might normally do.

Last year I experienced death pretty up close and personal.  Jason’s dad was fighting cancer, his gran had passed, and then… like a train wreck from no where, blind siding me, Shar.

I had lost a friend when I was younger.  But while she was a friend when I was 10, not having been in touch with her for almost 3 years dulled the reaction, it dulled the impact.  I didn’t really have a sense of continuity with friends I made when I was that young.  I mean, why would I?  The internet wasn’t even for public use yet, and when you’re moving from one place to another in the space of a few years, you get used to leaving old friends behind for new.

So… when my friend Kelly died at 13 of spinal menigitus in North Carolina (where her family was stationed once they left Groton), I was sad… but it didn’t linger.  Still makes me kind of sad, she was a pretty red head, freckles and all.  Her neighbor, young girl named Heather, was my first school yard “brawl”, if you can call throwing dirt and pulling hair a brawl. *smirk*

She had it coming to her.  Told Kyle I liked him.  (Blasphemy in the eyes of 10 yr olds.)

But with Shar… I never got to see her, face to face.  But I knew her.  We weren’t BFFL, but we were friends.  She liked to cosplay, she loved her tiny japanese dolls, she was an anime freak! and usually where I would get some good tips for good shows, she loved cows.  It was such an odd quirk, but adorable at the same time.

I almost wish I had her moo on recording.  I almost had it.  I fraps’d the Headless Horseman fight when it first came out, twice.  Once with sound, once without.  She was in the silent version.

Sometimes I can’t get the sound out of my head.

It’s probably pretty dramatic sounding, but this is still… painful.  It’s been a year.  There’s no more “fights” between her and Fio about which is stronger, the power of OOM or MOO.

I should probably go to sleep, but this unusual April heat in the northeast is keeping me up.

Yea, it’s just the heat.

~

Yesterday, we lost a sister.

We lost a friend.

I’m still not sure what to say or think about it. She was so awesome in so many ways. We met her in WoW, a month or two after we started playing. We were fast friends. Both her and D. Back on Lothar, they were in a guild with some friends, but we did a lot of things together.

She was there for my first ding to 60. The Giddglet. Boomkin bookends.

She loved to dance. When we finally made the move from Lothar to Drenden, she and D and a few others came with us. We created a new Aetherial Circle, friends who played together, with lofty hopes of raiding together someday.

And raid we did…

First, gotta get your Kara key.

Then raid some Karazhan.

Lots of Karazhan.

Then some Gruul’s. What can we say? We’re a very druid friendly place <3

Which lead us to SSC pwnage. Mooo…

To now, when we’re chargin’ down Vashj’s door.

___

She’s gone now.  And it hurts.   In this day and age where friendships can be made across vast distances, some people may think that our sorrow isn’t as real as if we knew her in real life.  But that’s just it, we DID know her.  The game was just the bar, the club, the meeting place.  In the fall, we’re having a BBQ for AC, people are going to gather to meet in person and shoot the shit for a weekend.  She was looking forward to it, and excited to be there.

There’s gonna be an empty spot at the table now.

And it hurts.

We’re gonna miss you Tara.  So much…

T.T