Steemit you are the Frankenstein to my Monster -Steemit Ultimate Challenge 8 Weeks - Week #6

So you ask me how Steemit changed my life and the answer is layered. My life in general has not been easy but the last 18 have been the hardest. It started with my then 12 year old daughter having a stroke and almost dying in the year 2000. Worn down I let myself into a relationship that almost cost me my life. The grand finale was the guy locking me in a room with a broken leg for 3 months. I got out, I survived, it was not pleasant. That is all I have to say about it for now. Maybe I will talk about it at a later date maybe never. He was one of the reasons that brought me back to U.S America, stupidest decision ever but if wishes were fishes we would all have bicycles and hindsight is a dime a dozen. The next years where full of dramatic ups and downs got a high paying job, lost it two years later. Decided to go to school to finally get degree, got myself 3 and was planning on getting a doctorate when my illness presented its first signs. School was no longer an option. Work wasn’t either.

At the time I had started something called the Mutanthouse project. The Idea was to turn my home and the acre of land that I had into a thriving self sustainable micro community and home for both humans and non humans. I had already been rescuing dogs and cats and soon a few humans and more non humans called the place their home. The idea was to build interconnected tiny homes and shared communal spaces. We had plans to become energy independent then ultimately off grid. We wanted to plant a permaculture food forest, grow our own food and teach each other our skills. the plan was to combine resources and talent to generally up the life quality for all that came knocking but also the community around us. Me getting sick brought the whole the to a screeching halt and it all ended quite miserably 3 years later with me losing the place to foreclosure (as I had used all my savings to save the place, the fur people in my care) and my dream. During this time I also lost a close friend to an aggressive cancer. My own diagnosis and pain spells turned into the final nail in my coffin. I just shut down. Whatever energy I had went toward my fur family but more or less I was dead to the world and myself.

Although I miraculously found refuge and relative safety with my non human family members; ultimately represented myself in my disability hearing (after being unceremoniously dumped by my lawyer 2 months before trial) and won- I was not really alive. For the last 5 years I have been pretty much living on autopilot, taking care of and fixing the things needed done and fixing but not really living. For the last year the only face to face human contact that I have had that lasted more then a nod hello, were with my doctors, nurses, the man at the corner store, pizza delivery people and the woman who goes shopping for me once a month. And I was not planning to change that, my shell and my exile had become comfortable and I was really tired of a world that did not give a shit.

My online presence was a bit more lively, mostly political and animal rights activism and debate but it did not warm my core. It would have all stayed like that had youtube not pissed me off with their demonetisation gig. While I never monetised my stuff anyway, because I did not like that I had no control over what they were selling on my channel, the way youtube addressed the issue just rubbed me the wrong way. 24 hours after I got their condescending letter, informing me that I was basically dust and that they were pulling my privileges. I took my entire content of their platform, all 100+ videos. I left one saying why I left. And another where I could be found (namely here) and now I only use the platform to park unlisted videos if I need to and as soon as Dtube becomes 100% reliable that will end as well.

The day after leaving Youtube I posted on facebook asking people for a viable, worthy, replacement and one person just said Dtube. I looked into it signed up for an account and waited. When I did not hear back after a week I started researching about the place and it is then where I found out that it was not only a video forum but a multifaceted universe. I was thrilled, finally a place where I could share all my talents and talk about all my interests from art to science, from sustainability, to genetic engineering, to the downright silly like, the superiority of Pie as nutritional source, gaming and Sci-fi. It also did not hurt that there was the potential to get paid as I am living on 750$ a month on disability and feed 15 furpeople plus myself so the prospect of making some extra money was a nice thing to dream about. I did not really notice any changes in myself in the beginning ,It sort of crept up on me.The more I wrote, composed shared and learned about the platform, the more excited I got about its potential and the world changing possibilities( if we do not let the idiots ruin the show). I am also presently surprised at the level of intelligence of the average user here, before I came here I was about to lose hope for humanity entirely.

So here I am about to be 50 on April 13th and I am dreaming of communities again, and spreading knowledge. I will not lie I am pretty banged up still, it will take awhile for me to recover, but I feel life stirring and it is growing wondrous offshoots. Best example In the last 3 days in steemitschool I have talked more, communicated more over voice then I have in the last 1.5 years. So when you ask me how steemit changed my life I guess it has become the Frankenstein to my monster to quote a famous movie “SHE'S ALIVE, ALIVE”!

(Image credit Dave Renike and a portrait of the fair jubilee made by myself turned into this here universal truth meme)

Bonus 1 my Minnow ballad footage credits here

bonus 2

my Stemitschool Song

For Author Bio go Here

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