The original site this came from is long gone, so this has been rescued from the Wayback Machine.
The views here are those of the author, and are presented for archival purposes.
I have made layout changes, but otherwise left the grammer alone. ~Sphynx
Some people have asked why I keep this particular
item on this site if I don't accept the "turning theory" as other
people have talked about it on other sites. The reason is because what he
describes as aftereffects appear to be accurate, so I will therefore entertain
the possibility. In any event, it makes for interesting reading.
It is a life of more. It seems now, that everything has become just a little more than it once was. My vision, though it hasn't improved, per se, has changed. Colors are brighter, movement more distinct, and I have become more photosensitive. Imagine, if you will, that your vision is like your television. Turn the "color" control up all the way and the "brightness" up a few notches. Leave the contrast and sharpness where they were and you'll get the idea. Though bright lights are always blinding, it is only the Sun which is painful: kind of a dull headache usually, but when I step into a sunlight-filled area after being in a darkened environment, it is usually a combination of complete, temporary blindness, and a searing pain in my eyeballs. Direct sunlight on my skin feels much like being directly under a heat lamp, like the ones common in cafeterias. In small doses, it is more annoying than painful. If, however I am forced into prolonged exposure to direct sunlight, I will have a nasty sunburn which generally shows up the next day and peels in a pretty disgusting manner for almost a week thereafter. I've found SPF 45 sunscreen to stop the burning and lessen the annoying heat, but that can't help the mild headache I get from the light. (I originally wrote this in the day, with a thin layer of high, cirrus clouds and behind tinted glass, and I still felt the sun through SPF 45 and two pair of sunglasses.)
Another effect, presumably due to the Sun, is my general energy level. The lowest point occurs around noon, when in some situations, I have trouble remaining conscious. My energy also drops slightly just before dusk, but rises quickly after the sun is completely below the horizon. My energy level then continues to wax until about 3 am, when it drops only slightly toward dawn. There is another mild upswing near early to midmorning, and a drop to the lowest level, near noon. This cycle, of course, makes it easiest to go to sleep just before noon and wake up shortly after dusk, thus a basically nocturnal lifestyle would be best.
Since it is exceedingly difficult to maintain such a lifestyle, even in today's society, many of us rely on a wide range of stimulants to keep us going. This may add to the physical leanness, so often attributed to vampires. I have yet to meet one of us who do not take some form of stimulating substance, but preferences range the entire gamut from coffee to ginseng to various forms of speed. I, myself, can almost always be found drinking black coffee, Jolt, or Mountain Dew. For really hard times, such as when I have to work the day shift, I keep a bottle of over-the-counter asthma medicine (ephedrine hydrochloride, 50 mg).
Other drugs, both legal and illegal are common among us, both for the above reasons, and because our senses are more distinct. Hallucinogens are treasured items, though in nearly all cases, treated with extreme care and always in moderation.
Closely related to the careful use of hallucinogens is our generally refined taste in most things. As I said in the opening of this essay, ours is a life of more. We experience pleasure and pain more distinctly. Since very few of us are very affluent monetarily, we tend to try to offset this problem with whatever inexpensive comforts we may find. Thus, we usually have a few sets of the most beautiful clothing we can afford. Our sense of beauty, however, is in most cases, fiercely independent, both of society's norms and of the fashions of the day. Personally, I am fond of mixing 15th century shirts, 16th century riding boots, 18th century waistcoats, and 20th century black jeans. In colder weather, 19th century blanket shirts, full-circle hooded cloaks, or long modern trench coats keep me warm, though I sometimes opt for a natural colored leather bomber jacket if I don't feel like drawing attention.
Our keen awareness of comfort is also evident in our bearing. When we feel the need, we can look surprisingly regal, but in private company, when and where there is no need to make an impression, we quickly take on the posture of lazy sloths. It is common for us to be half-lying on the floor, or whatever furniture is around. Sometimes you may catch us with our feet propped up on whatever is available at the moment, that often being someone else's lap, which brings up another point. In most public situations, vampires, like most goths, are loners, keeping to themselves and their circle of friends, ice cold to outsiders. This may be so strong at times, that we seem as cold and impersonal as to be similar to German or Prussian military officers. Remove the outsiders, however, and get us into a private atmosphere, and we take the opposite approach. The stiffness reverses and it takes on the atmosphere of an opium den without the opium.
When standing around in private and semiprivate company, it is usual that vampires will lean against walls or posts, almost always leaning on one foot or the other. Often, too, the other leg will be crossed over and the toe of the crossed foot touching the ground beyond the supporting foot, thus forming sort of a figure 4 type position.
With food, folklore and common fiction have almost unanimously been incorrect. I have yet to meet one of us who does not require normal foods. As for garlic, most of us like it very much, while only a very small percentage are allergic to it. I personally like it more than most non-vampires do. Most of us are extremely fond of good, quality food. Gourmet meals of any variety are excellent, and ethnic cooking is best when it is accurate and well made. As far as food is concerned, the only difference between vampires and non-vampires when it comes to food (besides the refined tastes) is that we generally require some meat products in out diet. (Woe to those vegetarians - turned - vampire...)
Sickness of any kind is relatively rare among us, but when it hits, it tends to be quite debilitating at the time. We are sorry creatures when sick, even worse than when we are malnourished. In general, though we are quite hardy. Though most of us eat meat products which are barely even cooked (if at all), I have yet to hear of one of us ever getting food poisoning. When we are denied what we need, we get very lethargic, with occasional bursts of energy. These come when we lose our temper, a difficult thing to control when we're sick or hungry. When mildly hungry, we are restless and irritable. When truly starved, we are vulnerable to illness and dangerously irritable, but otherwise not very energetic.
With the proper diet, however, including the life-energy we need, our energy is high, we are powerful, and controlled, but the energy flows smoothly, unlike when the hunger is excessively great.
Speaking of energy and power, I practiced magic(k) for almost 5 years before I became a vampire. From a magickal or psychic viewpoint, I noticed a lot has changed. The first things I noticed were that my magickal energy levels had suddenly become much greater, and my astral sight improved considerably. On the downside, nothing I had been able to do worked quite the same. It was as if I needed to relearn everything from scratch, so that's exactly what I did, and continue to do. Psychically scanning other vampires with this newfound sight, I noticed something common among most of us. At first glance, one gets the impression of "all is normal... nothing out of the ordinary here."
This seems to be a natural facade and shielding all rolled up into one. Upon deeper inquiry, under most conditions, one may realize this mask of normalcy as being a facade but find absolutely nothing beyond. The vampire being scanned, if he or she chooses to, may reveal more, but it seems this must be a conscious effort on the vampire's part or else the person scanning, unless a very powerful psychic, will continue to get absolutely nothing. The first time I dropped my defenses to a budding psychic, all he managed to see was that I was no longer alive. He saw my face fade into a skull and back again. Magickal abilities become seriously confused during the change. One vampire I know, of Celtic and Native American descent, after 20 some-odd years as a vampire still has extreme difficulty getting a spell to work properly, although her psychic senses are rather well honed. Another, newly-made, is having a difficult time with this part of the change, as he was a rather competent magic(k)ian for most of his life.
As you can see, not everything gets better. Along with our more acute sense of pleasure, we also have a more refined sense of pain. Emotionally, we most often and commonly feel loneliness. Ending friendships for any reason can be very hard on us, so once we have learned this, we are extremely careful about who we choose to share a closeness. Perhaps this is the reason many people see us as aloof or cold. For those we choose to be close with, our passion and loyalty can seem extreme at times. The occasions when we allow this to happen are few and far between, so we generally choose a pursuit to escape from having to be so cold. This makes loners of us all. This is one paradox of our existence: we are social loners. We are loners because we find it difficult to find proper company with which to be social. A good analogy is the type of person who spends all his or her time alone in a room, talking to a select group of close friends via a computer. In fact, a growing number of vampires are doing just that, myself included. Over time we realize that in the long run, we are alone. Petty squabbles, personal differences, and all too much back-stabbing preclude constant, long term friendships. So, we back off, and enjoy each others' company when we can. Our loyalties are quite like a clan system after a time. Despite our differences, we are sometimes willing to aid our own kind. Alignments are made and broken in a never constant web of intrigue. After a while some of us step out of this web entirely to avoid the constant but never consistent battles. At other times, we step in, usually out of boredom or longing to interact with our own kind.
Contrary to common belief, we are commonly nonviolent creatures. It would obviously behoove us not to have an unfortunate run in with the "authorities" when the two possible outcomes are jail or looney bin. Because of this, we usually become secretive and quiet people. Our lives as such strike people as cowardly, and perhaps cowards we are. On those extremely rare occasions when we choose to hold our ground, such as when cornered, the results can be rather spectacular. Don't expect any one of us involved in such a spectacle afterwards, though. Neither a jail nor a psychiatric hospital appeal to us, nor are our chances of long-term survival in either very good. I have only heard of one such incident happening in the recent past. Some time in the 1980's, in Boston, a small group of vampires was severely threatened. In the end, about a dozen and a half vampires disappeared. No one seems to know their fate, whether they are alive or not. Only one has made one has made contact in the area (very briefly, in 1996), and finding too many questions being asked, promptly returned to the shadows. The battle, which involved vampires and magic(k)ians on both sides was powerful enough to shake the pagan community and get the local authorities involved. One or two buildings associated with the participants burned down due to "unknown" causes, and the occupants were never found. Come to think of it, I don't think there were any bodies found either, but there were plenty of missing-person reports filed.
The only other occasion I have heard of similar to this was in a California city just over 20 years ago. One house (formerly occupied by vampires) burned down, a handful of people dead and no bodies found "officially". Again, almost none of the participants were heard from afterward. The person I heard this from had been a former occupant of this house and was handed a ticket out of town just a couple of days before the events took place. She pieced together what happened from news reports and word of mouth from other people she knew in that city.
As I said, however, those events are very rare. We are labeled cowards, but now that I am in this world of vampires, I have found the term to be inaccurate. Although we would like to do certain things, out of our nature, we exercise a great amount of restraint in order to survive. In today's high-tech society, despite its merits, it is becoming increasingly difficult to hide after such incidents as these.
This article is presented as part of an ongoing effort to present other views outside of, as well as within, the online vampire community. Those of us who consider ourselves vampiric don't always look at things from the same viewpoint due to our life experiences. As such, the views and opinions contained in this article are entirely those of the author(s), and may not necessarily be shared by SphynxCatVP. The webmaster is not under obligation to update or otherwise keep current the contents of this article. Most importantly, only you can decide for yourself whether this article or any of the author(s) other views are useful or applicable to you - you are responsible for using your own reasoning and judgement, so judge wisely.
|
