Way overdue introduction...
Nov. 26th, 2007 07:29 pm![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
sun-huntress.livejournal.com posting in ![[community profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/community.png){kind=small}
animal_quillsHey there, folks. My name's Kusani - I'm a lioness-woman. I've been watching this community for... well, a long time... and I figure it's about time that I step out of the shadows and actually introduce myself.
I'm from West Virginia, and I live in Colorado now, near Denver. I'm close enough to the foothills of the mountains to be content, and I have a good view of the city lights from my second story apartment's little deck. I live with one small dog, two cats, three plants, and no humans. I work as a web and graphic designer, as a search engine optimizer, and as a copywriter. I write sci-fantasy novels on the side and participate in National Novel-Writing Month every year. I love inventive video games, science and zoology, and stories that tug on the heart-strings. Oh, and I'm an eclectic pagan-ish person.
Those're the basics, and honestly, those don't matter that terribly much for this particular community, but hey, an intro's an intro, right? Well, let's flip the coin and take a look at the animal side of things.
What's in the mind of a lioness?
Her mind is a strange place, sometimes. Full of contradictions (adaptability to different circumstances) and paradoxes (well-rounded-ness).
Take, for example, a lioness-mother with her cubs. It's the heat of the day, and she's half-dozing in the shade. Her senses still report on what other animals are nearby - the reek of a buffalo herd upwind, the occasional flutter of a bird in the acacia tree overhead, the lazy movements of distant grazing gazelles. Her body, both warmed and drained by the sheer heat, is in a state of almost-sleep - like a trance. Her cubs are her most immediate concern, and her head will turn as she keeps track of them if they play, or she'll "listen" to the feel of their small bodies pushed up against her flank to nap. She is both conscious and asleep; she is alert and aware, yet there is no sense of action - only the ability to react.
Take, for another example, a lioness-mother on the hunt to feed those same cubs. There is cooperation and intelligence amongst huntresses - make no mistake - and it is both similar and different to how a wolf pack works. She must be alert and keen to pick out the target, pegged by his weakness or his distance from his mother - and her fellow lionesses must choose the same target by the same criteria. The one that is easiest to get. She feeds on the input of her senses, can almost taste the wind, and she moves forward without any signal from her companions. They know - they operate on the same instinctual level, and on that level, their minds are one. And now, she must be both reaction and action. She is fast and strong, and with her pridemates, she is a killer - but she is not unstoppable. Prey have taken back their calves before - or other predators have claimed the kill and driven her off. But gone now is the sense of passive existence - she is moving and breathing and there will be blood and meat. Adrenaline and flesh-stench is already in the air, and the herd is restless as the lionesses close in. They are focused and yet still listening-with-all-senses to everything around them.
Active, and reactive. Passive, and aggressive. Single-minded focus, and mindless diffusion. Lioness can do all of these things. Her life is easier than some, sometimes - she has pridemates to help her hunt, and she has a male or two to defend herself and her cubs. The pride together will protect its hunting grounds, but they are not bound to one patch of land - they can and will move if the food leaves or the water dries.
Active, when I can feel my heart beating in my ears and I'm moving and there are claws on my fingers and a tufted tail slung out behind me and my lips are curled to show off fangs that no one can see. Active, but still aware, when the music is loud - almost louder than my own heart - and I'm moving in response, instinctive, subconscious, never trying to think but only letting myself be.
Passive, when I am still, and warm, and cozy, and all of my senses report but I pay no more mind to one over the other. Passive, reactive, when I am curled up with my pridemates or my animals, listening to my skin report their warmth and weight, listening to the air move as people move, listening to things that my ears can't fathom ever hearing but it's listening all the same. Almost mindless, almost not-conscious, when all that exists is a quiet self and the external world - no internal chatter, no thoughts, only input of senses and the ability to react if need be.
Lioness.
I'm from West Virginia, and I live in Colorado now, near Denver. I'm close enough to the foothills of the mountains to be content, and I have a good view of the city lights from my second story apartment's little deck. I live with one small dog, two cats, three plants, and no humans. I work as a web and graphic designer, as a search engine optimizer, and as a copywriter. I write sci-fantasy novels on the side and participate in National Novel-Writing Month every year. I love inventive video games, science and zoology, and stories that tug on the heart-strings. Oh, and I'm an eclectic pagan-ish person.
Those're the basics, and honestly, those don't matter that terribly much for this particular community, but hey, an intro's an intro, right? Well, let's flip the coin and take a look at the animal side of things.
What's in the mind of a lioness?
Her mind is a strange place, sometimes. Full of contradictions (adaptability to different circumstances) and paradoxes (well-rounded-ness).
Take, for example, a lioness-mother with her cubs. It's the heat of the day, and she's half-dozing in the shade. Her senses still report on what other animals are nearby - the reek of a buffalo herd upwind, the occasional flutter of a bird in the acacia tree overhead, the lazy movements of distant grazing gazelles. Her body, both warmed and drained by the sheer heat, is in a state of almost-sleep - like a trance. Her cubs are her most immediate concern, and her head will turn as she keeps track of them if they play, or she'll "listen" to the feel of their small bodies pushed up against her flank to nap. She is both conscious and asleep; she is alert and aware, yet there is no sense of action - only the ability to react.
Take, for another example, a lioness-mother on the hunt to feed those same cubs. There is cooperation and intelligence amongst huntresses - make no mistake - and it is both similar and different to how a wolf pack works. She must be alert and keen to pick out the target, pegged by his weakness or his distance from his mother - and her fellow lionesses must choose the same target by the same criteria. The one that is easiest to get. She feeds on the input of her senses, can almost taste the wind, and she moves forward without any signal from her companions. They know - they operate on the same instinctual level, and on that level, their minds are one. And now, she must be both reaction and action. She is fast and strong, and with her pridemates, she is a killer - but she is not unstoppable. Prey have taken back their calves before - or other predators have claimed the kill and driven her off. But gone now is the sense of passive existence - she is moving and breathing and there will be blood and meat. Adrenaline and flesh-stench is already in the air, and the herd is restless as the lionesses close in. They are focused and yet still listening-with-all-senses to everything around them.
Active, and reactive. Passive, and aggressive. Single-minded focus, and mindless diffusion. Lioness can do all of these things. Her life is easier than some, sometimes - she has pridemates to help her hunt, and she has a male or two to defend herself and her cubs. The pride together will protect its hunting grounds, but they are not bound to one patch of land - they can and will move if the food leaves or the water dries.
Active, when I can feel my heart beating in my ears and I'm moving and there are claws on my fingers and a tufted tail slung out behind me and my lips are curled to show off fangs that no one can see. Active, but still aware, when the music is loud - almost louder than my own heart - and I'm moving in response, instinctive, subconscious, never trying to think but only letting myself be.
Passive, when I am still, and warm, and cozy, and all of my senses report but I pay no more mind to one over the other. Passive, reactive, when I am curled up with my pridemates or my animals, listening to my skin report their warmth and weight, listening to the air move as people move, listening to things that my ears can't fathom ever hearing but it's listening all the same. Almost mindless, almost not-conscious, when all that exists is a quiet self and the external world - no internal chatter, no thoughts, only input of senses and the ability to react if need be.
Lioness.
no subject
Date: 2007-11-27 02:48 am (UTC)And to other animal-folk reading this: until her site is up I've been hosting Kusani's writings so you can read her wonderful thoughts and musings: Of storms and lions (http://akhila.feralscribes.org/guests/lions.php), What exists (http://akhila.feralscribes.org/guests/exists.php), Territory (http://akhila.feralscribes.org/guests/territory.php), Soulskins (http://akhila.feralscribes.org/guests/soulskins.php), Lionmind (http://akhila.feralscribes.org/guests/lionmind.php). Check it out, it's good stuff. :3
no subject
Date: 2007-11-27 03:10 am (UTC)I kinda cheated and used most of "Lionmind" as part of this intro post, so uh, if anyone checks out any of those links... skip that one; you've read the meat of it already. *grin*
I still need to get my own bloody website up... s'like the cobbler whose kids don't have shoes, I swear.
Thanks for the welcome!
no subject
Date: 2007-11-27 03:18 am (UTC)It's about time!
*slack-jawed grin*
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Date: 2007-11-27 03:26 am (UTC)Yeah yeah, I know, I'm slow. *headbumps and grins*
no subject
Date: 2007-11-27 04:34 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-11-27 04:47 am (UTC)Thank you, and good to meet you as well. ^_^
no subject
Date: 2007-11-27 06:05 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-11-27 07:07 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-11-27 01:14 pm (UTC)*purrs and offers headrub*
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Date: 2007-11-27 05:25 pm (UTC)I have never met a lion before! And only one other lioness. Interesting how the instinctual reaction is different, even though you're still my own kind. ^_^
Well-met!
no subject
Date: 2007-11-27 03:27 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-11-27 05:26 pm (UTC)