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My Slashy Valentine: Sign-ups are open!
- Dec. 7th, 2023 at 7:03 PM
- reposted by
red_lasbelin
From the Years of the Trees to the Fourth Age, from sultry tales of the Silmarillion to romances in the Ring Wars ... sound familiar? That's right, Slashy Swaps are back and it’s once again time to make your Tolkien fanfic dreams come true.
My Slashy Valentine is a hand matched slash fiction exchange focused on the people of J.R.R. Tolkien’s Middle-earth. Sign ups are now OPEN so spread the word, recruit your friends and fellow authors, and get ready for MSV 2024.
Sign-up Period: December 7th to December 21st
Assignments distributed: by December 28th
Deadline for first time participants: January 31st, 2024
Deadline for veteran participants: February 7th, 2024
Archive opens: February 14th, 2024
The FAQ and Rules are on the AO3 collection page! Okay? Are you ready? This way to our SIGN UP PAGE.
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~Many thanks to M, T and R for letting me share a little bit about Keiliss and what she meant to me.
Kei and I were a very unlikely friendship from the start. I grew up in a small town in America eight thousand miles (or 13 thousand kilometers) from South Africa and I had never really heard of the band Queen. *grin* But the internet made our friendship possible. We met on a mailing list based on the fantasy books of J.R.R. Tolkien and quickly established a connection based around the love of stories. We shared an intense passion for books and saw libraries as magical gateways to different worlds and the people who inhabited them.
Kei wrote as a young teenager but put the words aside to focus on art, music, her family (and more books of course). Then, as time and grown children allowed, she discovered the magic of writing again.
As her editor, I had the privilege of discussing her writing, reading her stories and encouraging her in any way I could. This hobby connected her to people all over the world - the UK, America, Germany, Portugal, the isle of Skye, and Argentina...just to name a few.
( Read more...Collapse )This has been such a surreal experience. I got badly choked up at the airport because I never imagined I'd get here and she would not be there at the end of the journey. But then her daughter, M and her husband picked me up at the airport and it's fascinating to meet people you've never met but you've heard about for years so you feel like you know them already. And Kei talked about me like I was her next door neighbor so they felt like they already knew me in a way too.
They've just been so kind. I didn't expect them to be mean or anything but I knew this was such an odd situation and I had no idea what they would make of me. They've responded by wrapping me into their family and that has just blown me away. They don't really understand fandom as such, so they kind of call us her Book Club people. And they knew she loved to write. I've got to play with her grandchildren as well, they are the same age as several of my nieces and nephews and they were so important to her.
Her funeral is on Tuesday, and one of the things she asked for was that her coffin could be written and drawn on. I didn't even know you could do that, but it fits both sides of her so well, both the artist and the writer. I'm going to write something on there for me and for her Tolkien peeps. They also asked if I wanted to say something at the funeral. I hadn't even thought of that so I must put something together. It's so hard to encapsulate what she means to me and everyone here.
I did ask them you guys wanting to donate something to the funeral, flowers or charity, whatever. Ray, her husband, immediately said he would want whatever it is to go to charity in her name. Kei was a life long supporter of charity and it would be a beautiful thing. We've discussed several different options, and I think the children's red cross, her local animal shelter and the Cancer society are the most likely places.
M doesn't have PayPal yet and she's handling the bulk of the funeral arrangements, so if you want to donate, please send it to me and I will get it to her family while I'm here. No pressure to give, of course, Kei would not want that ever! But I do know some people will want to. My PayPal is japaskey(@)gmail.com. I promise all of it will go to them to distribute as they wish to each charity.
Thank you all. I'm also going to ask them if they would like a donation to her favorite charity or flowers or something, so you guys have an option to contribute if you wish. Will update as soon as I have details.
M emailed me and said that Kei passed away at 12am Cape Town time. She was admitted to the hospital July 20th for what we thought was persistent pneumonia. They decided to do a CT scan as they thought it was potentially a blood clot in the lung. The CT revealed a large mass in one of her lungs in addition to the pnemonia and multiple lesions on her lymph nodes. She also had a lump on her very upper leg, which they did a biopsy on.
On July 26th, we got the results that it was stage 4 lung cancer. This was her worst nightmare come to life. I got to talk to her in the middle of the night for a couple of hours on July 29th.
She did five days of radiation in the hopes of shrinking the mass enough for her to be able to mechanically breathe better — this was keeping her on oxygen. The hope was that she would recover from the radiation at home and have a chance to get strong for chemotherapy, though at stage 4 the discussion was about trying to buy time more than cure it.
I was sitting in the passport agency office when M emailed me and told they were trying to get palliative care cover in place so Kei could go home in the end. I was so lost at that point — there was nothing I could do at that point to get to Cape Town any faster.
I know she didn't want to battle cancer again, I know that the last months would have been very, very difficult for her.
I am just — devastated. I do not have words for how devastated I am for her family and for the fact that I am never going to be able to talk to her again or hold her hand — I so desperately wanted to hold her hand.
I did not get to say goodbye.
Hi guys. I heard from M and it's been a very rough week for Kei. Kei didn't give me permission to share full details about what's going on yet and I've not been able to speak directly to her for more than a week, so unfortunately I have to stay vague. She's had several procedures done and the aftermath has left her in rough shape. Prayers/good thoughts/energy for her, wisdom for the doctors, nurses and medical staff with next steps. Strength and patience and comfort for her family too.
I have scheduled my trip to go see her, I'm leaving next Sunday. Fingers crossed that the passport renewal goes smoothly and that there are no wild and crazy flight delays, please.
Her daughter said: "thank all the people you have asked to pray for my mom. It means so much to all of us especially my mom even though she can't convey that now. She said you are all such special people. You really are."
This has been really rough, and I'm sorry I'm not answering people individually right now. I appreciate absolutely everything you guys are doing, the messages you are sending her and me - crazy how we all made such important connections all around some books and movies.
Thank you so very much.
Hey, back in for an update. They had to move her to another hospital for specialty care that the previous hospital wasn't equipped to deal with, but it sounds like the transfer went well, and her daughter told me she got a nice quiet ward with outside view. Having a view to look out of when these things happen can really help so I'm glad for that.
There is hope that she will be able to go home in the next few days. I also got to talk to her directly for a little bit, but she's very tired so the contact is infrequent. It meant so much to hear from her.
She also said that while she does not have the energy to reply to anything yet, she has had the opportunity to read some of the emails and messages people have sent her and they have been special and very meaningful to her. So thank you, everyone! ♥ (if you want her email and for some reason don't have it, just let me know and I will get it to you.)
All the prayers/good thoughts/energy matters too. I think M is impressed by how many international friends Kei has. *G*
I think I've got potential dates for the trip, and I'm lucky to have enough miles and vacation time to make this work. Fingers crossed that it all works out and that I have picked the right timeframe.
Sorry for the freak out last post, I was climbing the walls.
Just wanted to let people know that Keiliss is in the ICU and has been for several days now. I've been able to speak to her daughter, M, who is keeping me in the loop about it. I can't really share specifics - I don't have direct permission from her yet for the gory bits.
If you guys would light a candle for her and send good thoughts her way - or prayers if you believe in that - it would be appreciated. I know her presence in the Tolkien fandom has been meaningful for a lot of people and her stories have touched us all.
If she owes you an answer to a comment or an email, this is why you've not heard from her and it could be a while before you do. She will definitely have a recovery period after this, even though she always frets about leaving things unanswered for too long. I'm sure messages/emails would be appreciated, if again, not answered quickly.
Comments
Love to you, Jane