<3

To put a long story into a slightly shorter but still really long story, college was really shitty for me around sophomore year. For one thing, I was trying to go off my meds at the same time that I was playing LB. While I function very well on them, there's a certain emotional flatness I've always worried a lot about because I take them. I felt they kept me shackled down at the time, and I wanted to feel like a more independent, stronger person who's not limited by them. So I gave them up for a bit.

It didn't go well. Emotionally I swung like crazy (which lead to some very strong positive connections to LB, honestly), but ohhh man. There's a certain level of mindlessness that I can safely classify as a byproduct of ADHD and not just me being forgetful, and it was springing up so often. The point where I knew something was legitimately wrong with me was the worst; I looked at a door saying "PULL" while I was pushing on it for about 5-10 seconds. The experience was so vivid I can physically feel it; every second my mind was saying "pull it," but from an action standpoint I wasn't making the connection that what I was doing previously was obviously wrong. Despite this stark red message glaring at me- and my mind clearly processing it as "PULL"- I couldn't something so obvious, and so I stood there leaning on it for a good while. Such awful shit; bit by bit I got really depressed over being such a wreck, felt stupid and started skipping some classes.

Furthermore, I had a weird social life, and it felt like I had a lot of splits in how I acted with people. By myself I'm calm and very introspective, someone who craves some sort of art or stimulation. But with friends I don't get to be that most of the time, and with people who I don't know, I get very anxious and self-conscious. So with friends, I end up very... Excitable, nutty, and such. If I'm one on one with certain really close friends/family/significant others I get incredibly warm and affectionate. But it's so, *so* rare that I get to do that... I feel like I've only been really, really true to myself to a very select few people in my entire life. I've felt disingenuous and awful about this. As if no one knew me.

In that sense, the way I've always seen Mio's route in a ridiculously symbolic and personal way. Mainly, I don't see Midori as any sort of separate entity of Mio; she is Mio. That's a bit obvious, considering she's just a part of her psyche, but the entire idea that they're fundamentally the same person vying for reality really hits me hard.

Midori isn't bad. People like Midori. Riki doesn't eve really hate Midori by the end, but he doesn't want her. Mio- deep down- doesn't really want her either; she wants to be herself, enjoying her sort of romance in poetry by herself, having friends but keeping somewhat distant. Even though Midori is a state of personality for Mio that might be socially 'correct,' Mio isn't fulfilled. And when they started mentioning that they had to suppress Midori with medication, it shook the hell out of me.

It's on a lot of levels that I get very attached to this character who's probably as minor and unconnected to the rest of the story as possible. The idea that someone might get me for who I deep down might be, even if I'm not 'right' or what others want, gives me some sort of hope that someone will really deep down accept me for all the dumb shit and embarrassing parts of me... It's a kernal of optimism. I hold onto it and that ending scene a lot. Cause sometimes I'm worried I'll just say fuck everything and seagull the shit away from where I live because I'm sick of my surroundings, but I know I've just gotta be patient and I'm sure I'll find someone who'll swim after me. Not only that, but it let me feel that having different ways of behaving around people is still 'me,' and it calmed me way down. As long as I'm not being deceitful, I'm okay, y'know? I can be social and it's not necessarily a denial of myself or to anyone or anything, it's just... Me being me.

Of course, the biggest problem is that the part of me that wants to break out all the time - my ADHD, my Midori - isn't something that's beneficial to me, nor can I whisk it away. It's not something that's a Jekyll and Hyde thing, it just creeps into my few little actions that get me pissed off at myself. And unlike Mio, it's something that my deeper emotional side WANTS to embrace rather than the other way around. It's a mental place where I can indulge in my spaciness and introversion if I want. But I can't do it or I'm practically a danger, trapped in a dumb state of idiocy.

And... That's okay. I don't have a clear key ending where my issues are all solved by the end, but stuff like Little Busters reminds me that sometimes as long as I'm content, everything feels solved, and that's the sort of thing that lets us be happy through our troubles. It's why I love key and it's why I love Mio and her route.

(Also on a related side note, I had the door thing happen on the same day I hit Refrain and that one part with that Masato quote: "Because my way of thinking was slightly different from theirs, people often found it weird. They described that gap as 'idiocy,' as I learned." Not gonna lie, it made me cry. Still tearing up a bit now.)