I don't really like to get emotional and share it with the general internet because I'm a fairly private person, but this is one of those exceptions. This past Sunday, Monty Oum passed away, and I've been taking it pretty hard. For those of you who aren't aware, Monty has been an integral part of the animation department at Rooster Teeth for the past 5 or so years. I've been a Rooster Teeth fan for quite a while, and the company as a whole has gotten me through some pretty rough times, which I am very thankful for. I'm not the most hardcore fan of Red vs. Blue or RWBY, but I enjoy both of them very much, and they've flourished from Monty's input--and in the case of RWBY, it actually became a thing BECAUSE of him.

He wasn't one of the public figures you saw very often, but he was pretty hard to miss. He was a very quirky guy, and his work ethic was absolutely astounding to me. I really idolize people who are able to hit the ground running and just don't stop for basically anything. Creators that do everything in their power to just MAKE what they want to make to the best of their ability, where the most important thing to them is putting the project out so they can move right on to the next one. I love that. I want to BE that person, but for so long I've been too insecure and intimidated by my own ambitions. It's kinda funny in a sad way that I decided to just say fuck it and do shit anyway recently, because almost at the exact same time that I was working on something that I was giving my all, one of the people who inspired me to do just that was fighting for his life.

Death is always painful, but arguably the worst part about it for me is seeing the loved ones of the person who passed mourning. This time is no different, but in all of my time of being involved in the RT community, I have never seen anything like this. With people who are normally so upbeat and energetic 95% of the time that you see them, witnessing them broken and distraught just drives it home of how big what we're dealing with is. It's salt in a very fresh wound, and it's difficult to not be affected by it to some degree. His passing was very sudden--which is unfortunately very common in most situations involving death--and by the time it was publicly announced that he was hospitalized and in critical condition, he was pretty much gone. There was a fund to help cover his medical expenses for his treatment, and many people (my husband and I included) chipped in, hoping for the best, but there was just nothing they could do.

Monty was only 33, but he had accomplished so much in that time. He definitely left a mark on quite a few lives, and it's disappointing that we'll never get to see what he could do next. He was an amazing person who found ways to do things that people could only dream of, and no one person could ever come close to filling his shoes. 2014 was a very bad year for me creatively, so I was intending 2015 to rectify that. With recent events, I just want to do it even more for a handful of reasons. I have so much potential, and I'm going to do my damnedest to tap into it and grow--both as an artist and a person.

Working on this was very therapeutic for me, but I'm not going to bounce back from this for a little while yet. I've been pretty emotional and weepy for the past few weeks, and this just isn't helping. Still, I'm going to try and turn the negative energy into something positive. I know I sound a bit silly rambling via a text wall about doing great things when I use my skills to produce copious amount of gross furry porn, but honestly I enjoy that, and until that changes, that's just what I'm going to continue to do.

TL;DR: Weh.