A Fond Farewell

[Alexander Promise R7]

Dear Four Houses Family,

I’m sure almost all of you have noticed that mine and Mack’s names are no longer in colour, signifying that we have both stepped off of staff. It’s taken a while to get up this post, because life has really been in a rush lately, and so I’m sorry that my explanation is so late.

My time here on The Four Houses has been the greatest role playing experience I have ever had in my entire RPG career. From the very first post here on site I have been impressed by the level that this site functions under, and the level that its members have come to expect and present. With that said, it is with a sad face that I announce my step back from The Four Houses.

My life had gone into over drive lately. Currently I’m working towards graduating early (in my junior year for you Americans, 11th for you…UK-ites…haha) and this involves not only taking high school classes, but classes at the local community college. Aside from that I’ve really plunged myself head first into the fine arts program at my high school, and my free time has been consumed by performances. At the end of the day I return home exhausted and zapped of nearly all of my inspiration. I attempted to take a break and see how that was going, but while I was on my vacation it became apparent to me that I was in need of a much, much longer break then I originally thought. Therefore, I took my leave from staff, and now regretfully must take my leave from The Four Houses.

As I mentioned, nearly all of my inspiration for posting these days is gone. I’m not quite sure when it faded away, but it was probably in the midst of trying to balance all of my academic, fine arts, and Four Houses responsibilities. I believe the role playing is first and foremost for fun, and that is should be a relaxing experience; always. However, it lost that appeal for me a short while ago and it has become a duty rather then a fun hobby.

This has been my reasoning, and I know Mack will be posting up her own in a short bit (she too is swamped) but I wanted you all here to know why I’ve stepped back so you all didn’t think that we’ve just abandoned you for no reason. In the end, this comes down to a personal choice to keep ourselves healthy and happy, and we’re sure you all with understand that.

The both of us will continue to check on the site, looking into things and logging on, and if you ever want to get in touch with us don’t hesitate to PM us! Neither of us can be sure if this is only a temporary or permanent thing, and so we’re not making any final decisions. For now we’re stepping back, but if we find the inspiration again you can bet we’ll be back full force!

Thanks for the wonderful time, and keep the joy of posting alive guys! You’re all great role players, and you are what make this site so great.

Again, Thanks! See you around!

Sincerely,
Alex

[Mackenzie Holden]

Well…as busy as I have been, I can't say that it's my sole reason for being so late in putting this up. I've actually been dragging my feet in it. There are quite a few reasons: and I don't mean to muddle up anything by saying all my reasons for leaving, or to cause hurt feelings, and if I do then I am quite sorry. But you all deserve to know the truth.

When I first joined Four Houses, I had never really role played before – the Realm wasn't this kind of role playing – and this felt so overwhelming. But I jumped in, for the first time in my life, and I was welcomed by a group of great people. I excelled fast and it was great. I made friends, including Katy, and my writing blossomed. Soon enough I was accepted onto staff, and I thought it was the most amazing thing ever. I was ecstatic for weeks.

I don't know how many of you realise how much heart I put into this site, how much time and love. My relationship with my boyfriend dwindled to nothing because of this site. It consumed me. My characters were me. When Lovefool started up, it was all I could think about. This site was everything to me. The friends I made on it were the best I'd ever had. I don't want to say that staff ruined it for me, because it makes it sound like staff is terrible – but in a way staff did ruin it for me.

The magic that I had thought was behind staff doors wasn't real. It was all fake. It turned out to be a lot of hard work and a lot of thinking. So many people and so many opinions clashed. It was like a war zone. Or perhaps that wasn't until recent. I realised that a lot of it dealt with me. I clashed with other people, not so much them clashing with me. I'm a hard person to work with because I like things my way, I'll admit, and because I'm strong in what I believe. This caused many problems with me and the other staff members. Clashes. Everything. Feelings were hurt and, yeah, friendships were torn apart.

I had hoped that having Alex, who is my rock, on staff would help (please don't think that's the only reason why Alex was appointed, because it wasn't), but it didn't much. It only caused more tension and more feelings were hurt. Alex and I argued over staff things, and it wasn't a good thing for our relationship. Staff had weighed on me for awhile. I didn't ever feel like I was being adequate enough. I was either posting too much and doing too little staff stuff or posting too little and doing too much staff stuff (not saying that any of you staff members told me this, but it's just how I felt). I couldn’t ever find a happy medium.

So, it was with great reluctance that I backed off staff. Meaning I was still on staff, but I didn't take part in any staff things I thought would erupt into a huge argument. This didn't help either, because then I started to feel hurt – and useless. So, the final decision was to leave staff altogether. Which we've done, as Alex said above and for the reasons that were mentioned. We are both extremely busy, we are both swamped in personal things, in school, and outside of schools.

There are my specific reasons, and I thought you all should hear them.

For those of you who are members and are not a part of staff, my advice to you is to not take the staff members for granted. They're wonderful people who put a lot into this site. They sacrifice a lot for this site, for you all, and for the sake of role playing. They're real gold. Don't take them for granted. They're human, too.

I just cracked. They are stronger than I am. I don't love the site any less than they do, I just don’t have the same amount of strength and sanity.

I will always be a part of this site. I can never really leave. But my inspiration for posting here is iced over, gone, drained, it exists no longer. I will always check the site. And you can always get a hold of me via IM or Email.

I will miss all of you dearly.

-Caitlin

P.S: Adam, I am so terribly sorry. I don't plan on dropping Dixie and if I ever get inspiration for HP role playing again, I will definitely post her first. She is my favourite character after all. Don't give up hope on me. Please?

[Ariane Chan]

*huggles Cait and Alex* Meh. You guys have already heard what I wanted to say. But... on a final note, and reiterated once again - I love you guys, I think you're great people. It was a hard time, but I probably remained quite sane because I was a new staff member - inexperienced and naive. I did take burdens on; somehow, I got mixed up in... stuff. I know Alex, you did too, cause you had Cait to support as well as finding your feet. But, I'm just glad that period is over, and you two - and me - and the rest of us - are fine now. I'm glad.

Um, you will be missed. How many times have I said that? Lol! As a personal question to Cait - does this mean Tristan is gone forever? I guess Ari minds (understatement of the year!), but, I completely understand. Jez will be delighted... Hahaha. But, send me a PM or something to tell me. I'd love to hear from you. I plan on sneaking up on you on msn now and again, so watch out for me.

[Kennedy Valak S6]

No worries, Cait, Adam will be here for a while since he is now a professor. Though, I will likely drop Clay just because I have not got to post him much. *Hugs* Lovefool will forever be remembered by me for sure. I remember the nights when we would reply back and forth like 5 times or more in just a few hours. Those were the days. *sigh* Best of luck to both of your in your future pursuits! I look forward to hearing from you often.