BuffyL Fanfiction

March 10, 2017

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Dear Buffy the Vampire Slayer,

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HAPPY 20TH ANNIVERSARY!

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I just wanted to take this opportunity to thank you for being a saving grace on so many occasions. You aren't just a TV show to me. Sure, it may have started out that way (and you better believe I negotiated like hell around being grounded on your nights), but you quickly became like family. I grew up with your characters. I laughed and cried and learned right alongside them. And, surprisingly, I still am. I can go back and watch you now and appreciate different layers that weren't apparent to me as a teenager or as a twenty-something trying to find her way in the world and even now as I'm figuring out how to be a 31 year old adult with crazy adult problems. (Seriously, who's running this thing? Sometimes I wonder if Joss Whedon or George R.R. Martin is writing my life.)

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But it goes even deeper than that. The term "what would Buffy do" is something I carry very close to my heart. I was once in a very, very dark place and I really believed there was no way out of it. I had a bunch of different pills in one hand and a bottle of tequila I had found in my father's kitchen pantry in my other. I looked in the mirror and saw a poster of you, Buffy, behind me looking so very strong and resilient. I thought "God, you would be so disappointed in me." And then my very own Angel (my first love, my high school sweetheart, the one when I looked into the future all I could see was him) called me like he knew something was wrong. He invoked that term and I knew he was right. So I put the pills down and I got help.

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That led me to fanfiction. It was suggested to me that I start writing what I was feeling. I tried the journal thing, but I could never get into it. It weirdly felt... Impersonal. One day, I sat down at my computer and I started browsing the internet (at school because it didn't take me long to get bored with whatever we were doing in computer class) and I found fanfiction. I could use my favorite characters to tell stories and express my feelings through them! That's WAY easier! So, I opened up a notebook and started writing (in math class, because who's going to need the value of x in real life, right?). Eventually I got a computer of my very own and I opened up a MS Word document and the rest is history. I love writing. I'm even working on a book that I'm hoping I might get published one day. (And no, it's not a badly written 50 Shades type horror.)

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And it all started with you, a mid-season replacement on a network that most of the world's population had never heard of.

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One day I hope that I can have the opportunity to thank Joss Whedon and Sarah Michelle Gellar properly for all that they've done for me. (And not just in a 140 character tweet that I've tagged them in today. HA!) So, I'm writing you this letter to try and find the words to let you know how much you mean to me personally. Thank you, thank you, thank you a thousand times over and a thousand times more.

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Love,

Shelby

aka BuffyL

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And I'll leave the rest of you with this (a sentence chock-full of Buffy goodness):

The hardest thing in this world is to live in it, but be brave, stand up, and walk through the fire to seize the day, because tomorrow you might be dead.