On In Response to Another Blogger:

I found a blog today. New to me, but out there in cyber space for a while now. It is Goth Ilk. She is open to more then the narrow view of what a goth is. Here is what I wrote to her in response to her posting ‘Goth before Goth‘.

Hi Naomie,

I just found your blog today and just had to comment. I find your take on goth music refreshing. I was goth before goth was an in thing to be. There was no sub culture to support my views on life.

I had to hide my gothiness or was threatened with shock therapy for a depression I didn't have. I was happy, but liked to hang out in cemeteries and think about death and the beyond. I would wear dark makeup in my room and wear a mix of old fashioned clothing and new alone where no one could see me. I was drawn to a look that didn't exist except in horror/vampire films.

The look of goth is beautiful to me. In my day the closest I got in public was being Snow White on Halloween. Pale skin, dark eyes and lips. And she got to wear a red cape too. Oh, if only I got to look like the dark queen in the Disney version back then.

Goth is more then a fan base for a group of post punk bands. Those bands collected the people like me around them.

No longer did I have to listen to opera to get a dark theme set to music.

You are too young to know of the fairy tales of old and their dark themes and the scary nursery rhymes that taught children to be too frightened to step out of line.

In our sanitized 'don't frighten the children' world, Goth has always been around, it just didn't have a name or group following in an open way before.

In a way 'Old Goths' are the only true goths. For they are the only ones that have been tested enough and still hold true to the thing inside them that makes them like and follow beyond the fad phases life has to offer.

In the end, music and fashion may have been a gathering point, but goth is a way of life from the heart and soul. Not evil or threatening in any way just free and different with a little shock value thrown in for fun.

Sincerely, Lady Euphoria