Birthday: March 10, 1990
Method of Creation: #1 and #3- He was a name on a roster who I later made into a person. He was a "loose caricature" of someone I knew, although he ended up being quite a bit different.
A perfect portrait of Eagle, complete with his unique tailoring skills. Haha.
Pastoral sketch, Eagle in his typical clothing lounging in the sun. :P
Eagle, posing before a day of surfing.
Creation Story:This one starts way back with a name on a roster. I like to make lists. I make lots of them. They range from families to a school class, or in this case the choir members of an important tour.
**As a sidenote, I went to Europe with an honor band and chorus and toured six countries playing concerts and seeing the sights. This inspired me to make one in my world. It's called the Tevernid International Honor Band and Choir, and it tours Catarika.**
Anyways, I had decided that Eric Latham was going to sing in this group for their 2008 summer season so I wrote out the entire roster for the choir men. From this list came about 5 or 6 new faces in my world. Under "Tenor 1" there were about ten guys. I even went a step further and put the city and state that they lived in.
**Another sidenote!! There is a state in Kiillaana called the Lost Islands which has five islands on the west coast. One of them, Isle Del Akai (Red Island) is the "hippie" island. I was so intrigued by the 60's Hippie movement that I put it in my world and they all went to this island. That will explain lots of what I'm about to say, so keep that in mind :-)**
So, back to the Tenor 1 list, one of the names on the roster was Eagle Rivers and he was from Port Rose, Lost Islands. Just to give him a friend, I also put in someone named Jaguarondi Lightfoot in the bass section, also from Port Rose. These two ended up being best friends.
The way I originally brought Eagle about was in a series of shorts entitled "Roomies." These short stories took people from the roster and had them discover their roommates for this tour. I originally wrote just one for Eric Latham but it was so good and I liked the idea so much that I kept going and paired many others. In Eagle's case, his story was based off of one my friends that I met on the tour and his roommate.
My friend's roommate was truly one-of-a-kind and although I won't describe him here I was inspired to have a similar situation happen to Eagle. As the young musicians were gathering in the meeting and rehearsal place, little groups of people started to show up. Among them were two Jadali-Kiillra men.
So anyways these Jadali men came by, wearing their unique clothing. Eagle, who at the time was full of wonder was very wowed by their appearance and mannerisms. He turned to Jag and commented that they were really cool and then said something to the effect of "Too bad I probably won't get to know them... They'll probably not be on my bus."
You can probably guess what happened next. Yes, Eagle became roommates with one of them. His name was Isiador Lochgren and indeed he was Jadali. He looked "like he came right out of Dragon Dodger's time." Since they were both technically islanders and from opposite sides of the country, they were able to chat at great length and learn from each other. They were the most unlikely pair to be roommates but they had a wonderful time together.
I left this for a while but decided to revisit Eagle as I began to talk more and more about the Lost Islands and Isle Del Akai in particular. Eagle is obviously a "hippie" and has several hallmark features. This is where the #3 comes in. I knew someone who was a hippie (I'll refer to him as "JOE") and had these characteristic features and mannerisms which I tried to incorporate into Eagle. Eagle retained a few features from JOE like:
1. His long, messy, curly, dirty-blonde hair. This hair became one of Eagle's Lisjovalan qualities.
2. His rectangular eyeglasses that were often "misplaced." Eagle's glasses are not lost in various places the way JOE's were likely to be, but they are "misplaced" in the fact that they slide down his nose. This led me to give him a Lisjovalan nose.
3. His mannerisms. This is a very vague one. JOE was quite absent-minded and Eagle generally isn't. The way he reacts to things is almost the same- with lots of excitement, raised eyebrows, general "freaking out" etc although in a different way. Eagle also retained JOE's height and some of the way JOE walks.
So now I had the makings of a new person. I started to write down a little about him and now had to add things that only Eagle would do. One major difference that I have to point out happened. As I said, JOE is very absent-minded, due to some... um... choices he made. Eagle is for the most part well-composed but sometimes he gets a little spacy. I didn't want it to be for the same reason as JOE so I had to think of something else. *BINGO!* Something medical! Eagle, in fact, has one of the worst cases of hypoglycemia around. His blood sugar is always very low which makes him tired, spacy, twitchy, and not to mention very, very thin.
**Sidenote again! I like to make up my own genetic disorders and assigned numbers to them. Sometimes they are a real known disorder but most of the time they are uniquely my own. I wouldn't be surprised if half of them were actually real though. The one Eagle has is called "D-13."**
Eagle's disorder which he has is caused by his body being unable to absorb the sugars in food very well. Therefore it causes him to have very low blood sugars and he must eat all the time otherwise bad things will result. That led to many things about him such as his needing to constantly snack, his characteristic "twitchiness", his good and bad days, and him being 5'11'' but only weighing like 115 or less. He has been severely affected by his disease and it has greatly impaced his health, which he is constantly worrying about. As he says all the time, "So on we go...".
Now for the fun part. What exactly does Eagle look like? Well, he's 5'11'' and weighs in at about 115 pounds. He is VERY THIN considering his body burns fat and even muscle for energy. He is like five different races since he was born and raised on an island united by ideals instead of race. According to him, he is "Mostly Lisjovalan and Tellish with a little Raellian, Catin, and Kiillaanian thrown in for good measure." He has an oval-shaped face with a long nose, Tellish blue eyes, a soft smile, and "naturally ridiculous" hair that is blond, thick, and curly. He has rectangular glasses that are always slipping down to the end of his nose because of his steep nasal bridge which just adds character.
Being a "hippie" Eagle dresses, eats, acts a different way.
**Keep in mind that my definition of "hippie" is probably not the same as yours.**
He works at the local fish market and is an expert at preparing fish and seafood for people to eat. His job was to "gut fish and shuck oysters, and [he] love[s] every minute of it!" People from his island can be classified as "vegetarians that eat fish." The reason they do not eat meat though is because they don't have access to it, not because they are against meat. They eat fish and shellfish, considering they are islanders, and a wide variety of fruit, veggies, rice, etc. They dress in a very specific way too. Eagle wears his clothing until they are literally falling off his back. Then he simply sews the remaining scraps onto other clothing. He is always wearing shorts and if he has shoes on at all, they are flip-flops. Like most on the island, Eagle is able to make something out of nothing and is resourceful to a great extent.
As the story goes now, Eagle went on that choir trip and then went to college in the middle of a country he really had never been to. He now goes to the same school as Avicile Mohaili Diamond, Lesko Diamond, Gary Charles, etc- Kennywood University. He is majoring in Music Education and... Oh my gosh! I forgot to mention! He is very musical! He is an excellent tenor singer with a very operatic voice and also plays the piano and guitar very well, since his island revolves around music. When he started middle school, he began playing percussion in the band and is quite good at that as well. He does all these things in college and hopes to teach one day. He was drum major his senior year and turned out to be a very talented conductor. And so, I leave this with you to digest, but first:
Five Fun Facts:
1. Eagle has Perfect Pitch! Very useful as a singer, eh?
2. He has a younger brother named Falcon and a little sister named Phoenix (bird theme much?).
3. Eagle and his siblings all have the genetic disorder called "D-13."
4. Eagle is partially blind in his right eye from so many low blood sugar scares.
5. Eagle is a surfer.
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