OOC Info:
Player Name: Jay
Player Email: ms_ellery@hotmail.com
Other player contact: AIM: ms_ellery@hotmail.com
Player age: 30
Time Zone: Pacific Standard (GMT -8)
IC Info:
Character Name: Josh Lowell
Character Journal Username: ![[info]](https://www.scribbld.com/img/userinfo.gif) hippocampus
Age and physical description: In the prime of his life, Josh is in his late twenties, slim and athletic. A rural upbringing and military service have honed his physique into something sleek rather than muscled and he likes it that way. His hair is dark brown, his eyes blue, and he often allows a five-o'clock shadow to darken his cheeks – it helps convince the clients he's rugged enough to teach survivalist classes. Accordingly, he tends to dress casually but it doesn't take too much to convince him to dress up for a night on the town.
Former Deity Name and Pantheon: Poseidon/Greek
Personality:
Josh is proud and self-sufficient. He understands the value of teamwork but he refuses to be entirely reliant on any one person. He'd much rather be the strong pillar others lean against than to admit he needs assistance. It makes deep relationships, especially romantic ones, just a little more difficult, but Josh is a loyal friend to those he trusts. On the other hand, he is capable of carrying a grudge to the end of his days.
He has a bit of a temper but he keeps a tight reign on it, trying to live up to the example of his adoptive father and refusing to sink to the level of his biological donor. When he does blow up, it's usually a fast and furious outburst to clear the air. After that, he's often willing to let bygones be bygones, forgiving if not quite forgetting. Piss him off one too many times and you're on his shit list for life. His temper seems to be influenced by the weather – or maybe it's the other way around. Just know that it's best to tread lightly in his presence when a storm is in the air.
History:
Elizabeth MacDonald was a teenage runaway from a verbally abusive home with stars in her eyes. She thought Hollywood would be the answer to her prayers for a better life. Unfortunately, she fell in with a rough crowd and a boyfriend who treated her even worse than her father had. It was only when she learned she was pregnant that she found the courage to run once more, not for her own sake but for the child she carried.
Someone above must have finally smiled on her because the first vehicle to pickup the hitchhiking girl was driven by George Lowell, a young rancher from Montana down south on business. It was as close to love at first sight as possible. By the time the old Ford truck was approaching Denver city limits, George had already made up his mind to ask Liz to stay with him, although it took him until Wyoming to gather the nerve to ask her. His armor was tarnished with hard work and horse crap, but he was the knight Liz had been waiting all her life for.
Josh was born two months after the wedding. Raised on the Lowell family ranch, a half-hour drive from the nearest city, Josh's childhood passed in rural splendor. Up before the sun everyday to help his dad with the horses, an ethic of hard work was instilled in him at an early age. When not in school, he could be found tending the animals or swimming in the creek. He took to the water like a duck, teaching himself to swim almost before he could walk, leading to many a near heart-attack for his parents.
Straight out of high school, Josh decided to follow in the Lowell tradition of military service and signed up with the Army. His test scores were high enough that his recruiters pushed for him to take a technical job rather than combat so Josh joined the ranks of the few, the proud, the geeks as a Satellite Communications Technician. He excelled at both the physical and mental aspects of the job and easily achieved the rank of Sergeant.
It wasn't until an extended training exercise in South Korea that Josh's skin condition became serious. He'd always known he had sensitive skin, prone to drying out under the Big Sky summer sun, but given that he spent half his days splashing in the creek, it hadn't been too much of a problem. During Basic Training, he'd been able to cope by drinking lots of water. Now with showers several days apart, his skin began to split and crack painfully, being especially noticeable along his knuckles.
As soon as they made it back to base, his team lead forced him to sick call. And just like that, SGT Lowell found his military career over, discharged for medical reasons. His mysterious skin ailment was never fully diagnosed but it was judged severe enough to make him a liability. Josh returned to the States just a handful of days before his 23rd birthday.
With the idea that it could be genetic, Josh finally expressed a desire to locate his birth father. Although his mother was reluctant, she gave him the name. It wasn't difficult to track the man down. He'd been in prison for the last ten years. Disgusted, Josh made the decision not to contact the man. He'd rather live with an undiagnosable but manageable disease than have anything to do with a man convicted of rape and murder.
It was never any secret that Montana would never be able to hold Josh. While he wouldn't have chosen any other childhood, the horse business wasn't for him. A frank discussion between himself and his father several years earlier left George training up one of his nephews as his successor. Feeling at a bit of a loss, Josh began to travel, working odd jobs when necessary, moving on whenever the wind changed direction. He worked on a crab boat in the Bering Strait, as a video game tester in LA, and in a potato chip factory in the mid-west. Eventually, he wound up on the east coast, campaigning for the rights of lesbian, gay, and bisexual service men and women, a cause near and dear to his heart. Deciding he liked the feel of the area, he has been settled in the DC area for the past two years, where he has a job teaching wilderness and ocean survival to the rich, bored, and paranoid.
Strengths:
Breath Control: Josh has an amazing natural lung capacity. On land, he can hold his breath for nearly 10 minutes. In water, he can go for twice as long, thanks in part to the mammalian diving reflex. He's never had the need to push it, but he thinks if he actually trained, he could hold his breath for even longer.
Weather Influence: It's something of a chicken and egg scenario. Are Josh's emotions affected by the weather or is the weather responding to his mental state? Right now, it's anyone's guess but it's obvious the two are entwined. If/When Josh awakens to his ancient history, he may gain the ability to control storms at will but for now, we can simply be thankful he has control over his temper.
Weaknesses:
Dry Skin: He found out the hard way what happens when he goes for too long without hydrating his skin. His normal routine is to shower first thing in the morning and again in the evening. Otherwise, his skin becomes dry and cracks, especially at his joints.
General Deity History:
Poseidon was fathered by the Titan Cronus, a paranoid bastard who believed one of his sons would do onto him as he had done to his father – violently usurp his place in the cosmos. Instead of practicing birth control, he decided to swallow alive each of the children born to him by his sister Rhea. With that kind of parenting, who wouldn't grow up with Daddy issues?
After seeing five of her children devoured by their father, including Poseidon, Rhea finally wised up and gave the old bastard a stone in place of baby Zeus. Zeus was hidden away, grew up, and took his revenge, freeing his siblings. The young Olympians, who had matured in their father's belly, emerged in reverse order of their birth – Poseidon, Hades, Hera, Demeter, and Hestia. With their allies, the young gods fought their elders and emerged victorious.
Later, when it came time to divide the universe between them, the brothers drew lots for rule of each dominion. Zeus got the sky, Hades the underworld, and Poseidon became god of the sea, rivers, flood and drought, earthquakes, and horses.
Poseidon was a fairly moody god. When he was in a good mood, the sea was calm and he might create a new island or two for fun. When he was pissed, earthquakes, floods, violent storms, and shipwrecks were common. And like his brother Zeus, he was a lusty old goat, with a number of sexual conquests, willing or not. Several of his children were chimerical, like Triton (half-man, half-fish), Chrysaor and Pegasus (a winged boar and winged horse, respectively), and Arion (a talking horse). He was also an early pioneer in gender reassignment when he transformed Caeneus into a man (at her request after raping her). That's not to say he doesn't know how to woo the ladies properly. To impress Demeter, he created the horse. And Amphitrite was his faithful long term consort, a sea-goddess in her own right.
Poseidon is also known to be a champion grudge holder. The famous example is that of Odysseus, who had blinded the god's son, the cyclops Polyphemus. Because of that act, what should have been a quick sail home would take ten long years beset with danger.
Played By: Dan Futterman
Other Pertinent Info As Needed:
At this point, Josh is unaware of his past as a major deity but it's only a matter of time.
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