#but not much more than that

[solarisol]

Ok I just need everyone to know, as a third gen Mexican-American, Leo Valdez does not speak Spanish.

He is fourth (probably more) gen and lost his mother at a young age. You think this kid speaks Spanish??? When it comes to languages, if you don’t use it you lose it (side eyes Nico’s ability to speak Italian) and Leo was tossed from foster home to foster home, most of which, if not all, likely didn’t speak Spanish. Even before that, could his mom speak Spanish? She was a third gen (if not more) like me and seemed to speak pretty good English. She probably spoke Spanish too (I hope) and used both with Leo.

So: Leo knows terms of endearment for a child. He might know how to count up to 5 or maybe 10. He definitely knows at least one swear word. He knows titles (uncle/aunt obviously, Mr/Mrs too, probably). He knows some household items and the names of other everyday things. He seems to have been able to hold onto most of his memories of his childhood before the foster homes which is why I think he knows counting and everyday things, because that’s probably what his mamá taught him. Now, this is aaalll assuming Leo’s mom knew Spanish. It’s possible she only knew the bare minimum. I like to think she knew enough to hold a conversation, if not more because of how her grandfather (Sammy) talked. But it’s also possible she knew very little Spanish.

Now, a little disclaimer: I was not taught Spanish as a child. I had to learn it in school. Do I resent that? Yes, absolutely. That’s why I say I hope Esperanza knew how to speak Spanish (Jesus Christ it took me an entire rant to remember her name) and why I like to think Leo could maybe hold an extremely simple conversation in Spanish. His grammar would probably be shit and there’s definitely a lot of Spanglish thrown in there but he could get by. Maybe. If he doesn’t have anxiety about messing up like I do. Anyways, I’m also only a quarter Mexican so maintaining the cultural stuff was a little hard - meaning, I’m culturally American. And that’s the vibe I get from Leo. He gives very strong Americanized vibes and with Americanization comes no sabo.

However! I like to think that once Leo has a stable place to call home, he starts trying to learn more Spanish. At first as a way to connect with his mom and her culture, and then just cause it’s useful.

#Leo Valdez #the heroes of olympus #percy jackson #valgrace #yes this is aimed specifically all those reader inserts I see where people r like #oh he speaks Spanish to u and u don’t understand it #like girl no #this boy can tell you the day of the week and like #if he’s hungry #in Spanish #but not much more than that #he might have some terms of endearment that can be used for a partner but he heard them used for a beloved child #first #from his mama 🥰

[heyclickadee]

A sketch of a gal and her bird horse.

#sketch #my art #oc sketch #birdhorse #I have a vague idea of a story for these two #but not much more than that

[zomblorbs]

i wish there wasn’t such a stigmatized view on platonically loving people.

I can’t call people nicknames and pet names like hun and honey without them immediately assuming i have romantic interest in them.

i can’t tell my friends i love them without adding on “platonically” or shortening the phrase “ily” “love you” “love u”

i love a lot of people. i love my sister, i love my boyfriend, and i love my best friend. All different versions of love.

let us love people openly and honestly without it being seen as “making a move” or being romantically interested.

please please please stop assuming that love is strictly romantic, i promise you life becomes so much brighter and bigger when you stop keeping love strictly romantic.

#finn rants #platonic love #romantic love #there’s so much more than just romantic love #the greek literally had seven different words for love #LISTEN TO THEM!!!

[phantomrose96]

You know, an interesting tumblr transformation that's happened gradually, and which I've seen no one talk about: ask-culture has essentially dropped off to nothing.

By which I mean, asks used to be WAY more of the tumblr economy. They used to be more common to send, and receive, and see. They were integral to the collaborative, forum-like behavior of old tumblr communities, not even to speak on the HUGE number of ask-blogs that used to exist to only be interacted with in ask-form.

I'm not saying this in a vying-for-attention way but instead in an observational way: I used to get way way more asks in like 2015, even with a fraction of my follower count. I wonder if it's due to the homogenization of social media sites? There's a lot more of this divide between "content creator" and "consumer" instead of just a bunch of peer blogs who would talk to each other. "Asks" aren't really a thing on twitter, are they? And as I understand it, the closest thing to an "ask" on instagram or tiktok would be a creator screenshotting some comment and responding to it in a new reel or video or whatever those content mediums are. Are asks just too tumblr-specific? Is that aspect of the site culture dying out as more and more people converge to using all their social media sites in the same way?

#of course asks still EXIST #theyre just so much more of an afterthought than they used to be #chrissy speaks

[excavatinglizard]

Shoutout to my dad for being the funniest person I know

#mitski #dumb shit i do #lesbian #I'm turning reblogs back on but you all have to be nice to each other or you're losing Lesbian Dad privileges #would like to add that mitski is an incredible writer and lyricist and so much more than sad lesbian music. #I am. however. a sad lesbian who is haunted by said lyrics and writing

[timelesslords]

thinking about how the hunger games were designed to prove that without society, order, government, someone to rule, we devolve into little more than animals, and how the games themselves prove over and over again that this is not true. We see it in every single game we witness.

Katniss placing flowers around Rue's body in the arena. Thresh sparing Katniss because she was kind to Rue, even though he was making it that much harder for himself to win.

Haymitch going back for Maysilee after hearing her scream even though their alliance had been broken. Haymitch holding her as she dies the same way Katniss did Rue.

Coral's "I can't have killed them all for nothing" when she realizes she's not going home. Lamina cutting down Marcus at great personal risk. And, my favorite moment in tbosas, Reaper collecting the bodies of his fellow tributes, his peers, even the ones who tried to kill him, into a pile. Taking the weapons from their hands. Closing their eyes and crossing their arms in the best approximation of a proper burial he can manage, covering them with the Capitol flag as a makeshift shroud.

The Games bring out the worst in people, yes. But despite the extreme circumstances, despite the exterior pressure of the Capitol, despite the fact that it could mean pain and heartbreak and death, it also shows that people have an enormous capacity for goodness. That even in a situation purposefully designed to make empathy impossible, people can't help but have it anyway.

Snow looks at the Games and all he can see is what's inside himself-- this pure animalistic drive to conquer and defeat. He kills and it feels good and he thinks that everyone else must feel that way too. He doesn't realize (maybe can't realize) that he is the exception, not the rule. He cannot see outside himself, outside his own warped perspective, to realize that the fact that people do show humanity in the games proves his entire worldview wrong.

#tbosas #the hunger games #im sure someone has already said this much more eloquently than this #but i cant stop thinking about it #the ballad of songbirds and snakes #ballad of songbirds and snakes #hunger games #tbosas spoilers #thg #catching fire #i could write a thesis on this #suzanne collins the woman you are

[bisclavaret]

a day late to my 6 years on t anniversary ✨🏳️‍⚧️ a short comic about looking back

#trans pride #transmasc #comics #autobio comics #transgender #this reads a little more melancholy than I meant it to! #I think I forget how far I’ve come #like oh yeah this rules actually my body’s changed so much #also I grew my hair out and I’m less blond now #anyway I love being on testosterone :) #life saving magic potion that makes you hot and happy #my art #Magnus post art at a reasonable hour challenge (impossible)

[mumblesplash]

i know it’s like years old at this point but i love that one collab mumbo and grian did with tommyinnit bc it’s like the single most concentrated example i’ve seen of mumbo’s Chaos Nullification Powers

you get to see a bit of it on hermitcraft, mostly via his interactions with grian, but until seeing that collab it didn’t really hit me just how completely mumbo can no-sell other people’s attempts to control a situation. tommyinnit is possibly the single shoutiest, most chaotic minecraft youtuber out there, and in most videos i’ve seen he pretty much overwhelms everyone else and sets the tone for interactions because of this. but mumbo just. doesn’t let him. no matter how much tommy escalates in intensity, mumbo reacts with *exactly* the same energy he always does. grian largely comes across in the whole video as annoyed and reluctant to engage with the whole thing, but mumbo’s not even affected. he just rolls with anything he finds funny and basically ignores anything he disapproves of, only seeming more and more unflappable the harder anyone tries to get a rise out of him.

AND imo, this is the key to my favorite interpretation of him as a character

see, when the people around him are being more reasonable/calm, i think mumbo often comes across as anxious and a bit easily overwhelmed. the thing is, his nervous wet cat vibes do not scale. he has one setting. his responses to the last life ‘ah-ha!’ jokes and to hermitcraft 8 starting to crumble to pieces under a falling moon are almost identical.

mumbo jumbo is inexorably and eternally Just Some Guy, but that gets stranger and stranger the weirder his surroundings become. the giggly incredulousness that makes him an easy target for goofy puns looks Very different when it’s also his reaction to the impending end of the world.

#anyway yeah i have this whole idea in my head about mumbo’s friendship with grian from a characterization standpoint #bc i agree with the somewhat? common consensus that being friends with mumbo has made grian softer and friendlier over time #but i don’t think it was in a ‘reflecting back the kindness he’s being shown’ way #i think it’s because the more harsh and chaotic you try to be towards mumbo the more you feel ineffectual and out of control #and grian can’t handle it so he slowly becomes nicer until he feels like they’re on equal footing again #like don’t get me wrong i think they genuinely are good friends #and i don’t think this is necessarily something mumbo is doing on purpose #but i think the power dynamic going on under the surface is much more bizarre and weighted in mumbo’s favor than it seems at first glance #mumbling

[excali8ur]

When you meet your past lives but they're all ignoring you and freaking out over this one guy?

I've seen a few versions of this floating around with the different Leos and I wanted to have a go at doing one for Mikey. They're all collectively realising what a bus sized bullet they dodged by not ending up as messed up as Ronin

#art #artists on tumblr #Just realised the fucking nightmare I'm about to have tagging all these guys. Fml #tmnt #The Last Ronin #TMNT Mutant Mayhem #rottmnt #tmnt 2012 #mikey #MM Mikey #Ronin Mikey #rottmnt mikey #2012 mikey #tmnt idw #idw mikey #tmnt crossover #I'm not tagging the others I don't wanna clutter up any more tags than I already have #I like to imagine Ronin is just telling MM Mike the most horrific shit and everyone else looks round like What The Fuck #Also if you're wondering where Bayverse Mikey is: I didn't include him because I hate him so goddamn much ^^ #He's in interdimensional turtle jail for 6 million years #the last ronin spoilers #I GUESS LMAO

[watchingwisteria]

listen there really was just something about how in the book, snow’s 3-page descent from hesitant lover boy to deluded psychopath happens entirely in his mind. lucy gray gives him no indication whatsoever that she suspects him, that she’s going to leave or betray him. he’s just sitting quietly in the cabin waiting for her to return when that seed of calculated suspicion, which he has needed to survive the capitol, takes a hold of him and chokes the life out of any goodness left inside him. it really drives home your terror as a reader that “oh my god did he kill her? did she escape? what happened to her? why would he even think that?” in a way that when the movie had to adjust for visualization it lost some of that holy shit this guy has lost it emphasis.

#seeing some discourse and im not saying lucy grey didnt know #im saying she never dropped the kind of hints that she knew like she did in the movie #or if she did snow isnt worried about them until he very suddenly is consumed by them #snow is not concerned about whether or not she believed him. of course she did! hes snow! #but then shes gone…. for a while…… #and its the sudden immediate drastic unravelling that comes across so clearly in the book #that i knew wouldn’t translate to screen yet still cant help but miss #the hunger games #coriolanus snow #tbosas #lucy gray baird #not a crime or anything just a note that i cannot stop thinking about #the ballad of songbirds and snakes #this is all from memory of reading it quite a while ago. so maybe 3 pages is an exaggeration #but i remember it happening VERY quickly and without much external cause #like we as the reader have no indication as to whether shes nearby or not. #snow has no idea either. he just SUSPECTS. and his suspicion breeds the hatred that has been bubbling inside him all this time #he hates how she undoes him. he hates that he WOULD run away with her if shed let him keep his secrets #and he HATES more than anything that she makes him WANT to tell his secrets #he wants to be vulnerable and reveal the ugly nasty parts about himself and still be loved #but he does not let himself and it is everyone’s downfall #he chooses cruelty bc it is easy and familiar and makes him feel more powerful than the vulnerable give and take that real love requires

[blurred-cat]

i've met several people that are angry i've done this vanlife shit and haven't posted things on a permanent social media platform like another "vanlife influencer" that's because living doesn't necessarily have to be for Profit or for Attention. sometimes a motherfucker can live in Private.

#I'm Talking #i mention it here and there #but not much more than that #like..... because it's just life?

[spinaholi]

sandra lynn’s dating history now includes:

the most red-flag, gaslighting, married guy who became a world renowned insidious televangelist and ruined her perception of love and self-worth

the saddest, wettest, cardboard-box-living, yogurt covered man with an ancient hereditary curse of bad luck

the arch devil of gluttony and living embodiment of insatiable desire and hunger

a former drug addict, high school student councillor, werewolf, who’s probably the most mentally healthy person to ever exist

sexy pirate

#sandra lynn if u have 0 fans i am dead i love her so much #also sorry to garty o’brien they r more than just sexy pirate i just thought it was funny to end it like that #dimension 20 #fantasy high #fantasy high junior year #fhjy spoilers #d20 #fhjy #sandra lynn faeth #spina speaks

[chloesimaginationthings]

FNAF puppet and Michael Afton got beef,,

#myart #chloesimagination #comic #michael afton #mike schmidt #the marionette #the puppet #charlie emily #fnaf #fnaf 2 #fnaf movie #fnaf fanart #five nights at freddy's #I don’t think the puppet likes Michael much pff #doesn’t hate him just knows what he did #I like how the puppet is seemingly more aware than most haunted animatronics #so it makes sense to me they’d talk so forwardly to the others #she’s mostly just joking and teasing here #I also think about how violent they were as lefty #so this blunt attitude + hostility in the games towards Michael #just adds to this personality #PUPPET MENTIONED 🔥🔥 #we love the puppet

[fleshdyke]

art tips that actually help. tracing pictures is fine. try not to shade with black. draw as much as you can all the time and make it shitty im so serious. dont buy expensive materials its not worth it. never post your art to tiktok. raise your commission prices. sparkle on be yourself

#i dont care how good or bad your art is or how old you are or how low your self esteem is RAISE YOUR PRICES #and if you’re like 13 and people in their 30s are giving you like $5 for your art you’re being exploited i dont care if that’s how much you #set your prices at. you are being exploited. 30+ year olds can afford more than $5 for art from a teenager #source: i did that for fucking ages. dont do that. #rambles #100 #1k #10k #20k

[inkskinned]

no, actually, where is the whimsy?

my ex had a best friend named larry who asked me once: what do you think comes after irony?

we were at the bar where larry worked. it was a quiet night, and he'd hopped over to sit with us on the patron side. i swirled the lemon around my limoncello martini.

earnest positivity, i said, while my ex said, art self-destructs.

i stared at my ex. he stared at me.

his argument was the cinemasins argument: look how bad media is becoming! look at the loopholes and the dumb shit!

it was roughly 2011. galaxy print was still in. at the time, i had a favorite shirt that was a wolf howling at the moon. it got ripped in half in the wash and i honestly still mourn it. i dressed like effie stonem, because everyone did. and irony was the name of the thing. men liked MLP "ironically." the internet liked the kind of crass, "anti-mainstream" vibes of things like fuck romance, touch my butt and buy me pizza. we put cats in sunglasses everywhere, which was because we only liked things in irony.

and media had the same vibe in it: anti-hero white men would be "hard to love" and then storm off the scene. nobody was just earnestly trying to save the world: they were jaded, angry, unoriginal. mad you even asked them to try to help.

my ex ends up not being wrong. cinemasins becomes super popular. a lot of people start viewing media with this lens that is the cruelest, most jaded depiction. it's wrong for your character to have unexplained powers, even if the entire movie is about how strange it is she has unexplained powers - that is still considered a "loophole." characters make thoughtless, panicked choices? loophole. characters are actually kind people, despite hardship? loophole. features a woman doing literally anything without assistance? loophole. movies become hyper-aware of scrutiny, and now irony rules the media.

which means you go to a movie, and the character has to turn to the screen and say "beats me!!" or one of the side characters has to have some kind of quip like "are you seriously telling me that you think this is normal?" because nothing can happen in earnest. like a sitcom laugh track, we now anticipate the fourth-wall break: the moment that the media acknowledges it is telling a story. the media has to apologize for itself, or else someone like my ex rolls their eyes.

but here's the thing: i wasn't wrong either.

the difference might be that i am (and always have been) so soft-hearted that any crack in the light of this world will spear me into the ground. and i was the poet in the relationship. (he thought that was the same thing as being naïve and stupid). i was making things daily. i knew how all of us artists are driven by some strange desire to evolve. he notably liked to critique art, not to create it.

so yes, i've made things that are bitter and angry and even ironic. i've made long, sharp poems with all capital letters, and i've made poems about how the silence stretches out like a song. someone wrote once that we will spend our whole lives just circling the place we grew up. i think it's more that we spend our whole lives trying to remake a home. i think it's that as we age, it becomes less exciting to build the castle on the beach - we become aware of erosion, of windforce. we realize what we really want is to come home to our dog, castle or not.

and while art in the foreground is mired in white male violence and irony, and aggression, and not taking anything seriously - i don't think that's true of all art. i think more and more artists are leaning in to the things we love. the world has changed so much. they have taken so many things from us. the only thing we have left is love. at the bottom of the moving box - all we get is the faint sense that we have to appreciate what little we've got. i can't enjoy this stuff ironically anymore: what room do i have for irony? if it makes me happy, that is an amazing thing. there are so few happy places left for me. i want to be happy because of how leaves shiver beside each other like nestling birds. i want to be happy because of the color pink, and how magenta doesn't exist. i have spent so much of this life suffering, i have earned my right to a gentle ending. if nothing matters, i get to assign meaning to the nothing. i get to create meaning. i am an artist first and foremost, which means creation is my thing.

where is the whimsy? wherever i fucking put it. because if this is my last fucking chance to do any good in this world - i want to do it earnestly. i want to write things that make you happy. that make people feel heard and seen. what comes after irony has to be positivity.

it was close to my 21st birthday. in 7 years, i would end up writing a book about this relationship, which is hopefully coming out somewhere around May 2024. i come back to this bar scene in my memories a lot. i keep thinking of how pale my ex was. the look that crossed his face. how i looked back at him. how for a moment, both of us couldn't recognize the other person. like the gulf between us was a suddenly wide and cavernous thing. like we were alien to each other. he never took my opinion seriously, and he always seemed surprised whenever his manic-pixie-dream-girl ever broke free of the plot. like in the whole time we were together, i wasn't human enough.

this knowledge: where he said nothing comes after, my only instinct was what comes after is love.

#spilled ink #writeblr #this is a real story lol #looking back i liked larry as a person SO much more than my ex hollyyyyy shitttt #compulsory heterosexuality will do you DIRTY #edit to correct effies name my apologies to effie and effies family

[brw]

My least favourite type of internet person is the person who claims fanfic is over thousands of years old or whatever. I understand we like to joke but fanfiction is fundamentally tied to fandom culture and is a very specific way of engaging with media. Religious texts based off other religious texts is not fanfiction and it is worrying the only way you can justify your interest is by comparing the two. I promise you you don't have to reinvent the wheel to write fanfic you can just do that but we don't have to say "Shakespeare wrote fanfiction about Richard III", there was not a Richard III fandom in 1592, that was called the divine right of kings.

#brieuc.txt #I just dislike those kinds of comments #it feels like trying to justify and validate something that doesn't need it #the desire to prop fanfic up as just as much a serious text is strange? fanfic is more interesting in it's relationship to modern media #modern filmmaking modern storytelling #rather than bending over backwards to call dante's inferno fanfiction