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serafilms · 3 years

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Hi Ash!I'm not sure if you still write for dc but in case you do,i'm here to resend my request!Can you please write headcanons for Jason Todd x gender neutral!Reader where Y/n was adopted by Clark and Lois when they were 10 because Lex Luthor killed their parents in a rampage across the city and that caused them to unlock their pyrokinesis(fire powers)so Clark took them under his wing as his sidekick so that's how they met Jason?They have anger issues like Jason which their adoptive parents took them to anger management classes for as a kid and they worked and go by Clark's last name(Kent) + the hero name 'Sparks' so Jason calls them 'Sparkles' and the main plot is them getting together after Jason comes back to life?

jason todd x pyrokinesis!reader hc's

↳ pairing – jason todd x gn!pyrokinesis!reader

↳ genre – headcanons; bulleted scenarios; fluff; gender neutral reader

↳ warnings – mentions of death

hi frankie! when i moved blogs, i decided to reinvent my masterlist to fit my current interests, and i realised that dc doesn't fall under that category so i put a miscellaneous section of the masterlist for the odd thing i may write. so yeah while i don't write for dc anymore, i still wanted to write this for you as my friend and one of the best supporters i have on tumblr <3333 (i've also put atla and pj under misc as i don't see myself writing for them a lot, and well, you saw the announcement). i hope you like this!

10 years old was a rough age for you

you suppose it all started when lex luthor staged an attack on metropolis

you had been asleep at the time but your parents had woken up in a panic

they had yelled at you to wake up and run

so you did

when it was all over you couldn't find your parents anywhere and your house had essentially collapsed on itself

it wasn't all that hard to figure out what happened and you found yourself falling to your knees and crying

something snapped inside of you and the next thing you knew you were surrounded by a ring of flames

and that was when clark found you

as superman ofc

he saw your powers in action and had a big oh my god moment and decided he couldn't just leave you on the streets

so he took you in

it was tough goings at first

you had a lot of difficulty controlling your powers, and even more difficulty controlling your emotions

you found yourself exploding at the tiniest things

both metaphorically and literally

clark did his best to train you, but hero training and emotional training are two very different things, so you had yet to prove that you could be brought into a field as a sidekick

eventually clark and lois had to bring you to a specialist to work through your anger

your attitude became better

you had less outbursts

and you were more in control of your powers than ever

finally you were allowed to go out into the field

your first mission ever was a situation in gotham city that had gotten out of hand

and it was there that you met batman and robin

you and jason were snarky with each other at first but eventually you called a truce and made peace with each other

and you two became the best of friends

for the next few years you two would do everything together (that you could, living in different cities)

you understand each other well, having similar pasts and even more similar personalities

when he died you were devastated

your emotions were out of check and clark had to pull you from field work and put you behind a desk so you wouldn't burn down metropolis

after a few months you were ready to go back into the field again and for a while you tried to enjoy it

it was nice getting back out there

but it wasn't the same

so you quit and decided to focus on the last few years of high school and then college

clark and lois had become parental figures to you and they wholeheartedly supported your decision

so that's what you did

you moved on with your life

it wasn't easy, but you tried to live out the rest of your adolescence and beginning of your adulthood as best you could

when the time came for you to go away to college you said your goodbyes to them and your old friends and moved away, to a crappy little apartment closer to your school in gotham

gotham may be a freak show, but goddamn their universities are good

yeah ok shh it's for the plot

you didn't have any roommates and it was a somewhat unsafe area, but it was still pretty average and heaven knows you could take care of yourself

it was in this apartment that you and jason met again

clark had told you about a new vigilante with a red helmet and leather jacket who had been causing trouble in gotham

he still kept you in the loop even though you had quit the hero business years ago

sometimes you thought he might just want you back as a sidekick

i mean you were pretty amazing

you didn't really think much of it

new vigilantes, heroes, and villains popped up all the time so it wasn't anything surprising

until of course he showed up in your living room

you were in the kitchen cooking a budget college student dinner (toast. it was just toast.)

"can i get some of that?"

cue heart attack

"WHAT THE FUCK"

you shot a blast of fire towards him, it he dodged and it disintegrated out the window

"whoa, whoa, whoa. it's me"

he took his helmet off

"jason? wtf"

you couldn't believe it

you'd literally talked to bruce

you were sure jason had died

there was no way you were mistaken

"hey sparkles"

"stfu bitch ur dead"

"yea about that lol"

you spent the next 2 hours sitting around your kitchen bench eating toast and drinking tea, trying to catch up with each other and make sense of what happened (jason and then you, respectfully)

it was really nice

you offered jason a place to stay for the night since it was getting late, and he accepted

the two of you lay in the dark of the living room that night, pretending like you were middle schoolers having a slumber party, and not young adults who had just reunited for the first time ever

but the next morning you woke up to the shower running and when jason came out, dressed in his clothes from yesterday but still with wet hair

you couldn't help but

notice him

dying and coming back to life really did something for him

and this became a regular occurrence

every now and then, red hood would pause his duties to come visit you and hang out

he would make sure you're ok in your sketchy little neighbourhood and you would reassure him with a small demonstration of your powers that you were fine

jason knew you could take care of yourself, but it had been years since he'd seen you, and since then you'd retired as a superhero

he couldn't help but be a little worried about you

so this routine continued for a while until one night you were lying side by side on your bed watching this show you had become obsessed with after jason's death (that he obviously missed because he was dead)

and you fell asleep and CUDDLED HIM

while you were dozing off, somewhere in the state between awake and asleep, you felt him kiss your head and whisper "i love you sparkles"

the next morning you were in a daze

you couldn't do anything properly and almost burned the pancakes you were making

"whoa, you ok, sparkles?"

you turned abruptly

"did you mean it?" "huh?"

"last night, when you said you loved me"

"WTF YOU HEARD ME" "YEAH"

awkward silence

"well,,,,, yeah"

"oh,,,, cool,,,, well me too"

"hUH?"

"i love you"

*open mouthed fish jason*

"hurry up and kiss me, jackass"

and you all lived happily ever after :)

#dc #dc comics #dc imagines #jason todd #jason todd imagines #jason todd x reader

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corpsehusband-simp · 4 years

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Insecure

Request: Can you do a roommate fluff where the reader is noticeably just avoiding eating and all that and corpse tries to comfort her and reassure her.

A/N: This is a bit heavier than I have written but I hope you guys like it. Please remember you are beautiful no matter your body type. I am always here if you need to talk and my DMs are always open for you to message me. I love you guys. Also thank you so much for 500+ followers!!!

Warnings: Angst. Body image issues. Cursing. fluff at the end.

✨Master list✨

You looked up from your phone hearing a giggle coming from Corpse. He was sitting on the other end of the couch also on his phone but your legs were stretched over his lap and his free hand gently traced up and down your shin. These were your favorite days, just you and him hanging out. “What are you giggling about bug?” It was a nickname you had given your best friend years ago. Corpse leaned over showing you his phone. It was a pretty girl dancing to one of his songs. Your smile faltered a little but you quickly recover. “They are getting really creative, how does it feel to have reinvented the E-girl catgirls?” Corpse snorted and shook his head as he returned to his original position. “This whole thing is fucking crazy, I genuinely wasn’t expecting any of this to happen.” You let out a hum and looked at his Instagram story. Your stomach turned a little and your heart dropped. All of the girls he posted on his story were skinny and beautiful. Why would he want to be friends with me when there are all of these beautiful people around him? He must look at me and feel embarrassed. You shook your head and stood up, shoving your phone into your pocket. “I’ll be right back.” You walk into the bathroom and lift up your shirt looking at your body in the mirror. Your fingers gently traced your stretch marks. You didn’t want to spend your time comparing yourself to random girls on the internet but you couldn’t help it when your best friends Twitter and Instagram were flooded by them. You put back on your shirt and rub your face before going back out to the living room. “It’s my night to make dinner, what are you in the mood for?” You needed a distraction and cooking was the perfect thing. Corpse chuckled looking up at you. “Peanut every night is your night to cook, remember when you first moved in here I burnt ramen in the microwave.” You threw your head back laughing at the memory. “Yeah, you are banned from the kitchen. Not to mention you couldn’t get the aluminum foil open.” Corpse gasped and threw a pillow at your head. “Rude!” You laugh and threw the pillow back at him before going to the kitchen. Corpse got up as well and leans on the counter as you search through the fridge. “Buuuug what sounds good what do you want to eat?” “Why do I have to pick what do you want?” You sigh and keep your back to Corpse. “I’m not really hungry” you shrug and turn around, finally looking at Corpse. His eyebrows were furred together. He stood up straight, setting his phone down on the counter and crossing his arms. “Y/N.” His voice was calm but it had a stern edge to it. “Why are you doing that?” You bit the inside of your lip and look at him. “Doing what?” You decided to play oblivious but you knew he wasn’t going to buy it, the man knew everything about you and could read you like a book. “Y/N don’t play coy with me. Don’t think I haven’t noticed you haven’t been eating. I thought maybe you were on your period or just weren’t feeling well but this-” He motioned his hand in front of you. “This is different, so please tell me what’s going on because I’m worried about you.” You saw the sincerity in his eyes. You hated that he was worried because you knew he was already filled with so much anxiety. You blinked a few times trying to fight back the tears. “It’s nothing Corpse. I’m just not hungry.” Your voice was just above a whisper in fear that if you made it any louder it would fail you and shake. Before Corpse could push the topic any further you close the fridge and leave the kitchen going to your room. “I’m gonna head to bed early. “Y/N wait plea-” You cut him short closing your door locking it. You fell face-first into your bed and let out a sob into your pillow. You hated feeling like this. You laid there for a while crying as you looked at the different girls Corpse was posting. You jumped a little hearing a soft knock at the door. “Hey, peanut...can I come in?” You bit your lip laying there for a moment contemplating if you should pretend to be asleep or not. “I can’t see that you’re active on Instagram so don’t even try and pretend you are asleep.” A small smile forms on your lips. “Brat.” You mumble getting up, as you walk to the door you catch a glimpse of yourself in the full-length mirror your eyes were red and puffy. You sigh and open the door. “Hi” Corpse frowns and reaches up wiping away a stray tear off your cheek. “Y/N we are best friends, you are the most important person in my life, you’ve been there for me through everything. You’ve stuck through all the bullshit and you know that I’ve always, always been right here for you so why are you pushing me away now?” You let out a shaky breath and look at the ground avoiding eye contact with him. “Because it’s stupid.” Corpse cups your cheeks with both his hands and gently makes you look at him. “If it’s making you feel like this then it’s not stupid, so please Y/N tell me what’s going on. Talk it through with me because maybe I can help.” You look up into his eyes and your bottom lip starts to shake. “I’m ugly. I hate myself Corpse. I look at all the girls you post and I want to be beautiful and skinny like them.” Corpse’s jaw dropped and his heart broke at your words. “Y/N…” He paused for a moment taking in a shaky breath and tries to blink away his tears. “You are beautiful. There is no debate about that. Your weight does not define your beauty. But you, my dear, are beautiful on the inside and outside. You outshine every girl I have ever posted on my story. I am honored every day to have you in my life please never forget that.” Corpse let go of your face and pulls you into a tight close hug. You cling to him and nuzzle your face into his shoulder. “I love you Corpse thank you for always being my rock.” he gave you a squeeze and rests his chin on your head. “We keep each other grounded. I don’t know where I would be without you.” He pulls back and pinches your cheek. “Now come on Peanut lets get some food and watch TV.” You smile, looking up at him. I may not be perfect but imperfect to him and that’s all that matters. You think to yourself before nodding. “Okay bug but your driving.” He grabs his keys out of his pocket and takes you hand in his. “Deal now come on.”

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#corpse husband #corpse husband x reader #corpse #x reader

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chaos-burst · 4 years

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Hey! :) I’ve wanted to play d&d for a while now, and after getting into critical role i finally decided to convince my friends to play with me. None of us have played before, so im both exited and a bit nervous since i’ll be the dm. We don’t know anyone who plays, and i’m not very comfortable with palying with strangers, so we’ll be diving right in together! Do you or your followers have any tips or good resources to recommend for new players and/or dms? Any tips would be greatly appreciated! :D

Hey there!

I’m very flattered that you would ask me for DMing tips, but I just have to preface this saying that I am a first time DM myself and I am currently on session 13 of my campaign. But I can see if I can list some things that I found useful building my first campaign :) And I totally feel you not being comfortable with strangers, I play with a group of friends and we were all first time players when we started!

Let’s start with resources! (I will put the links in a reblog bc tumblr is a dick about posts with external links in them. Sry for the hassle!)

Probably a bit redundant, but nevertheless very helpful: The core rulebooks for D&D. Which is to say The Dungeon Master Guide, The Monster Manual and The Players Handbook. Bc those are expensive as fuck, check out this lovely thing (1).

Then, depending on whether you play online or live: Roll20.net (2) You can invite your players to your campaign and make maps for encounters with minis on them, you can insert music that plays in the background and it also rolls dice for you if you have to roll a big amount of dice and don’t want to do math ;)

There is an encounter builder on kobold-fightclub (3) that can help you balance encounters according to your party’s level! I have found it quite helpful and it’s also an easy way to filter monsters for a specific terrain when you know that you’ll be running through a swamp/desert/cave etc.!

I also found this this cheat sheet very helpful, esp regarding the different conditions that I can never seem to remember.

Then, ofc, one of CR’s sponsors: dndbeyond (4). Me and my friends bought a subscription bc damn is it useful to be able to click on anything on your character sheet and see what the hell it means. It also helps you track your spellslots/HP etc. during combat.

Something I also did was watch Matt’s videos (5) on how he DMs. Altho it bears to say: Don’t compare yourself to Matt Mercer. It will only stress you out.

You like maps? So do I! Check these out (6/7).

You want to keep track of your npcs and important lore and places and everything? You could try worldanvil (8)! It’s like building a wiki for your own world!

And then about tips. It is probably easier to give tips when you have specific questions than it is to give general tips, but I’ll do my best! I’m sure many experienced DMs want to chime in and add to it :)

Communication is (as with most things in life) key to everything. Get together with your players for a Session 0 and just talk about what kind of game you want to run and what kind of game they want to play. There are people who like combat more than roleplay or vice versa. There are people who want to play an evil campaign or they want a lot of political intrigue or they are soft marshmallows like I am and don’t want permanent character deaths and so on and so on. Just get together and talk about what you guys want to create. Also talk about the characters with each individual player.Ask them about triggers they have, so you can avoid topics. Ask them how they feel about an NPC flirting with their character. It goes the other way around as well! Tell them about your boundaries and your expectations. One of my friends wanted to make a character with a neutral evil alignment. I told that it’s fine, as long as there’s the prospect for the character to evolve towards a neutral or good alignment, bc I have no interest in dm-ing an “evil” campaign.

Something that might make running a campaign easier for you is if your players’ characters already know each other before the game starts. If you’re like me you will sweat bullets thinking about how to get them to work towards a common goal. If they’re already friends/rivals/lovers/colleagues/members of the same adventuring guild you will not have that problem. And they can give you some notes on how they envision the relationships to be/how they met.

You can start your adventure with one of the official adventures that are out there if you want to! You don’t have to do a whole ton of worldbuilding like I did bc I’m a crazy person and have my whole setting homebrewed. If not, you can always make life as easy as possible for yourself and start small! Build a small town with a few key NPCs, put a small assortment of possible quests there and then only roughly sketch out what you want the “outside world” to look like. I as a player love some context when I build characters, so if you want to give your players a small introduction into the campaign setting, I think that would be helpful and also helps creating characters who fit into your setting! If you want to run a campaign that has tons of dragons and poisoned oceans that cannot be crossed by mortals it would be sad if a player came to you and gave you the character sheet for a sailor.

If you do a whole campaign, I found it helpful to have a rough idea about different factions and two or three major events that shape your world. Ideas for later quests will eventually tie into big world events when the players get higher level!

Draw yourself a map. It doesn’t have to be elaborate or anything, but at some point there will be a question about “where is the next big city, we need to buy healing potions” and you will feel much safer if you just have a piece of paper (analogue or virtual) with like... a rough outline, some landmarks and some cities on it. At least that’s how it was for me!

You don’t have to reinvent the wheel. Don’t beat yourself up if your first quests are “standard” stuff like “Take care of this giant rat infestation in the cellar of the tavern.” or “My purple dragoncat has been abducted, please get him back for me.”. I started my campaign with small quests before getting to a small arc and then I want to work towards bigger arcs eventually. But for new players and a new DM I found it very helpful to keep things low stakes to not stress anyone out too much. If you fuck up the giant rat infestation, the world will not end, you know? That is nice. Also works well as a tutorial for everyone! Combat is intimidating! So many rules! Take your time to figure out how stuff works with some nice, small quests and some not-too-complex-combat encounters!

You don’t have to follow every rule. There are so many rules for everything and that can be helpful but it can also be stressful. You don’t have to do everything by the book and if you notice that some rules annoy you and your players, you can always change them as you go along! (Cats have nightvision. Sometimes the rulebooks are dumb.)

Don’t get hung up on too many details. I love worldbuilding, but I get obsessive easily. Sometimes I think my world isn’t ready enough bc I tend to think like a writer who has to have everything figured out. That is not the case with d&d! Sure, It’s good if you know stuff. But d&d is not only about planning, it’s also about improvising. And the world will grow while you play in it! Before you know it you’ll go like “I want to have an encounter with this cool ice monster. I need an icy landscape.” and then you will make one. And maybe it wasn’t there before, but who cares. Your players will be excited and you can make up the lore as you move along!

Did I mention communication?

If you have specific questions about certain aspects of DMing or how to start, feel free to message me anytime :) I hope this helps a little bit! I’ll reblog in a second with the links!

#Anonymous #dungeons and dragons #d&d #ask #anon #screeching into the void

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river-bottom-nightmare · 4 years

Text

[New draft]

I’m finally getting hitched Tying The Knot Official Words

Wedding Vows

by roy harper, putting the laughter in manslaughter since 1983

A couple years ago, you asked me why I loved you, and I said “I-I don’t know.” Except you weren’t really happy with that answer, I could tell, so I tried to put it into nicer words. I mean, I’ve loved a lot of people in my life, or at least I thought I did. Look how that turned out. And, you know, I kind of write them off when they leave me, or when I leave them, because obviously that means it couldn’t have been love in the first place. But then I know that’s a big fat fucking lie because I still remember all of them, still remember exactly how it felt to tumble head over heels. So maybe they reason they stayed with me forever, despite one of us leaving, has to do with them and not me? And I was about halfway through this awful explanation when Dick gave us a call, told us that dealer we were tracking had just put his dirty little hands in Bludhaven, so we went to go deal with that.

Both of us were glad that conversation was over, and I’m pretty sure you forgot all about it. But I didn’t. I never forgot about it, and I realized I never really answered your question. So, here goes.

I mean, I thought I was so smart when you met me. Sure, I was at my absolute lowest. But I was 25 and reckless, and the heroin had me feeling like a real person for the first time, you know? A human being, with the kind of secrets a grown-up kept, telling the kind of lies grown-ups told. And I thought I loved the way grown-ups loved. Always on the move, always leaving. Because it was either leave or get left. And I thought that was love. And I thought that was a brilliant idea. I was all dark and tough and had this tragic backstory, and I thought I was fucking irresistible, but only for a night. I thought I was fucking irresistible for a night, and after that I wasn’t worth shit.

Now, I’m looking back at 25 year old me and the only thought going through my head was, what an asshole. Just, everything about me was supremely dickish. But most of all, it was the way I treated relationships. Do you remember that time you, me, and Kori went to that carnival? And Kori won that strength competition and we got free cotton candy? And I just gorged myself on candy floss, man. I was worse that Wally used to be, back in the day. And then we went on all those carnival rides and I thought to myself, I’d be fine. I run around jumping off rooftops with grappling arrows, and I used to practice marital arts with Dick Grayson. Motion sickness doesn’t happen to me. And then like half an hour later I was puking my guts out and you stood there and laughed at me? That. That’s how I treated love. I gobbled up everything I could get, and it was way more than I could handle, and then I’d throw it all up and run away.

I’m not 25 anymore, but it feels like I’m still running. Except I can’t get away with what I used to do, ‘cause Kori can hear my fucking heartbeat and you check my arms for track marks all the time and Dick bribed his way into being my second emergency contact after you. So I hide away in my room and sort of melt onto my sofa. But not the good melting, like the way I melt into your mouth like you snipped all my strings. The gross kind of melting where I’m curled up onto the couch and I just wanna hack all my hair off with a knife and it feels like my brain is leaking all over the sofa and I know you killed most of my old dealers but I wanna bring them back to life because just one more hit, I just need one more hit, and I wanna drink myself into a rage but you locked away all the alcohol with a bat-lock that even I can’t break. Figures. It’s funny. You’ll shoot yourself in the neck before you go to Bruce for anything, but if it’s for me, you’ll swallow your pride in a second and get whatever the hell you need.

I guess I’m just scared. I’m scared that I’m imaginary. I’m scared I’ll always end up reinventing myself every day to spare other people the trouble of having to do that for me. That what I want everyone to see always takes precedent to who I really am. I’m scared that I’ve finally lost it, that I’m crazy, that I’ve finally gone mad. But I’m even more scared that I’m perfectly sane. Because if I’m sane, then what excuse do I have? What excuse do I have for treating people the way I do, like they’re problems that I have to solve or explain or else I’ll just fall behind everyone else.

And that’s where you come in. Fuck, Jay. That’s, that’s when you came in.

I tried to word vomit that last part to you one night when you thought I was drunk and I thought you were drunk but neither of us had had a drop, and we hid behind the curtain of alcohol to have a heart to heart. And you told me people don’t have to be solved or explained. We’re all just ghost stories, and maybe we should just try to stay that way. Because we spend our days doing wonderful things, horrible things, and sometimes there’s no reason behind it. Or, wait, fuck, no. There is a reason. But that reason’s too simple and too straightforward to really be satisfying, you know? And then we keep forgetting the lesson that we learned and re-mystifying these problems that we already solved because deep down we don’t actually want to figure out why we love each other but hurt each other and-

Fuck. Sorry, Jaybird. This was supposed to be a simple answer to a simple question.

I think. Um. No, I don’t think. I know. I know I love you because I have to.

There’s no “why” about it. Any more than there’s a reason why Kori loves the dew drops that gather in the morning grass, or why that old hag in the apartment next to us can’t keep a plant alive for the life of her. I mean, I guess there is a reason. There’s always a reason, there’s always a “why.” I don’t really understand it, though. And you know how much that bothers me, you gotta know how much I hate that. Maybe if I dug around in myself for a bit, really thought some stuff through, talked to some people I thought I was done talking to, I’d figure it out. I’d figure out where all this love comes from. What it’s for.

But then the question would be answered. Why do I love you? Boom, I’d have an explanation. The ghost story would be over. And there’s really no point in telling a ghost story that has an ending, all nice and neat and wrapped up in a little package.

Right now, I think I’m finally at a place where I can just let it be. It’s just you and me. Me sleeping ‘till noon, then waking up to see you in my kitchen, looking like a fucking greek god reincarnated, a smile on your face that I don’t think anyone else but me gets to see, flipping an omelette with the same ease and grace that you flip knives. Me in fiddling with a couple spare parts, adding on to my arrows, and you either sliding up behind me, wrapping your arms around my waist and whispering in my ear how good I look in this old tank top or you throwing a greasy rag at my face and laughing at how it messed up the bun I had my hair put up in and telling me to wash up, dinner’s in 10. The two of us crowding around a set of blueprints, scheming and figuring out how to best hurt this one greedy asshole and send him down the highway to hell. And you honestly know all my secrets, all the dark thoughts I had when I was doped up and hating the world and everyone in it. And I’m the only one who knows what really happened in that funky green goo you call a Lazarus Pit, I’m the only one who knows what you went through under the League. The fact that we don’t have any secrets gives me this feeling in my chest, it’s warm and golden and sorta like how you feel with Dick Grayson smiles at you, except this time I think I caused it.

I just hope to god I’m right when I say “I love you.”

‘Cause I do. Jason. I love you. I just, fuck. I like being around you. And for the first time in a long while, I don’t think I’m going anywhere.

Fuck. That was stupid. This barely even made sense anyway.

[Are you sure you want to delete this document?]

[Document deleted]

[New draft]

Wedding Vows.

From Roy Harper. To Jason Todd.

I was trying something new with this and I have no idea whether it worked or not but oh well here it is.

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1989xtaylorsversion · 3 years

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emma macdonald: is she worth watching or should you keep scrolling? my thoughts, opinions, and review.

i don’t know about a lot of you, but if you’re someone who watches a lot of youtube, you might’ve stumbled upon one of the most fascinating and interesting genres on the platform - lifestyle vlogs. there are countless people - mostly teen / young adult girls who document their lives and journeys of going through life, and sharing their daily or weekly celebrations, struggles, and experiences. most of them live a life that seems glamorous and fun, but it begs the question of who’s really telling the truth and who’s just putting on a show?

i’ve watched a lot of lifestyle gurus, and one person in particular i’ve stumbled upon a little over a year ago was miss emma macdonald (pictured below). in case you don’t know who she is, she’s a 19 year old vlogger from boston, massachusetts. according to her, her channel “is mostly around my daily life, fitness, health, fashion (if hoodies and sweatpants count). Mostly a place to make you happy and feel good about you!!” in this current moment, she has garnered 336k subscribers. something i find kind of unique about her is the fact that her older sister maggie also has a youtube channel with 327k subscribers, and she makes similar content, if her description is anything to go by.

now don’t get me wrong, two sisters making similar content isn’t that special, but it’s just a little interesting. based on their videos, you can tell they’re very close and often hang out together and make cameos in each other’s vlogs, which isn’t surprising since they live close together.

EMMA’S CHANNEL - her likability

now, diving into emma’s channel, here’s my opinion. i can totally see her appeal. i mean, let’s not forget the society in which we live in. she’s a young, conventionally attractive, white, thin, and blonde woman living an incredibly privileged life in one of the best cities in america. with these factors it’s no surprise she has an audience. i will admit, there are times i’ve watched her channel and i find myself having this surge of sudden motivation, and i suddenly want to go and do something besides watch youtube videos all day. i think sometimes she gives off good vibes in her videos, and i enjoy watching her and her sister interact - they’re very sweet together.

WHERE EMMA FALLS SHORT

if i’m being honest, my problem with emma lies in the fact that oftentimes she comes across as materialistic. don’t get me wrong, i know she must make a ton of money on youtube, and i’m not going to sit here and tell her how to spend her money. she can do whatever she wants with it, but the amount of times she uploads videos in which she talks about her clothes, sneakers, and sweats can't go unnoticed. i don’t want to come across as nitpicky, but this criticism is one i often read in her comment sections, and on tumblr blogs. it’s also a prevalent thing i find with a lot of young influencers these days. it gives off the vibe of all show, and no substance. i think emma is capable of making good content, but there are moments when she comes across as vapid and shallow. i’m not saying every vlog has to be some shakespearean masterpiece, but if you go through her catalogue from even the past few months, you’d see what i’m talking about.

on a related note, another opinion i’ve developed and read is that emma’s life just isn’t all too interesting. if we narrow down how many of her vlogs are centered around her talking about shopping, hanging out with her sister, working out, or just riding in her car, it’d probably add up to 95% of her content. i understand that’s what her content would revolve around according to her description, but i often wonder, if you took away the glitz and glamor, and she was a regular girl, would you be interested in her life? some content is exciting, but it’s really nothing special. i mean, how long can you show the same thing before people move on and grow out of it? i watched maggie’s videos to get a sense of these two, and sometimes i prefer maggie’s vlogs to emma’s. i think maggie’s older age and maturity givers her a certain appeal that i don’t always see from emma. the macdonald sisters make very similar content, so it’s not a huge contrast, but sometimes i feel like i prefer maggie’s videos to emma’s. it’s subjective, of course, but since i’ve caught myself having these thoughts, i feel like it’s worth noting.

EMMA’S LIFE - who is she?

when we watch these people, it’s natural to want to know everything about them, including their personal life. sometimes the line between privacy and honesty gets blurred and youtubers overshare and reveal too much, or they share too little and their subscribers feel as if they know nothing about the person they’re watching. i feel like emma falls somewhere in the middle because she does open up about personal struggles, relationships, and journeys, but she also maintains a certain level of privacy that’s probably needed for the internet. however, one thing i always wonder is who are emma’s friends? if you watch her videos, you can see that her best friend is maggie. it’s common for your sibling to be your best friend, but is that all? emma has youtube friends, and her roommate, but she hardly talks about them. one of her public friendships is with paige lorenze, who’s not exactly the paragon of maturity and likability. the common consensus with paige is not a favorable one, and i can make a whole post dedicated to her and her foolishness. it’s not surprising these two paired up since they seem to be in the hockey scene, but that's another topic. something worth noting with these two is that months ago emma uploaded a grwm for a date night video, and she essentially promoted products in which all signs pointed to a pyramid scheme. she had hundreds of people telling her to be more cautious and judicious about what she promotes, but she held her belief that they were good, clean products since paige was a consultant for the company. this rubbed me and everyone else with a modicum of common sense the wrong way, because she clearly didn’t do her due diligence, and she didn’t realize that it’s probably not the smartest idea to promote a pyramid scheme. emma’s audience is likely made up of girls her age and younger who are impressionable. she has to be more aware of what she puts out there. it’s not a huge scandal, but it wasn't one of her brightest moments. if she keeps that up, i can totally see her carelessness getting her into more trouble later on.

additionally, i feel like she’s had fall outs with some of her friends, such as her high school best friend ella. i don’t know too much about her, but it’s obvious emma and ella have been best friends for a long time, and she even made a lot of appearances in emma’s earlier videos. however, clearly something went wrong at some point because i recall months ago ella made a tiktok calling emma out for trying to confess her love for ella’s boyfriend. i also recall emma clapping back in the comments, but then she talked about hanging out with ella in some of her recent vlogs, so who knows what even happened there. i just found this to be shady, and if it’s the truth, it could be indicative of emma’s character. but, since not much came of this, i guess there’s not much to tell.

overall, what do i think of emma?

i think she’s an average girl who just got lucky with the platform she’s been given. you can find a hundred girls like her on any social media. she’s not reinventing the wheel or anything with her content. i can see the appeal at times, but her vlogs are nothing more than those videos you watch at night when you want to shut your brain off and unwind.

what i would love to see more of is her real personality. something that other people say about emma (when she’s with her sister or friends) is that she’s actually a funny person in real life and it doesn’t always come across that way in videos. i’d love for her to open up more about her true self and make more sit down videos, or more q&a’s. the q&a she did with paige recently was actually a pleasant change of pace, and i liked some of the things she had to say. when she vlogs her daily or weekly life, and all she talks about is working out, shopping, or hanging out with her sister, i don’t feel like i see her real self, and i certainly don’t see the humor everyone else raves about. if she showed her true personality a little bit more, then maybe people would see a different, less materialistic version of herself. she has the potential, but right now i’m not seeing anything incredibly special.

overall rating:

3/5

EDIT: JAN 11, 2O21

as i’m editing this, the macdonald sisters have decided to travel - AGAIN - during the PANDEMIC. i’m not sure if they understand this little concept, but a social media following doesn’t exempt them from catching corona. it’s really disappointing to see them traveling for the third time?? i’ve lost count because they keep doing it. like i stated in my conclusion, their videos aren’t anything spectacular, so i get going on a vacation spices your content up, but girls read the room. if influencers can’t be entertaining without traveling all the time, then why do they even have a youtube channel? the comments on maggie’s tiktok in which people rightfully called them out for their recent trip gives me some hope in humanity. at least some people know better. @ macdonald sisters, be smarter. do better. you guys have an influence. google the definition of the word if you have to, just stay home.

#emma macdonald #maggie macdonald #youtube #vlogs #paige lorenze #lifestyle #hockey #nhl

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mercyparkgirl · 4 years

Text

the roommate

Pairing: Logan x MC (implied)

Warnings: angst, ptsd

Word Count: ~1835

Summary: Set after the events of Ride or Die, my MC (Ellie Wheeler) adjusts to her new life, from the perspective of herself and her roomate, Sophie.

Notes: So... this is the first fanfic I’ve ever written! Always been too nervous to post but with @rodappreciationweek I figured why not. Hope you enjoy!

_________________________

sophia.

My roommate’s name was Ellie, from Los Angeles. We only texted a little before move-in day at Langston, and I really hoped we would get along. My older brother had told me horror stories about his freshman roommate, some of which I believed, most which I guessed he made up to scare me. Still, those stories had taken root in my mind and I found myself with a little more than first-day anxiety as mom fussed over the fitted bed sheet and position of the throw pillows in my new room.

“Hi” a soft voice spoke from the door and I turned around quickly to greet the girl in the doorway. Her hair was pulled back and I squealed as I noticed her Langston sweatshirt, gesturing at the identical one I was wearing. She laughed at that, and to her surprise I launched forward to give her a hug. She only tensed for a moment before hugging me back, and with the ice seemingly broken we settled comfortably into unpacking and setting up the room.

I felt definitively uncool as my mom chattered on and on, immediately conscious of the fact that Ellie apparently didn’t need her mom to make her bed for her. I caught her a couple of times smiling softly at my mom with a longing look in her eyes I couldn’t quite place and I wondered what she thought of me.

Ellie certainly didn’t seem to have as much stuff as I did, and certainly not my plant habit that was rapidly turning into an addiction. The only thing she set on her desk was a framed photograph which she removed from a box full of tissue paper with great care, running a hand quickly over the glass before setting it down. I snuck a look at it as I pushed a succulent into her hands, insisting that she have something else to liven up her side of the room.

She and an unusually attractive boy, both dressed in formal attire, stared fiercely into the camera as if daring someone to oppose them, his arm wrapped protectively around her. His eyes were dark and powerful, while hers were full of a righteous fury and passion that seemed both completely out of place and extraordinarily natural on her features.

Ellie and I spent that night and the next few weeks getting to know each other. We bonded over both being from the West Coast, though Tacoma is very different from LA. She was smart, though she had the air of a student who wasn’t used to being surrounded by people at her level. We had no classes together but it was easy to fall into the rhythm of studying together in the library or student union building every night. I was so lucky to have her for the transition to college, and I hoped she felt the same.

She wanted stories about my siblings, my parents, the plays I’d been in during middle school, and I was more than happy to talk without realizing that I was learning very little about her in return. Still, I managed to pick up on some things. She spun her charm bracelet when she got excited about something, and fiddled with some strange object on a chain around her neck when she thought no one was looking, a far-away look on her face.

For a girl who owned so many leather jackets and an apparently very impressive car (The only thing I care about less than cars are the Kardashians and essential oils) she was surprisingly sweet and funny, enough that I was shocked the first time I saw her in short sleeves.

“Is that a real tattoo?” I exclaimed, not giving her time to answer. “That is so cool. I really wanted one when I was 16 and my sister told me she’d poke me with a needle for free. What is it? A wolf? Badass. Do you have a whole pack of them?”

She laughed and pulled a jacket on. “It’s a lone wolf, I’m afraid. Ran away from its pack.”

I’m a light sleeper which I always considered a curse in a house full of noisy siblings, but I was glad of it the first time I woke up in the middle of the night to a scream, sleepily flicking on the light to see her writhing in her bed. I threw back the covers and sat down on her bed, gently shaking her shoulder until she woke up gasping, nails digging into my arm. For just a moment I swore I could see the ghosts of great flames in her eyes, fading back into embers as she realized where she was.

I wrapped my arms around her and she sat still for a few long moments before squeezing my arm and standing up.

“I think… I think I’m going to go for a drive. Thank you Soph.” I wanted to wait up for her but I fell asleep on top of my sheets.

The nightmares happened again, and then again. Some nights she would just curl back into the blankets, or open the window before falling back to sleep.

And some nights she would grab the keys from her nightstand and leave without a word. I’d be asleep before she came home, or maybe she never came back to bed those nights. Maybe she drove until the morning sun stretched her fingers above the horizon and began her slow crawl to the other side.

ellie.

When I left LA, it felt like the ending of a story. The closing of a book. But I’m starting to realize life doesn’t work like that. Nobody gets happy endings or tidy conclusions. Life just… keeps going. And it’s up to us whether we can stay afloat or get lost in the riptide, losing ourselves in the memories and regrets.

Don’t get me wrong, nothing could take away the magic of stepping out of my car at the place I had dreamed about since I was old enough to dream, completely and terrifyingly on my own. No curfew, no explanations needed. I could reinvent myself. It would be a brand new start. But as I subconsciously ran a hand over the smooth hood of my Widow I remembered the first time I had seen her, sleek and dangerous and mine in Kaneko’s shop, how the leather of the seats smelled like home, and I knew forgetting wasn’t an option. And maybe I didn’t want it to be.

I had never shared a room with anyone, unless you count sleepovers with Riya or the week I spent in Logan’s loft above the shop. But Sophia made it feel like I’d been missing out. She was kind and open and welcoming from the moment I stepped in the room. She was brilliant, too, even for Langston standards which were far above what I was used to at Mar Vista Prep. I quickly realized that there would be little time to fully appreciate the lack of parental control given my heavy workload.

I had a couple classes with Ingrid and was surprised by how happy I was to see her. I needed to get out of LA but it would always be the place I was from and she represented a piece of my past. A reminder of a time in my life that I might have convinced myself never really happened if not for her. We were friendly and the fun kind of competitive, but didn’t hang out much outside of class, though I felt that either one of us would be happy to if the other one asked. I made a lot of acquaintances very quickly, a few of which turned tentatively into friends, but I mostly hung out with Soph when I wasn’t in class.

My dad and I talked nearly every day for the first couple weeks, which gradually turned into every weekend. We never talked for long, classes were “going well”, work was “busy”. I loved him, of course, but I found it hard to shake the image of him pointing a gun at the man I loved, face tight with bitter fury.

I knew Colt was still in LA, and I hesitantly tried to inquire about the specifics of my dad’s latest assignments. He must have figured what my real question was because he got quiet for a moment then said “I think it’s best if we don’t talk about that. Best to leave it in the past.”

I didn’t mention it again, or ask about Mona which had been my next idea. But it was hard to leave Logan in the past when I’d spent so much time seeing him as my future. I texted his number a couple times even though I knew he’d no longer have it, pitiful ‘I love you’s when I felt so lonely it was hard to breathe.

At night my fingers would trace the places his had until the memories of his rough hands on my body were blurred with my own and I was no longer sure if he had ever touched me at all. If not for the spark plug I wore around my neck and the picture of us at prom I kept next to a succulent Soph had given me, I wouldn’t be sure he ever existed at all.

I was ok most of the time and on occasion, I wasn’t. I cried sometimes and I didn’t even know why. I grew to fear lying in bed because the thoughts threatened to crush me, my brain forcing myself to relive every moment of that spring and asking me what I should have done differently. And when I finally, finally got to sleep I had nightmares.

Jason looming over me, larger than life, hands reaching out as my feet stuck to the ground, my car nowhere to be seen. Or a blazing inferno on the bridge, Colt’s screams of pain and grief pounding in my ears, his face twisted in an agony I could have prevented. Kaneko’s voice a whisper in my skull “Once you’ve made your choice it is made. You hold true until the end.”

The fire from the explosion spreads, higher and farther than I remember it, the flames taking Jason’s shape, and my father’s, consuming me completely until I wake up, sweating and throat hoarse with Sophia’s soft hands on my shoulder.

Sometimes I can get back to sleep, but sometimes I know I won’t be able to. On those nights I grab my keys and run down to my Widow, no jacket so I can feel the wind on as much of my body as possible. At that hour the streets are sleepy and I can make it to the freeway in 10 minutes. And as the lights passing by turn into stars, spinning above my head, I drive. And in that moment I can hear their laughter, their whoops and cheers. In that moment, as I fly into the night... I’m not alone.

#RoDaw #rod #ride or die #choices rod #rod choices #playchoices #choices #logan x mc #pixelberry #pixelberry choices #fanfic #choices fanfic #fanfiction #choices fanfiction #logan #rod logan

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catboymingi · 4 years

Text

reinventing - in this life and the next chap. 2

navi/masterlist

story masterlist

pairing: mingi x reader

genre: angst; soulmates & reincarnation au

word count: 6k

warnings: language, dealing with loss & grieving

a/n: please excuse if this one’s not very good, i’ve had a lot on my mind but i also wanted to continue this :(( also it says angst for the genre near constantly but it’s not all sad, it’s just not cute enough to warrant fluff yet!

memories aren’t all that defines you - the two of you have to learn this in different ways

for a moment, it felt like she was back. mingi’s head jolted up to look in the direction of whoever had called for him, but quickly let it sink again when he saw it wasn’t her. he didn’t think much of you knowing his name, guessing that yunho had told you, but both the blond and you were surprised. you were fairly certain that you hadn’t been told his name, so how did you know it? why were you so happy to see the man you’d never met before? why did the hopeful look in his eyes as he looked up at you make your heart skip a beat? you hadn’t felt like this even about your family, so why did a stranger affect you like this? it was weird, it didn’t make sense, and it caused you to feel a strange mixture of unexplained comfort and much more logical discomfort around the man.

“mingi.” he could barely even stand to look at you when he held out his hand for you to shake it.

“y/n.” and you could barely even stand to shake his hand. you didn’t like the way it felt, big and warm and familiar, as if you’d held it countless of times before. you didn’t like mingi, or the way he made you feel. you didn’t like yourself, because you knew you shouldn’t be feeling this way about a man who’d just lost the love of his life, when you hadn’t even been able to feel anything towards your family. you didn’t like this entire situation and just wanted to go back home, but you couldn’t, you had to be nice to these people because they were responsible for whether or not you’d end up on the streets.

“this is the main tenant”, yunho tried to end the awkward tension, and you nodded in acknowledgment, hand dropping back to your side. though you couldn’t help your curiosity - did you know this man? you’d accepted not getting any memories back, but now that you felt even the slightest hint of familiarity with him and his place you wanted to hold on to it, wanted to find out more, wanted to know if maybe there was a way to remember if not who you were, then who he was.

“do i know you?” and first then did he look back up at you, eyeing you up and down to see if he maybe did, and again you felt weird when you saw his eyes.

“not that i remember. do you know me?” his voice was so beautiful, you wanted him to keep talking.

“i wish i knew.”

now you had his curiosity, the weird girl with the bright hair in contrast to the all-black attire that had been so understanding of all the weird fears and rules he had and that now looked at him with such a weird expression. you’d sat down by now, opposite him, nervously fiddling with your hands, and though he maybe shouldn’t try to dig in your past when he’d been so scared you might dig in his you left him wanting to know a little more.

“you wish you knew?” this question left you the option to say as much or as little as you wanted to, something he felt to be a fair compromise.

“i don’t remember. it’s a little embarrassing because i feel like i do know you, but then it could also just be me hoping to.”

he nodded, not much clearer about you, but you continued by yourself since you realised how you might have come across.

“that sounds like bad flirting, sorry, i don’t mean it that way. i just have really bad amnesia. wouldn’t remember my name if it wasn’t on my id, so it’s weird that i knew yours.”

“i thought yunho told you?”

first now did the tall blond say anything.

“i don’t think i did”, and you nodded in confirmation because you were fairly certain that he hadn’t.

“so obviously i got a little excited. sorry if i was staring all weird though.”

“no, i get it. don’t worry about it.” then, though he didn’t know why he even cared, why he even wanted to know, “may i ask what happened?”

“i was really sick, i guess. or, i know i was, but i don’t remember that either. died for four minutes, came back by some miracle. and apparently the price i had to pay for getting rid of whatever autoimmune disease caused this was not remembering anything at all. so here i am.”

mingi recognised the coldness in your voice, the complete lack of emotion. it was the same voice he used when he tried to convince himself that he was fine, that things didn’t affect him even though he wanted nothing more than to cry. and because he knew that voice he put his hand on your forearm instinctively in an attempt to offer some comfort.

“i’m sorry to hear that.”

and he recognised your reaction, too, when you told him it wasn’t a big deal, that it could be worse, because it was what he tried telling himself day after day as well.

“but does it have to be?”

you looked at the man surprised, because he was the first one that had ever said something like this ever since you woke up. everyone else told you it could be worse, tried to cheer you up by saying it could be worse instead of acknowledging the hurt the current situation was causing you. and now someone that did have it worse was telling you that it didn’t have to be worse to deserve his compassion.

“i guess not.” you nearly caused yunho a heart attack when you smiled at mingi, a shy, somewhat awkward smile, and the corners of his mouth moved upwards as well. it barely even counted as a smile, in all honesty, but it was the closest to a smile that the blond had seen from his friend in months.

it wasn’t something you noticed, though, because your eyes were trained on his hand on your forearm and you were trying to sort out the weird feelings of familiarity you had despite him telling you he didn’t know you. none of it made any sense, and you really weren’t sure whether this was even good. whether you should be sitting here with him, feeling weird, feeling, when that wasn’t something you’d done for weeks now. you were torn between leaving because it was the more sensible choice and what you really wanted to do because the thought of getting any memory back scared you, in some way, left you afraid of not liking what you remembered, and staying because it was polite and because they might kick you out if you acted weird, and you’d neither fount a flat nor a job yet. you had to stay.

both your and mingi’s smiles had faded just a moment after first appearing, each of you stuck in their own thoughts, and yunho felt a little like a third wheel in a really bizarre kind of relationship based on the trauma of losing an integral part of yourself. the two of you had suffered more than he could even imagine, so a tense atmosphere was understandable, but he felt weird, slightly uncomfortable, so he forcibly brought you back to reality when he asked if you wanted to drink something.

“just a water.”

the tall blond was relieved when he could go and fetch you a water, glad to be able to at least momentarily leave the situation. he had no idea what weird thing was going on, but he had a very clear feeling that he wasn’t part of it. and he wasn’t sure if he wanted to be, either.

mingi felt weird, too. it seemed like there was no one at this table that wasn’t able to feel that something wasn’t quite how it should be, but none of you knew what it was.

he was strangely intrigued by you, though, the girl that seemed to know him, in some way, without remembering him. the girl that seemed to have a story not even she could remember. he felt sorry for you, of course he did, but there was also something else. a genuine interest in you, or at least something close to it. a curiosity. and he didn’t know whether this was because he wanted to talk to someone that he felt could relate, at least partly, to losing someone - or something - so dear to them, or if it was about you as a person. it was confusing and left him slightly uneasy, though not to the same degree that you felt. for him, the curiosity was stronger, while you just wanted to run.

“how old are you?”

it was a horribly awkward attempt at small talk, and it was made even more awkward when you didn’t even seem to know, getting out your wallet to check on your id. it hadn’t come up in conversation before, and while it was easy to tell that you were a young adult “somewhere between 18 and 23, i guess” wasn’t exactly the answer you’d expect for this question.

“seems like i’m almost twenty. you?”

“twenty-one. i’m sorry if i’m prying into things that are none of my business, but is there anything you remember?”

he knew how hurtful talking about things like these could be, so he wanted to be one hundred percent sure you knew you didn’t have to talk about this if you didn’t want to. but you didn’t know if you wanted to - part of you did, but another part wanted to bury the anxiety and the feeling of loss deep down and pretend it wasn’t there. there wasn’t really anything else to talk about, though, so this would have to do.

“i remember a lot, actually, but only common knowledge. i know about hanja, history, current politics, things like that, but i don’t know about myself. it kind of feels like my personality got rebooted.”

you let out a bitter mixture of a scoff and a laugh at that, and while you seemed to think it wasn’t a big deal to you, tried to joke about it, he could tell that you were trying to distance yourself from the pain that would take over otherwise. he knew, and he understood. so he decided to just nod in acknowledgment, not wanting to upset you further.

lucky for both of you yunho returned with your water, and he was better at making small talk than both you and mingi combined. he asked how you liked the flat, what you did during your days, if there was anything that needed touching up on, a lot of questions that could lead to deeper conversation if you wanted them to but could also be answered shortly and shallowly. it was thanks to him that you weren’t just sitting in awkward silence after five minutes.

“i wanted to say thanks”, the other man suddenly spoke up, and when you looked all surprised - what did he have to thank you for? he was the one letting you live in his home - he elaborated.

“yunho told me that you barely seem to touch anything.”

it hadn’t occurred to you that this was something to warrant thanking, but to him it very much was. it probably meant more to him than you not stealing (if you’d be stealing something that didn’t hold any memories), because physical things could be replaced, but all these memories, all these reminders, couldn’t be.

“of course. i’m glad i have a place to stay at all.”

again, your reply left him curious - did you not have a family that would take you in when you were obviously, objectively in a vulnerable position? but it wasn’t his place to ask.

the entire afternoon felt awkward, and you were glad when it was over. they hadn’t been rude, quite the opposite, but it hadn’t been comfortable because you could so clearly tell that they wanted to ask more and that they weren’t sure how far they could go in their prying, because you felt out of place, because you wished you could make small talk about hobbies or similar but you weren’t able to remember anything so you didn’t have anything to talk about. it had made you feel both weirdly in focus and left out at the same time, so when yunho said they should probably leave soon you almost sighed in relief. they were nice, objectively, so it wasn’t that you didn’t want to be around them, just… in a different set up, maybe. and for less time. this had felt forced, and you hadn’t been a fan of forced communication for as long as you could remember. ha ha.

you went home immediately after saying goodbye, feeling like you needed to recharge. you had no idea why it had left you so drained, but it was most likely both the tense atmosphere and the reminder of how little you knew about yourself even now. the fact that you’d had to check your id for your age had left you more shaken up than you’d like to admit, and you wanted a shower.

the hot water managed to relax you at least physically, but you found yourself disappointed by the fact that you didn’t own any soft pyjamas, because right now they would have been nicer than an old t-shirt and sweatpants. but this would have to do, especially since you were planning on taking a nap, anyway, and once you were asleep it wouldn’t exactly matter what you wore. before you entered the land of dreams you decided to check your phone, however, and saw that yunho had tried to call you several times. you guessed you should probably call him back, just to find out what was up.

“hey”, you heard yunho’s voice from the other end, though he sounded somewhat different, voice coloured by an emotion you couldn’t place because you hadn’t heard anyone sound like that in so long. you didn’t recognise the sound of happiness anymore.

“hi.”

“you got home safely?”

“yeah, thank you. i took a shower, sorry for not picking up.” the several attempts to reach you had made you a little anxious, so you weren’t sure what more to say, but lucky for you the man quickly told you the reason for his call.

“i’ve just been wondering how you felt about meeting mingi?”

that explained it; of course he was curious, you’d be too if you were him. and this gave you the perfect opportunity to say what you wanted to say, what conclusion you’d come to pretty much immediately after leaving the little café, because the way you felt wasn’t a way you wanted to keep feeling, and you knew you would if you found yourself in a situation awkward like that again.

“it wasn’t bad, but i don’t think i want to repeat that.”

mingi knew you didn’t know he was listening, so that explained why you weren’t at all hesitant to say this, but he couldn’t help but feel a little worried, a little disappointed. it did sound a lot like you didn’t want to meet him again at all, and he could tell that his friend was looking at him with a slight nervousness, because even though he didn’t know what the deal was with him now today had been the first time in months that the tall brunette seemed… alive, for lack of a better word. a secret part of the blond had hoped that you’d maybe manage to pull mingi out of his slump, but that wouldn’t happen if you’d never even want to meet him again.

“oh. yeah, that’s fair. i can continue sorting things, it’s worked so far?” even that was a question, because it hadn’t seemed like meeting the other man had gone bad either, but here you were.

“you sound like that’s a question?” now all three of you were confused, because you hadn’t realised that you sounded like you wanted your newest acquaintance to stay as far out of your life as possible - you’d just wanted to say that meeting up with both of them had you feeling weird, because they knew what to talk about and you felt a little out of place. much like yunho had felt earlier, except you didn’t know that.

“i’m just wondering if you’d rather i didn’t come over anymore either, when you’re there, at least.”

“oh! oh, no that wasn’t what i meant. it was just the… atmosphere today. i felt a little odd, like i didn’t have anything to talk about while you and mingi had dozens of topics, kind of. very third grade of me but i felt like i wasn’t supposed to be there, but it’s not that i have anything against him, or you.”

both men were pleasantly surprised by how straight-forward you were about this. it wouldn’t have been odd if you’d chosen to make excuses or beat around the bush, but you’d just said it as it was, something that was very appreciated because it made working with you (if you could call renting an apartment that) a lot easier.

“i’m sorry it felt that way, it definitely wasn’t how we meant it. it’s probably just hard when you and mingi haven’t met before, i guess?”

you hummed in confirmation on the other end, and yunho continued: “he said if you want he could message you, so if something’s wrong and you can’t reach me maybe he can help.”

“sure.”

why mingi felt relieved by that and by you not having a problem with him personally might forever remain a mystery, but for now he simply pushed it to the back of his head as he listened to the last little bit of small talk yunho made with you, deciding to take a shower himself before he’d message you later.

you decided to take a nap right after the call, the much desired nap you’d meant to take as soon as you got out of the shower, knocking out immediately after your head hit the pillow. your dreams were odd, flashes of images and colours and feelings that you couldn’t remember as soon as you woke up, but they left you about as exhausted mentally as you’d been before. at least your body felt rested, though.

as you went to grab some water you casually checked your phone for the time (22:32 - your nap had turned into a deep several-hour sleep) and found that mingi had already messaged you more than three hours ago. it didn’t seem urgent, though, so you didn’t feel too bad when you opened the chat first now, when you couldn’t even be sure if he was still awake.

[unknown]: hi, it’s mingi.

[unknown]: yunho gave me your number - hopefully that was okay.

his way of typing was so serious that you felt somewhat unsure about what the appropriate style would be as you replied - you didn’t like full stops, something you had quickly noticed as you’d re-entered the human realm, but you didn’t want to be too casual. before now you hadn’t even known that it was possible to be insecure about your typing style.

[y/n]: don’t worry, it’s fine

[y/n]: sorry, i was asleep

he obviously knew that this was your number, so you didn’t repeat your name again seeing how there very much was no need to and it would be somewhat awkward. instead you locked your phone, taking your assigned glass and emptying it in one go before refilling it and doing the same, and a third time, before you felt somewhat nauseous from drinking so much so fast. the water was nice and cold and managed to calm whatever nerves you’d got from the weird dreams, so you refilled the glass only to hold on to it. the room was dark, you hadn’t bothered to turn on the lights, but you liked this, liked the calm atmosphere that was created by the room being illuminated by the moon and the stars only. and your phone screen, as it lit up with a new message.

[mingi]: it’s no problem. did you sleep well?

you set down the glass in order to reply, unsure whether or not to be surprised that he was still awake. then again, he had his own demons that probably kept him up at night, and insomnia was no stranger to you.

[y/n]: not exactly, but i slept

that was your standard by now; you’d given up on expecting to sleep well, but if you managed to get more than an hour per night that was already a success in your book. and while this hadn’t exactly been night it still counted. you couldn’t be too picky, or your sleeping habits would sound even more pathetic than they already did.

[mingi]: fair. yunho told me about the call.

he didn’t have to tell you that he’d been there eavesdropping on you, though it probably wasn’t eavesdropping exactly since his friend had put you on speaker.

[mingi]: i’m sorry for making you feel excluded. i didn’t realise we did that.

[y/n]: it’s no issue, really, don’t worry about it

[mingi]: i hope so.

silence - or the texting equivalent of it - for about a minute, before another message popped up, one that took you by surprise.

[mingi]: i was wondering if you’d like to meet again, in a less third-wheel setting?

you grinned - this was the first time his texting had seemed even somewhat like you’d expect someone his age to text.

as soon as the message was sent mingi was inclined to delete it again, because there was a somewhat high chance that you’d think it was awkward, weird or uncomfortable. the motivation to ask had come from yunho, who had managed to convince his friend that meeting up with people would be good for him, and since you were quite literally living in his apartment it might be good to get to know you a little. he hadn’t said it, but he was still thinking about the smile-adjacent expression he’d seen on the brunette’s face earlier, and if you managed to bring forth a real smile the blond might just have to marry you. he hoped you would. mingi deserved it, deserved to find at least some joy in life again, though it would never be the same; he knew it would never be the same.

waiting for your reply felt quite bad; he had no idea what to expect, whether you would be entirely opposed or not, and it made him nervous. he had no reason to be, though, he realised when your reply finally appeared.

[y/n (tenant)]: if you have a place in mind? it might be nice

there was only one problem: he didn’t. he had no idea what you liked to do (and neither did you), and he’d stopped liking to do things months ago, so it didn’t exactly leave a lot of options that he could guarantee were less awkward than today had been. he rummaged through his brain for ideas, but the only ones he got were things he’d done on dates with her, and those were most definitely out of the question.

[mingi]: i’ll try to think of something.

rather, yunho would. or at least he’d probably be the one to come up with something decent, as opposed to mingi, whose brain was trained on a café or maybe the movies, neither of which were any less awkward than today’s predicaments.

“yunho?”

the tall blond appeared almost immediately, still constantly scared that his friend was on the verge of another breakdown when he heard him call for him. he was relieved, though, when the other man didn’t seem like he was going to cry anytime soon, steps slowing down when he was sure hurry wasn’t needed.

“what’s up?”

now the brunette just had to figure out how to ask for advice without making a fool of himself. he knew the other had been the one to suggest meeting up with you in the first place, but he still felt like he was cheating on her, in a way. moving on too fast, even though he was far from. he was scared that coming out of his shell, even if only a little bit, would give people the wrong impression. he felt guilty for even having the chance to continue and to get over it when she never ever would be given a chance like that.

“what’s a non-awkward non-date place to meet up with y/n?”

yunho was most definitely surprised, but he tried not to show it. he didn’t want to make mingi feel like he was judging, because it was the opposite; he was happily surprised, glad that his friend seemed willing to resume life that was neither work nor the apartment he’d moved into now. so he tried to come up with something, because it probably was easier for him to do when he hadn’t had the girlfriend attachment to her and was more objectively able to tell what could be misunderstood as a date.

“do you know what y/n does in her free time?” he guessed that would be a good starting point.

“she said she doesn’t have any hobbies. that’s what makes this so hard.”

nods in acknowledgment, humming while trying to think of anything the two of you could do. then, the figurative lightbulb lit up above his head.

“you could find a hobby together? i’d guess she needs one, and i think it’d be good for you, too.”

the slightly shorter male had half expected the idea to be bad, but was surprised when it seemed like an actually good one. it would be a way to have something to do not just once, but also if you decided to meet up more than this once, and even if not you’d have some use from it.

“i guess that would work. thanks, yunho.” and though he couldn’t expect a smile from his friend yunho knew that if the situation had been any more like even just six months ago mingi would’ve beamed at him.

you hadn’t expected your somewhat-landlord to message you today again, but since you weren’t able to sleep anyway you might as well reply already.

[mingi]: i found some things we could try. tell me what you think?

[mingi]: //link// //link// //link// //link//

the first link took you to a dancing studio’s prices page, stating at the top that the first lesson would be free if you decided to see if this was for you. the second was the volunteer page of an animal shelter, the third a book club which had its meetings every friday (it was tuesday, you noted when you checked the date on your phone), and the fourth was a pottery class, which made a small smile appear on your face. it was obvious he’d just looked for whatever options that you’d be able to start relatively soon, and you found it nice of him that he’d put in the effort to look for these things.

[y/n]: dancing or animals seems best to me, what do you think?

[mingi]: glad you picked those

and though he hadn’t used any indicator of his mood other than the absence of the full stops that had been taunting you you were glad, because it seemed like he’d warmed up even a little.

[y/n]: i should sleep now i guess, just tell me where and when? it’s not like i’d have big plans to cancel

it was a bad attempt at joking, but at least you’d tried. it was all you were capable of in your sorry tired state - it was closer to one than it was to midnight now, and your body was complaining. that meant it was most definitely time to go to sleep.

you hadn’t missed much, either, you saw the next morning, because the only message mingi had sent after that was him saying he’d call the next day (so, today) and ask when you were free to come, and sending a goodnight. you didn’t bother to reply, seeing how it was six in the morning and he most likely wasn’t up yet and, even if he was, how he wouldn’t be able to call any place before a few hours had passed. you decided to spend those listening to music and overthinking your life, your greatest (and only) hobby.

mingi woke up around nine and once more asked yunho for advice as he tried to decide whether or not meeting you today already would be too soon, and his friend gave him the quite obvious advice to just ask about several days at the places he’d call and offer you the option to choose. the brunette did feel somewhat socially inept, but who could blame him, really? he’d near exclusively talked to either his current flatmate or the people at work for months now, hadn’t tried to form any new contacts in who even knew how long. he had the right to be socially inept.

both the dancing studio and the pet shelter seemed like they were glad he’d called, and while he was free to come to the shelter whenever the dancing place offered him a time on this day and the next two, and told him to just call again if none of those fit. he thanked the man on the other end of the line and hung up, messaging you as long as he still remembered the times given.

[mingi]: dancing is today at 3, tomorrow at 2 or thursday at 3 again. the shelter said we can come whenever

[mingi]: what fits best?

his friend forced him to get breakfast while he waited for your reply, claiming that he wouldn’t let him leave if he didn’t at least try to get some nutrition. that threat hadn’t been very effective for ages now, but he still tried day after day, and today it actually worked. though mingi wasn’t pleased he did eat a single piece of toast, frowning all the while, but what counted was that he did it. the blond didn’t know how you’d done it, but you’d dragged mingi back to the realm of the living. yunho most definitely would have to marry you.

[y/n (tenant)]: all are fine, we could do today? you pick

[mingi]: okay, so today at 3? you got the address, it’s on their website

and when you confirmed the plans mingi genuinely did feel alive again, even if just for a moment. you hadn’t been the only one completely gone since the day both of your fates had changed so drastically, but now it seemed like at least he was returning.

the time passed somewhat fast, because you realised you didn’t have food left at home, so you showered, got dressed, picked out your dancing outfit - the only pair of sweatpants you had that wasn’t your pyjamas plus one of your tighter shirts because you knew you’d hate the fabric flapping around you -, and then left to get some cheap lunch at the first place you’d see on your way to the dancing studio. you didn’t mind waiting, so it wouldn’t matter if you were early - which you inevitably were.

“hey”, mingi greeted you when he arrived, and then, because you didn’t seem like you’d arrived just a few minutes before him, “have you been waiting for long?”

“it’s fine”, you told him, “not much difference between listening to music here and listening to music on the couch.” and you smiled, a smile that didn’t quite reach your eyes because you once more realised how fucking sad your life had become. not even just since you moved out (an euphemism for ‘ran away’, but same thing) but ever since you woke up the way you were now. you had no hobbies, you had no friends, you had no personality.

“let’s go.” you didn’t want to think about this, certain that the man would be able to read your expression if you didn’t get distracted, and soon.

the atmosphere in the studio was nice and sweaty, a weird combination of attributes, but true nonetheless. people were either dancing or smiling, and you felt comfortable. you’d probably like it here. the brunette sorted whatever there was to sort for your practice lesson and then a friendly-looking guy showed you some stretches, basic moves, things to warm you up and get you some feeling for how this worked without overwhelming you. you couldn’t speak for mingi, but you definitely enjoyed this. maybe you’d finally have a hobby soon, a real one.

“how’d you like it?”, he asked you after the lesson was over, and you furrowed your brows. it was a hard question to answer - you had liked it, no question, but you were constantly wondering if your actual you, the you you were supposed to be, would have liked it, and if you were right in liking it or if it was out of character for you. it made your head spin.

your silence didn’t go unnoticed, making the tall man worry a little.

“what’s wrong?” maybe he shouldn’t pry, but if it was a problem with him he’d rather know right away.

“i’m just kind of worried i’m being out of character. what if i actually hate dancing? what if i’m acting wrong? or, completely odd, i guess. not like myself. whoever that is.”

he nodded, seeming to understand your concerns, and because it was him you felt like he maybe actually could understand, on some level.

“tell me if i’m crossing a line”, he started, “but if you don’t know who you are, what you’re like… why don’t you just invent a new one? reinvent yourself? so being out of character is an active choice. i don’t know.”

that was a surprisingly good idea. there probably was no way you’d remember who you used to be, but that didn’t mean you had to be stuck being an empty form. you’d already feared you wouldn’t even like your past you, so just becoming a whole new one might possibly, hopefully, solve this problem. solve your ongoing identity crisis.

“maybe i should.”

“maybe.” and there it was again, the almost-smile, the one neither of you consciously noticed but that had both of you feeling some kind of way. it wasn’t anything romantic, neither of you were in the place for that, but it was… comfort. the feeling of not being as alone in the world as you thought you were.

you parted ways soon after, though now you were left with a purpose that drove you to yet another new place with your phone in your hand. he’d told you you needed to reinvent yourself if you didn’t want to wait to get the old you back, and he’d been right. you had subconsciously already done that when you went from looking like a neat schoolgirl to looking like a punk that hasn’t yet figured out how this works, wardrobe being reformed to be near-exclusively black or other dark colours, hair a contrastingly bright colour, and you figured now it was time for the next step. the next step being an appointment at a piercing studio that had offered you the option to come over right away and a decent price, kind of like a bulk discount because you’d called and told them you wanted five helix and two nostril piercings (go big or go home), something that had surprised them a little, but they weren’t complaining. they’d told you that if the pain got too bad at any point you could just book a new appointment, and you’d acknowledged that option, though you were rather sure you wouldn’t need that.

and now here you were, in front of the tattoo parlour, about to create a new you. about to reinvent yourself.

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thisselflovecamebacktome · 3 years

Text

My personal connection with Taylor’s discography, part eleven: Happiness

Basically this is just a series I’m doing where I write down my feelings on what each of the Taylor songs means to me personally on a line to line basis both for my own sake to have it somewhere and for anyone who wants to know anything further about me.

So with that in mind, let’s get started.

Happiness

So much like the majority of Evermore and Folklore, Happiness reminds me of my family and the trauma of losing them which I’m trying to move past. Particularly, Happiness is the connecting point of the progress I’ve made moving forth and the reality that there’s still a long way to go and wishing I was further along the recovery road.

Honey, when I'm above the trees I see this for what it is

I feel like this lyric is pretty much what it’s like on ‘good’ days. Like when I have removed myself enough from the situation and pain, I can rationalise to myself that what happened to my family wasn’t anyone’s fault, it was just a bunch of well meaning people who made choices they thought were for the best but ultimately did more harm than good. I can also acknowledge that what happened was probably for the best and that while I’m in pain now, it probably would have been worse otherwise.

But now I'm right down in it, all the years I've given is just shit we're dividin' up

But most days aren’t ‘good’ days. Most days, it feels inescapable that I gave between 16 to 23 years to these people that were meant to love me unconditionally for my whole lifetime just for them to decide that what we had wasn’t worth sticking around for. Most days, I can’t move past the bitterness that I have knowing that I feel like I’ve wasted my life because genuinely lived my life as a mirrorball and gave my all to make these people happy and keep us together just for it all to fall apart anyway.

Showed you all of my hiding spots

I’ve always been an oversharer that kept her heart on her sleeve. I genuinely feel like I showed my family, and especially my immediate family, every version of myself. My highs, my lows, my strengths, my weaknesses, my likes and dislikes; I showed it all.

I was dancing when the music stopped

I’ve mentioned this a few times in this project, but despite the issues my family had, I really fucking believed we’d get out of this okay and that the others wanted to. And I wore rose coloured glasses as things were ending and people were showing their true colours because I wanted so badly to believe that it was just a bad fight and once things cooled down, everyone would pitch in to fix things. So when it finally hit that none of them truly wanted to fix things, I realised that the music had stopped years beforehand and I had just been living in my own fantasy world dancing to a beat that wasn’t there.

And in the disbelief, I can't face reinvention. I haven’t met the new me yet

I saw a post recently that said this line is pretty much Right Where You Left Me condensed into one lyric and genuinely I have not seen anything more correct in years. Like I am still sitting here nearly six years after this started and nearly four years since I finally accepted it (god realising it’s been that long hit me like a fucking truck, not gonna lie) wondering who the fuck am I meant to be now? Like even without feeling like I devoted my life/existence for these people, who are you meant to be if not a reflection of the people who raised you and were meant to love you unconditionally?

There'll be happiness after you

I know I will get my balance back one day and be happy. There’s a lot of practical steps that need to happen first, but I know I’ll get there. And even though I wish it was with my family, I’ve accepted that it won’t be and it can’t be dependent on them or else I’m going to end up like my mother and never happy.

But there was happiness because of you

As much as I still cuss out my family, particularly my father, I grew up as a daddy’s girl and family orientated person and not all of that was negative. Though I can’t currently look back at them without crying, I have photos of birthdays, concerts, events, holidays and even just random day to day life at home that brought me so much joy. Likewise, though not directly involved, I would not have had one of the best experiences in my life of going to Japan with my school had my parents not cared enough to work their ass off for it. And though it’s hard to remember at times, especially on bad days, that is just as important to remember as the fact I’m going to be happy one day if I truly want to heal.

Both of these things can be true

Like I said, both past and future happiness is important and doesn’t negate each other. I can accept that someone from my past that made me happy isn’t going to be the one that does it in my future without either being more or lesser than the other.

There is happiness past the blood and bruise, past the curses and cries. Beyond the terror in the nightfall

Growing up in a mentally, emotionally and at times physically abusively household has left me with a lot of scars and while there’s no way to ‘prove’ it, I genuinely believe was the start of my then undiagnosed PTSD as opposed to the events of 2011. While ‘terror in the nightfall’ can directly be linked with the PTSD symptom of having chronic nightmares, I also link it just as strongly with general self doubting thoughts. Like I am very much still in a place where despite wanting to, I constantly question whether I should get married and have children or even just make new friends because I don’t feel worthy of it. All it would do is fuck over these other people. Because like end of the day, if the people who were supposed to love me unconditionally for my whole life didn’t, why the hell would anyone else?

Haunted by the look in my eyes that would've loved you for a lifetime

I will love my family forever. And genuinely, if they hadn’t of left, I would have done anything to make them happy for the rest of my life. And the fact that I do not get the chance to do that haunts me, and while I can never know for sure, I genuinely think it haunts them too.

Leave it all behind and there is happiness

Though it’s been hard, I’ve reached a point where I recognise that if I want to be happy, I need to leave behind the ‘what ifs’ and ‘what’s “meant” to be’ and focus on what is and the people who want to be in my life.

Tell me, when did your winning smile begin to look like a smirk?

Like I mentioned, I grew up as a daddy’s girl. Growing up, he was always the ‘fun’ parent. The one who was smiling and laughing all the time. The one who propped me up when I felt down. The one I really thought believed in me. But somewhere along the lines, he took offence to me wanting him to step up and face his choices so that we could fix our family. And as a result, he took joy in, in his own words, turning my sister against my mother and I and pushing me to still see him in order for mum to get spousal payments before the legal settlement out of spite. So I spent years begging him to be different, really thinking it was just a moment of hurt just for him to take pleasure in it.

When did all our lessons start to look like weapons pointed at my deepest hurt?

I’ve hinted at the fact that my mother is still less willing to recover and move past what happened with my family. Consequently, she’s spent the last 5 ½ years being like a bull seeing red at all times. And though I’ve tried everything I could to help her (literal hundreds of letters to politicians and other related parties to step in, reaching out to family, constant meetings with lawyers etc), even going as far as to go to law school hoping to find a solution there. But none of it panned out like we hoped. And because richer people with better connections, more money and “smaller” issues that are unrelated to ours won their cases in court and because I’m fighting for future laws to prevent this happening again rather than the unwinnable battle with my now fully adult and moved on family, suddenly it’s my fault things turned out like they did. She genuinely believes I did not try hard enough and did not care enough about my family, and particularly my sister, when in reality, losing her was, is, and always will be the biggest heartbreak of my life.

I hope she'll be your beautiful fool who takes my spot next to you

I’ve mentioned in a few other posts that both of my parents have, in their own way, raised my sister and I to be rivals rather than sisters. And so when my father chose to not reunite our family, it felt like he was picking her over me. And in my bitterness, I spent a long time making comments about how she was either just as bad as he is and using him financially or she was an idiot who couldn’t see through his bullshit and was fine being nothing more than a trophy so long as she was his favourite.

No, I didn't mean that. Sorry, I can't see facts through all of my fury

With time and distance away from my father and the refusal to constantly lend myself to my mother’s negativity however, I realised that I really had been aiming my anger at the wrong person. My sister was 16 when she left. A literal child. Each and every adult in my family, my then 20 year old self included, owed her more than what happened. Even if she was a “problem child” who physically and verbally lashed out, we owed her more and we failed her. That’s the part about all this that will haunt me forever. It’s not what happened to me. It’s what happened to her and the ways I let my anger and my parents cloud my vision to the point I know in my heart that things would have been different and I could have done more to save this family had I not. And I know that that anger probably traumatised and provoked a lot of my sister’s actions too. And in all honesty? The anger probably came from a place of projection too because in realising my father would rather stick with his lies than his family, I had to accept that I had been the fool that spent years soaking up praise about my achievements just to find out that’s as far as his ‘favouritism’ of me went.

You haven't met the new me yet

I somewhat joke about it, but I genuinely feel like I became a new person in 2019. Though I’m obviously not like magically healed from the trauma or anything, and while I don’t ever see a way I can have these people in my life again, on the most part I have a new outlook on everything. On top of no longer blaming my sister, I’ve been putting the focus back on myself both in terms of things I could have done differently but also doing my best to not see my family’s decision to lie and take the easy way out as being a reflection on me. Because ultimately, it’s not about me; and it took me a long time to realise that. And there’s a sense of peace in that which is the first of many parts that they won’t know about me. And in many ways, that feels like the first step to rebuilding myself.

There'll be happiness after me

Much like how my life has kept going, so has theirs. My now nearly 22 year old sister has a son who’s about to be a toddler. She has friends I’ve probably never met. My other family members probably have just as fulfilling relationships and memories that I’m not part of. It’s sad, but that’s how life goes.

But there was happiness because of me

Again, just like how my anger doesn’t negate the positive memories I’ve had with these people, realistically it’s doubtful that every second of the 16 – 23 years they knew me was neutral at best for them.

Both of these things, I believe

Logically you cannot have one of the above and not the other. Like despite what my mother thinks, you do not just stop being happy one day just because someone, or in this case many people, left. But that new happiness you have doesn’t make the old happiness any less honest. Also just in general In still in a place where like I really have to believe that my family loved and were happy with me but also happy now or else I’ll have a mental breakdown. So yeah…

There is happiness in our history, across our great divide there is a glorious sunrise, dappled with the flickers of light from the dress I wore at midnight

Like I’ve said, I have had a lot of good memories with my family, and with them being night owls and our Christmas day events at my uncle’s tending to run for 10 – 12 hours, the use of the time of midnight feels all the more personal to me. And while like I said, these fond memories aren’t enough to go back to that environment, they’re enough to be a light in the dark that reminds me that I’ve been happy before and illuminate the way across the divide to be happy again.

I can't make it go away by making you a villain

Listen, I will probably blame my father and other family members for the rest of my days over what happened. But with the new me that came in 2019, I’ve also accepted that focusing on that both internally and feeling the need to demonise them to everyone by acting like they were the only ones to make bad calls and that some of those calls didn’t come from a well-intentioned but misinformed place doesn’t make any of the pain go away. Even if they were the devil personified, I cannot change what happened. All I can focus on is myself and my future. And that’s the only way I’m going to heal and find peace.

I guess it's the price I paid for seven years in Heaven

Despite everything that happened in my childhood before the split, I am someone who got through it still loving my family and not feeling traumatised by them (or at least not processing it as such) until my adulthood. And while that may seem very bare minimum for a lot of people, it’s also a lot better than a lot of people had it.

And I pulled your body into mine every goddamn night, now I get fake niceties

I know a lot of people see this as a sexual line, but I gotta be real, from the first listen, I pictured the moments where I held/hugged my sister through anxiety attacks and lash outs and my father did the same for me. And again, despite that intimacy, we’re now in a place where we’re only polite in public (not that I’ve seen them out but if I did) in order to not cause a scene/get chucked out of wherever we were. Also, I can see this being how my father viewed all the awkward silences (which I spoke about in my It’s Time To Go post) and whatever when I did go to see him after my parents separation, because again, it did feel more like obligation than actually wanting to be there and while I know he somewhat caused that by deliberately keeping the family apart, I still feel bad over it.

No one teaches you what to do when a good man hurts you and you know you hurt him, too

Even the worst of families never expect things to blow up in the way my family’s relationships did. There isn’t and probably never will be a manual on that shit. And there’s an inherit loneliness about that because while your other loved ones can stand by your side, ultimately you gotta go through that shit alone because no one really knows what to say. So all the guilt, anger, depression and whatever else you’re feeling is exactly that: yours and yours alone. And that makes it all the rougher.

But now my eyes leak acid rain on the pillow where you used to lay your head

After my sister and father left, my mother couldn’t bare to sleep in her and my father’s old room nor my sister and my old room; instead opting to sleep in the lounge room. As a result, I moved into my parents’ old room. Though I have all new furniture, it’s set up in much the same way my parents had it and so it’s hard to not think about how my father slept in the same place I am now for 20 years of my life and the same can be said about my sister being in our childhood room for 16 years of her life. And while I’m somebody who has blocked out the ability to cry over most emotions, I’m still someone who cries very easily when I’m frustrated which as much as I wish I wasn’t, I still am frustrated and have cried more tears than I’d like to admit over how easy it should have been to keep our family together and how they just didn’t want to. And because there is that bitterness with the frustration, it does feel far more toxic than regular tears.

After giving you the best I had, tell me what to give after that

As I’ve mentioned, I’ve blamed myself a lot for decisions I should have made differently in this process, so I see this more as a line to remind myself that I did all I could. Like I took the ‘nice’ route with the adults in my family only to be rejected, I tried the assertive route and was only met with being cut off, and even if I took the ‘nice’ route with my sister, there is no reconnecting people who do not want to be. They all made their choices and could have come back at any time to hear our side even if they didn’t want to at the beginning, but again, taking the easy route was more important to them than taking the right one and no amount of me giving them what they wanted was going to change that.

All you want from me now is the green light of forgiveness... and I think she'll give you that

This is another fantasy moment for me. Like I really hope that one day I can forgive my family. Not to be in their life or anything, that ship has sailed. But just for my own peace of mind. I feel like I’m almost there with my sister, but honestly? It feels like I’m never going to get there with the rest of them. Alternatively, I see this line as again, being about forgiving myself for the bad calls I made, and while I’m not quite there either, I definitely think I will get there someday.

#about me #happiness #taylor swift #evermore album #ngl kinda hate this because it took so long to do but i also feel like i somehow didn't get it all out despite it being far too long #also this process has shown me that happiness is by far taylor's most devastating song for me personally

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jerepars · 3 years

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Throwing Copper Extended Chapter Notes

1 / 5 Reinventing Your Exit

Hyperlinks appear in blue (underlined on mobile). The story is posted here.

Teresa could see the stress James carried in his jaw and the dark circles under his eyes. She recognized it because she’d seen it in herself before, the restlessness and slight delirium, when she wasn’t sleeping.

The first sentence is an ode to the opening lyrics of Remo Drive’s “I’m My Own Doctor”: I’ve been self-diagnosing all of my problems, carrying all my stress in my jaw.

David Lee Autry was one of many aliases James had over the last few years but one he maintained with close attention because the so-called Autry had a credit card in his name. James hadn’t exactly had time to pack a bag when he broke out of a CIA facility to warn Teresa about impending doom. He showed up in New Orleans in a stolen car, the clothes on his back, contents of his pockets, and a bullet lodged in his chest.

David Lee Autry is the name written on James’ fake passport in 2x03 (around 20:54 in the episode); Pete from the militia group reads it.

James felt a lump in this throat. Whether it was because there was something very domestic about letting someone else do his laundry or because he worried the warning he’d come with wasn’t enough to protect Teresa every time she walked out the door, he wasn’t sure. But he swallowed his feelings down and didn’t put up an argument to her laundry suggestion. He appreciated the clothing George had lent him, but oversized tracksuits and brightly patterned button-down shirts were far from James’ aesthetic. And he absolutely refused to put on King George-branded attire, aerodynamic or not, so he’d been going commando while waiting for David Lee Autry’s online order to show up at Teresa’s PO Box.

When Teresa and James meet King George for the first time in 2x01, we get the lovely scene where he yells for someone to get Teresa a King George bikini (1:12) and later points to the speedo he’s wearing, saying “aerodynamic as shit, will make you feel alive, I trust” (1:18). And, like, who am I to not bring up aerodynamic speedos and going commando?

The doctor had come back and after patching him up, again, prescribed bed rest for the patient who seemed to be doing everything to keep aggravating his body rather than help it get better. Teresa had been furious, asking if he had a death wish after all, so he’d spent the last two days bored out of his mind in bed from inactivity, barely sleeping and reading Faulkner. Or maybe he’d barely slept because he was reading Faulkner. Either way, James knew it best to tread lightly where Teresa was concerned.

That didn’t mean he couldn’t sit in a chair at a desk though. Anything would be an improvement over laying on his back and waiting for his thoughts to float up to the ceiling.

So, listen, since they’re in Louisiana, and given their close proximity to matters of death and dying, if James is going to be reading anything at all, it just feels fitting that he’d be reading Southern literature, specifically William Faulkner. As I Lay Dying is an obvious choice, but personally I think he’d be reading The Sound and the Fury. Not that it matters.

The last sentence in the second paragraph is a reference to “Dreamspace” by Glacier Veins, and the line that goes I’m on my back so I float up to the ceiling to feel different.

Teresa had cried herself to sleep that night thinking about everything that could have gone wrong, if he hadn’t made it in time, or if he had but if it had been too late for him. It wasn’t just anyone—it was James, and he would’ve spent his last dying breath to tell her to chase safety if that was what it took.

Never did I think I’d manage to make a nod to and with my one last gasping breath I’d apologize for bleeding on your shirt from “You’re So Last Summer” by Taking Back Sunday. To be here, in 2020, as an adult, and finding a way to make that reference is...strange yet somehow satisfying at the same time. Also, the chapter title is in reference to a song off the Underoath album They’re Only Chasing Safety, and it looks like I found a way to work that in as well. I don’t know why my musical inspiration for this version of Jeresa seems to come from music that peaked in the early 2000s?

There was a time when James had been her mentor to the underworld, always keeping her from sinking to the bottom, even when he’d been the one who had to make the tough calls and take the brutal actions. She didn’t think he’d ever be able to rid himself of that balancing act, of showing her the ropes but strongly advising her to untether herself from the line completely, to walk away. Teresa could still hear his voice in the back of her mind, from the night after the party at the Birdman’s when he told her in a matter-of-fact fashion why he’d sent her in: your job was to learn. Since then, and especially in his absence, it seemed there’d been only tough lessons to learn and bitter pills to swallow.

I have so much appreciation for the early dynamic between James and Teresa. The car scene in 1x05 outside the warehouse is a highlight because when Teresa gets out, all indignant, she thinks she has the last word (0:15), and James comes right back at her (0:21) to tell her how it is. He’s kind of smug about it. I love it.

And I know that there’s trouble all the time. But it’s interesting that when they get away from this dynamic (especially in S4 where it doesn’t exist, because James isn’t there), it seems that’s where the real trouble comes in.

The balance that they create is delicate.

They were so far removed from the time he’d said I’ve got a plan for a future and it doesn’t include getting killed by crossfire meant for you. But he’d chosen crossfire—sought it out, really—that was what his future devolved into. And like he’d said back then, she was trouble. More and more, Teresa had begun to wonder if there was anything the James she’d first met in Dallas wasn’t right about.

I know this scene in 1x04 is often reblogged and quoted. After watching it several times, my only question is if it’s just the lighting of the scene or did they forget to apply James’ tattoos on set that day? I can’t watch it or see gifs of it now without that bothering me.

It only took Teresa a day to get the cat to venture inside and it only took George a few minutes to declare its name: Peach. God damn, we got ourselves a grumpy cat on our hands, George had exclaimed as she sunk her claws into his flesh before escaping from his embrace like a magic trick, she’s got the same personality as Giant Peach over here. She’s little Peach.

So I guess I rolled with that bts picture of Peter from Alice’s story and wrote the cat into the story. I bet this cat makes zero appearance in S5 and at no point do any of them ever have a pet but I did it anyway. The first thought when I saw it was “Peach and Giant Peach”. Would James be a cat guy? I think he would.

George suspected there was much more to the exchange than the parting words voiced out loud, noticing there was a sense of thanks in her eyes, too. The looks Teresa and James gave each other exuded the tension between them and always made it feel at least ten degrees hotter than it actually was in any room. They had their own way of communicating that only made sense to them, that no one else was privy to. There were better odds throwing copper down a wishing well than trying to decode their language of silence.

The story title comes from “Throwing Copper” by Touché Amoré. Like throwing copper in a well. You’ll never know if wishes work only time can tell.

This is not really the part that made me decide to name the story after the song, but I was still happy to find a place for it in the narration.

“Think you might need to reinvent your exit strategy, Giant Peach,” George said with a frown, nearly in disbelief with himself over what he was about to reveal to James.

“Reinvent?”

“Reinvent. Rethink. As in don’t make one. Methinks the last thing Little Principessa needs right now is more people leaving.” George spoke without his usual puns, so James didn’t have to question if he was being serious.

As mentioned earlier, the chapter title is from a song off of They’re Only Chasing Safety, “Reinventing Your Exit”. I think this might be the biggest Underoath song there ever was? Just listening to this makes me feel 14 again. This was such a gateway to other music that I ended up loving.

Teresa’s evolving thirst for vengeance, to even the score, was foreign to James. It was part of Teresa that scared James a bit. Before he left Phoenix, he’d seen tiny red flashes of her anger, questionable decisions so far removed from when she’d stood within shooting distance on a train car and said we can do a different way, where none of us has to die. Her vision had seemed clear then; she wanted to move product without the same bloodshed as Camila. When James worked for Teresa, he’d never wanted her to lose herself in the business, and never thought she should stay in the business—those were things she’d said she never wanted, too. But being at the top in the business, like she was, it changed people. It was inevitable. It pulled them down into the fire until there was nothing left but scorched earth.

I get the sense that we are never ever getting this kind of James in canon, who is not totally cool with the part of Teresa that she shuts off in order to be queen. I think we probably get another yes man. And for canon, for the sake of Teresa being the queen, I get it. That’s fine. But, in any fic, I always find myself trying to humanize characters and not just leave them as archetypes. The reason this story got so long, the reason there was no way I was going to get through it in 2500 words or less (lol, who am I kidding, I can’t write anything of that length), is because I realized this is the James I want to explore. I want to see him push back at Teresa and not just let go, not just get shut down. Because Teresa is far from perfect and she doesn’t always make the right decisions (tbh, I think she makes a lot of dumb decisions). It’s a delicate balance between the two of them that gives the best outcome.

James’ thoughts in this first chapter are the setup for the exploration of the Jeresa dynamic in the next two chapters.

James used to see a blinding light when he looked right into Teresa’s eyes, a moral compass of sorts, always willing him to choose the humanity he’d buried so deep. But now it was light mixed with dark, integrated too well to be separated. Now looking into her eyes was like staring at a flickering light, not sure if it was going to illuminate the cave or burn out.

Here is the part of “Throwing Copper” that resonated with me for this whole thing: Like staring at a flickering light, you don't know when It'll burn out, or how much time you have left to let it light up your life.

So relevant.

I don’t want to lose you. Maybe that had been a proclamation of love in her own way, and maybe that was the last honest thing Teresa had ever said to James, after she’d realized she’d been wrong to doubt him. Those words had gripped him and followed him. He’d found solace and comfort in them even after he left, because he’d wanted nothing more than to stay, but he left to protect her because of what Devon had hanging over his head.

One of the lines in Tegan and Sara’s “This is Everything” is baby, this is the last honest look I’ll ever give. But by the end of the song it turns into baby, this is the last honest love I’ll ever give.

Teresa and James so obviously love each other but they never say that out loud, right? I feel like that moment in 3x12 when she says “I don’t want to lose you” (around 23:05 of the episode) is the closest we’ve gotten thus far. There’s a silent moment before she says it, and a silent moment after, before James answers and I swear all of it is so telling. The silence. The way they look at each other. The body language. Everything. They know.

#je repars notes

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aro-neir-o · 4 years

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Carnival of Aros: New January 2020 Roundup

You all no-doubt saw my frantic posting and reblogging of the submissions on Friday (apologies; I thought I had spread those out, but no, I did not queue things correctly).

Thank you to everyone who submitted something and also to everyone who interacted with the submissions. I very much enjoyed hosting this carnival and everyone had something interesting to say. I myself did not have the spoons to write my own piece but a lot of my thoughts and feelings were echoed in others’ pieces.

I am following the format the December Carnival of Aros host used for the roundup. There is a Short List which is an amalgamation of links to all the submissions and a Long List with commentary about what each submission covered in terms of themes or topic. The Long List is under the Read More link.

SHORT LIST

Isaac, Part One and Part Two

Briar

Annie

Maximus

Ace of Arrows

Izel

Laura

Le herbe

Sennkestra

Scoop

LONG LIST

The first post Isaac wrote covers how learning the difference between asexuality and aromanticism opened up many doors for thinking about orientation, especially how a-spec orientations interact with non-a-spec orientation. Additionally, coining the term “squish” helped explain a lot of the non-normative platonic feelings aromanticism brought with it, and so new conceptualizations were able to be shared with the whole community. The second post talks about how discovering aromanticism interacted with discovering gender for Isaac. Orientation models that work with aromanticism can be applied to gender as well, so that one’s relationship to their sex can be considered separately from one’s relationship to gender.

“I didn’t identify as aromantic immediately, and as asexual even later, but splitting what was socially tangled opened new doors to me. [...] Sharing the terminology of “squish” with other people aware of aromanticism has allowed me to express clearly my feelings and even to establish a queerplatonic relationship, though I didn’t know of the terminology yet. [...] I could realize my gender identity because I split biological sex and psychosocial gender even for identity, where they are usually grouped together.”

In their post, Briar talks about how re-closeting themself has made them approach aspects of their identity differently. They mention how the prioritization of the identities they have in their life seems to be different from most aro bloggers, and how this makes them feel distanced from the community. How many issues framed as aro-specific issues are also being taken up by alloromantic people was also something they touch upon. They also share how a poem written by their friend resonated with aro experiences, giving an in-depth analysis of each stanza.

“I’m not trying to get some sort of reassurance that I can include myself in the aro community with this. It’s more that I’ve realized that not every group or community is made up of 200% committed Ride Or Die people, even if said group is considered young and relatively smaller than more established groups. [...] When I was first trying to figure out if I was somewhere under the aro umbrella at all, I came up with a term that I felt encompassed my specific experience. It kinda, sorta has overlap with a few other terms that I’ve seen a few times (definitely not often), but I’ve honestly never felt like sharing that term would actually accomplish anything in the aro community.”

Annie submitted a beautiful piece of art that expresses feelings of happiness upon discovering the aromantic identity. How the vocabulary and conceptualizations of the aro community helped Annie craft a new self can be seen in the colourful and prideful painting. Giving back to the community and sharing these feelings of happiness and gratitude really comes through in the piece.

“I have always been kinda creative, and I really wanted do something for the aro community and for myself. I discovered I was aro a year ago, and it made me so happy to have this new label that was almost made for me.”

Maximus wrote faer post on how discovering aromanticism can help one understand romance better. Fae talks about faer experiences with compulsory romance and heteronormativity growing up, and how understanding aromanticism helped with stepping back and becoming less judgemental towards others who experience romantic attraction. Furthermore, how romance can look very different for different people opened up a whole new understanding of love for Maximus.

“Being able to situate myself in the aro identity has given me a new, and frankly better, way to address the emotions and trends of my peers. Honestly, spending years of my life assuming people were being dramatic on purpose as a way of gaining or asserting social status was not the healthiest. It hasn't been until recently that I've been able to move away from the mindset that romance is a horrible thing. It is simply a strong emotion that I don't experience. The assumption that I did experience it was always, and continues to be, the worst part.”

The post Ace of Arrows made centers on positivity and acceptance of diversity. Channeling a mutually understood frustration into positive action is one such theme covered in the post. Ace of Arrows also discusses how aromanticism as an individual preference of orientation is deeply linked to narratives normalized in Western culture - narratives that are, historically speaking, new. The post ends with some book recommendations that align with Ace of Arrows’ own journey learning about alternative relationship models.

“I often think about how “romance” and the idea of “marrying for love” are actually very recent concepts that started gaining traction in the West some time around the middle of the 20th century, and yet we act as if this is how all humans everywhere have always conducted their relationships. [...] So it follows that there have also always been people who have conducted their individual relationships in a manner that is more closely aligned to the relationships of aromantic people today than the normalised romantic narrative of society.”

Izel submitted a poem, titled “To all the aros.” The poem opens with a call to other aros who share Izel’s experiences of frustrations and rejection, and it reads as a uniting anthem against these negative feelings. Acceptance of one’s own identity and of the diversity of aromantic experiences shine through as major takeaways from this piece.

“I thought that I needed a fairytail love story in my life in order to be happy. … … But I don’t need that.Aros don’t need that, don’t we? We don’t feel romantic attraction, and that’s ok.And some of us feel some romantic attraction, and that’s ok, too. Sometimes, romance isn’t for everyone.”

In her post, Laura discusses how new doesn’t always equate with excitement and optimism. Things that are new can just as often cause us fear and nervousness. Laura discusses how Tumblr has contributed to aro activism and growth, in both positive and negative ways. Finally, Laura calls for the aro community to continue reinventing itself and continue “becoming new,” to shed the fears that come with change, and to commit to real inclusion.

“I want to see the aro community grow. I want to see it create new resources, explore issues that have never been explored before, and build a foundation for a vibrant, inclusive community that will continue well into the future. [...] I’ve been doing my best to push the aro community in new directions for the better part of two years now. However, every time I or anyone else tries something new, there are people who are afraid.”

Herbe de provence wrote a post on how discovering aromanticism, at first, triggered feelings of denial, but then set off a chain reaction of self-reflection that ended up explaining of lot of childhood feelings. Learning about aromanticism gave Le herbe new confidence to be accepting. How accepting and curious LGBTQ+ friends increased Le herbe’s pride in the aromantic identity is also an important theme touched on in the post.

“In truth, when I learned that I was aromantic I earned so much more than just a word to describe my experience for I learned to accept a part of myself I never knew I was reppresing. [...] Many, many months after first reading the word « aromantic �� this is still new for me and I sometime have to remind myself that *it is alright to be myself*. That *it is alright to love like I want*, Like I *do*.”

Sennkestra wrote a post combining the themes of “new” and “allyship.” Being a good ally means being consistently accepting, patient, and an active listener, but it can also mean learning and growing with new ways of being a better ally every so often. Sennkestra shares anecdotes as examples of above-and-beyond allyship and also encourages others to share their own, so that allies to aros everywhere can add new and diverse actions to their repertoire. The little things can count a lot.

“Even though many of these actions are objectively somewhat small things, they show that these people have remembered my identities, taken the time to learn a bit about it, and have had the presence of mind to actively take the chance to support us when they saw an opening. And cumulatively, they all add up to a lot of support that’s made it much easier to live the lifestyle I want to live without anxiety, and given me the backing I need to continue to do active work even with audiences who might not be so supportive.”

In her post, Scoop talks about how discovering the aro community brought her new understandings and connections with people that she was missing, but it also made connecting with non-aros that much harder. Scoop also describes her struggles choosing between non-SAM and alloaro labels - both of which resonate with her but are considered completely separate microcommunities. Finally, while Scoop expresses about her excitement with involving herself in new types of activism, she also expresses her fear about being outed in these situations. What’s new isn’t always without great risk.

“One of my friends will say, every now and then, 'romance isn’t all bad' to me and I find myself taken aback every time. I know it isn’t all bad? Does she think I do? Is it bc I criticise the system? But in reality I want people to find the romance they desire. I just simply think that they deserve it in a way that is much kinder and more considerate than they often receive it. And give it. I've gotten really good at speaking aro and sometimes I'm going to need to translate that language. [...] ”

#aro #aromantic #arospec #carnival of aros #new #january 2020 #roundup #actuallyaromantic

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lia-jones · 4 years

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Growing Stronger - Chapter One - Andrea’s Breakup Recovery Guide

Author’s note: Yay, part two! Posting chapters as fast as I can, because stuff is coming and you don’t want to miss (I hope so!).

In pretty much every magazine for women or teenagers, one is destined to come across something along the subject of breakups and how to recover from them. A paraphernalia of advice on what you should do, like reinvent yourself, cut communication, get hammered. I used to laugh when I read such articles, I felt so above it. Well, it turns out, I wasn’t. I was just never so broken-hearted before.

Breaking up with Victor was one of the hardest things I had done in my life, to be honest. The pain I felt could easily compare with the pain of being a victim of domestic abuse, if not worse. By the time things ended with Daniel, I wasn’t in love with him. It was a huge relief to get rid of him. But I was still very much in love with Victor. And losing him was like losing a lung, it made it so much harder to breathe.

I looked at my phone countless times, hoping he would text, or wanting to call him. I imagined myself meeting him by accident on the street, or the supermarket, the window for reconciliation opening, us together again, and hopefully, happily ever after. I ran all these scenarios in my mind, painfully remembering how good it felt to have his hands on my skin, his lips, his warmth. I laughed again at all the jokes he told me, because Victor could look cold and mechanic, but he was actually very witty and funny when he felt more at ease. And I recalled every single line of our fight, and always came to the same conclusion: our relationship was the perfect storm, and we were better apart than together.

We didn’t break up for no reason, and even though I was obviously wearing breakup rose-colored glasses, the truth was painstakingly evident. We had problems. Lots of them. Thanks to his fame I would never have a private life again, and despite our best efforts to keep the media quiet, God only knew when they would remember to revisit my abuse, or interview someone in my family, and how that would affect my work. And despite his apparent wish in wanting me in his life, I had to conclude I never was truly in his life. He hid things from me. Important things. There were years of Victor I did not know, and he was not willing to share. Huge red flag. Apart from that, I didn’t seem to be a good fit in his life either. His father disapproved of our relationship and was very clear about it. Victor’s relationship with his father wasn’t very good to begin with, sure, and it seemed that nothing that Victor ever did was good enough for his father, but still… His father was his family. People we would have to have some connection to over the years, and starting on a sour note was very dangerous, and a prelude for more problems.

And then there was another seldomly discussed but extremely painful reason: I was infertile. I was able to overcome every single thing Daniel had done to me but this. And this was huge. Should Victor be with me, I would be depriving him of something that could mean a lot to him. Even if he accepted it at first, he would eventually want a child of his own, with his features, his DNA… and he wouldn’t be able to do it with me. He wouldn’t leave me for that, he was a “thick and thin” kind of guy, so he would slowly start to resent me instead. We would end up an unhappy bitter couple. I didn’t want to do that to myself, but most of all, Victor did not deserve it. I didn’t want to be the one making him go through so much hardship.

So I decided to keep looking at my phone, put my breakup in my It’s for the best mental drawer, and focus on learning to live without him. I must confess, if my endless nights crying while gulping Ben&Jerry’s were any indicator, I didn’t start my healing process very well. I was still sad and starting to gain some weight, and none of that was helpful. So, remembering the articles I used to read about breakups, and that concluding steps like getting myself hammered and writing bitter letters were as helpful to me as crying and ice cream, I decided to create a list of my own.

Working hard was always a good distraction, so I decided I would start with that. The less time I had left to think about Victor, the better, so I took as much work as I could, leaving only a few hours out for sleep and socializing. I restarted my Krav Maga lessons and actually added some more exercise to burn the ice cream calories off. Levi immediately offered himself to be my exercise buddy, so I wouldn’t even have the time to think about Victor when I ran, which would also be a very good thing.

Those magazine articles always spoke of some kind of reinvention, and although I didn’t want to be drastic, I could use a haircut. I cut my curls in a shoulder-length angled bob, and did some blond ombre highlights to compliment my hair color. I decided to get some new clothes as well. Since my position at the university didn’t require business clothes, I decided it wouldn’t hurt to add some casual clothes, like jeans and more flowy tops. Maybe those cute sneakers I saw at that shop that day.

Bottling up my emotions was not a good idea, so I figured I should find some kind of outlet for them. Writing bitter letters was not a viable option, and Victor did not deserve them, so I settled for music instead. I missed my piano, and always thought about buying one if I truly settled in Loveland. Now I could afford it, I was working at the University and making good money. After thoughtful consideration and what I considered a true real-life Tetris experience, I finally managed to rearrange my furniture and make space for a digital piano. I would express my feelings through playing, maybe write a few songs of my own.

Needless to say, none of my friends or family took the news of the breakup very well, although I never shared the details of it with anyone. My mom, of course, tried to find out more and offer me some unwarranted therapy, but just ended up saying that, despite thinking I had made a big mistake, she wished me well and only wanted me to be happy. My father, my brother and Cristina were disappointed too. Apparently, Victor had made a bigger impression than I thought.

I remained close to Diane and Goldman, although I couldn’t discuss the breakup with them either. Diane was adamant on us meeting at least once a week for lunch, and clearly was not accepting the breakup, always hinting we would end up together again. I tried my best to steer clear off the topic, talking about her and Goldman instead, or something work-related. Surprisingly, in one of those mandatory outings, she seemed to have no intention to mention Victor.

“You are a terrible friend, you know.” Diane declared, sipping on her orange juice.

“I would ask why, but I’m pretty sure you are going to tell me.” I teased her.

“Well, I’ve been waving my hand like crazy for the last 30 minutes and you didn’t even notice what I have on my finger!” She almost yelled, excited. “I mean, it’s no use wearing an engagement ring if it doesn’t make your friends jealous!”

Yup. There it was. A lovely golden band with a considerably sized diamond in it. I gasped.

“Goldman proposed?!?!? When?”

“Last weekend.” She smiled, dreamily. “He took us to the restaurant we went to on our very first date, that Italian cute one? He hid the ring in the tiramisu.”

“That sounds really dangerous.” I laughed. “One of you would’ve had a surprise that night. Maybe a trip to the hospital.”

“Oh, just say it, you’re jealous.” She gave me a sly smile. “All you have to do is to stop that breakup nonsense, so we can pick wedding dresses together!”

“Whoa, Bridezilla! Hold your horses!” I laughed, starting to get a bit tense. “Even if Victor and I were together, which you know we are not, there would be no guarantee of him popping the question any time soon.”

“I feel so sad to hear that.” Diane almost pouted. “Was the breakup that bad? No going back? At all? You never say anything!”

“First of all, your fiancé works with my ex, so… And besides, how rude would it be of me to go around trashing my ex after breaking up with him? Victor doesn’t deserve it, he is a great guy. It’s not right to just go out disclosing facts about our intimacy because I was part of it.”

“Most girls would just badmouth the ex.” Diane frowned.

“Most girls didn’t date Victor Lee.” I shrugged.

“The upside is, if you are adamant in protecting him, it may be salvageable after all. He’s been really moody these days.” Diane continued to push the issue, sounding worried. I quickly brushed it off.

“When is he not?” I shrugged. “It’s Victor.”

“When he was with you.” Diane smiled. “Andrea, he’s hurting. He’s been sad, and reclusive, burying himself in work.”

It didn’t surprise me to know I wasn’t the only one using work as a distraction.

“Breakups are hard, Diane. He’s not the only one hurting. I won’t say much, but I will give you this. It was for the best, for both of us. It hurts now, but we will move on. I moved on from Daniel, he moved on from Mia. We will move on from each other.”

“I witnessed the whole Mia situation. Andrea, he wasn’t like this. Not like this.”

“It’s Victor. He’ll bounce back soon enough.” Or so I hoped. I felt my heart tighten with emotions I couldn’t or wouldn’t dare to identify.

That night, I resumed the staring contest with my phone, thinking about Victor. I missed his voice. I was worried about him. Instead of doing the absolute error of calling my ex, I did something even worse, I went through the pictures. I found one of my favorites, one of Victor sleeping. There was something sweet in his expression when he slept, there were none of the usual barriers he set in place. There was only Victor, and the sweetness he contained, that I was so honored to witness. He opened himself to me, let me look into his light, let me touch it and bask in it, and trusted me with this secret. And I let him down.

No matter how things ended, no matter how many reasons I could come up with to hate him, I loved him. I didn’t blame him for this breakup, I took full responsibility on that. Yes, he was hiding things from me, and yes, he did say some very hurtful things, but I was the one that hurt him the most. I slapped him and I left him. In his words, I abandoned him.

And even though I had my reasons, I still felt like a total bitch for breaking his heart like that. No amount of advice on how to recover from a breakup would help me with that.

#Growing Pains - Series #growingstronger #victor x oc #mlqc victor #mlqc li zeyan #love and producer #mister love queens choice

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routinehabits-blog · 3 years

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Breaking up

Breakups have the potential to be the ultimate displays of love.

"Fuck you! I hate you! I never want to talk to you again!" essentially equates to, "You broke my heart! I love you! I am going to miss you to an unhealthy degree!"

If love is the fear of losing someone, then the absence of love is that fear coming true. It's being lost, not only to your lover, but also to a version of yourself. The person whose reflection gave your image something to look at.

I wasn't whole in my last relationship. In fact, I was very full of holes, more so at the end than when we started seeing each other. But I knew every one intimately.

Now, I'm just walking around with all this damage that I'm supposed to make sense of in some other scenario with some other lover and some other version of myself?

I should be excited by the opportunity for psychic reinvention. I've pretty well exhausted this character over the last five years. But there's a satisfaction in feeling like I know myself, something like confidence.

But is this the person I want to be for the rest of my life? Hell no! There's so much more to see, to do, to experience.

When you start understanding yourself in the context of a partner, you begin to judge yourself by how you respond to them versus the greater world around you. Their reflection of you risks becoming the foundation of your identity.

I am grateful to repossess my base layer and discover it is sand, not concrete. I can build something else here, move some grains around.

The old me would have called relentlessly until you picked up and sobbed to you about how I was miserable without you.

The new me trusts in her choices and doesn’t give in to longing or loneliness. She recalls how your insults stung. She forgets how your cheek felt. You transform into a postcard from a life she left behind for sweet everythings and peach fuzz.

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choupichoups · 5 years

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Eliott falls helplessly infatuated with his best friend’s little brother— he knows he’s writing up his own death wish going after this boy, but fuck if Lucas isn’t the most beautiful thing he’s ever laid eyes on.

Or: Eliott’s under the impression that his best friend’s new step brother, ‘Lulu’, is a literal baby. Nobody tells him the guy’s actually a fucking babe-y.

The first big party of the semester is always a hit— people hooking up left and right with no hope of remembering any names come the morning light. At this point of the year, nobody gives much of a fuck about anything. Much less the first years, who’ve all got the same reinvent myself mentality that would either lift or destroy them in the long run.

Eliott is in his fifth semester already. He doesn’t give much of a fuck at any point in time.

A girl with burnt whiskey eyes catches his gaze while sauntering past, long dark hair falling in soft waves down her back. Her face is quite lovely in the midst of the sweaty heaps of bodies wriggling on the makeshift dance floor and Eliott smiles, eyes dark with challenge, but his feet don’t move from their spot.

“Already scouting the first years, I see.”

Eliott turns towards the voice, only mildly irritated by the interruption. “You know how it is.”

“Uh huh,” Adrien chuckles into his bottle, taking a long sip from his beer before pointing out a nervous looking boy by the speakers. “Thought that was more of your type?” The boy is tall, not as much as Eliott but enough to make him noticeable. His features are rounded and his carefully styled hair is just begging for searching hands to muss it up. If Eliott’s a little less sober than he currently is, then maybe he can settle for it.

But alas.

“I don’t have a type,” Eliott says, eyes casting around for the girl with the nice hair. “Last time was a fluke.” Benjamin had been the resident know it all in his literature class; cute but talked too much, argued too much, stressed out too much. Eliott had done him a favour with that fling last year— no, really, Benjamin's still one of his most pleasant break ups to happen that year. Maybe even of all time. They still text sometimes and all.

“You’re the worst,” Adrien snorts.

“Aw, don’t be jealous, someone’s bound to kiss you before we graduate, you’ll see.” It’s not long before he gives up looking for the girl, mostly because he’s already half forgotten what she looks like and he can’t be bothered to put more effort into the search.

“Oh fuck off, I got game.”

“I’ll believe it when I see it.” Eliott smiles, laughing as he dodges Adrien’s swing at his head. It’s an easy feat— the alcohol has made his best friend quite slow.

“Shut up!” Adrien frowns, but doesn’t try for another swipe. “Oh, I’ve got someone I wanna introduce to you, actually.” He starts looking out into the crowd but a displeased pout is quick to form over his lips when he can’t seem find the person he’s looking for.

“Someone cute?” Eliott teases, grinning when he dodges a kick to his shin. “Geez, no need for violence.”

“No fucking kidding, man, stay away from this one.”

“Then what’s the point of introducing us?”

“You’re hopeless, you know that? When will you stop looking at people as things to play with? That’s gotta be tiring, man.”

Eliott shrugs, immune to each and every one of Adrien’s righteous spiels. He doesn’t take offence to it, used to the lack of filter that comes with the copious amount of alcohol consumed.

Adrien eventually gives up on searching the crowd. Granted, sticking his head out in one direction or another like some confused imitation of a mother goose isn’t exactly the best way to find someone in a jam-packed apartment but Eliott isn’t about to call him out on it.

“Where are the others?” he asks instead.

Adrien nods towards the backyard. “Out back.”

“Cool, you coming?”

“Nah, I have to look for someone, catch ya later.”

Making his way through the crowd is quite an interesting challenge. Eliott allows some wandering hands to pull him close, hoping that one of them would be enough to snap him out of this drudging atmosphere. But he quickly grows tired of that game— no amount of drunken grinding and senseless conversations tempt him stay.

Boring. Everything’s so fucking boring.

“Eliott!” His idiot friends cheer once he gets outside, getting a genuine laugh to pass through his lips. Idriss has his arms held out for a hug but Eliott very intentionally walks a giant circle around him, sitting next to Sofiane instead. Idriss flips him off.

“Having fun?” He nudges shoulders with a hunched up Sofiane, who blinks at him as if he doesn’t hear a word Eliott says. “Enjoying the party?” he repeats with a fond chuckle.

“Oh! Yeah, uh,” Sofiane hums, glancing back down at his phone. It lights up with a text from Imane. “It’s okay, I guess.”

Eliott rolls his eyes and leaves him to his pining. Sofiane gets extra sappy during the late hours of the night and he doesn’t even need the help of alcohol to get there; the fact that he doesn’t drink is probably a blessing for those around him.

He gets up to borrow a lighter from one of Idriss’ friends — Eliott can’t remember the guy’s name for the life of him — and pulls out the joint he’d been saving for much, much later into the party, but desperate times, desperate measures, etcetera etcetera.

“Eli, can you get us some more drinks, please?” Idriss calls out from where he’s slouched into a lawn chair, looking like he needs a nap and a huge bottle of water more than anything else.

“You sure?” Eliott surveys the piles of empty beer cans and bottles littering the ground. The amount is just a tad bit worrying but nobody else seems to be in a panic about it so Eliott lets it be. There must be a reason behind it and he’s also not about to act like any of their mothers.

“Super sure!”

He goes back inside with a shrug, unlit joint and lighter slipping back into his pockets. It’s not like the backyard company is any more stimulating than the ones inside. For god’s sake, he’s bored out of his goddamn mind. He might as well just go home and watch Animal Planet at this point. It’d probably bring about the same amount of joy as he’s feeling right now. Except he’d have the privilege of being in his pyjamas.

The fridge is empty of anything but cases upon cases of beer. Eliott turns each pack over, wincing at the brands. Even the alcohol is boring, fuck.

“Top left cupboard.”

And alright, nobody can blame him for the little jump he does at the sound of that voice— he swears the kitchen was empty when he’d entered it.

Eliott whirls around to face the person who’d tried to give him a heart attack, prepared to bite back with a slightly snappy response only to find himself face to face with cutting cheekbones and full lips curled into the most adorable of smiles. The boy’s hair is a divine mess, falling over large eyes as blue as the deepest waters of the sea.

Holy shit, he’s beautiful.

Eliott kicks the fridge shut, all thoughts of alcohol wiped from his mind. “What?”

The boy tilts his head. Cute, Eliott’s mind supplies.

“They’re hiding the good beer inside the top left cupboard,” the boy elaborates, legs swinging back and forth from where he’s perched up on one of the kitchen counters. Eliott’s eyes follow the movement, wondering how long it would take for him to get those very same legs wrapped around his waist. Preferably sometime soon. Behind closed doors. Sometime tonight, actually. Eliott isn’t made for waiting.

“And you know that how?”

“I’ve been in here for too long, apparently.” The boy shrugs, offering another tiny smile before he drops his eyes back down to his phone.

No, that won’t do. Eliott wants this boy’s attention all to himself. So he steps closer, wiping a hand over his lips as he thinks of which guns to pull.

But before he can make his move, another boy enters the kitchen with frantic hands waving in the air, heading straight for the space in front of Eliott’s boy without so much as a glance around. There’s a small, crooked joint sitting in between the newcomer’s fingers and from what Eliott can catch of his rambling, he’s gloating about scoring it for cheap.

“What?” His boy asks, sounding amused. “Slow down, Bas, I literally can’t understand a word you’re saying.”

Eliott comes up behind the guy — Bas? — and picks the joint out of his grip, easy as stealing candy from a child.

“Hey!” Bas yelps, eyebrows furrowed as he turns around to puff up at his offender. Eliott almost laughs when Bas’ expression melts into half fear half wonder at the sight of Eliott hovering over them.

“You got tricked,” Eliott says, inspecting the poorly rolled mess in his hand. “This thing is shit. Whoever gave you this tried to pull a fast one.”

Bas squawks, mumbling equal amounts of gratitude and colourful curses as he takes the joint back from Eliott and rushes out of the kitchen, presumably to give his dealer a piece of his mind.

“Was that true?” His boy asks, and Eliott finds that he enjoys the playful glint in those pretty, blue eyes a little too much.

Just as playfully, he responds with a raise of an eyebrow. “Of course,” he says, digging his joint and the borrowed lighter out of his pockets. He wiggles it in between the two of them until a wide smile breaks out from the boy’s tantalizing bite over his lips. “I’m Eliott.”

“Lucas.”

Lucas, he repeats in the safe privacy of his mind. It’s only fitting— a pretty name for a pretty boy. He wonders how it feels for that name to roll off his tongue.

Eliott brings the joint to his lips, not once looking away from the staring match he and Lucas have unwittingly started. Lucas is the one to break first, glancing down at the darkened screen of his phone and then away to the side where a suspicious looking stain is splattered on the wall.

Wordlessly, Eliott flicks his thumb over the lighter and lets the smoke fill his lungs, the familiar sensation rolling over him as he thinks of the most delicate way to ask if Lucas is interested in examining the walls of Eliott’s bedroom instead.

“So what, are you some sort of weed master, Eliott?”

Eyes closed, Eliott chuckles, slowly inching in as he whispers, “No, I just know the good stuff.”

“Right.”

“You don’t believe me.” He takes another hit, head turned slightly to the left as he exhales. They’re close enough that blowing the smoke right in front of Lucas would be considered nothing short of suggestive and while Eliott plans to do exactly that, he needs a bit more reassurance that Lucas is as on board with this as he is.

And Lucas, bless his tempting little self, has that plush bottom lip trapped in between his teeth when Eliott glances back at him. “Not unless you share,” Lucas mumbles, looking up at Eliott from below his lashes. Eliott’s sure Lucas has got to be aware of what he’s doing. There’s no way any of this is done out of oblivion.

“I’m afraid you can’t handle it.” Eliott grins, daring himself to step even closer. A giddy part of him cheers when Lucas opens his legs wider to allow Eliott a space in between.

“You don’t think I can handle a little smoking?” Lucas leans back the slightest bit, balancing on the balls of his palms placed behind himself on the counter.

Eliott recovers the distance with a simple tilt of his head. “No,” he says, pleased when Lucas makes no other move to back off. “Something else.”

“Oh yeah?” The question is a whisper that sends heat coursing along Eliott’s bloodstream, which is ridiculous. Lucas hasn’t done anything but speak. “What then?”

Eliott brings the joint back to his mouth, taking a deep hit as he reaches over and presses a thumb over Lucas’ petal soft lips, almost groaning out loud when the boy opens up with ease, pliant under Eliott’s touch.

Their noses brush gently as Eliott aligns their mouths, lips parting to blow the smoke into Lucas’ waiting ones. He watches with hooded eyes the way Lucas’ own pair slide shut, breathing soundlessly as he takes in everything Eliott gives.

Magnetized by the alluring sight, Eliott falls forward, fully intending to close what’s left of the distance between them.

Unfortunately for him, Lucas has other plans. Their upper lips have barely grazed each other before Lucas tilts his head up, away from the loose touch of Eliott’s thumb. But with the distance as small as it is, Lucas’ mouth drags along Eliott’s own when he moves— a provocative hint of the taste Eliott’s been quite cruelly deprived of.

Stunned, Eliott can only nuzzle into the underside of Lucas’ chin, laughing in disbelief as this infuriating boy exhales the smoke up at the ceiling.

He feels Lucas’ body move soon after and Eliott shivers at the feeling of cool hands landing on the back of his neck. Lucas is smiling when Eliott straightens back up, looking equal parts endearing and dangerous. His fingers slide up the length of Eliott’s jaw, up behind his ears, and into the hair at the back of his head, scratching down until they land right back on his nape. The tips of his fingers have dipped into the neck of Eliott’s shirt, electrifying the small span of skin he touches.

Forcefully clearing the haze from his brain, Eliott goes in for another try, only for Lucas to curl up so that Eliott’s lips land on his forehead instead. Lucas’ laugh is a warm huff of breath over his collarbone and it feels like a cheeky apology, one that Eliott’s quick to accept with a chuckle of his own.

Eliott can’t believe he’s getting so worked up over some boy who denies him kisses and makes it up to him with fleeting, barely there touches. His friends would be rolling on the floor if they see him now.

But it doesn’t matter, because Lucas is so fucking hot and Eliott wants him so fucking bad.

He doesn’t notice the joint being taken from his hand until Lucas has lifted it to his own mouth. Eliott is mesmerized as he watches Lucas’ tongue dart out to wet his lips before taking a hit, cheeks hollowing from the initial inhale. Eliott’s head isn’t constantly in the gutter, mind you, but Lucas isn’t leaving him with much of a choice over here.

Both hands now free, Eliott intends to take back his control over the situation, but Lucas lifts his arms, landing warm and light over Eliott’s shoulders, twining around his neck, and Eliott finds himself dazed all over. His hands are loosely gripping the back of Lucas’ knees, and they’d maybe give an illusion of a purpose if Eliott isn’t so acutely focused on figuring out how to kiss Lucas before he dies from all the teasing.

Lucas shuffles invitingly close and blows the smoke into the corner of Eliott’s slightly parted lips. Eliott can feel the heat from the joint behind his head where Lucas’ arms are still curled. Or maybe that’s just the heat from Lucas’ body. He doesn’t know, Eliott can’t tell shit apart at this point. All he knows is that there’s a warmth everywhere as he exhales, watching clouds of smoke mingle in the air below the fluorescent kitchen lights.

He’s just about regained control over his own limbs, hands starting to tighten around Lucas, just about ready to fucking carry him straight into a bedroom— it doesn’t even have to be Eliott’s bedroom, he doesn’t mind, when all of a sudden he’s cold all over. All traces of warmth is gone from his arms and he looks down just in time to see Lucas somehow sliding smoothly off the counter and then hopping towards the living room in one quick movement.

“Thanks, Eliott,” Lucas pipes up, looking back at Eliott over his shoulder. His grin is wide and buoyant, looking way too pleased with himself. Eliott feels like he should be offended about something but he’s having trouble keeping up as it is.

What the fuck just happened?

He stands in the kitchen, staring blankly at the counter as he replays the last couple of minutes in his head— because that’s all it's been. No matter how much his brain is dramatically insisting that an entire lifetime has passed since the whirlwind that is Lucas, it truly only has been a couple of minutes since they’ve met.

His feet take him out of the kitchen before his brain follows the movement. It also belatedly registers that the dumb smile that’s stuck on his face won’t go away any time soon.

Friends and acquaintances alike find him wandering the place with his eyes lifted far, their attempts at conversation politely cut short as he searches above everyone’s heads for the only face he wants to see.

It takes Eliott a full hour to understand that Lucas has stolen his joint.

His mystery boy has vanished into thin air. Eliott can’t find him anywhere, which doesn’t even make sense. It’s not like the apartment is massive or anything. But the crowd is gradually thinning out, those with sense still left in them are heading out to better prepare themselves for the torture that is the coming week ahead and—

Ah. There he is.

Eliott spots him beside the balcony doors, flanked between two girls who seem to be in a deep, animated discussion with him.

“Yo, Eliott, we’re leaving.” Someone calls out from behind him and Eliott thinks that’s Sofiane. He’s the only one always sober enough to relay proper information between their group.

The only response he can muster is a distracted hum, but he does twist around to spare a quick glance at Idriss, who’s now laughing way too loud at everything he sees around him. Nothing particularly entertaining is going on so Eliott assumes it really is about time for Idriss to make his leave.

Eliott rolls his eyes, sharing an exasperated glance with Sofiane as he watches the poor boy try to talk Idriss out of sitting in with the giant game of truth or dare in the dining room. Luckily enough, Adrien checks in on them soon after. For whatever reason, he’s the only one Idriss listens to whenever the latter is drunk out of his mind. The trio exchange quick, silent looks between themselves before an amused Adrien finally convinces Idriss to make his merry way back to the front door.

A commotion by the balcony steals Eliott’s attention away from his stumbling friends, and he looks back to where he’s last seen Lucas just in time to watch the latter laugh at some guy who looks like he’s spilled an entire can of beer down his shirt. The music’s too loud for Eliott to hear the sound of it but his own lips twitch at the mere sight either way.

He doesn’t realize Sofiane’s snuck up behind him, following Eliott’s line of vision, until he hears an incredulous, “Oh no, Eliott. I wouldn’t go for that one.”

Eliott has to peel his eyes off of Lucas’ radiant smile. “Huh?”

Sofiane eyes him dubiously. “You’re looking at the boy in the gray hoodie, right?”

“Uh.” Apparently his non-answer is enough. Sofiane reaches for his shoulders and starts shaking him quite violently. Eliott gathers his wits about him and brushes the offending hands away from his person. “Why not?” he complains, aware that he sounds like a scolded pre-schooler.

“Bro, that’s Lucas,” Sofiane says urgently and, well, yes? Eliott wants to voice out his thoughts but Sofiane’s looking at him like there’s some kind of revelation to be had. Whatever it is goes way past over Eliott’s head.

“And?” Eliott drags the word out, frown deepening when Sofiane’s expression pinches strangely, like he isn’t sure whether to fuss over worrying or just outright laugh. It’s a face Eliott’s grown very familiar with.

“Adrien’s Lucas?”

Eliott remains staring at him incomprehensibly.

Sofiane’s starting to look a bit constipated. “You know… his precious Lulu? That’s him.”

Oh.

“That’s Adrien’s little brother.”

Oh fuck.

#skam france #elu fic #elu #fictag #has in fact nothing to do with letters #summary written at 2 in the morning #it is now 9 and i still haven't changed it #que sera sera #the shotgunning fic gone awry

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hannahwaterman · 3 years

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Type and Language 1 - Choosing a quote, planning my project, brainstorming.

Selecting a quote for this briefing was something I tried to get done very quickly so that I could begin making work fast. At first I thought of doing the following quote by Bill Hicks:

“The world is like a ride in an amusement park, and when you choose to go on it you think it's real because that's how powerful our minds are. The ride goes up and down, around and around, it has thrills and chills, and it's very brightly colored, and it's very loud, and it's fun for a while. Many people have been on the ride a long time, and they begin to wonder, "Hey, is this real, or is this just a ride?" And other people have remembered, and they come back to us and say, "Hey, don't worry; don't be afraid, ever, because this is just a ride." And we … kill those people. "Shut him up! I've got a lot invested in this ride, shut him up! Look at my furrows of worry, look at my big bank account, and my family. This has to be real." It's just a ride. But we always kill the good guys who try and tell us that, you ever notice that? And let the demons run amok … But it doesn't matter, because it's just a ride. And we can change it any time we want. It's only a choice. No effort, no work, no job, no savings of money. Just a simple choice, right now, between fear and love. The eyes of fear want you to put bigger locks on your doors, buy guns, close yourself off. The eyes of love instead see all of us as one. Here's what we can do to change the world, right now, to a better ride. Take all that money we spend on weapons and defenses each year and instead spend it feeding and clothing and educating the poor of the world, which it would pay for many times over, not one human being excluded, and we could explore space, together, both inner and outer, forever, in peace.”

It’s very long, but I think it’s a very beautiful and well meaning piece of spoken word. Bill Hicks was a comedian-philosopher, and he was a very influential person in the formative years of my life from about 10 years old onwards. Definitely too young to be listening to Bill Hicks, but hey - his words really stuck with me and I think this quote is a very important one in my life.

I thought I could do something funny like this quote from Come Dine With Me:

Dear Lord, what a sad little life, Jane. You ruined my night, completely, so you could have the money, but I hope now you spend it on getting some lessons in grace and decorum because you have all the grace of a reversing dump truck without any tyres on.

But ultimately, I didn’t have faith that I would really be able to get excited about it!

I finally settled for this quote by Robert Sapolsky, a human behavioural biologist:

I am not worried if scientists go and explain everything. This is for a very simple reason: an impala sprinting across the Savannah can be reduced to biomechanics, and Bach can be reduced to counterpoint, yet that does not decrease one iota our ability to shiver as we experience impalas leaping or Bach thundering. We can only gain and grow with each discovery that there is structure underlying the most accessible levels of things that fill us with awe. But there is an even stronger reason why I am not afraid that scientists will inadvertently go and explain everything--it will never happen. While in certain realms, it may prove to be the case that science can explain anything, it will never explain everything. As should be obvious after all these pages, as part of the scientific process, for every question answered, a dozen newer ones are generated. And they are usually far more puzzling, more challenging than than the prior problems. This was stated wonderfully in a quote by a geneticist named Haldane earlier in the century: "Life is not only stranger than we imagine, it is stranger than we can imagine." We will never have our flames extinguished by knowledge. The purpose of science is not to cure us of our sense of mystery and wonder, but to constantly reinvent and reinvigorate it.

It’s very long, so I chose from it the most effecting and important sentences, and I was left with the following.

I am not worried if scientists go and explain everything. It will never happen. It will never explain everything. As part of the scientific process, for every question answered, a dozen newer ones are generated. And they are usually far more puzzling, more challenging than than the prior problems. Life is not only stranger than we imagine, it is stranger than we can imagine. We will never have our flames extinguished by knowledge. The purpose of science is not to cure us of our sense of mystery and wonder, but to constantly reinvent and reinvigorate it.

Robert Sapolsky lectures on human behaviour, taking information from many different scientific avenues, including biology, endocrinology, sociology, criminology, neuroscience, etc, to build a massive and complex picture of why it is humans behave the way we do, looking at our behaviour through multiple lenses and disciplines, and combining them in order to answer some of the biggest philosophical questions, including questions about free will, about love, about hatred and forgiveness and family.

He is one of the biggest influences on my outlook towards life and my trauma and mental health recovery, because not only are his teachings grounded in extremely interesting research and knowledge, but they are able to explain and open up discussions some of the most confusing and difficult parts of the human experience. Sex, love, violence, free will, tribalism, trauma, fear - Sapolsky tackles all of these terrifying and wonderful parts of our lives with such grace and poise and intelligence - his lectures have coloured my world with a newfound respect for myself and those around me.

He delivers this quote or similar at the end of one of his books and in his lecture series, to help clear up some of the biggest fears that people have of scientific knowledge, and it is a sentiment that I hold very dear to my heart. We should not fear advancement and knowledge. It can only enrich our lives, and a better understanding of myself as not just another person in society, but my very own series of complex and intricate biological mechanisms, has completely enriched my life.

I began by experimenting with very basic black and white type designs on Procreate on my iPad. I tend to jump straight into making before I do research, or much thinking at all, because it is often the case that I can come up with some very raw, messy, and interesting visual ideas. The first few attempts I have at a task like this can really inform where my project will go, what I would like to work on over the duration of the project, and what techniques will or won’t help me.

I often start projects in black and white because it is a very basic and simple building block foundation for the shapes in the work, and makes it so that more complex parts of a visual identity can be added later, giving me more time to think about colours and textures before going ahead with them.

I had fun warping text like this - it makes the writing mysterious and mostly illegible. It did not yet communicate effectively, however, and I had a talk with Sarah to better discuss where to go with this project.

Sarah told me to really think about WHO said the text, and WHY. To ask questions about WHAT I am trying to convey. How will I bring the message of the words to life? How can I use type to emphasise and better explain the language being spoken? How can I use typography as not just a fun image, but a visual tool to really hammer home the intent behind the words being spoken?

Sarah advised me to sketch out “how to quote acts”, how it moves and it feels. Also to question, how do I want people to react to this type?

With this higher level of specificity, I was able to think much more clearly about the task at hand. My plan now was to take certain important words from my quote, and do visual research surrounding them. To really give this project a microscopic view to begin with, I am going to focus on smaller fractions of the text, to begin to build up a catalogue of how those words really feel, act, and speak to a reader. I need to bring into question, how can I communicate better using type? How can I make somebody listen with my typography? How can I use my skillset as a designer to translate information into something visually consumable and interesting to look at?

Once I’ve done visual research and sketches focusing on the very zoomed in parts of this quote, I am going to try to visualise those in context of Sapolsky’s life and teachings. He started off his practice as a field scientist, living amongst primates, and studying their movements. He went on to combine this knowledge with laboratory work, studying hormones and neurodevelopment in rats and analysing other studies. He now, on top of all of this, lectures at Stanford, and has written multiple books on the subject of human and animal behaviour, for the casual reader and scientist alike.

How can I represent Sapolsky’s life with design? Can I start off the quote as rough and messy and dusty and animalistic, representing the time he spent amongst apes in the jungle - then developing it into something very neat, tidy and clinical like his lab studies are? Can I make 2 different designs to represent these, then overlay them? Use colours to represent the two different stages of his practice? Can I make this into a screenprint? A series of 2 or 3 posters?

Or could I make a typographic mural to go on the wall at Stanford or another institute of science? A series of posters? A small book or leaflet? An animation? Who am I aiming it at? Over the next few days I am going to collate visual research and express it as a series of typographic works.

#type and language #typography #agp500

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