i still think about the day
i read that poem out loud to the class.
the teacher said
choose a poem from this book
and read it
and put in emotion and bring it to life.
i chose a poem
the most beautiful of all
and waited impatiently for my turn.
expecting to be praised as always.
when i stood in front of the class
i was nervous, but i felt good.
the poem was long and i kept reading
the ball rang and i kept reading.
no one said anything, so i didn't stop.
when i finished, i wasn't aware of any mistake.
it was only when my teacher thanked me
that this feeling started to cave in:
thank you, you chose a lovely poem.
i left the classroom
and this feeling kept growing.
i did something wrong, of course.
replaying the situation in my head
i understood too late.
they didn't want me to read for that long
or i didn't read it well enough.
probably one because of the other.
and that's the worst part: not that i wasn't good
for once. but that i didn't get it.
that i kept going, thinking they liked me
unaware of the obvious cues.
no, that's not the worst part.
it was a good poem, they liked the poem in itself.
they just didn't like the way i read it -
i ruined a beautiful thing.
simply by touching it
simply by giving all that i was
because the truth is:
not that i wasn't good enough
it's that i'm something that will never be liked.
i still think about the day
i read that poem out loud to the class.
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Hello there 👋👀,
So I just found your blog and had a lot of fun scrolling through all the pjo show crit😂 I couldn't help but notice that one tag you left on a post where you said you had some beef with Annabeth's portrayal in the books 👀 Would you mind elaborating on that if you're comfortable with it🙈? Because I absolutely share that sentiment, but it's sooo veeeery rare that I see other people express anything like it... I've found that trying to be a part of the fandom can be pretty alienating most of the time, if you're not exactly the biggest most devoted Percabeth shipper...😅 And often any criticism leveled at Annabeth just gets you a smack with the "internalized-misogyny" hammer... it's even worse in the tv show now due to... obvious reasons...
Again just if you're comfortable with answering of course🙈 There is a reason I stayed on anon after all...😅😂
Really glad you asked because i finally get to ramble about this heheheh (going forward, know that i skimmed over The Last Olympian to have a clearer sense of what I meant because that's the book where Rick fumbles her character more than the others)
i'm gonna try to make as much sense as possible but short answer would be, she's underdeveloped. Long answer:
She really got on my nerves in the last two books, with the whole Rachel debacle and then the Battle of New York. I can't really remember a single moment in those books where she and Percy aren't bickering or having heated discussions, which really made me question their friendship status. Of course, it's not like friends can't fight and it obviously builds up the (romantic) tension between them, but it got unbearable at one point.
I understand she's a teenager in an incredibly stressful situation that didn't even get to have a normal upbringing- she grew up way too fast (run away at 7, head counselor at 12) while also not really maturing, which is not a problem for a character, if it is handled properly. Given the fact that I am writing this, Riordan did not.
On the surface, my biggest beef is that Annabeth is not exactly held accountable for her actions (ie. treating Rachel a bit like shit and going off on Percy for a bunch of stuff.) I know Percy is to blame a bit here: as far as we know, in TLO he basically cuts the greek world out of his life as much as he can as a coping mechanism. And while yes, he never apologizes either, he doesn't give her nearly half the hard time she gives him: always either giving him the cold shoulder (there must be at least one example of this in the entire series but i cant be bothered to look it up sorry) or starting an argument only to then storm off (see the "you're a coward, Percy Jackson!" scene, which is not the fairest example since she was confronting Percy about ignoring camp but also was a bit too harsh about it) (especially after finally reading the prophecy and being under the impression that he was absolutely going to die when he turned 16 lmao) or just straight up storming off (see, Annabeth reacting when Rachel shows up for the first time during the battle of new york). While most of these feel, at least to some degree, fairly justified given how the entire situation does an absolute number on her emotions, she comes off a bit brattish and like she's trying to rile Percy up, especially when it comes to Rachel, which in the context of a battle that could mean the destruction of the world.... Well, it reads as a bit childish to me, and i wouldn't exactly have that much of a problem with it if it was dealt with in some way (a two-way apology would be nice).
After that first impression, i realized that Annabeth is barely ever anything else other than a plot device (when relating to Luke) or a love interest (when relating to Percy). This might be because the books are on Percy's POV. Hell, on the third book he's even conflicted when Annabeth is considering joining the Hunters of Artemis, aka, when making a choice for herself would mean he loses her (which is fine and dandy but it feels like Percy is more upset about her choosing her own path rather than being sad about not seeing her as often); we really only get a few glimpses of her, as in, actually her when she's on her own.
Obviously it's impossible to talk about Annabeth without touching on percabeth, which also is, in my opinion, what hinders Annabeth's character the most. On paper they sound great. The guy whose fatal flaw is loyalty falls in love with a girl whose been let down by people over and over, and she decides to never give up on the boy whose always had people give up on him (can't find one of the million posts that talks about this right now but it always goes something like that) And yeah, the bickering is really well written! But that's literally as far as it ever goes: they don't ever seem to have fun together, because 8 times out of 10 the bickering ends up being passive aggressive, and mostly done by Annabeth. My biggest gripe about percabeth is that their friendship seems to be based off... shared trauma. Literally. Other than going on quests together we are given no examples of them hanging out, nor a reason why they would want to spend time together in the first place, not even a shared hobby. Yes, in the fourth book they had a movie "date" planned but of course they didn't even get to it, and surprise surprise, they had a minor discussion, and surprise surprise, Annabeth was passive aggressive again. It's hard to picture them having fun together when even the author doesn't write in any scenes in which they get along smoothly (and before you say anything, a scene in which they get along where neither of them is about to die, and they're not talking about previous adventures. Gets a bit hard then, doesn't it?) It's even harder to picture them as a couple when the moment she gets upset about something, she starts coming off as emotionally manipulative (see, again, literally any conversation with Rachel or about Rachel)
To be fair, the books are relatively short and don't allow many "filler" chapters, if you will; there's always something happening to keep the main plot or a minor plot point moving forward, but it's not like there is no room to develop the characters' relationships, especially when we're talking about the main char and what is essentially his endgame. As an example we have Percy and Clarisse, or Percy and Beckendorf. Their interactions are brief but still hold so much weight.
Worst of all, Annabeth could be one hell of a character; what's most interesting of all is how being a daughter of Athena she is still incredibly emotionally driven, which is displayed very clearly with her fatal flaw being pride: her telling the Sphynx that her questions were too easy was not smart nor strategic: it was completely impulsive. I seriously think she wasn't far from being the best character in the series had she been given more time.
I guess i have as much beef with Annabeth as i have with Rick for doing her dirty. I really could sum this up with: while her emotions are justified, she acts upon them quite poorly. And this is what i mean when i say she's underdeveloped, because it would've been nice to see her come to her senses a bit.
Would love to read anyone's opinions on her character though, feel free to comment, even (or especially) if you don't agree with me!
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awww i'm flattered! you think i'm worth your time to give anon hate! makes me feel special (by twice) 🥰
what do you hope to accomplish here, anon? like i'm just curious. me personally, i'm here to post things that i enjoy. and if our interests don't align, you can do this really simple thing called ✨ ignoring my content ✨ i would tell you to block me but i'll just make it easy and block you instead <3
arguably, sending this in response to a txt post is so laughable. have you not witnessed the gender of blue hour? do you also think yeonjun is wrong for enjoying wearing skirts??
also if you're going to hate on me,,, at least get it right lmao,,, transgender. no "-ed". and trans people ARE queer so idk what you're on about tbh!
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your tags about visiting with your exes are so funny and it sound like it might be so uncomfortable! I hope you will 1) share an advice about how did you contact them all and 2) write some x your boyfriend stories about it. I hope your visit is very nice! if you don't want to answer I hope you will know that it is very impressive and you are very brave!
it was very normal! we had an extremely normal time!! and even though things apparently did not work out with his girlfriend so he is currently single, there was no kissing, on the neck or otherwise!!! we only hugged once and it was a 100% normal hug. i know insisting upon the normality of this is making it sound like it was extremely weird and i'm just in denial about it, but i swear to you! THIS IS THE YEAR WE BECOME NORMAL!!!
unfortunately i have no advice for you because i didn't really do anything; in both cases the exes reached out to me. i guess the only thing i would say is that these relationships ended 13 and 5 years ago, and i was not ready to be friends with either of them until recently. part of that is just time creating distance between now and when we broke up, and part of it is that i have legit matured as a person as i've aged. so if there are any exes of yours that you'd like to be friends with but you don't feel capable of it currently, don't put pressure on yourself to be ready sooner than you're ready! if you can't do it now, that doesn't necessarily mean you'll never be able to do it. these things take time.
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OPINIONS ON DREAMS FACE????
uh
Kind of weird out of the blue because this isn't my mcyt blog but I also don't have anon one there sooooooo
yeah he's a dude. I don't know what to say? Like That Sure Is A Guy
Like he's not bad? He looks a lot younger than I was expecting tbh
i mean go for it if you think he's attractive or hot or whatever but for me he just looks wayyyyy too young for me yknow? i mean as a man liking man i see the appeal but asking people their opinions on a guy they dont know based on his face and internet persona feels kinda weird?
i mean the boarder between fans and mcyt people is kinda wobbly at the best of times
idk this is just a bit of weird subject?
honest opinion though when I think of the word "youtuber" thats the exact guy i'm seeing in my head. like yeah that sure is a guy who exists on youtube uh huh. make your silly little videos boy
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designs for my azem (with color!)
more info under the cut bc i ramble
their name is hestia! and they may have been an experiment for creation magicks early in life (looks lovingly at the raids for confirming my suspicions that creation magic could absolutely be misused on people). so their hair n eyes r supposed to be weird, their hair specifically supposed to give you the idea of fire-head [gender redacted], and their eyes are supposed to be iridescent as opposed to the usual glow ancients have. they would really rather everyone behaved normally about it and didnt bring it up though
they dont have any memories from before they were found abandoned as a child, and due to the amount of strange things wrong with them, venat/azem ended up taking them in as she investigated, which turned into an apprenticeship and then got them the position of azem. venat never found out where exactly they came from, but she is certain of is that someone did experiments on them and that they are much happier as her adoptee and azem than digging into their past.
they almost always glamour over their actual convocation mask with a regular one bc they dont want to intimidate anyone by being azem (emet-selch has long since given up on complaining about it). if they are in a place like elpis where they need their hood down and their mask off, they cover up their hair with a scarf and wear their mask anyways until they get told to take it off. its both because of how strange they look but also because their aether is warped in a way to draw in other people’s aether (which is mostly just annoying in that it makes people think they have a gravity to their presence). but the amount gets worse when they get people’s direct attention and dont get a chance to mitigate, and in some cases it ends badly because people have differing reactions to being drawn to them
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