#or take child development classes to ensure I’m a good stay at home mom and know what I’m doing

[guiltysecretpasttime]

Blended

I was (thankfully) given some time off during this holiday season; which I promptly used to spend time with the family and recharge at home. Also spent time watching various movies during this time and a little LoK story idea came from it.

In my usual writing preference – it’s still a Lin/Tenzin endgame story but – in sort of a modern setting AU, blended family/semi-highschool themed with ages differed a bit (Lin and Tenzin was aged down by around 5 years). Expect it to be tropey and may be a bit of a cliché. This is written on a whim so if it doesn’t make sense…ah well. Haha! May edit this piece later on…

I’m considering this to be a short story, just a little self-indulgent-written-for-fun type of thing. But if other people enjoy it too then that’s such an added bonus so I’m sharing it with you as well. 😊 Let me know what you think since this is somewhat different from my usual style, I guess.

Also – I have misgivings regarding creating OCs so I’m likely to lean on canon characters and take a lot of creative license in developing them for the story.

 ---

Title (tentative):  Blended

Legend of Korra, Lin/Tenzin, Modern AU, no bending

(Not sure if one-shot or will be multi-part yet)

 ---

Tenzin, Republic City Primary School

“Thank you for making time to meet today,” The silver-haired lady clasped her hands together on her desk. “I know you must have a packed schedule, but I think it would be good to have the check-in session for your daughter today.”

“Yes, of course – anything for my daughter.” The bald and bearded man threw a look at the door’s window, where he could see his daughter swinging her legs while seated at the corridor.

“Ikki is a bright child and she’s been doing her best to catch up with the class requirements. She excels the most at individual tasks.” The teacher continued to talk a little bit more about the projects that the students have been working on.

Teacher Yue handed the father a folder marked “Ikki”. Tenzin carefully picked it up and looked into the contents, smiling as he saw Ikki’s artworks and class outputs.

“However, I see that she seems to have challenges in adjusting in a large class set-up.” Yue shared. “It’s nothing to worry about though. We’ve had several transferees in the past as well and this is usual; I expect that might take a little bit longer since it’s a transition from homeschooling to a big school.”

Tenzin frowned and he hurt for his daughter. His two children had both been homeschooled until recently.

They also had to experience a lot of upheaval in the past year or so – from the divorce, to being uprooted from their childhood home, moving to a new city, and then going to a new school.

He did notice that while his son was as precocious as ever (maybe owing to his young age?), his daughter had become more subdued since their move.

“What can we do for her?”

“Well, we have a big sister-little sister type of mentorship program.” The teacher pushed forward a brochure and several index cards. “It’s mostly an afterschool interaction activity, we have here several students who have been volunteering. Maybe you’d like to ask Ikki to join?” She pointed at the index cards. “Feel free to select which mentor you think would help her best. We usually ask the parent or the student to select their preferred mentor profile from the roster. We would not want Ikki to feel uncomfortable; you’d know her best than any teacher.”

He nodded. After a few moments perusing the index cards and the brochure and pulled out one from the pile. “Let’s go with this girl.”

Tenzin pointed out to a profile labelled Jinora.

 ---

Jinora, Home

The ten-year old girl has just finished putting hair in a bun when she heard a knock on her bedroom door.

“Jinora!” It was her oldest brother. “Mom says I can use the car today – want to leave with us instead of riding the bus?”

“Sure!” She called back, quickly grabbing her backpack. “I’ll be down in a bit.”

“Alright!”

Smack!

“Hey! Why did you do that for?”

“Good morning bro!”

Jinora rolled her eyes good-naturedly. That was probably her other brother slapping the arm of the other one.

Even at eighteen and sixteen years old respectively, they tend to act like children occasionally to the consternation of their mother.

She hurried down, knowing that if she did not do so, there would be no pancakes left for her.

Jinora heard her mother’s gruff voice in the dining room. “Bolin! Leave some eggs for your sister!”

“But, Mom,” Bolin spoke through a mouthful of scrambled eggs. “I’m a growing boy. I need this stuff.”

“And Jinora is a growing girl,” Their mother drolly responded, taking a sip of her coffee after putting down the last batch of pancakes on the platter. “There should be enough from everyone.”

“It’s fine, Mom,” Jinora immediately sat down and her brother forked two pancakes to her plate. “Thanks, Mako.” She slathered butter all over the cakes then squeezed a load of maple syrup.

She ignored Bolin gagging at her left at the amount of sweetness. She also ignored her mother who was hiding a smile and shaking her head at seeing the display.

In their family, it was only Jinora had a penchant for sweets. Her mother said she likely took after her father in that regard.

Her father…her absentee father…

Jinora shook off her maudlin thoughts when she saw Pabu, Bolin’s pet guinea pig, land on her mother’s shoulder, probably hopping from her brother’s backpack which was hung behind his chair.

Pabu began chewing their mother’s greying hair without warning.

Wheek-wheek-wheek.

“BOLIN!”

“I’m so sorry, Mom! Pabu get down from there – leave mom’s hair alone!”

All in all, it was another morning in their household.

It was noisy and sometimes chaotic, but Jinora would not exchange it for the world.

 ---

Ikki, library

Truth be told, Ikki liked going to school. She even liked her teacher and classmates.

She liked to be busy and the activities were very interesting. Getting homeschooled and only seeing their tutor, nanny and Meelo had become very tedious anyway.

Staying at their old home also reminded her acutely that their mother was not there anymore. She did not understand what happened, but she tried to.

It has been more than a year since their parents sat her and her brother down to explain that they were separating but it did not mean they did not love her and Meelo any less.

At first, she thought it might have been her fault (or maybe Meelo’s fault for that matter, he did fart a lot and that annoyed her terribly). Her dad and mom were quick to quash those theories, however. They spoke of drifting apart, change in priorities and other grown-up things that she supposed she will understand when she gets older.

But for now, she supposed as she opened her notebook on one of the long tables in the library, they would need to get used to their new living arrangement.

It was difficult last year as they were shuttled to and from two households. It also did not help that their mother was starting out with her new venture had been spending less time at her home. On the other hand, Ikki noticed their father spending more time with them, cutting down his work hours. It all came to a head when Pema had said she will be moving to another country to establish her new business. And so, they ended up -.

“Hey, are you Ikki?”

Ikki looked up to see an older girl with dark brown hair in a bun.

She nodded her head yes.

The girl gave her a bright smile and extended her hand.

“I’m Jinora and welcome to Republic City!”

 ---

Lin, Future Industries Head Office

Lin tiredly wiped her glasses clean before putting them on again, rereading her email response for one last time before hitting send.

It had been a long yet productive day. Her team had managed to fulfill all the visual design requirements that were due that day. She reviewed the different files sent to the printers, making sure that the final and correct collaterals were attached.

Her last task was to ensure that the last set of proposals were on-brand and aligned with Future Industries’ visual identity. Once she had provided her comments and revisions needed on the file, she sat back as she waited for the files to be uploaded to their server.

She reached for her cellphone, wanting to check on her kids while waiting. She looked at their family group chat and read messages from the last time she sent one.

 Ohana (Lin repressed the urge to cringe. That was the final time that she would ask Bolin to create their group chat)

Lin: Kids – as mentioned earlier, I’ll be home a bit late. No need to drop by to fetch me; have dinner already and don’t wait up.

Jinora: Mom, I’ll be staying behind after class – I got a mentee! ☺ Mako Bolin can you wait up?

Mako: Jinora Bo has training today; I think we can wait for you.

Bolin: Jinora 👍🏼

Jinora: Mako Bolin thanks! 🙌

Jinora: Mako what will you be doing while waiting? You sure you’ll be okay?

Mako: Don’t worry about me. I’ll manage.

Lin scrolled through some more messages. Knowing her eldest, Mako would like skulk off to the library.

Jinora: I met my mentee this afternoon. She’s such a lovely girl.

Lin smiled at this. Her daughter had always been the polite one.

Jinora: Her name’s Ikki and she’s two years younger than me. She said she and her father had first checked out Patola Mountain Primary.

Lin frowned. Patola Primary was far; she went there as a child.

Mako: Kid didn’t like it there?

Jinora: They didn’t have the chance to know. They had to move besause of her father’s job.

Bolin: heeey sorry guys- just about to be done with training. Just gonna shower …unless I just shower at home?

Jinora: Ew, no Bo. Shower first please

Mako: Agree. You’ll stink up the car, bro.

Ding!

Lin drew her attention from her phone as her laptop screen indicated that the files have been uploaded. She hit the send button and packed up for the day.

She was looking forward to spending some quiet time with her kids tonight.

 ---

Bumi, White Lotus Headquarters

Bumi leaned back in his fully ergonomic chair, thinking about how times had changed.

Being in an office was something he balked at when he was younger. But now, after serving a long career in defense and military, he submitted his retirement and come to the aid of his younger brother.

Ah, his only brother – back in the day, he would be hard-pressed to keep contact with his brother.

His brother who took on the role of spearheading their family’s company back when their father died.

His brother who had the task of continuing to revive the company and making sure it keeps up with the times.

His brother, who, despite being the youngest, was tagged by the board of directors as the heir apparent owing to his excellent academic records.

His brother who Bumi had felt envious of at some point. He later on realized that his brother actually missed out on a lot of freedom in his life.

His brother who managed to keep their company part of the Top 100 and make malls relevant again.

His brother who probably made some life decisions for the benefit of their company rather than his own.

His brother who had been through hell and back the past year when he and his much younger wife called it quits. His brother whose ex-wife is now galivanting somewhere in the Fire Nation, expanding a business built on horticulture and floristry.

His brother who, despite making some decisions that Bumi might not agree with, is still family.

And if there was anything that their parents taught them – family is permanent.

The ex-military man took a deep breath, looking at their last family photo. For what it’s worth, he liked to think that their fragmented family had found its way back into each other in their adulthood.

Bumi had to admit that Tenzin did have remarkable business acumen that benefited their company, a conglomerate built on the mall industry. With the fourth industrial revolution at hand and the shift towards virtual and digital, the White Lotus Corporation had been challenged during the last years of their father’s life. Tenzin had worked hard to change the ways of working and the culture in the company.

To do it, he had to make sure that there is a buy-in from the board. Ironically, to bring the company to the current century, he had to abide with one of the most archaic practices – an arranged marriage, a marriage that would serve as a press release to the business world in general, that their company was stable and there to stay.

Bumi had been surprised to get a call from Tenzin back then. He had called to let him know of his impending engagement, seeking support. Bumi had cheered, given his congratulations – but named the wrong bride. He had launched into a long tirade, berating his brother for his choices. Tenzin had shouted back his defense.

He still did not understand why Tenzin acted the way he did. However, he could never regret his niece and nephew which came from this questionable business-like union.

Bloop-bloop-bloop.

Speaking of which…

“Hey Uncle Bumi!”

“Hello there, cloudchild!” Bumi greeted his niece with a nickname his sister Kya came up with, given that the kids were actually born somewhere near the mountains. “How’s the new school?”

“It’s great!” Ikki beamed at him and gushed into a long narrative of what she had been up to in the past days.

Bumi enjoyed video conferencing with his niece and nephew. Granted, Meelo had a short attention span but Ikki had always had the flair for storytelling.

It pleased him to see her spark back. He had heard from his brother and their trusted bodyguard/chauffeur Shung that Ikki had been withdrawn during the first weeks in Republic City. It saddened him to learn that the otherwise bubbly child had been affected in that way.

“…And then, I invited her over! Daddy said it was okay – and she’s sooooo nice. Didjaknow she also knows how to play the piano! We practiced a bit. She’s good even if her family didn’t have a piano, they only had this electronic keyboard but it’s so short. But she did well. She said she had a stepdad and it was totally okay. They’re a happy family. D’you think I’ll have a stepmom too? I think it would be okay if Daddy thinks so and maybe we’ll be a happy family here too and you know I joined this contest in school and I-.”

“Whoa, slow down, kiddo.” Bumi let out his booming laughter. “I didn’t quite catch it – what’s the name of your new friend?” He was heartened that Ikki seemed to have adjusted better now.

“Jinora!” His seven-year-old niece practically chirped the name. “She’s actually here!” Ikki turned to someone from beyond the view of the webcam. “Jin, it’s my Uncle Bumi – I want you to meet him!”

“Um, it’s fine, Ikki.” A calm voice of an older child can be heard. “I can wait here.”

“Nooonseeense.” Bumi could see Ikki pull something, rather someone to the camera. “Uncle Bumi, this is my friend Jinora. Jinora, my Uncle Bumi.” She said by way of introducing them.

Jinora gives a small wave and a soft hello.

Bumi gives them a short bow. “Nice to meet you, Jinora. It’s great to meet the friend of my favorite niece (Ikki ­please don’t tell Korra).”

Ikki gives a delighted clap and proceeds into another lengthy tale on what she and Jinora were working on that day at home.

Bumi smiles back at them, observing the children’s banter as they demonstrate the monologue that Ikki was preparing for. It was amusing.

Heh, they could be cousins.

He recalled when he was young, he, his siblings and even the sisters-who-must-not-be-named would stay over in one house after school to work on school projects. It had been one of the highlights of his childhood. He was glad that his niece would be somewhat experience it; he had been worried a few years back when Tenzin and Pema (primarily Pema) were very protective of their kids. It was to the point that they were both homeschooled and basically kept out of the public eye and the public itself.

It can’t be good for socialization. But what can he say? He didn’t have kids so he probably wouldn’t know what he was talking about, right?

He’s just fun ole Uncle Bumi.

Nonetheless, as he turned his attention back to the two girls, Bumi promised himself that he will always be there for his brother’s kids. It’s the least he could do as their godfather.

 ---

Mako, Republic City High

“I worry about Mom.” Mako picked at his dumplings during lunch time, a stark contrast to his brother who was eating a lot (“Coach said I needed to bulk up!”).

“Why? Has my dad been overworking her?” Asami slipped beside him at their usual lunch table. She brought out her packed lunch of pasta and a bottle of coconut water. “Just let me know and I can try to look into it.” She was, after all, interning at Future Industries in her spare time.

“Now that’s just powerplay.” The exchange student from Ba Sing Se High chortled, taking a sip of his sparkling water. “And that’s a no-no and Auntie will definitely get mad if she hears about that.”

“You would know about powerplay,” Bolin swallowed a mouthful of chicken, pointing his fork at the other boy. “Wasn’t that why you got the last slot in the elective you wanted to take this year?”

“Who? Me?” The other boy dramatically placed a hand on his chest, eyes widening. “You think, I Wu would stoop so low as to manipulate the results of the audition for the voice elective? Don’t you think I have enough talent to get into that class?”

Bolin just snorted into his food and Asami choked on her drink. Wu cracked a smile at their reactions.

“Again, Wu – don’t let Mom hear you call her Auntie.” Mako reiterated for the nth time in their friendship. “She hates it.”

“That’s why I do it.” Wu winked at them.

“Wait, Mako, what were you saying about Mom?” Bolin managed to ask in between bites of food. “Is something wrong? I mean, she’s a little bit run-down but she said it’s just because of the time of the year.” The last quarter of the year, after all, is usually the busiest.

“No, it’s just – well,” Mako sought words to explain it. “I’ll be leaving for college, you’ll be away for training, and okay, Jinora would be there but she’s in middle school now…” He trailed off. With Jinora’s aptitude and interests, Mako would not be surprised if she took on a lot of electives and extra-curricular activities. “Mom works too hard, you know?” He ended lamely.

“She has always looked out for us, but yeah,” A shadow passed over his brother’s face. “Ever since Pa passed away a few years back, she poured much of her energy to ensuring our welfare. She’s barely spent time for herself.”

Mako met Bolin’s now worried eyes.

The brothers knew that their mom had sacrificed a lot for them and Jinora.

When they first met Lin and one-year-old Jinora, she had already been under a lot of duress – taking care of a baby, leaving behind Jinora’s deadbeat dad, settling down in a new neighborhood and restarting a career. It had been two years later when she married their father San, who had been a sergeant at the city’s police station at the time.

And, Mako thought wearily, history has not been kind to Lin Beifong at all. While they did have four years (four wonderful years that Mako will treasure for the rest of his life), their fairytale-like family life came to an abrupt end.

San was involved in an armed bank robbery four years later and had not survived the gunshot wounds – leaving Lin behind with two boys at the brink of puberty and a young daughter.

Bolin and Jinora had been very confused at the time. Mako, already fifteen, had been expecting that he and Bolin would be forced into the system or sent off to their relatives in Ba Sing Se. He felt that Lin would not be in any way obligated to take him and his brother in; they were not blood relatives anyway. They were just stepchildren.

To his stunned astonishment, Lin did neither.  He recalled crying in Lin’s arms that night after his father’s funeral.

She had asked him, with a confused expression, why he was packing. Lin wept alongside him as she explained that Mako and Bolin are her sons and there was no way that she was sending them away.

Since then, Mako made sure to look after his mom the way she looked after them. The brothers’ protectiveness was soon well-known in their neighborhood.

Probably also why no one had expressed any type of interest towards Lin even years after…

Mako reflected that it might have been a good move on their part but now it might have been a little bit selfish.

He and Bolin would now need to rethink their strategy…

After all, their mom Lin deserves all the happiness in the world.

 ---

Tenzin, Republic City Primary School – Parking Lot

“Are you sure you’re not just using this as an excuse to have a sleepover?” Tenzin looked over at his daughter, a teasing grin out of place on his face.

“Of course not, Daddy.” Ikki replied indignantly, kicking pebbles as they waited at the parking lot.

“Why can’t you do the project at our house?” He was actually leaning towards allowing Ikki on her first ever sleepover/overnight but he wanted to hear from his daughter.

“We’ll need a big big printer, Daddy.” Ikki raised her arms to show him just how big. “We’ll need to print out my project and Jinora’s mommy has a big printer and lamin-lami-lamintor (“Laminating machine, dear?” Tenzin clarified.) because she frilancets (“Freelances?”).”

“Mmhhmm.” Tenzin looked across the school building, shifting Ikki’s overnight bag on his shoulder.

Ikki timidly approached him the other night, asking if she could spend Friday night and Saturday at her friend Jinora’s house. They had an output required of them of the big sister-little sister program. Tenzin was actually unclear as to what is the specific output that the girls had decided on but it did require a large-scale printer and a laminating machine.

Jinora attempted to explain to him what they were going to do during the last week that they were in his house but he felt out of his depth so he had nodded and let them work on what they needed to.

The father had met Jinora several times already in the past months so he knew the child was in earnest that their intent for the overnight activity would be mainly to finish a project. He also realized (well, Bumi made him realize) that Ikki was old enough for a sleepover (and Pema’s overprotectiveness would be to the detriment of their kids’ development). Additionally, he thought grimly, it would also keep Meelo from wreaking havoc on the work area of the girls.

Nonetheless, he took up Jinora’s mom’s offer to meet up for snacks before she takes the kids home. This would give him a chance to meet the mom, discuss some ground rules and as well thank the mom privately for letting Jinora help Ikki come out of her shell during her first months in Republic City Primary. Jinora did say that her pa and mom used to do the same before she spends the night over at her other friends – the parents meet up, share a small meal, get to know each other. Tenzin thought this was a good parenting tactic; it would definitely assuage his fears as well.

But now, said mom was late.

Jinora had hurried to them, dragging with her a large cartolina and illustration board. She explained that her mom’s work meeting overran and if it would be okay if she rode with them? Her mom will be meeting them at the local diner instead, so they don’t get caught up in traffic.

Tenzin could feel his impatience growing.

So far, this woman was not making a good impression on him.

How on earth she produced a lovely daughter like Jinora was beyond him.

 ---

Lin, Narook’s

Damn Sato, Lin ground her teeth as she finally parked her car into the last parking space in front of Narook’s. Of all the days for a meeting to go over time, it has to be today when she had explicitly asked to leave early to fetch her daughter.

Jinora had provided her enough context to know that making a good impression with Ikki’s dad was important to her daughter.

Lin heard that the dad was some big shot divorced corporate guy, who, she thought, was a bit paranoid about his kids’ safety.

Lin acted as an arts club moderator so she was regularly present at the Republic City High, which gave her chances to meet Ikki whenever she drops by the primary school to fetch Jinora.

The girl was a sweet child – energetic and delightful once she felt comfortable enough with you. It had come to her attention, in the short conversations with the kid, that she was not allowed to go out and play with other kids in their old neighborhood so she was very much excited to have a new friend outside of her class and her family.

When Jinora mentioned their culminating project and their dilemma on the timeline and materials, Lin suggested that they take the project home to work on.

The crestfallen expression of Ikki as she stated that her dad would not allow her pushed Lin to share that she’s willing to talk to the dad to help convince him to give his permission.

The infectious smile that burst on Ikki’s face was enough to convince Lin that she made the right decision.

Now, however, as she entered the diner, spotting her daughter at the corner booth, she froze and started to doubt all her life decisions that led to this moment.

Wondering and questioning the universe what had she done in her past life for her to deserve this.

Across Jinora, beside the talkative Ikki, sat Tenzin – her former boyfriend and Jinora’s father.

 ---

Note: Soooo hmmmmmm. What do you think?

#linzin #linzin fanfic #legend of korra #lin beifong #tenzin #jinora #ikki #mako #toccatina's fanfics #toccatina wip

[charlotteu]

⟨ SON CHAEYOUNG. CIS FEMALE. SHE/HER. ⟩ though the mist might prevent some from seeing it, CHARLOTTE TAM is actually a descendent of H E P H A E S T U S it’s still a question of whether or not the TWENTY TWO year old CIVIL ENGINEERING/BUSINESS MAJOR from SEOUL, SOUTH KOREA has taken after their godly parent completely, but the demigod is still known to be quite PRECISE & TENSE.

heyheyhey girls gays & they’s. my og’s remember charlotte and how deeply i love her also the looming promise that i’d bring her back. and here are we so ✌️ if any of you don’t know, i’m dakota, i’m nineteen (19), i live in cst, and i’m a part time barista along with a full time political science major. i’ll have some vague wanted connections at the bottom of this but my dm’s are always open both on here and on discord @ wet ass politics#6969

trigger warnings: death

full name & nicknames :

charlotte chunhwa tam / lottie & lola

major :

civil engineering & business

sexuality :

lesbian

gender idenitity / pronouns :

cis - female / she/her

age / birthday :

twenty - three, december tenth, nineteen - ninety - eight

zodiac :

sagittarius

personality :

charlotte is known to find literal scraps of anything and manage to make something gorgeous from it - whether it’s food, metal scraps, or a nearly - ruined picnic table - it’s a skill that she takes great pride in. she constantly tries to bring her loved ones together in one form or another, which results in quite a lot of last - minute plans and “family dinners.” because of these two traits, if someone just happened to forget to plan a birthday party or a baby shower and needed it thrown together within a day or two (maybe that is on her bucket list, maybe not,) charlotte is your perfect person. regardless of this, charlotte is still considered that friend that never has their life together and has an extensional crises every few weeks. family wise, their relationship with their siblings is something that they take very seriously. even the ones that give her stress acne are still very much able to feel the affection and love she’s has for her family. she constantly checks in on all of her siblings and regularly makes an effort to be as involved in their lives as possible.

when it comes to school work, charlotte is perfectly organized. a well - planned and well - filled out academic calendar is always in her backpack and she has a few dozen notifications on both her phone and her laptop to remind her of class assignments. she is well - known at the tutoring center for her near constant sessions to ensure to that she is totally, a hundred percent getting the assignment. her math classes is where she thrives, and she has a record of taking several math classes during the summertime to further her knowledge. charlotte’s known for the immense pride that she takes in her work along with the very long academia career that they wish to have.

myers - briggs, vice, & virtue :

entp, temperance, & distrusting

hobbies :

welding, drawing, sculpting/general crafting, trivia games, meditation, going into nature & finding animals, 

powers :

sensing faults in metal ores, technokenesis, and pyrokinesis. charlotte considers her technokenesis powers to be the stronger of her abilities now that she’s taken the time to work on it since her break. she uses it to help both students and professors on campus deal with their I.T issues and to make small devices to help her friends in their way to help with their daily life. she plans to use her sensing abilities to help with her career choice later on in life, so she continues to work on improving them to help later on. with honesty, she doesn’t use pyrokinesis beyond helping her forge things or as a cute party trick. they have very few plans to ever venture beyond the walls of a protected area ever again so her ability to control whatever flames she makes under pressure is virtually nonexistent.

backstory :

         tam chaewon, aged thirty, had just finished her blacksmith apprenticeship abroad in the netherlands when she decides to go to a bar to celebrate with some friends before trying to find a job when she’s approached by a man claiming to overhear her accomplishment. eager to talk about her future, the two of them end up talking for three hours about it along with the various paths open for her to take. maybe it’s the willingness to sit and listen to her or maybe it’s the legitimacy in his interest that drew her in, but the two ended up spending the night together; they spend only two days together before he leaves with an address for chaewon to write to him if it’s needed. and she does, approximately two months later when she learns she’s pregnant with a baby girl. he writes back nothing but an apology, money to help with the expenses, along with a separate letter to give to the child when she turned ten. 

(trigger warning in the paragraph: death specifically during child birth.)         fast forward through a tornado of eight months and chaewon is visiting her parents when charlotte was born prematurely in seoul, south korea in chaewon’s childhood bathroom. there’s a complication with both chaewon and charlotte shortly the birth and the paramedics sped through the streets to pick up the two, doing their best to keep the two of them alive during the ride. the woman’s family races behind them in the family car, barely able to find the room the two are in to see the nurses rush ahead of them. (no one can tell charlotte what the complication is, but her mom stays alive for an gruesome day and a half, straddling the border between life and death. she’s declared dead on december eleventh at 12:18 pm, 1998.) legend has it that silence ran through the waiting room that the family was in, an unearthly wail leaving charlotte’s grandmother as she realizes what she had to pay to receive her granddaughter. no one wants to touch the child, let alone raise her. their family is faced with a choice when they’re handed the death certificate of their daughter, the birth certificate of their granddaughter, and their granddaughter herself.

           her uncle is the one that ends up taking her in that day. the oldest sibling to her mother by six years, he had been an entrepreneur bachelor his entire life up until that point. so it’s whiplash, to say the least, to completely upheave his life in seoul and move to the small town of parga, greece to raise charlotte. the transition period between being a bachelor to a single father is hard, but he does his best to not give up on it. along side the lack of support from his family, it makes it all such a draining process. when she turns six, her uncle hires the first person to help the family: a highly recommended local nanny by the name of phoebe who would stay with the tam family until charlotte turned eighteen. it’s around this time that her uncle begins to drift away more, trying to keep his business on track, but he always comes back with an elaborate apology and an equally elaborate gift for charlotte to make up for the digression. 

          when she turns twelve, she starts to develop ... slightly unusual powers that always came as a shock but were immediately chalked up to scarily accurate guesses. it’s a fun party trick she uses at classroom gatherings, guessing where faults where in desks, trying to figure out what was wrong with technology, etc. and it didn’t go much beyond that for a very long time. it’s a rainy summer day when her uncle sits her down with a strange man who explains to the both of them that she’s a ... demigod. it takes a whole afternoon to convince charlotte of this fact while her uncle looks at her like a monster. she promptly declines any move to go to a camp (much to her uncle’s dismay) and the next six years of her life is promptly laid out. a life lived in a private plane, tucked away from the world to live out of a few suitcases and bought time from others.

          this quiet life sealed away from the outside world leaves her doing whatever she can to keep busy. building whatever she can, trying to stay as occupied as much as she can. it results in a suitcase full of little trinkets by the time she’s six months into home schooling. the next few years of her life pass her by in a terrible haze as she does everything she can to catch up to the life that has been set out for her. her life begins to slow down when she gets into college at the age of nineteen, where she finally finds a safe haven amongst people like her. however, at the beginning of 2020, charlotte finds herself catching deep feelings for one EILILDH GALBRAITH. a fiery, vibrant, and resistant spirit immediately draws charlotte into deep feelings for her. the relationship happens for several months before the relationship comes to an abrupt halt in the end of october. unable to come to terms with her first major breakup, charlotte cites a personal, family matter to switch to online classes before coming back to in person at the end of finals shortly before the evacuation. 

wanted connections :

DREAMLAND / a v simple plot with room for extreme nuance! someone that charlotte can help bounce ideas off of and vise versa. enable each other’s terrible ideas but do it with much love and a camera on hand at all times. ( 0/2 spots taken )

HIT DIFFERENT / some type of fun flirtatious relationship. maybe they’re just friends, maybe they’re party buddies (for the rare parties that she goes to,) or maybe they just happen to keep meeting. hopefully it’s very relaxed on both ends. ( 0/1 spots taken, must be afab )

ALWAYS GOLDEN / best friends, ride or die type shit. can we get some friend group for it tho because i always love a good group dynamic ( 0/5 spots taken )

I DIDN’T FALL / some kind of missed love, like those missed connections on craiglist. maybe the two of them grew close during charlotte’s time away from university or maybe they almost dated before charlotte was out, either way there’s still some mixed feelings of resentment for not making a move, the deathly “what if’s?”, and mayhaps some feelings that still linger. ( 0/1 spots taken, must be afab )

SPORTS / someone who helped navigate charlotte through her own experience of coming out and how that fits into her cultural identity along and her career field. i have a decent idea of her coming out process but i’m definitely flexible with it ( 0/1 spots taken )

#i said i'd make her kind of different and wow :) #euintro

[thelittlestcheshire]

Hello! I’m Katie, and this is my muse Ches. There’s like death/murder tws in this but honestly? I just did this in a quick fact kinda way so... nothing is really detailed.

Is that HAILEY CHESHIRE “CHES” ELSWOOD? Wow, they do look a lot like KATHERINE MCNAMARA. I hear SHE is a EIGHTEEN year old SENIOR who originally attended CARNIFEX Academy. Word is they are an ARISTOCRAT student. You should watch out because they can be IMPULSIVE and STUBBORN, but on the bright side they can also be LOYAL and CREATIVE. Ultimately, you’ll get to see it all for yourself.

♥ basics; Full Name: Hailey Cheshire “Ches” Elswood Age: 18 Birthday: July 19th Sexual Orientation: Biromantic bisexual Relationship Status: Single Occupation: Student Nationality: American [with French dual citizenship] Ches’s Car

♥ classes;

Anthropology

Shakespearean Studies

Linguistics

Latin

Music

Advanced Sociology

Advanced Psychology

Russian

World History

♥ extracurriculars;

National Honor Society

Theater Club (Actor)

Concert Band (Piano)

♥ background; Place of Birth: Paris, France Hometown: New York, New York Health Issues: Borderline Personality Disorder and PTSD Traumas: Watching her mother die (mugging gone wrong/shot to death)

♥ physical; Face Claim: Katherine McNamara Eye Color: Green Hair Color: Red Height: 5′3 ½” Weight: 115 lbs Tattoos, Birthmarks, Scars, etc: Mole above her belly button, a few moles on her thighs, freckles and face moles. (Face Ref 1, Face Ref 2,  Body Ref 1, Body Ref 2)

♥ relatives;

Father’s Full Name: Edward Valentine Elswood Father’s Status: Alive Father’s Occupation: CEO/Owner of a multi-billion dollar luxury goods conglomerate  (net worth of 50+ Billion in fact - in turn Elswood kids do NOT bat an eyelash at prices) Mother’s Full Name: Julia Andrieux Elswood Mother’s Status: Deceased [shot by a mugger on the twin’s 8th birthday] Siblings: 6 brothers and sisters (family page here) Elswood Children Oldest to Youngest:

Logan (23)

Jamie (21)

Emmett (19)

Jonah / Ches (TWINS)

Effie (13)

Ella (10)

♥ relationships; Ex-Significant Other(s): Probably a handful of people tbh, hit me up if you want this as a WC Reason for Separation: Stuff not working out, Ches getting bored before she got attached, so on - she’s a flirt tbh, it takes her wanting to get invested for her to stay Current Significant Other: N/A because she’s too busy sabotaging shit with Thomas

♥ misc;

Hobbies: playing piano, archery, singing, reading, and acting

Pinterest Board // Musings Tag // Playlist

Ches speaks English and French fluently, her mother was born and raised in Paris so she learnt them both at the same time

DO NOT CALL HER HAILEY unless you really want to end up on her shit list.

She’s the mom friend if your mom friend also goes “I HAVE THE BEST IDEA” and drags you into trouble. Literally, the one who frets over you and proceeds to get you into trouble.

This muse does what she wants, I just write it down I apologize always for her

Doesn’t really... seriously date too much because of past situations (Her older brother slept with the first person she truly loved) and she tries to avoid falling in love

That being said platonic I love yous are her shit, she loves her friends a LOT

Ches is very serious about her studying (and wanting to be among the best of the best because - this girl has Ivy league college dreams and she has no intents on fucking those up)

That being said if you get her away from her books she’s actually a lot of fun, she’s just like work first play later

She’s a bit of a closet nerd - if you look under her bed she has a chest of comic books, she’ll just lie if you ask her about them

Honestly, bios are my least favorite thing so if anyone has questions about Chessie just... toss them my way I’ll eagerly answer them.

♥ bio;

TWs: Gun Violence, Murder, Death, Blood, Abuse (Relationship), Cheating, Mental Illnesses

Growing up as an Elswood means two things, you have a lot of a sibling and a lot of money. Her parents had decided to raise their children in Manhattan, New York, where they could keep a close eye on their multi-billion dollar conglomerate. Her mother, Julia, would take them on trips constantly too - when she wanted to get the children away from the hustle and bustle of the city they’d go to their vacation home upstate, or their private island, or even to visit their family in Paris. At that point in life, Ches was happy. She had a solid group of friends, she had the best friend she could ever imagine having in the form of her twin brother, she had a loving and warm family, and she had a parent who would tell her no. 

When she thinks back to her life before the incident, it feels like a completely different story. A fairytale even, perfect and happy in every way compared to her life now. However, it wouldn’t last, after all, fairy tales didn’t exist and reality was a much crueler mistress. One could say Lin-Manuel Miranda described it best; “life doesn't discriminate between the sinners and the saints. It takes and it takes and it takes.”

Everything changed on her eighth birthday when her mother took her out shopping to get a present for twin brother Jonah at Palisades Mall. A man came up with a gun while they were in the parking lot and asked for all of their money. Julia Elswood compiled but she made one mistake, the simple utterance of “Cours, Ches” as she gave the man her purse.

Ches might have gotten out of the event alive, but not she was not unscathed. Julia Elswood was pronounced dead when medical finally arrived on the scene, her blood coating her daughter’s hands and clothing from Ches’s attempts to stop the bleeding. She might have survived the event without physical harm but she was never the same child she was before after that.

One day she had an intact family, the next day the Elswoods were in ruin. Her father completely shut himself out from the family, only coming out for birthdays and holidays. Her oldest brother stepped up as their parental figure, first starting out with homeschooling before he eventually dropped out to ensure his siblings was getting as much of his time as they possibly could. He tried his hardest to make the loss of their mother easier on the younger girls especially, given how young they were at the time. She helped him with the girls as much as she could (and over time she slowly started filling the role as their second parent). Because of how busy the younger Elswood children kept him, sometimes Logan didn’t have the time to comfort Ches when she woke up in the middle of the night, haunted by their mother.

That was when Emmett stepped in. It wasn’t uncommon for him to sleep on her floor so he’d be there when she woke up terrified out of her mind, and he was there when she just eventually stopped sleeping like people tended to. Over time she realized that Jonah and her weren’t truly two peas in a pod the way they used to be, that Emmett was the only Elswood who truly got her. He wasn’t perfectly normal either, his thoughts and feelings were flawed like hers. 

In a family that made her feel so broken at times, Emmett was a saving grace - a reminder she wasn’t alone.

He wasn’t the only reminder however, another one entered her life in the form of Asher Churchill when she was 11. He was on vacation in Paris while she was visiting her family when their paths crossed, they were fast friends and there was a point where she wished he would stay longer, a wish she felt guilty for after his family went through their own trauma. The experience only solidified her friendship with him, however - she likes to think that no matter what happens, she’ll always have Asher. He’s her ride or die, one of the few people who’s willing to put up with her all of her shit and want to keep her in their life. They even tried dating at one point, although that was fairly short-lived. She simply doesn’t love him like that.

It didn’t take her long to find someone she did love like that, however. Ches had thought she was fucked up before she met James, that she was at the worst point she ever could be. He showed her how mistaken she had been, even now she doesn’t like thinking about everything he had done to her. She doesn’t discuss everything he had put her through nor does she have any intentions on truly discussing the worst of the abuse she endured while dating him. Her past with James does have an effect on her, it made her terrified of truly falling in love with somebody again. 

James is also a massive reason why she doesn't get along with her brother Jamie, the two Elswood siblings never recovered from Jamie sleeping with Ches’s boyfriend. It causes a good deal of tension in the Elswood home but Ches can’t just forgive him, her brother never even apologized for his actions, she wasn’t going to pretend he didn’t hurt her because her father wanted them to get along for his own sake. They were on the rocks before this and afterward the tension just got a whole lot worse.

Perhaps the increasing tension was a factor in Ches deciding she wanted to attend Carnifex, the fact she knew Asher would be in attendance was another factor. (Although she plays dumb to the fact she actually knows he’s a Churchill, if he wanted to lie to everyone, she was going to play along - no matter how adorable she thinks the fact he actually believes she doesn’t know is.) It’s certainly a factor in why she stays, she gets very homesick at times - even after attending boarding school for her entire high school career. She misses her younger sisters, she missed Emmett and Camellia, and she misses her friends in the city. She also dislikes just how restricted she truly is when it comes to Instagram and trying to grow her influence while she attends Carnifex. Networking had to wait until she was home and sometimes she questions why she decided boarding school was a good idea.

And then Ches looks at her friends, at the education she’s receiving, and all the fond memories she’s developing. Carnifex, and now Luxor, was well worth the fear of missing out she feels. She’s happy in Lake George, and she has no intention of leaving the area before she graduates.

Please note, Asher is mentioned a lot. He belonged to an ex-member who is no longer here. I may write him out later but for now, keep that in mind.

TLDR / quick important notes recap for rereads:

Ches’s mother was murdered on her 8th birthday in front of her

She was raised by her oldest brother, Logan, and is NOT close to her father really. She also helped raise her younger sisters and is very protective of them.

The Elswood she is closest to is Emmett, Jonah and her grew apart after her mother’s death.

Ches’s first real love was James, they dated (entire)Freshman-(mid)Sophomore years, it was abusive (much more than Ches will ever discuss unless she gets majorly close to someone and they HAVE to know (cough still hasn’t happened though cough)) and Ches is now terrified of falling in love again. Her messy as fuck relationships & exes all start after this point.

#luxorintro #death tw #murder tw #for her mommy #now this is posted from my drafts I'm gonna let myself eat this Kinder Egg I've been eyeballing for hours

[iamnotmylabel]

Kaylani. Jacksonville, FL

Thinking back, I was a good child, yet I never felt like it. I was adopted. Growing up I never suspected what was happening wasn't normal. I spent my life living two lives. In the first life I was the upbeat, interesting, active,  young lady who  always tried her hardest to keep everybody happy. The second life I spent being my father’s sex doll. The first occasion when it happens I felt anxious and I didn't recognize what was going on however by age 8 it had turned into an everyday routine for me. I set out not tell anybody or my family will go to pieces. It did exactly that. Much the same as he said it would. Almost as if he had practiced it and knew his lines and what activities took after mine. We used to call it "Our secret to the grave". Swimming in an inn pool never again was a young lady in her floaties, it was daddy playing "games" where I jumped around, so individuals thought it was a water fight. I clearly remember being in the pool, fake smiling, secretly hoping someone would state something or bump into us. I was his puppet and he was pulling the strings. Nobody at any point said or did anything. It continued for a long time. Each memory I have is appended to him. Swimming pools, inn, my folk’s washroom, his chair, my folks room, my child covers. individuals' homes. It didn't make a difference where he did it since I was only a child … and he knew I was not going to tell. I had officially lost one family, I couldn't take it in the event that I lost another. Examinations we're done because of another sibling reporting it. I can still feel the cold pole between my legs as I simply lay there in light of the fact that I was used to it by now. The specialist cleared every one of us and said nobody was penetrated, thus I was never removed from the house. I stayed in the house and he kept on foundling, groping, penetrating and scaring me. In the fifth grade I wrote a story in a blue notebook that I accidently left on my trampoline about a girl my age getting pregnant by their father and one of his companions. I was scolded for it, yet nobody inquired as to why somebody my age would recognize what all of that was. I trusted some place in a little corner of my brain that somebody would help me to despite the fact that I couldn't discuss it. I would compose stories relating to my trauma. At the same time my mother was mean and scornful. She has dependably had a temper. I searched for the positive qualities in her at that age all I thought about was having a family… a family who adored me. She selected each imperfection I had and even the ones I didn't understand we're there. My mother and I we're close at a certain point. They chose they needed to move to Florida. It was the most noticeably bad day of my life when they called me in the family room to disclose to me that. It's really the first occasion when I attempted to hurt myself. I broke open a red glass shoe piggy bank and just before I did it my best friend took it from my hands. You see, my best friend was my safe haven. Every time I had anything happen I would run to her house and pretend like my life didn't exist there.  We lived in the same neighborhood. I thank god I met her consistently. My father knew I was so close to her. It's nothing unexpected I was wreck when we moved. She got the opportunity to return with me for a bit. When she had to leave my entire world felt like it had fell apart. I missed her so much and that implied my father would have been ready to get me at whenever he needed. My alarm clock in the morning was his hands shoved down my pants. I even set out to wake up early and leave before he got up, yet I understood that regardless of how early I got up, he would always beat me to the punch no matter what. That is why I knew he had won.. he crushed me. I never again cried at his crackly old hands touching my shoulders and I simply laid there for him. The light in my eyes went out long before I tried to end my own life. 

 I hated middle school, however I made friends who made everything worth the while, and this magnificent man who I now call my husband. At some point not long after my middle school years possibly my first year of high school my father was deemed incompetent and was put in a 24 hour hospital. I developed an eating disorder and I was put into treatment for the sexual abuse and my toxic relationship with my mother. Presently, I know the common theme is currently "dear, that is still your mother" however what do you do when your parents are your bully? The most poisonous one? Do you attempt to satisfy her? You can't, you'll fail just as I did simply because no matter what you do, nothing will be good enough in those eyes.  My high school years we're the darkest times of my life. I missed my homecoming tenth grade year since it was imagined that I would hang myself in the restrooms. So, my better half came over and made his own homecoming with me. Recently, I got my drivers permit, something I never thought I'd be alive to accomplish. I have been called every name in the book, had my words turned, and left in the breeze to dwindle. Where I soon discovered refuge in the lord and my friend’s mother's. I was baker acted several times because of PTSD, depression and psychosis. The specialists actually had too force my mom to leave the room as a result of how unsupportive and furious she was at me for letting it be known that it was not the first time I tried to end my life. She said I was a coward. She said I was pathetic and I'm an attention seeker.  I needed her to be there so badly. She was uncapable of it. The first occasion when I ate my first meal was fish and veggies, she stirred up some dust about how I needed to eat something other than that as opposed to being glad that I was taking my dietary problem by its horns, she scolded me, left the facility and left me crying my first night admitted. My eating disorder issue only continued to get worse. My family came over and I was pulling up my size elevens and my mom said "KAYLANI! With a colossal grin. “Whatever you are doing, keep it up. You look so great. you look amazing". You knew how awful I was doing, but it was all just a joke to you, and I actually couldn't comprehend what you just said to me. I can remember the urge I had to cut every time we made eye contact, I figure that wouldn't trouble you considering you we're the person who gave me the blade back after I had taken it from your sewing drawer and I'll always remember what you said too me " Here. just make sure you don't get blood in the house." I ran to the bathroom.  I gazed back at a young lady I couldn't recognize any longer. I was admitted for cutting every last trace of my body I could find. She had no clue why I would have done that. I remained in Georgia for two weeks where I had a psychotic break. The only person I was aloud to speak to be my mother. She made it clear she wishes she would have never baker acted me, so I would do what needs to be done as of now since somebody who is suicidal is going to do it any ways and if you can’t, then you’re an attention seeker. I got back home, I was sent away once more, it was rehashed endeavors of "fix" me. While I was in those places I learned a lot about myself and the people around me. In high school everyone dependably asked where I was, and we said I was on vacation. I lost a great deal of friends at that time, yet I kept the genuine ones since they are still here to this very day. At long last when I was 17 I was placed in a recovery center out in Miami.  I was crushed to go. It was my saving grace. I got out on my 18 birthday. Nothing had changed, the moment I got in the car the ridicules began again. I don't call her mother any more however for this, I will. I would tell you “I am all better” now, however I'm most certainly not. I am getting better day by day. My entire family dropped me like I never existed, with the exception of my wonderful sister. She never left my side and constantly checked on me. I left home at 18 and I have never returned. I attempted to make it work, I tried to imagine nothing happen, I even at one-point thought things had changed yet I understood that was only a fable since it was only a cover the whole time. I never realized the amount of hold someone can have on a person’s soul. I'm always asked if I know what I did to my family, however no one at any point asked me what it has done to me. I know I will never hear anything nice come from your mouth, and I've come to acknowledgment that I'm okay with that. Don't you dare take credit for the way you raised me or how I turned out. I did that on my own, once again.  You said I would be a “knocked up, drop out”. I graduated with my class with diligent work. One of the greatest days of my life that you we’re once again, absent for. I walked across that stage standing tall without a sound, a hoot or holler. I did it for me. Unfortunately, when I cleared out home at 18 I walked directly into a fire of more toxic people. It’s like I had a magnet for toxic people to latch too.

 In 2016 my life partner' turned out to be sick. I thought I lost him forever. He was the person who pulled me through the greater part of this, now it was my opportunity to help him. I spent the following 4-5 months on hospital floor ensuring he was alright. I turned into his full-time nurse. He endured strokes, meningitis and brain damage. We we’re crushed by it, yet he was so strong, and I was his inspiration to walk once more. He now walks, a few complications however he buckles down each day and we are working hard. I don’t hear from my brother; however, I know why, and I trust one day he comprehends I did what I needed to do to survive. 

 I became homeless last year and a very beautiful person I know took me in. The taught me what love really felt like. The unconditional kind. I am now 22 years old as of yesterday and I am loving life learning to appreciate the ups and downs. I no longer have to open the shower curtain to check if I’m being watched, flashbacks are always triggered. Yelling will send me straight into a panic attack, I still hear the critical voice that was hammered into my head, but I fight them full force every day, I still jump if you touch me unexpectedly, but I don’t cry as much. I would like to tell you I’m “all better” but the things is that with mental illness, it doesn’t go away, you just find better ways to manage and cope with it. 

 I’m excited to start a new journey in my life. I am KayLani, my diagnosis is PTSD, and schizoaffective, and I’m not a monster. I take one day at a time and treasure the hard days and the good days, because in the end it’s not about what happens to us, it’s about what we allow it to shape us into. 

 Break The silence. 

  The next time that someone makes you feel small, remember you are as tall as you allow yourself too to be. It’s ok too let them go. It’s okay too hurt, cry and scream just as long as you pick up your baggage and keep moving when you’re done. My story is not over. It has just begun.

#imnotmylabel

#PTSD #Schizoaffective Disorder

[maychorian]

hey! i was wondering if you have any voltron angsty lance-centric fic recommendations? aside from your own amazing ones ofc

Mmkay, so I’m what I’m doing here is going through my fic rec tag and just copy-pasting stories where Lance suffers. Some are angst, some are hurt/comfort, some are epic stories where the angst and hurt/comfort might be more of a side dish than a main course. The word count on most of the WIPs is no longer accurate, and some are complete, but I am too lazy to edit. This is taking long enough as it is. But yeah, you asked for it, you’re getting it. Langst recs, maychorian style. Warning: This is long. If you press the read more, be prepared to scroll.

Trembling Lips by nonna Words:  14,001 (WIP, but only one chapter to go)Author’s Summary: Lance is an emotional person who cries easily (and does the trembly-lip thing a lot) but tries to stay strong in front of the team.ORFive times Lance stopped himself from crying in front of his teammates, and the one time he couldn’t hold it back.My Comments: The BEST gen Lance-angst I have found yet. It is so good. The fourth chapter almost made me cry and I think I read it five times. I just…kept going back. I am DYING for the last chapter, omg, join me in waiting for it. Lance’s characterization is great, and Shiro is trying so hard, and everyone’s making mistakes but they don’t mean to. It’s absolutely marvelous and you should read it.

Collateral baggage by Zan_scrawlingWords:  718 Author’s Summary:  Lance can’t sleep; Coran is up and able to listen. My Comments: TOO SHORT but very sweet little character study. I’m such a sucker for Coran being serious and comforting for all these tiny, tiny smol children who have ended up in his castle, for real. I read this fic early on in my fandom experience with Voltron, too, so it, uh, might have influenced me.

I’m not the Lance You think I am by KairaKara101Words:  36,200 (WIP)Author’s Summary:  Lance isn’t human. Not that the team would know, he likes to keep that little fact a secret because he’s not sure if they’d treat him the same. That they’d be as welcoming as his family is. How in the world did he go from fighting in space to living on Earth acting like a class clown to fighting in space again?My Comments: I haven’t finished reading even what’s available yet but I’m reccing it anyway because it’s FANTASTIC. Lance as an alien crash-landing on Earth and immediately being adopted by an enormous, loving Hispanic family is absolute joy, and I’m just getting into the chapters where he joins Garrison and meets Hunk and the others. It’s just…really fun, and Lance is adorable and SO sweet with his new family and siblings. I love it, great stuff, I wish it was 200k words and I am honestly glad that it’s a WIP because I want more and I want to watch it grow up healthy and strong.

Burning by Tiger1Words:  11,457 (WIP)Author’s Summary:  The aftermath of their escape from Zarkon led to serious consequences for each member of the team, but at least they were all still alive - still together. Lance, however….well, let’s just say Lance didn’t get by totally unscathed. My Comments: As soon as the notification for my subscription on this lands in my email, I drop everything to read it. It’s a little more simple of a story, maybe, but it has everything I like. I would also like this one to be much, much longer, and also finished so I can read it at once.

Hunk and Lance’s Excellent Adventures by kiaella_vWords:  4,883 (WIP)Author’s Summary: Hunk and Lance being buddies.Chapter 5: Breathe.Or; Hunk and Lance Best Friendy Fluff..now feature Angst.My Comments: The CUTEST Hunk and Lance on AO3, golly, I love them so much. The first three chapters were just pure fluffy sunshine, then the author brought in the pain, and I am breathless for more. (Apparently going to be Klance eventually, but the focus is Hunk and Lance friendship.)

my head is dizzy now by asexualreyWords:  3,871Author’s Summary:  Allura had better get there soon. He doesn’t want to be responsible for Lance dying just because he’s completely useless. My Comments: Lance gets suddenly sick on a planet and Keith has to take care of him and Keith is AWKWARD and he is SCARED and it’s really NICE. Klance but can be read as gen.

My Youth Is Yours by MilkTeaMikuWords:  29,840 Author’s Summary: An unforseen blast in the middle of a battle de-ages Lance into a child for a week. Keith does not understand babies.My Comments: I am a HUGE sucker for deaged fics, and oh look, it’s Lance! What an adorable wee child! But also there is angst and heartache and pain and the Galra, and Keith is confused, but also drawn, and everyone is sweet and helpful, and Hunk and Shiro will be amazing parents someday if they live past this war, I swear. But yeah, well-written, super cute, baby Lance. Klance endgame, but mostly it’s about how cute tiny Lance is.

Tight Spaces by Emerald_AshesWords: 2,716 Author’s Summary: Set after “Crystal Venom”, the castle is slowly being brought back into working order after the corruption in the ship’s systems. Coran has a training exercise planned to serve as a test that is supposed to be simple, and easy. But with Lance things are never easy, although this time it’s really not his fault. My Comments: Mmm, yeah, Lance having a panic attack. This is really well-written and heart-wrenching, and everyone is very supportive in the end. I may have read this more than once. Or twice.

Waiting Room by GemmaRoseWords:  3,033 Author’s Summary:  When a fight ends badly, Hunk is hurt and needs more medical attention than a cryo-pod can provide. Luckily for the paladins, they’re close to home. My Comments: Really lovely future fic in which the paladins have been fighting together for over a year. Told from Lance’s POV as he fights to get Hunk medical attention, then has to wait for news with the others. The author does a great job of making everyone feel a little older, and a little harder, and a whole lot closer. I want a lot more. This could go 20k+, easy.

Just Static by Jessadilla (wobblyarms)Words: 73,144 (WIP, one chapter to go)Author’s Summary: –Static—–iro, Hunk, Kei—, nybody? I’m—–static—-I’m sorry guys. This is all my—-static–cc—–I found my coordinates. They’re—stttcc–guys. I hear something—–scccc–end transmission- Alone on a hostile planet, transmissions aren’t getting through. How did it come to this?My Comments: Another really good Lance-focused hurt/comfort fic. Everyone is well-written and characterized, though Keith and Lance get most of the screentime. Starts with the self-doubt and ends with Lance stranded on a planet with a very cool and interesting new enemy to deal with while everyone fights to save him. Epic H/C, and Klance.

Seeing Red by SagitarrowWords: 4,360 Author’s Summary: There’s a constant throbbing in his spine, like someone royally pissed at him is taking a hammer to it. It radiates through his whole body, every inch is pulsating and Lance can’t even remember what it was like to be pain free. Or: Lance falls down a hole. The rest of the team freaks out.My Comments: What it says on the box! Lance is hurt and the others rescue him. The descriptions are really sharp and visceral, and Lance’s self-doubt rears its ugly head again, but for the most part it’s a fairly simple hurt/comfort fic. And I LOVE that. Klance if you squint.

Counterclock by riverbanksWords: 3,273 Author’s Summary: Post Crystal Venom -Later, there’s a shift, and Hunk notices long before Lance is aware of himself. My Comments: Can be read as Hance or gen. So as you may have noticed, I’m a huge sucker for Lance with PTSD. This is a really lovely exploration of it based on canon, with a tremendously loving and wise Hunk. And the lions, too! Both Blue and Yellow are very important in this fic. Beautiful and touching.

ghost of a king by ashinan Words: 16,878 (WIP, but only one chapter to go)Author’s Summary: During a routine recon mission turned ambush, Lance and Blue must take drastic measures to ensure their survival. The aftermath leaves Lance lost and dreaming, and the team helpless to the possibility that, without a guide, he won’t make it back. My Comments: Klance, but everyone is equally important. This is one of the most gorgeous fics I’ve ever read, bar none, let alone in this fandom. The space battle in the first chapter is absolutely thrilling, as well as visceral and terrifying. The descriptions of the abstract space Lance falls into are stunningly beautiful, and the team’s desperate struggle to get him back is heart-wrenching. And Blue! Blue is AMAZING in this fic! She and Lance have conversations and go back and forth on who is in control at any one moment, a complete partnership much more developed than anything we saw in the show. It’s beautiful and I love it to death. Can’t wait for the conclusion.

Aid by HaurvatatWords: 8,362 (WIP)Author’s Summary: Frankly, the only person on Team Voltron with their shit relatively together is Hunk. Lance tries so hard, but… he can’t help but feel there’s a reason he never gets too far with that one, and maybe not 100% of it is Keith’s fault. All it takes is one battle, one accident, one mistake, and one secret to make it all rise to the surface. My Comments: Really, really good and interesting take on Lance in this one, different than I’ve seen anywhere else, but still perfectly in-character. It feels entirely realistic, and all of the characters are themselves, including sometimes being jerks to each other. But my favorite aspect of this fic is the relationship between Lance and his lion. The blue lion is so SASSY in this story. And she and Lance are incredibly close and good friends. I love it and can’t wait to see where it goes.

weak link by asexualreyWords: 6,249 Author’s Summary: The one thing he always wants when he doesn’t feel well is his mom, and she’s…god knows how far away she is. She probably thinks he’s dead. In this moment, he almost wishes he was.My Comments: I am so BLESSED to be in a fandom that loves writing hurt/comfort featuring my favorite character, like for real. Yeah, Lance is horribly, horribly sick, and he wants his mom, and he tries to hide his weakness from the others. It does not go well. This one made me feel a lot. I’ve read it several times. Klance.

He Sleeps in the Sky of Ice by jadencrossWords:  16,043 (WIP, 8/16)Author’s Summary: It’s been three months since the plan to rescue Allura, and Team Voltron has finally found each other again. Well, almost. A certain blue paladin didn’t meet up with who he was supposed to. And now, the whole team has to figure out why. He wouldn’t just abandon them. Would he?My Comments: This is a great action/adventure type fic where the whole team is searching for a missing Lance. The peril is really intriguing, and the world-building is cool and interesting. The emotions are also very sharp and well-characterized. I’m very excited for every single update. I really want to know what happened, and I want them to find Lance, and I want him to be safe and okay.

 Necessary by always_a_slut_for_hcWords: 22,026 Author’s Summary: Keith screws up, Lance is captured, and the blue light of Voltron is dimmed. Who are you really, Lance? And what do you need?My Comments: Yep, it’s another fic where Lance is tortured, rescued, and recovers. I like these fics, what can I say. This is well-written and complete, so if you’re a sicko like me, check it out. Klance, but everyone is important.

Long Distance by Emerald_AshesWords: 1,565 Author’s Summary: Some nights you just wanted to call home, and know that everything was going to be okay. My Comments: Pidge and Lance! And Hunk as mom friend! But yeah, poor Pidge and Lance are both homesick and tired and they just want their families. I’m glad they have each other, though. The ending made me achy and happy.

Prison Bonds by GriffinRoseWords: 18,295 Author’s Summary: Keith and Lance are captured and stuck in a cell together, but it’s not the Galra. They almost wish it was. These Cordalians feed off of emotions, and their favorite emotion is sadness. Worse, they’ve found a way to make their victims relive their worst memories to make that pain fresh again, and Keith has a lot of terrible memories he’d rather not relive. My Comments: SO GOOD. SO MUCH PLATONIC CUDDLING. Lance and Keith are both suffering horribly, and all they can do is comfort each other and wait for rescue. I’m so happy that it’s gen, too. And it’s finished! Run, don’t walk. It’s so great.

your claws in me by burlesquecomposerWords: 41,766 (WIP)Author’s Summary: “Oh trust me. When I’m done with you, I won’t be able to stop laughing,” Lance says lowly, and his lips curl farther, and there’s something wild in his stare, and it hits Keith suddenly. This isn’t Lance.Lance falls under the control of Zarkon’s Druids, and although his friends manage to get him back, nothing is quite the same. Maybe the Galra succeeded after all. Maybe the Galra merely wanted to tear Team Voltron apart from the inside.My Comments: Tagged as Klance, but so far it reads platonic. Really, really amazing story with Lance fighting brainwashing and everyone struggling to save him, trust him, return him to normal. Everyone has an important role, though there’s an emphasis on Keith. I really liked this one. It’s tense and heartbreaking at times, but it also has moments of great beauty.

Fake It by WashiPuppyWords: 8,994 Author’s Summary: Without the presence of other people to drown them out, the thoughts inside his head were getting too loud. Loud enough to drive him from his room in a desperate attempt to escape his own stupid head for long enough to sleep. It was too loud in there, and too honest. He needed to be around people, otherwise he was just left with…Just himself, and the agitated, twitching feeling of his own skin. A tale in which Lance and the Blue Lion have a one-sided conversation, Hunk is a Lance Whisperer, Pidge notices lots of things, Keith gets the wrong end of the stick, and Shiro gets a new nickname.My Comments: It is a known fact of Voltron fanfic that an insecure Lance requires a wise, comforting Hunk. This should be chiseled in stone somewhere. It practically already is. But yeah, I love this. Some snark and humor in there, too, and the characters feel like themselves.

Space Is Cold by borrowedphrasesWords: 1,152 Author’s Summary: Lance is a pain in the butt, but Hunk loves him and worries about him anyway. My Comments: Hance. Cute, sweet, adorable, loving Hance. My sweet summer boys. Just the way I like them.

Simple by APendingThought for MilkTeaMikuWords: 1,363 Author’s Summary: Keith has babysitting duty for baby!Lance tonight. Six hours into the mission, he calls for backup. My Comments: Hey, look, more deaged!Lance! Wow, I’m predictable. I’ve previously recced the fic this one is based on, and this addition is very sweet and lovely.

Welcome Home by RenaRooWords: 1,253 Author’s Summary: Lance figures they’re lucky that homesickness isn’t contagious. My Comments: LANCE AND PIDGE! I’m so glad to find more fics with these two being kind to each other. The characterization is great, with Lance trying to shrug things off with humor at first, then showing his real emotions to someone he trusts. I want so much more with these two.

Bundle in Blankets by KnightNuraStarWords: 23,173 (WIP)Author’s Summary: The wormhole did more damage to Blue and Lance than anyone could imagine.Lance is vulnerable and Blue makes a deal.Lance faces different challenges ahead. “What the fuck.” “PIDGE LITTLE EARS!” “I AIN’T LITTLE JACKASS!” “LANCE!”“HE STARTED!” “I DON’T CARE WHO STARTED IT! I’M ENDING IT!”My Comments: This one, ah, it’s a little bit of a guilty pleasure for me, but gah, I do enjoy it. Lance is deaged and stuck on a hostile planet, and there’s only one way that Blue can make sure he survives: Make a deal with Sendak. I know, right? But the author makes it work. Things get worse, and worse, especially when the rest of the crew finally finds them, and it’s super dramatic, but the emotions really work for me. Give it a shot if you like deaged!Lance and hurt/comfort and sympathetic Galra.

Coming Undone by Emerald_AshesWords: 2,409 (WIP) Author’s Summary: A mission quickly transforms into an ambush. Outnumbered, and without the immediate assistance of their Lions, the paladins retreat. However, Lance is captured. And when he is eventually rescued, the circumstances of his capture raise more questions than answers. Things only continue to get worse as Lance now has to deal with the aftermath of being prisoner to the Galra, and they try to figure out why the trap was staged in the first place. My Comments: HEY LOOK, one of my favorite Voltron gen writers is doing a multi-chap fic! I’m SUPER excited. Go subscribe!

Nightmares by TrashnessWords: 14,864 Author’s Summary: Lance’s nightmares are getting out of control. It’s effecting his and the team’s performance, but he’s at a loss for how to fix this. Apparently sleeping next to a warm body helps.My Comments: Klance, but it’s so FLUFFY and full of such nice hurt/comfort that I have to rec it. I just really like Lance being cuddled when he’s sad and scared, okay. I really like it.

Vulnerable by nerdyketones Words:  7,850 Author’s Summary: Each paladin gets their own chapter describing a time when they were vulnerable, and when their teammates and team supported them and helped them through their hardship.Pidge-IllnessKeith-AnxietyHunk-GuiltLance- LonelinessShiro- Pressure/PTSDMy Comments: THESE ARE ALL SO GOOD. All of the children deserve comfort, and they get it. Allura helps too!

Damsel in Distress by birdzillaWords: 6,269 Author’s Summary: Somehow Lance always finds himself in trouble. Fortunately, his friends are always there to get him out of it. My Comments: This is so CUTE. The space crew has figured out that Lance has terrible luck and walks headfirst into danger too much due to his friendly and trusting nature, and they take steps to protect him. It’s very subtly and gently done, until the end, when it isn’t anymore. So good. Give me all the Lance Protection Squad fics, please.

Let The Water Lead Us Home by LynnLarshWords: 12,972 Author’s Summary: He’d just wanted a glimpse. It was stupid and childish and selfish, but he’d just wanted one more look out on the ocean, one more peek in the window of his family home, just in case they never made it back to Earth. Just in case he never got another chance.But this wasn’t the Holo-Deck from Star Trek. And this broken simulator tube wasn’t going to be able to do any of that for him, now was it? A.K.A - Lance finds himself stuck in a simulation and Keith is determined to get him out.My Comments: Hey, look, it’s two of my biases in a well-written Klance fic. Please protect Lance and let him see his family again someday, please.

He’ll Be Fine by babitty for everyone who loves some good angstWords: 7,471 Author’s Summary: In which Hunk gets hurt, and Lance has no one to steady him. “Lance’s face burned, and he could hardly see through the blood and sweat dripping into his eyes. His arms burned from supporting Hunk and carrying his bayard. His legs burned from running and his lungs were fire in his chest, pure adrenaline coursing through his entire body. It was the only thing keeping him upright.”My Comments: As always, I am down for an exploration of Hunk and Lance and their relationship, mmm yes, and this is a good one. Poor Lance is so frantic about Hunk getting hurt, and he really needs his team to reassure him that everything will be okay, even though it’s hard to believe. Warm and fuzzy to the max, with bonus big brother Shiro just being as sweet as can be with a distraught Lance.

All That Matters by CamsthiSkyWords: 637 Author’s Summary: Keith talks Lance down from a panic attack. My Comments: Short but sweet! I would read Keith (or Hunk, or Shiro, or anyone) talking Lance down from a panic attack all day long.

I’m Trying to Reach You by WashiPuppyWords: 22,109 Author’s Summary: The mind is a tenacious thing. Once it grabs hold of a thought, a memory, or a problem, it can be hard to convince it to let go.Pidge has her drive to find her family, though right now she has these communication codes that could help her do that. Shiro has his past, though right now he has his a lion asking him for help and teammates who won’t tell him what’s going on in their heads. Lance has his doubts. And Keith… Well, he’s convinced that Hunk is some kind of Sex God who has slept with both Shiro and Lance. Now, how to prove that? Meanwhile, Hunk is just doing his best to look out for everyone. It’s like herding cats.My Comments: This is a sequel to a fic I recced in the past, and you should probably read the whole series for context if you haven’t yet, but this is SO good that I had to tell you about this one specifically. Lance has convinced himself that he’s replaceable, unnecessary, and Keith has gotten a misunderstanding from things seen out of context, but mostly this is about how much Blue loves her paladin and will do anything to prove that to him. The ending made me cry.

The (Not So) Still Of The Night by Sandyclaws68Words: 3,532 Author’s Summary: A few nights in such close quarters taught all of them a lot of things about their team mates.My Comments: Technical problems with their living quarters force the paladins to all sleep together in a little tiny room, and bonding ensues. They all irritate each other, they all help each other, they all comfort and cuddle and learn about each other. It’s beautiful in every way.

Rough Landings by SilfrvargWords: 2,079 Author’s Summary: In which Lance is having a bad day, and Keith is there to help however he can. My Comments: Aw, Lance. Sometimes everything just kind of falls apart at once and overwhelms you, even when you’re a Hero of the Universe. I loved Keith just doing absolutely everything he could to help Lance get through it.

It’s Only Allergies! Swear! by carefulrenWords: 2,621 Author’s Summary: Lance starts his week off with an innocent case of the sniffles that he believes to be allergies. Despite growing worse as the week progresses, he wants to believe that it’s still allergies. It’s not.My Comments: It’s a Lance sickfic. Of course I like it. I’m not even embarrassed anymore. Well, maybe a little bit. But I’m still reccing this.

Open Water by NeyieaWords: 1,398 Author’s Summary: Lance misses the smell of salt and the crunch of sand and the untameable waves. My Comments: I love Lance and Coran interaction almost as much as I love Lance and Hunk interaction, and this fic gave me BOTH. It’s short but incredibly gorgeous, heartachey and sweet and satisfying. It hits the spot.

Beautiful Minds by PotatoBenderWords: 16,247 (WIP)Author’s Summary: Lance used to be proud of his mental abilities. A pilot. A Paladin. Someone experienced with delving and controlling his mind. But after being captured, and enduring just a single encounter with Haggar, his castle was reduced to rubble. Rescuing Lance was the easy part - healing him is much, much harder.My Comments: This is my favorite kind of torture-and-rescue fic, where you kind of gloss over the actual torture and get straight to the rescue and healing and recovery. That’s what I like. I really like this. I’ll be reading each update as soon as it shows up in my email.

Empty Shell Inside Of Me by infiniterhapsody, vagrantBreathWords: 7,180 (WIP)Author’s Summary: After a mission, Lance is acting strange. Spacing out, taking a while to respond to everyone. After a mission, Lance is locked away deep within Galra territory, at the hands of a Galra commander only wanting two things: information and his terror. Wait, what?My Comments: This one is especially heartrending because you get two Lances for the price of one, and they are BOTH scared and hurting and in need of help and gah, I’m so on edge about this story. The chapters are short but they’re updating quickly, which is good. I need them.

All The Stars In The Universe by jamwritesWords: 7,045 Author’s Summary: After being rescued from capture by the Galra Empire, Lance isn’t the same. He’s silent. Reserved. Broken. But Keith won’t accept this; every night, he comes to talk to Lance. Every night, he attempts to fix what is broken, and tonight may be his last chance. My Comments: Mm, yeah, hurt/comfort, this is the good stuff. THE GOOD STUFF. I was really touched by Keith’s tenacity and Lance’s courage, after all he’d been through, to still reach out the only way he could. Klance.

A Million Stars Apart by SerenePhenixWords: 8,217 (WIP 2/?)Summary: Lance usually could deal with a lot of things: being whisked away by a sentient alien ship together with friends, his hero and a rival, becoming part of an intergalatic war he had never known was even taking place, getting separated and reuniting with the closest thing he had to family in space…Yeah, it was not nice but he could take it.—–After surviving another incident with a malfunctioning wormhole, Lance finds himself in a position that might push him to his very limits. There are a lot of things he is unsure of but he knows with certainty that he does not wish to fail Allura or Coran in their quest to save the home they’ve lost. My Comments: This is such a fascinating concept. After a wormhole malfunction, Lance finds himself having dreams of an apparent alternate universe where he’s Allura’s sick younger brother. (BTW, yes, I am a big fan of AUs where Allura is Lance’s mom or big sister. Love ‘em.) Trouble is, he’s not getting any rest during these dreams, so he’s getting exhausted in his regular life. Seeing as I have written over 100k about exhausted Lance getting pushed to his breaking point and beyond, you can imagine how I feel about this fic. I am a fan.

Ablaze by waywardflowerWords: 5,297 Summary: He can’t burden them like this. He’ll be good, he’ll be fine by himself and he just has to show them that and they’ll leave him. Lance wants their attention, craves it, needs it to survive with his stupid omega body, but he can’t stand the thought of needing it. … Lance goes into heat.My Comments: Platonic omegaverse fic! Whoda thunk. Insecure Lance gets taken for a ride by his body, and it takes concentrated effort from everyone else to keep him safe. Some of the speeches at the end felt deeply personal and heartfelt. This fic made me ache, but I liked it.

This House Unfinished by boyghostsWords: 30,776 Author’s Summary: “Concept,” Lance said, his voice heavy and gutted with the ache of it; he caught Keith’s gaze and smiled wide, for show. “The war’s over. We’re back home. All the things we love in one place.” Lance keeps losing the things he’s built. Then there’s Keith.My Comments: Klance. This is a gorgeous fic. The writing is so descriptive and emotional, and I just adore Pidge and Hunk and everyone doing what they can to help Lance with his homesickness. The relationship with Keith feels natural, too, but the author did manage to kind of rip my heart out near the end, so. I’m gonna need some more, okay?

Feeling Blue by SkarmoreeWords: 8,940 Author’s Summary: Lance was the class clown back in school. His crooked grin full of gaps often brought a smile to his friend’s faces. Seeing everyone else smile made him happy. Lance was the shameless flirt in the Garrison. It made the girls laugh at his failed attempts, and the boys chuckle at his ridiculousness.He didn’t mind being turned down, because everyone ended up happy.Lance was the blue paladin. It was his duty as a member of Voltron to keep the universe happy. But sometimes, just sometimes -Lance couldn’t bring himself to smileMy Comments: Another fanfic trope I’m weak to: that one guy who always supports everyone else eventually not being able to do it anymore, having a breakdown, an injury, whatever, and everyone else rallies around to offer support in return. This fic does it well.

Trial by Ordeal by To Be or Not to- Oh forget it (Mikki)Words: 89,187 Author’s Summary: They’re supposed to be two sides of the same coin, or something like that. The truth is a bit more complicated. (Character study of Keith and Lance)My Comments: This is long, but absolutely worth the effort. Warning for depictions of abuse in both parts, but it’s treated realistically and respectfully. There were parts in Keith’s chapter that I had to stop reading for a while and do something else, and pretty much everything in Lance’s chapter made me ache for him and the family he left behind. But it’s really, really good. Amazingly well-written and deep and lifelike, and it all makes so much sense, for both of these characters. I’ll be thinking about this one for a long, long time.

Home by kencatWords: 1,138 Author’s Summary: Lance just misses home. My Comments: BEAUTIFUL Hunk and Lance interaction. I love them both so much.

Winter High, Winter Low by carefulrenWord Count: 3,362 Author’s Summary: Lance and Keith both live in the same shitty apartment complex. With a massive blizzard roaring outside and no power, Keith has to take care of an incredibly sick Lance. My Comments: Klance. Modern AU sickfic, and it hits the spot.

Long Distance by JennypenWord Count: 1,004 Author’s Summary: Someone gets the Christmas present they need. My Comments: Gah, I just love it when the others help Lance with his homesickness.

Just Ask for Help by genericfanaticWord Count: 1,787 Author’s Summary: Lance is having a problem with what should be an easy task. Shiro talks him down from his frustration My Comments: It’s sweet and simple and comforting, and kind, wise Shiro is the best.

Hold me close. by sevansaWord Count: 3,705 Author’s Summary: Lance’s heat is approaching… he has never felt so alone before. My Comments: Turns out I have a weird affinity for platonic omegaverse fics. Who woulda thought. I always hated the concept, but when it’s done like this, I don’t know. The idea of team-as-family is just ramped up to a hundred, and with some of the pack suffering biological needs that require special attention… I dunno. I like it. This is quite an id fic for me. It feeds something. I read it twice.

Restless by BanjiWord Count: 1,899 Author’s Summary: [X-posted on FF.net] Lance tries to find comfort in one of his friend after another night of bad dreams and worries. Keith is probably not the best choice. My Comments: It is fluffy and I approve. Keith tries, even when he’s out of his depth.

Road Trip to End Times by VelkynKarmaWord Count: 1,604 (the next chapter has the langst)Author’s Summary: The outbreak is at its peak, and the country is in ruins. But there’s still hope: Safe Haven, the colony on the West Coast. Reach it, and you’ll find safety and a chance to rebuild a new life in this zombie-controlled world. If you reach it, that is. But Shiro doesn’t intend to give up on trying. Not when he’s got four teenagers desperate to find their families again under his protection.My Comments: The author has been posting ficlets from this sort of tongue-in-cheek AU on tumblr, and they are all AWESOME. I will happily read them again on AO3. My favorite was the one where Shiro saves Lance from bandits, but that one isn’t on AO3 yet. But here’s Lance in his typical role as Best Morale Officer Ever, even in the middle of the zombie apocalypse.

The Empty Spaces Between the Stars by sliveredWord Count: 5,329 Author’s Summary: Talking was a far cry better than grunting, even if Keith’s voice did sound like… Feces, was it? Strange those human phrases that Lance had been trying to explain to him and Allura. But it didn’t sound good, was the point.*Five times Coran takes care of the Paladins.My Comments: This is super sweet and good and Coran is the best and I would like him to take care of me, too.

strength of the small by nowweareunstoppableWords: 12,736 Author’s Summary: A false distress signal lands the paladins in a tough situation. It falls to Pidge to earn their freedom, and it doesn’t come without a dangerous cost. My Comments: This fic is AMAZING. Pidge is an absolute badass, smart and strong and extremely well-characterized. The frantic run afterward to get her to help was intense and wrenching, too. And Lance was especially wonderful. You can feel his desperation, how deeply he loves Pidge and needs her to be okay, because she’s his little sister now and he CANNOT lose his family. Ahhh, I loved this one to bits. Highly recommended.

boredom is cruel and unusual punishment by babittyWords: 3,183 Author’s Summary: 3000 words of Lance getting the shit beat out of him, because i needed to get some angst out of my system. it’s not very graphic but injuries are listed and batons are used. My Comments: This is an old-fashioned whump fic, where the point is very much Lance (and Keith to a lesser extent) getting beat up. But there’s a lot of courage and tenacity on display here, and they do very much feel like themselves. An enjoyable fic, if you’re in the mood for hurt with not a lot of comfort.

all alone, all together by seulesWords: 1,516 Author’s Summary: This is bigger than anything he ever imagined. Lance knows the world’s balls deep shitty, so it’s not much of a stretch for the universe to take a crap and coat itself in it, only in a much larger scale. But it’s different when you’re told that the universe as you know it is about to be completely taken over by a tyrannical, fascist madman (surprise, surprise) and Obi-Lance Kenobi, you’re 1/5 of the universe’s only hope! My Comments: Aww, Lance and Allura bonding! I’m astounded that mine is the only comment on this fic. Please read it and encourage the writer.

Piece of Goo by genericfanaticWords: 1,207 Author’s Summary: Lance is sad and eats terrible food. My Comments: This is an excellent portrayal of depression and UGH I just want to give Lance a hug.

Infection by 5557Words: 73,271 Author’s Summary: While exploring an alien planet, Lance is nearly killed by a mysterious monster. Now he’s convinced that he is infected with an alien sickness. Why doesn’t anyone believe him? It must be Keith’s fault. This is a horror-comedy (but like, also a romance?), and I drew pictures.My Comments: Here, have some epic Klance hurt/comfort. It’s really well done. 

the currents you create by theoddoodisnudeWords: 18,501 Author’s Summary: Some days, he woke up even more tired than he’d been when he’d gone to sleep, and willing his body to go through the motions was just—tough. Like wading through thigh-high water or running on soft sand that gave under the soles of his feet. My Comments: Here’s my obligatory Klance hurt/comfort for the week. I think there’s always one. Anyway, this one is very good. Very realistic depiction of depression, and I liked how supportive everyone was, and how hard Lance tried to deal with everything even when he just wanted to give up. Also some wonderful Hunk and Lance and team bonding in there.

But a Scratch by manunulatWords: 1,052 Author’s Summary: This is a brief vignette set after s2ep2. Some things can’t be fixed by healing pods. My Comments: Would you like some Hunk and Lance being funny, loving bros, with just a touch of angst? I always like it. I like this one, too.

#voltron legendary defender #fic rec #he my babu #hurt/comfort #Anonymous #there are sixty fics #i counted #so with twenty weekly rec lists that's an average of three fics where lance suffers each week #sounds about right

[peacefulheartfarm]

The Tradition of Mother's Day

Happy Mother’s Day and welcome to all the new listeners and a shout out to all of the veteran homestead-loving regulars who stop by the FarmCast every week. I appreciate you all so much. There is a ton of stuff going on at the homestead right now and I’m so excited to share it with you. As Mother’s Day is quickly approaching that’s what I’m going to focus on this week. It’s a particularly important topic for me and I’m going to get a little more personal this week and share the mistakes I made regarding motherhood that changed my life forever. I hope that it helps someone else out there make easier life choices.

Today’s Show

Homestead Life Updates

The Tradition of Mothering

Mom’s Chocolate Pie Recipe

Homestead Life Updates

Animals and creamery

I’m going to make this short because I have a lot to say and share about motherhood for the FarmCast. The creamery is steadily progressing. Lambert, the bottle-fed lamb, appears to be doing very well and will live to a ripe age.

Farmer’s Market

This weekend we start the summer season. You will find me at the Wytheville Farmer’s Market every Saturday from 8am to 12pm. In addition to our grass-fed meats, I am offering celery starts. I have quite a few more, but they went fast last week. It’s a unique vegetable start that you don’t often find at a farmer’s market.

My herdshare program is finally defined. I just need to get the paperwork done. I’ll be offering yogurt samples at the market. Stop by and taste the tradition of yogurt made from grass-fed cow’s milk.

We’ve added to our cow herd. A jersey heifer made her way to our farm in the last few days. She will be giving birth soon and provide us with lots of yogurt and certified A2A2 milk for our herdshare participants during milking season. During winter market the herdshare will provide aged cheese and butter. Catch up with me at the market and I’ll give you the details. If you’re coming from south of us, you will probably want to stop by the farm instead. Our farm store hours are Tuesday’s from 10am to 12noon and Saturday afternoons from 3pm to 5pm.

The Tradition of Mothering

Since the beginning of time, Motherhood has been the bedrock of human existence and survival. Without mothers of children, the next generation simply would not have existed.

History of Mother’s Day including traditions observed around the world

The Mothering Mistakes That Altered My Life Forever

Why are Mothers So Important there is a Day Set Aside Just for Them?

How has Mothering Evolved – What Has It Evolved into?

How Can We Bring Back the Value of Being a Mother to Generations Convinced it is Not What They Want?

History of Mother’s Day

While the Mother’s Day that we celebrate on the second Sunday in May is a fairly recent development, the basic idea of honoring women as mothers goes back as far as ancient mythology and the Greco-Roman civilizations.

The Greeks paid annual homage to Cybele (pronounced sibilee, the mother figure of their gods, and the Romans dedicated an annual spring festival to the mother of their gods.

Traditions Around the World

India: 10-Day Festival

Each October, Hindus honor Durga, the goddess of mothers, during the 10-day festival known as Durga Puja. The celebration is thought to date back to the sixteenth century and is considered both a religious ceremony and a time for family reunions. One story tells of Durga returning to her parents’ home to show off her own children. Families spend weeks preparing food, gathering gifts, and decorating their homes for the festival.

Japan: The Right Flowers

Following World War II, a version of Mother’s Day grew popular as a way of comforting mothers who had lost sons to the war. You’ll see carnations presented during this holiday. The carnations symbolize the sweetness and endurance of motherhood in Japanese culture.

Ethiopia: Sing Along!

The Antrosht festival, which comes after the rains stop in early fall, is dedicated to moms. After the weather clears for good, family members from all over flock to their homes for a large meal and celebration. Daughters traditionally bring vegetables and cheese, while sons supply meat. Together, they prepare a meat hash and sing and perform dances that tell stories of family heroes.

United Kingdom: Mothering Sunday

England and Ireland observed the mid-Lent holiday and honored and decorated their “Mother Church,” the church where they were baptized. The church eventually extended the observation to honor all mothers. The English called this Mothering Sunday and, in the 1700's they observed it by taking a break from the fasting and penitence of Lent and having a family feast.  

France: Medals For Mom

In 1920, the government of France began awarding medals to mothers of large families in gratitude for helping rebuild the population after so many lives were lost in World War I. After the second World War, the government declared the last Sunday in May to be the Day of Mothers. The traditional gift is now a flower-shaped cake.

USA: Mother’s Day

The idea of celebrating Mother’s Day in the US was first conceptualized by Julia Ward Howe (famous lyricist of “The Battle Hymn of the Republic”).  In 1870, Julia Ward Howe wrote the “Mother’s Day Proclamation”. Julia Howe was distressed over what she saw as the unnecessary deaths of young men during the Civil War. She called upon mothers to come together and protest the senselessness of “sons killing the sons of other Mothers”, and to unite and celebrate an international Mother’s Day that would celebrate both peace and motherhood. She originally proposed converting July 4th into Mother’s Day as a way to dedicate the nation’s anniversary to peace. By 1873, eighteen North American cities observed the new Mother’s Day holiday.  However, Howe was the principal financier of these celebrations, and as she stopped contributing, many cities and states ceased observing the holiday. The idea for a day set aside to honor Mother’s lost momentum until the early 1900s.  

When Anna Reeves Jarvis died on May 5, 1905, her daughter Anna Jarvis was determined to honor her. She asked the minister at her church in West Virginia to give a sermon in her mother's memory. She began writing to congressmen, asking them to set aside a day to honor mothers. In 1910, the governor of West Virginia proclaimed the second Sunday in May as Mother's Day and in 1914 the bill passed in Congress.  President Woodrow Wilson signed the bill, declaring the second Sunday in May as Mother’s Day - forever establishing Mother’s Day as an official holiday in the U.S.

These are only a few. There are many other celebrations around the world all honoring motherhood and the glorious gift of mothering.

The Mistakes That Altered My Life Forever

When I was a child, all I wanted was to be a wife and mother when I grew up. I wanted to have a wonderful loving and attentive husband and lots of children. This was my dream life.

I was raised by a good Catholic turned Episcopalian mother. She instilled in me the virtues of loving one man, raising children with purpose and serving the community at large via volunteering. She grew much of our food. She made our clothes. She insisted all six of us were at least exposed to the sophistication and culture of music and dance. We were required to take one year of music and dance. I had two brothers that continued with music. I continued with both music and dance for many, many years.

My point here is that my mother took her job seriously. She educated herself in whatever she needed to in order to develop our character. Her basis for determination was based on her understanding of what a citizen contributing to society would need. I vividly remember her dedication to us. Often, we did not like what she required of us. But there was no doubt why she did it as she was repeating her reasons often. The vision she had of her role as our mother was crystal clear. Unfortunately, mine was never sharply defined.

As I described earlier, I wanted this great husband and lots of kids. That’s it. That was the extent of my vision. I do remember her telling me what I needed to do in order to ensure those things happened, but for whatever reason, they did not stick. And she was unaware that they did not stick or I believe she would have done something about it. She followed her playbook and expected a good result.

She constantly encouraged me to go to college. I was very good in school and loved learning. Shoving me toward college was one of her biggest mistakes, though I do not think I could have ever convinced her of that. I certainly had the brain for it and might have done well had I stayed on the straight and narrow path for which I was shaped.

It was the modern mantra. Your kids had to go to college. This was back when a college education meant something. It was a mark of your intelligence and potential for success beyond the middle class. My first 4 years would have been dedicated to expanding on what she began with a broad base of knowledge in English literature, foreign languages, world history, art appreciation and culture and so on. And then I would move on to focusing on a particular area of expertise where I could have a career if I chose. This was her vision. But the 60’s arrived.

I grew up in the 60’s as the 2nd wave of feminism took off. It was all about free love and peace and women burning their bras and getting out of the prison of housewifery and childrearing. We would use our brains for more than those simple tasks. Well, I still wanted to be a wife and mother even in the midst of all that. I was still following my ideal script. Then I became a teenager.

In the late 60’s things began to change more dramatically. There was civil unrest all over. After 12 years of a stable household in the same town, we moved a few miles away, then we moved from Michigan to Florida, then we moved to Georgia. My parents were going through some trials in their relationship and this was very bad timing for me. And I think for my older brothers as well. The foundation we were raised on was shaken and we all found out how weak and fragile it was. I still can’t put my finger on why it was weak. My memories of my childhood upbringing tell me I was secure and safe. And then all of a sudden things changed and I did not adapt well to that change.

I’m getting too far off the beaten path here. The bottom line is that I made choices that were in direct opposition to what I was taught as a Christian. No sex before marriage. Choose a “good man” who would support me and with whom I would live forever. Divorce was not an option. And then the little aside that my mother threw in there was “go to college because you never know what will happen”.  And then “No Fault Divorce” came around.

My dream life was forever altered because I got pregnant at 17, had my first child 10 days before I turned 18 and my second a month before I turned 19. I had married a man with no concept of hard work and determination and building a better life for his family. He had no real concept of the responsibility of being a father. Well, that being said, I had only vague concepts of what it really meant to be a wife and mother. I could see that my mother was doing it very well but I did not really understand what I needed to do. And after my superb fall from grace with my mother and especially my father by becoming pregnant out of wedlock, I was too ashamed to asked for their advice. Would I have taken it? I certainly hadn’t taken it so far. Who knows? This is all so far in the past. 

The “no fault divorce” option made it easy for me to make yet another life-altering decision that put my vision and dream of what it would be like to be a wife and mother even farther from my fingertips. It slipped away in the space of 3 years. By the time I was 20, that dream was dead. I was a divorced mother of two. The idyllic dream of living happily ever after with the man of my dreams and a dozen children surrounding us with their gales of laughter was dead. My life became one of simply surviving.

I know that popular rhetoric is that divorce is not an issue, but I beg to differ. Not only was my deepest heart-felt dream shattered, but the lives of my children were irreparably altered because of my poor choices. No child ever wants their parents to be divorced. Every child wants safety and stability. They want the original bond with their mother and father to be there forever – not simply on weekends and two weeks in the summer.

I can see your comments flowing into this post already. But Melanie, everyone makes bad choices sometimes. And I agree with that. But the choice of a mate and the choice to have children are the two most important decisions a woman can make. You mess either one of those up and your life will never be what you imagined. And with the focus today on women having careers, they are even less likely than I to make informed, educated, carefully thought-out decisions regarding their choice of a life partner. Their idea of building a family revolves around their own ability to make money rather than finding the man dedicated to providing the resources necessary.

And before everyone jumps in there and says that it requires two incomes, let me just jump ahead of you and say that is a myth. It depends on what physical circumstances you require. How large will your house be? How many cars will you have? How attached are you to designer labels? And are you willing to be the principal provider of food from a garden or must it be purchased? There are many choices that can be made. Unfortunately, so many of our choices today are based on what everybody else is doing rather than what our heart is telling us. I get it. It’s hard to go against the current and swim upstream. But I contend that the rewards are worth the effort.

Being a dedicated mother to the next generation is the most important job in the world. It requires your full attention. It requires much more than an hour in the morning while rushing your children off to the school bus and a couple of hours in the evening having let God knows who have charge of their precious minds for the other 9 or 10 hours of daylight. In order to be the best mother, you need to choose a mate that will provide financial security for you and your children. It means making your career “household manager in chief”. You are a partner in a small business where you manage and someone else brings the required finances. You are dependent on someone else to bring you the resources you need to make that happen for your children. That takes a great deal of self-respect and trust in yourself. Those just may be the most important missing pieces of character that led me down the wrong fork in the road.

Mothers So Important there is a Day Set Aside Just for Them

Mothers hold the future of civilization in their hands – or should I say in their wombs. Since the dawn of time, it is mothers who have born the children, cared for them, fed them, nurtured them, educated them and ensured that the genetic line would continue. Those that had the most children, did the best job of protecting them, and were able to provide sufficient nourishment, clothing and shelter ensured the continuation of the human species.

Until the 20th century, the odds of living to a ripe old age were dicey. Many women died in childbirth. Children died of exposure, pneumonia, and any number of infections often before the age of 1 or 2. If they made it to 5 or 6, things began to look better. Last week I talked about traditional healing wisdom and how it was the educated mother and community healer that helped the human race get to where we are today. And while that is true, perhaps I did not stress enough the value of modern emergency rooms. Technology has brought us light years into the future of survivability. Emergencies are things that a traditional herbalist cannot address. The merging of the traditional and the modern is the ultimate combination. The world is fraught with danger for a child – well adults as well. But today we are speaking of motherhood and children. Broken bones, deep cuts and wounds, burns, head injuries – you know the kind of things that we still have today with our children of all ages – these were often fatal before our modern medical emergency rooms were established.

Even as adults an infection could kill. Even with the care of a truly great and wise herbalist, infection could kill – and kill quickly. Today, we can get quick transportation and immediate medical care when a life-threatening condition arises. Sure, leave the common cold, mild fever, and mild diarrhea to a local healer. But the big stuff that keeps us alive in an emergency is modern medicine. They go hand in hand. Keep the small stuff close to home and keep those ER rooms free for true emergencies.

In the end, it is most often the mother that is making that decision. It is the mother that employs here best healing skill, or calls the local healer when it is beyond her knowledge. And ultimately it is usually the mother that makes the decision to rush to the hospital. She makes sure her child gets the best care available according to his or her needs at the time.

How has Mothering Evolved – What Has It Evolved into?

So often today, being a mother takes second place to a so-called career. I say so-called because this is a fallacy that our daughters are fed from a very early age. They are going to have a career. They need to have a career because this is how they will define themselves. But most don’t have careers. Many do have these great careers, but most have jobs. And those that do have these so-called great careers, have little time for children. They either forego children altogether of someone else raises them. A true career is very demanding of a person’s time. Long hours. Evenings and weekends along with the daily grind. Lots of stress. Lots of mental resources being used in the process. Is there anything left for kids?

It is up to the mother to educate herself in nutrition, exercise, cleanliness, education and so on. I know, I know. You are saying that the man should be there to help. You know why you say that? Usually it’s because you are working and need that help. So you take away from your husband’s work hours and ability to provide a greater sense of financial security because you chose to work. You ask him to do more so you can work outside the home. Truly, you wouldn’t need or demand that help if only the traditional value of motherhood and your responsibility to your children had not been usurped by the few so-called modern women of the 60s bashing you for wanting to be the best wife and mother possible. As a gender, we abdicated our inner urge for the mothering role because we were shamed by the 2nd wave feminists. We were fooled by popular media into believing that we were the minority if we only desired to be a wife and mother. If all we wanted was to manage our household, our children and our loving spouses with passion and expertise, we were ridiculed by those that would tell us we were not living up to our full potential. This from women who did not have a husband and children. This from women who literally had no knowledge of what they professed to have expertise. And, in the end, it has evolved into women working even harder because now they try to do both and end up doing neither as well as they are done individually.

I realize that some of my bitterness for my own mistakes in listening to the drivel of these childish females pretending to be adult women is coming through. There is still a part of me that wants to blame them for advising me incorrectly. But in the end, my choices are my own. And I live with them. I adapted to them and did the best I would with what I created for myself and my children. It was a wonderful journey – just not the one I had originally planned.  

How Can We Bring Back the Value of Being a Full Time Mother?

Is there a way to bring back the tradition of motherhood? And I mean in every sense of the word. Dedicating your life to educating yourself every day in the care and education of our children. I can’t put my finger on how it happened that while we were bombarded with the idea that being a full-time wife and mother was beneath us, the first thing I often hear from those not comfortable with homeschooling their children is “I don’t know enough to teach my children”. So, does that mean we are too dumb to learn how to teach our children. But by the same token we are too smart for the task and we must have a career. Which is it? Until we recognize these diametrically opposed thoughts, we will continue to make the same mistakes over and over. And yet not.

Have you noticed the jobs that most women choose? A publication called ThoughtCo.com published an article titled, “Top 10 Occupations That Employ the Largest Percentage of Women”. Here’s what they are, along with my comments on why women choose these jobs. And please don’t misunderstand. These are all very valuable occupations in the whole scheme of the world. Someone needs to do them.

Here they are:

Registered Nurses – 92% are women. Caring for others. These 2.5 million women in the US are caring for others. What if that desire was spent on their children? Obviously they are able to learn a lot about healthcare. That desire and ability would serve the family very well.

Meeting and Convention Planner – 83.3% are women. Well, I can certainly see that. If you are genetically wired to be a woman you would need excellent planning skills. But apparently those are only valuable if you make a lot of money doing it. You know, it’s about the money. It not about the nurturing, education, health and security of your own children and figuring out how to make all that happen. It’s so much better to do it for others so you can get money.

Elementary and Middle School Teachers – 81.9% are women. Are we beginning to see a pattern here? Women are dedicating their lives to the children of other women who are dedicating their lives to the children of other women. Someone else is educating their children while they educate the children of others. Does it sound craze to you? It sure does to me.

Tax Examiners, Collectors, and Revenue Agents – 73.8% are women. I love this one. Before women began filling these jobs and were still lowly homemakers, a primary responsibility was to choose a husband who was fiscally responsible. One who provided the resources to be collected and spent appropriately and responsibly for the household.

Medical and Health Services Manager – 69.5% are women. I won’t belabor this one as it is the same industry as nursing which is, again, the number one employer of women.

Social and Community Service Managers – 69.4% are women. This is an interesting one. Again, before women ventured out into the world for a better life that was more suited to their needs, they were the social and community managers in the volunteer industry. Women literally abdicated this responsibility to government agencies that now perform these functions so they could go and do the same thing for money. But does anyone believe the government agencies are doing the same level of service that volunteers used to provide? Perhaps, they are mostly women after all.

Psychologist – 68.8% are women. This one makes a great deal of sense. Any mother knows that some level of psychology is necessary to raise their children. I consulted one several times when I ran into issues with my children. These people are invaluable in that regard. However, with today’s technology, instead of spending so much time in school I think on line education and support groups would provide most of what we need as mothers. There will be exceptions of course.

Business Operations Specialists (other) – 68.4% are women. Other, really? That’s the category many of you mothers out there will recognize as doing whatever it takes to manage the family. Administrative analyst (making everybody and everything is where it is supposed to be), claim agent (mediating disagreements between siblings), labor contract analyst (clean your room and your get X), energy control officer (please turn off the light in the bathroom when you are done), import/export specialist (what should we buy and sell), lease buyer (you know it’s the mom that makes the decision about which house to rent or buy), police inspector (is everyone following the household rules) and tariff publishing agent (this trade will get you that new bicycle but will cost you a trip to the lake).

Human Resources Manager – 66.8% are women. I don’t know if I even need to explain this one. How are household responsibilities divided? Mom decides who is responsible for what and when to keep the household in order.

Financial Specialists (other) – 66.6% are women. Oh yeah, mom manages all the money. I think we talked about this one earlier. You learn how to stretch a dollar, save a dollar and make dollars grow.

There you have it. All of the things that women were too oppressed by their husbands to abide are exactly what they are doing outside the home. The downside is you are working on someone else’s schedule. You march to someone else’s tune when you could be the top banana in your fiefdom.

With a valiant effort to listen to our hearts we can bring back respect to the greatest office in the world. The office of wife and mother. And occupation where you decide how your children are nourished, how they are educated, how they are brought forth as morally, upright citizens as they enter their adult lives. You can have the greatest responsibility in the world as a mother. All it takes is recognizing the internal beating of your heart leading you forevermore into that blissful existence as chief nurturer of your clan.

Happy Mother’s Day. Make it a good one. 

Mom’s Chocolate Pie Recipe

It’s a basic custard. The recipe is over 100 years old – well sort of. I altered it a little for my own tastes. 😊

What you Need

9" deep dish pie shell

1 cup milk

1 cup cream

3 tablespoons powdered cocoa

1 cup Sugar

6 tablespoons flour

½ teaspoon salt

4 egg yolks (save whites for meringue)

2 tablespoons butter

1 teaspoon vanilla

What to Do

Brown the pie shell per instructions on the package or in the recipe you used to make yours from scratch. (Congrats to you on that accomplishment!!)

In a cast iron skillet (or sauce pan) mix dry ingredients and milk until steaming.

Beat egg yolks, add a small amount of milk and whisk it in. This is called tempering. You want to bring the temperature up a little without cooking the yolks.

Add tempered egg yolks to hot mixture.

Add vanilla and butter and stir in. Continue stirring and allow to thicken.

Pour into pie shell.  

Meringue

What you Need

4 egg whites

1 cup sugar

1 teaspoon cream of tartar

What to Do

In chilled mixing bowl, mix egg whites and cream of tartar until foamy.

Slowly add sugar and beat until stiff (but not dry) peaks form.

Top pie with meringue, bake until just slightly browned.

Cool before serving

Final Thoughts

I did the best I could with the choices I made. My children are doing well, though they too were infected with divorce. I love them dearly and have never regretted my decision to give them birth. In my older age, I now have part of the life I dreamed of. I have the best mate that anyone could ask for. I love him with all my heart. It took me many years to understand how to be a good wife. He stood by me through all of it. And I’m still a work in progress. We love our farm life. We love it when the kids and grandkids come to visit. Who could ask for more?

Give that chocolate pie a try. And while you are savoring the lovely texture and flavor of your creation, you might contemplate the awesome power of motherhood from a new perspective.

I hope you have a wonderful Mother’s Day.

If you enjoyed this podcast, please hop over to Apple Podcasts and give me a 5-star rating and review. Also, please share it with any friends or family who might be interested in this type of content.

As always, I’m here to help you “taste the traditional touch.”

Thank you so much for stopping by the homestead and until next time, may God fill your life with grace and peace.

References

Top 10 Occupations That Employ the Largest Percentage of Women

Recipe Link

Mom’s Chocolate Pie

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Real School Choice Means We Need Good Neighborhood Schools Too

I believe in school choice. But I believe in it like I believe in capitalism or college football. It’s a cool idea and I’m glad it’s around, but it doesn’t always work quite as well as advertised.

Capitalism needs regulations and external guardrails to operate in any sustainable, fair way, and college football needs…well, I don’t have room to go into everything wrong with college football.

What school choice needs—what Chicago needs—are good, solid neighborhood schools.

For starters, this city has many more smart, hardworking students than slots at schools dedicated to the highest academic achievers, like Chicago Public Schools’ (CPS) selective-enrollment options. And not every parent has the time or inclination to apply for charter schools and other programs.

That culling of the most driven and successful into selective schools has a downside anyway: When academically struggling students are in the mix with kids who have done better, they do better too.

Plus there is value in a child going to the same school her mom attended, or the crowd at the neighborhood’s team big game or neighbors getting to know each other at 3 o’clock pick-up. Urban planners call it social cohesion, and it’s essential glue for a healthy community.

Here in Chicago, talk of neighborhood schools is generally focused in parts of the South and West Sides where activists fight for their local schools in the face of declining enrollment, poor performance and the lure of new charter schools. They understand what it means for a school to be a neighborhood institution.

But neighborhood schools are just as important in more affluent communities. My son and daughter spent their entire K-8 years at a CPS neighborhood school in Roscoe Village on the North Side. For more than a decade I’ve seen parents forge friendships and work side-by-side to support it. It’s undoubtedly made the neighborhood a better place to live.

Full disclosure: We don’t live in Roscoe Village.

My son went to the school’s tuition-based pre-K program recommended by a friend who lived nearby. We liked it a lot, and so we stayed. Like I said, I believe in school choice.

Parents are going to look for every opportunity and advantage they can find for their children. Neighborhood schools can’t just be a good option in the abstract. I know a half dozen Roscoe Village families who have left CPS or even moved out of the city because they were unwilling to fight through the high school selective-enrollment process.

That might be infuriating to hear for families in other parts of the city with even fewer choice, but it’s a variable in Chicago’s school equation. It’s not good for the schools or the city tax base to be losing middle-class households that are heavily invested in their kids’ education.

Build the Neighborhood Schools and Build Their Brand

So, good neighborhood schools promote equity, build community, offer unique educational advantages and can help retain highly resourced families. Yet they’re an increasingly endangered species in CPS. What will it take to bring them back? I’ve got four ideas:

Differentiate instruction: There is a vicious circle when students with high GPAs avoid a school, making it even less attractive for the next class. If a neighborhood school is going to be a lively, viable entity in a choice ecosystem, it must have rigorous programs so parents are assured their children will be prepared for the next stage of education.

Bring in resources: Keeping a critical mass of families who want to be at the school isn’t just the classes. Is there a high school newspaper? Does an elementary school have band? To be competitive, a school needs to consider all the factors that make it attractive—and have the fiscal resources to offer those opportunities.

Prize the personnel: Schools succeed because of their staff. CPS should give neighborhood school principals the training and support to address the unique circumstances of that type of school and ensure the teachers have the professional development, autonomy and resources to excel.

Change the narrative: Students and their families are as susceptible to a “brand” as any other consumer. They want a school they can be proud of, one with a reputation as safe, challenging and interesting. CPS should provide their administrators with technical and financial support to market and communicate their strengths.

Driving my kids to school years ago, I would pass a sign advertising a new housing development. One of the selling points, right up next to the luxury appliances and granite countertops, was the fact that the homes would be inside the Bell Elementary boundary.

When they’re strong, neighborhood schools are a powerful asset. Just ask homeowners on the North Shore. CPS’ neighborhood schools can’t be allowed to languish. Instead, let’s make sure they’re a viable option in every Chicago community.

Photo by ELIZABETH L, Twenty20-licensed.

Real School Choice Means We Need Good Neighborhood Schools Too syndicated from https://sapsnkraguide.wordpress.com