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divineprank · 7 months

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In the land of Hyrule, there echoes a legend. A legend held dearly by the Royal Family that tells of a boy...

I was five years and almost six months old when Majora's Mask came out here in the US. I was also five years and almost six months old when my mother nearly lost her life in a terrible accident. You see, she came from THAT generation. You know the one I'm talking about, she was one of the "it's 10pm... do you know where your children are?"-type kids. She lived in a poor neighborhood and as a result, she was a scrapper, one of the kids that had no problem defending herself in fights against the older kids on the block. Even to the point that well into her adulthood, she was recognized by one of her old childhood opponents. Word had reached him that she was at the same party he was at, he loudly exclaimed his surprise, and actually pushed past people and ran out the door... My dad had bore witness to this.

One time when I was very young, my older sister pointed Impa out to me during a playthrough of Ocarina of Time and compared my mom to her. The biceps, the square shoulders, the toned legs. Even at that age, I saw it. She had Impa's body because she used to work on a ranch; she was a gymnast for a large portion of her young life, and her passion was dancing. She lived a very active, physical life. I mean, if there was a gnarly-looking tree and she had an excuse to climb it? She was going to, no matter fucking what.

So let's fast-forward to October 7th, 2000.

I was five years and almost six months old, I was attending my cousin's wedding with my older sister. My dad was working and my mom had claimed to not be feeling well, so she skipped it. This is because she's quite estranged from this family member and probably didn't want to be around her. My aunt--my mom's sister--had picked us up and we spent the day with them. I have very little memory of that day. I remember being bored as hell looking out upon the golf course resort and wanting to leave, and I remember bullying the hell out of my uncle (who HAD to be 100 years old) for taking too long to take a picture of me with a few family members. It wasn't until we were on our way home, after 10PM, travelling up my street that the warm purple glow of the red-and-blue EMS lights lit up our field of vision. We saw the emergency responders before we even got home.

The last memory of that night I have is my sister asking, "whose ass did mom kick now?"

The house that we were living in at the time, we had very recently moved into. Neither parent came from money and after purchasing your family's first house, you'll soon find out that it costs you quite a lot of it... Especially when you move in and your first night is met with your basement flooding with sewage water and your two young children having to go back to sharing a room on the top floor until the place can be dried out and fixed... Weeks later. That's about the same time our next-door neighbor came into the picture. Almost immediately after moving in, this old, Wicked Witch of the West-lookin' ass started rapping at our door and demanding we deal with the tree in our backyard. One of our town's oldest trees--something she has clearly had a personal vendetta against for quite a while. This is the type of old lady I'm talking about, the ones that devote themselves to one obnoxious cause because they don't have much else waiting for them in their own lives. She had been complaining that the dead limbs from a tree in our backyard had been falling into her yard, creating a mess, and on one occasion, she complained that our dead limbs had broken a window. This is laughable, you see, because if that were true, she would have been banging on the door demanding financial compensation. The cops showed up many times following our first encounter with "Sea Hag", a nickname my dad was very happy to give her after encountering it in our thesaurus. However, because our problem was a civil matter, the cops couldn't do anything about our tree causing our neighbor problems, but more than once we were begged to find a solution, because she had been clogging up their phones, officers, and resources for weeks.

So, comes the night of October 7th, 2000. My mom teaches me how to "play chicken" on my bike despite her concerns for my dress in the driveway. My aunt pulls in and I kiss the person who resembles my mother on the lips for the last time. You have to understand, at that age, I have memories of this person, but... I don't know her. I was too young: I don't remember my mom to be Impa. Not really.

Eventually we get home, and end up meeting the emergency medical services in our driveway as they're taking my mom away. Turns out, she fell out of that very old tree. By their estimate, they think that she had climbed up to about thirty-five feet before falling and landing on her head. She was raced to our nearby local hospital before they refused her and demanded that she be rushed the medical university in our state's capital if they wanted her to have a chance. Despite her grievous injuries in having crushed her neck, partially severing her spine, suffering a brain bleed, and breaking her ribs, AND despite how long she had been in the yard before she was found, the university hospital attempted something radical. They attached a titanium pulley system in her neck and fused her spine, effectively altering, but saving her life.

When she had come to after a small coma and memory loss, she explained that she had taken the down-time she had to climb that very tree and use our rake to knock some of the dead limbs out of the tree in order to appease "Sea Hag", because, well, what else were we supposed to do? It's not like our neighbor was going to stop complaining. She explained that finally, the rake got stuck, she pulled and the rake couldn't get loose. So she yanked back harder, and that's when she lost her grip and accidentally fell backwards, effectively landing on her head. The estimation of her climb came from where the rake was still stuck in our tree.

It's my understanding that what had been done to repair my mom's neck has never been done before. I have been told that what happened has been placed in the "medical history books"--whatever that means. Thing is, living in the United States means, if you have a historic uh-oh, your insurance company will want to charge you out the ass. By the time we went bankrupt, my dad expressed that my mother's medical bills, charges wherein she learned to talk, walk, feed herself, dress herself, battle paralysis, and become a mother to her children again, were reaching damn near close to one million dollars.

There was no way that we could spare sixty bucks for Majora's Mask which was set to release very soon. It was a game we had been looking forward to for months. I even remember discussing it with my mom and sister before her accident. You see, my mom used to love to watch and participate with us we tried to get through Ocarina of Time. Being inside one of the houses, my sister tried to roll into one of the many wooden crates, and the 64 being the Nintendo 64, if you came at something at a weird angle in the game, the collision would not always be reliable. (Epona jumping fences and trying to climb vines are perfect examples of this... I'm certain you know what I'm talking about, if you've played the games.) I remember being young and dumb enough to think that both my sister's player error and the N64's gitchiness came from Majora itself. It's supposed to be an evil demon, that makes people's lives hell, right?

Surprisingly, as the story of my sister and I moving between family members' houses while my dad would spend every night with my mom in intensive care reached the ears of the community, my dad's co-worker provided my older sister and I with a special card. Inside of it, was a kind note talking about how he and his wife had heard the story about my mom, and how they understand what kind of tragedy our family has faced. Sadly, I can't remember anything beyond the fact that some guy he knew and his wife gave us a free gift certificate to Toys-R-Us. That meant that indeed, our desires could come true, and come Thursday, October 26th, we would get our hands on the golden, holographic cartridge that became almost synonymous with the Majora's Mask game itself. Funnily enough, I remember freezing my ass off outside while we waited in line for Toys-R-Us to open. I remember taking turns waiting in the warm car as we waited... Tragically, I don't have much memory of slamming the game down into the 64 and playing it for the first time. But I do know that it's something that impacted me deeply as a child because I have drawings depicting the game and I remember even dreaming about it in my sleep.

Of course, I couldn't possibly make this connection in the year of, or even the years after, the accident. But as I grow older, I can't help but find myself grow much more attached to this game. It's not a game I pass off, don't get me wrong there. It's still up there with Ocarina of Time as my favorite game--I just always considered, you know, as the drawing above states: sabea 2. Zelda 2, the sequel to Ocarina of Time. It's just a continuation of the best game ever made, so I'll just cheat and mash those two into one solid number 1 choice. Which, fair.

...But it seems very dismissive. Not only of the game, but also of my own experiences. I mean, let's think about what I've talked about so far.

In the world of Termina, we are quickly faced with its imminent destruction, but it's a story of isolated danger. We're quick to surmise that this isn't quite Hyrule, but... somewhere else entirely. A place where, if complete and total destruction does strike, the only people who would give a shit are the people who went through it--the rest of the universe as we knew it would continue on as business as usual. This was a quiet, isolated place, a spec that nobody noticed.

I relate a lot to that.

My family was facing a severe and personal tragedy. Our whole world had come crashing down in the most violent and sudden manner. My mom had died twice in that ambulance ride to the capital, and if things had continued to go poorly, I can only see one alternative, and that is our moon having finally engulfed our world in flames while the rest of the world carries on without ever noticing. Nothing would be different for anyone else, but our entire life would be scarred and burned forever, maybe in a way i wouldn't be able to walk out of. I'm forever thankful that's not how things have turned out, even if things aren't the same as they used to be.

I think that's why I relate to Anju, the keeper of the Stock Pot Inn.

She tries her best to carry on and push herself despite the forces in her life bringing to terrible depression that stems from her lost husband-to-be. She is nervous, but she does her best to keep her composure despite what she faces... But she also isn't scarred over. She crumbles under the weight of her solitary hurt, and she absolutely will if you know when and where to look.

As a big girl, I find myself relating to Gorman, too. He's an uptight businessman whose immediately faced with the worst luck that someone in his position could see in a time like this: the troupe he manages has been cancelled at the most important time of his life. This is something he's bet his entire life on, something that has to pay off! And when it finally doesn't, what does he do but crumble under his own singular weight after having left his family to pursue his dreams, drowning himself in strange, alcoholic milk.

The Deku Butler's son, Darmani's quiet attempt to save his people, MIkau's solo challenge of the Gerudo Pirates.

This game is so lonely, so isolated, except... When you begin to portion it. The Deku Butler's son had his father who cared deeply for him. Darmani had the Village Elder and his son, and their people. Mikau had Japas, Toto and Evan, and Lulu and her babies. Anju, Mikau; Cremia, Romani... The Skull Kid after having been abandoned by the Four Giants, he still has Tatl and Tael.

All of this is going on without any of the other citizens noticing. The only thing that connects each of these individual people suffering their own unique pain is Link. And as silly as it is, I think I'd like to add myself and my family's names into that little hat. Yeah, he didn't come out of the screen and make my problem go away, and, sure, the memory of my suffering wasn't fed into the spirit of Fierce Deity...

But we were there along the way. I met Link again after our first encounter. He made me smile, he made some of the pain I had faced go away... Even if I hadn't realized it at the time.

There's a reason Majora's Mask is literally hung up so that it's the first thing you see once you walk into my room. It's why I have more merchandise than I do some of my other favorite Zelda games. It's why I just can't bare say Majora's Mask is my second favorite Zelda game.

It's because I can't thank Link enough for saving Termina.

#out of time. :: [out of character]#tw spinal injury #tw near death experience #tw broken bones #tw surgery #tw brain bleed #tw death #trauma dumping

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zeb-z · 5 months

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“Even if it’s not my fault, it’s still my accident, it’s still my mess. It’s still something that - exists, because I do” oh. and he just doesn’t know another way to help, either, because all his life has been screwing up without helpful direction in order to meet impossible standards, and so there is no other way than to bleed himself dry. for the cause, for a friend in need, for anyone he doesn’t know. especially for the problems that he himself creates, because to him his pure existence has always been the problem, because the elders were fucked as hell and traumatized him to no end - so even causing problems is a sin. a single mistake is a sin. it always has been. and it’s rough trying to learn anything other than that mindset - but Jay and Chip won’t let him struggle alone.

and it’s like - that’s what comes with being raised the way he was. punished for imperfection, but there’s no guidebook, no definition of perfect. and so perfect is never good enough anyway. it’s a trap and there is no winning, so there’s nothing else to do but take the blame and bear it, and internalize it. and it makes actual failure and actual mistakes that much more painful. of course responsibility needs to be taken for your actions - but when you’ve been taking responsibility for everything, up to and including the literal fate of the world, all of your life, every outcome is your fault. and guilt only builds, and resentment only festers. of course he hates the elders for how they treated him. of course he hates himself.

he’s grabbing his own destiny and making his own choices - but the thing about making your own choices is that there are so many of them. there’s no destiny to blame anymore. and all you can do is the best you can. and it’s not always going to be good enough. he’s learned plenty about failure, but with Jay and Chip around, maybe he’ll learn about second chances, and self forgiveness. maybe he’ll learn that accidents aren’t always met with extremes. and that he’s not the only one left to deal with a mess if he slips up and breaks something.

#after their talk and their big spar part 2 and everything I’m choosing to hope for the up and up #I just. I dunno. again. y’all ever think about how he never lays on hands to heal himself? because I do #I’m calling it what it is tw for the tags here but #passive suicidality. and it’s scary and tough to deal with especially under these conditions he’s under and it’s like #he’s someone who can be seen as bigger than life almost a moral role model. a hero of sorts. and still he thinks he’ll never be good enough #abuse will do that to a mf #but like. idk jay shot him and he forgave her. and chip can be a downright bastard and he still cares for him. as much as his own #morals and nature have rubbed off on the other captains they’ve also rubbed off on him. I mean sarcasm? pranks?#chip is valuing others more and more. and so maybe gillion will value himself more and more. yknow?#after every mistake he’s made and the others have made they’re still crew. family. and ain’t that somethin?#I dunno. taking responsibility isn’t just bleeding yourself out as retribution. there has to be a balance. and for gillion (and chip tbh)#that’s difficult. and something I am hoping they will continue improving on #idk. I have many thoughts without full articulation I’m just kinda spinning them all in my brain yknow #jrwi riptide 86 #jrwi #jrwi riptide #gillion tidestrider #character analysis #z speaks

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