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singingmice · 3 years

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energy & how water moves,

[I’ve not done much I’ve loved too little And I’m tired of running] - Frank O’Hara, from ‘Lines Across the United States’, Poems Retrieved Tin, It's past midday, Energy has been low for a while and I tell myself, is it just - to go more slowly, or is that - death shows its shadow and shows us what it is not to live? I try to go deep, but energy dictates everything. One wants to run down the mountain but moves like a sloth, turning the pages of a rain drenched book, an old rusted train unused for centuries. Then I think: spirit wants me back. Nature calls for me. It's there one must go rather than the endless productivity that dictates our times. Perhaps it is not the time for finishing writing, instead to clear through...to open up after this last year and a half of constraints, of collective fear and hesitation. I remember how water calms. I've been spending time recently with those who struggle to notice or appreciate poetry. Os spends most of her time inside or at work and there she is content. I cannot name where our attraction to each other came from, but feel a little foolish for it now. Perhaps loneliness accumulates. Perhaps one sometimes goes exactly in the direction where one is not heading in order, for the millionth time, to know what it is that one needs. I don't understand her at all, or perhaps I do, and this worries me more. The mechanisms of comfort, of predictability - ways to ward off the chaos that attacks us from all angles. And in that ruin, I find strength, and in it - she cleans and scrubs and tidies away that which can creep in unexpectedly. I led a yoga session yesterday and she said, "I feel nothing" and my heart sank. "Mr Duffy lived a short distance away from his body..." - James Joyce But I had missed / being held. And I've been with C in the north of Catalonia, who's living beside a large lake. At least with him we've been heading out to nature, having emotional talks at night. But I confess I miss literature. I miss the challenge to intellect. There is so much safety, routine...soon, I tell myself. Soon all of that will disappear and for the next month slow travels will await. Hiking, meeting some friends. You, snorkelling. How is it to live so close to such a vibrant sea? Have you noticed differences over the years of the life that can be found there? I went to the sea last week with C. Speedboats everywhere. Back on the island where I've been living since April it's much better for wilderness areas, but even then - boats everywhere. I long for a sea too rough for sailing, or too cold, too unpredictable. What happened with your March? We have much to catch up on... I often make Kombucha just with like it is, but sometimes add things like mint. I find it interesting to experiment with the kinds of tea... Fear. There is so much of it everywhere. I will have to go far, far from the city to get away from it. Here in Barcelona I feel it immediately. It's far different from the lake where C lives. I suppose it's my first direct confrontation with it. Fear attacks the immune system, the health inside, all the good we carry. Survival instinct kicks in, but when it never has an off button, because it's constant - exhaustion comes. I've been doing a lot of breath work the last months. It's helped a lot, though I have to be careful to keep up with it while travelling, as it's easy to resist all kinds of routine when away from it. Sometimes I just focus on releasing all the poison from the body and mind with the outbreath. The longer I can go the better. But I feel time also slipping away, as if all this period of inactivity...events to separate the days - brings time into a collective soup of which is there is little escape routes. The lentils cling to us and then there is no way out. The spontaneous is more important than ever but can that be forgotten, or is there some secret stash of the wild left in all beings? Those monitoring lizards are crafty...here it's bats, instead. The stories that best serve us... Perhaps it is just those that go towards

understanding, wisdom. But how to select them? I'm reading a book of a man's walk across Afghanistan currently. I found it in the garage of C of books travellers had left. I walk in the streets of Barcelona and see donkeys and deserts. Perhaps there is little worthwhile news stories, and what has worth is the personal, the way back to our origins, to the nests of where we belong. And breath, the body, the wind, gleaming eyes, animals. The rest - media seems to be stronger and stronger and leaves me weak. Little by little, disentangling, giving it up... My heart would be full of underground passages, some accessible, some not so much. C told me that I'm so much more open about my past than we last met seven years ago, on the way down to Morocco in his camper van. That I speak of my childhood without hesitation, of my father and the darkness there that envelopes. I keep reminding myself of gratitude. It helps a lot. My brother is becoming an ordained Hindu monk next week. It's like getting married / only to an elephant god (amongst others) rather than to another person. Been doing a lot of ancestral work recently, of the past - but I'm somewhat allergic to people romanticising the ancestors. For some of it - this is where trauma gets passed down - all the unresolved - the conflicts, the turned away from, that which is repelled. I for one am not particularly proud of my blood...but it's good to imagine some that are. I prefer, when offering a drink to the land, for it to be pachamama and not my ancestors, who likely had enough alcohol in life and don't need it in death too. You're in rain season now? On the island there are continuous floods even in summer. The lands are changing and people refuse to believe it. For years it brought me great despair to witness the extinctions, the loss of habitat. Somehow now, though the sadness and despair still remains - it almost rejoices, for perhaps now people finally realise. And we will not be forever. And some beings can take our place, and perhaps they will take better care... Well, a hug. One last day in the city, and more and more it makes less sense. Jass

#letters #Frank O’Hara #loss of poetry #climate collapse #Barcelona #summer #floods

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puddingheads · 4 years

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Turbulence || Suna Rintarou.

In which Suna was your anchor, your lullaby, your home.

Warnings: Angst, mentions of death (tw for car accidents), grief, fluff if you believe hard enough, slight post time skip manga spoilers

Word count: ~1.0k

Note: Disclaimer that this is not meant to romanticise death or the grieving process! (Please handle your grief in a healthy manner!) Also, this is set after the time skip!

—

hey baby,

how have you been? it’s been half a year since you left, have you gotten used to the other side yet? i'm getting by, if you’d call it that. i don’t remember how i lived before we met, i must have grown dependent on you.

it hasn’t stopped raining ever since the last time i saw you, lying there with your eyes closed. or maybe it did… i didn’t notice. i barely remember the blue sky now, all i ever see is grey. did you take the sun with you? if you did, i hope it’s bright and warm where you’re at. you never liked gloomy weather, after all. atsumu said that the skies are dark because of me. remember how he liked to tease me about being a ray of sunshine? i haven’t heard that in a while.

kita said i haven’t been smiling much. can you see me from up there? do you think i’ve been smiling less? i think i’m smiling just fine, just enough. at least, i smile when i see the violets you left me. remember them? i pressed them so i wouldn’t forget how you left them at my door when we fought. did you know they symbolise peace and healing when you gave them to me? it feels like a strange foreshadowing. did you know you would leave me? did you know how much it’d hurt? you knew a lot of things, i wouldn’t be surprised if you saw all this coming. (remember how you brought a clean shirt to our first date? i still don’t know how you predicted that i’d spill my drink all over myself.)

i still wake up at 6 every morning, though your alarm never rings anymore. i haven't gotten used to waking up without you by my side. sometimes, i think i hear you in the shower, but it’s just the rain against the windows. i've stopped asking for an extra 5 minutes in bed, because there isn't a reason to stay there any longer.

since your cursed sleep schedule haunts me till today(why aren't you haunting me like the ghost stories you used to tell?), i do the laundry in the morning now. i like to watch it sway in the wind. it's calming, like you. it makes me think everything will be okay, gives a strange sense of stability. on days the wind doesn't blow, i feel a little strange. there isn't much to wash now, so i wash the sheets a lot more. they've stopped smelling like you.

ah, i haven't washed your coat—the nice brown one i got you, not the black one you wore that night. it's still hanging by the door, in case you ever come back.

work is as per usual, but everyone has been nicer to me since they heard about you. even my manager stopped dumping work on me, can you believe it? the poor newcomer has to deal with her now. he makes really good coffee by the way, i think you’ll like it a lot. well, if you’d stop being a snob about instant coffee, at least. the beans aran got for your birthday are still in the cupboard. i’ll have to use them someday.

it feels wrong to drive past your training centre after work, so i stop by to say hi. they have a new middle blocker, but i haven’t had the chance to talk to him yet. komori tags along sometimes since he lives just a street down from us. he’s a funny one, he says it’ll be rude to sit in the passenger seat since it’s where you used to sit. he really looks up to you, but i’m sure you already knew that. he sings your praises whenever we talk about you, since you aren’t there to shoot them down.

of course, the roads still scare me a little. i drive really carefully, i promise. i wouldn’t want to take away someone’s everything because of my carelessness.

eating dinner at home really rubs it in my face that you’re not here anymore. can you believe that our tiny dining table could feel empty? i couldn’t at first, till the night after i got the phone call from the hospital. osamu invites me to onigiri miya a lot, i think he knows how much i’ve grown to dread dinnertime. don’t worry, he isn’t feeding me weird stuff. he’d only pull such pranks on atsumu. (we tricked him into eating a ghost pepper recently, you should’ve seen the look on his face when he realised.)

it's still hard to fall asleep, probably because you’re not lying next to me. it’s always in the middle of the night when the emotions really flood in. some nights, i feel like a ship trying to stay put in choppy waters without an anchor. some nights, i feel like a helicopter with one less rotor blade. some nights, i feel like a car without breaks. i hate how uneasy i feel without you beside me, but i'm learning to stand on my own once more.

anyway, your pillow gets cold at night, so i hug it to sleep now. i hope you don't mind, i'd still hug you over any pillow if i could. remember that fox plushie you got me from that festival? it’s on our bed now, so it doesn’t feel too empty. sometimes, i mistake it for you in the dark. kidding, but i’ll always tease you about looking like that plushie.

oh, and if you’re wondering, i’m still wearing the ring. you still have yours on, right? you’ll have to wait a little if you lost it again, since i can’t help you find it yet. the dress is in the closet, now in a box. don’t worry, as much as i want to wear it, i’ll only ever wear it for you. because we promised.

this letter is way longer than i'd intended it to be, so i'll tell you the rest another day. i'll see you soon, maybe. please wait for me.

till we meet again, i love you.

p.s. sorry for saying 'remember' so much, i was scared that you'll forget all this before i did. please remember me like how i'll always remember you.

—

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strangestdrabbles · 5 years

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Angel I’m Here

A/N: i hope i did this request justice and didn’t romanticise both depression and body dysmorphia,, i didn’t want that at all,, i hope you enjoy reading :o) x

Pairing: Jonathan Byers x Fem!Reader

It had taken every ounce of energy for Y/N to leave the confines of her bed to stand in front of the mirror, the soft golden glow of bedside lamp providing a warm haze over everything and for a moment Y/N’s mind was calm; like everything had slowed down and she had a chance to breathe. It slipped through her fingers as quickly as it came however as everything came back into hyperfocus, a clawing disgust bleeding in her mind and chest as the tears tracked her cheeks; her skin suffocating as she turned her body from left to right.

Y/N brought bother of her hands to her face and rested them on her cheeks, scrunching up her nose as she felt the flesh before allowing her hands to slowly travel south over her neck, shoulders, down the length of her arms and then briefly over her chest; the feeling of bile stinging the back of her throat as she hiccupped a sob. Y/N tilted her head as she tapped her fingers down to her stomach, flinching slightly as she took in her reflection. It was taking every ounce of will power to try and ignore the malicious voices in her head but before she could get her footing they were pulling her under; a darkness settling into her peripherals that was comforting even though it was destroying her.

The sound of rain created a backing track as Y/N rested her palms flat against her thighs, swallowing thickly because of the lump in her throat; her hands clenched into fists and her heart hammering against her chest as her body was overcome with mental anguish.

“Y/N?”

The voice pulled the distressed girl out of her thoughts before she turned her head, her bottom lip being rolled through her teeth aggressively enough to draw blood; a sob leaving her lips as her body shook. She couldn’t speak or do anything other than cry and try to find the strength to move the few steps to her bed, wanting more than anything to wrap herself once again in her duvet and not think about anything at all.

“Y/N? Darling oh my god.” Jonathan whispered as he moved almost silently over to his love, turning her around and pulling her into his arms.

She gripped onto the fabric of his sweater to attempt to ground herself, her body shivering as he whispered soft and pretty things against the crown of her head; his arms wrapped securely around her waist. The stuttering breaths and hiccupping broke Jonathan’s heart as he left lingering kisses on her forehead.

“Y-Y/N, baby girl, look at me please.”

It took a minute but Y/N finally looked up at Jonathan, allowing him to take in her bloodshot and watery eyes, flushed cheeks and nose, along with bruised and swollen lips; Jonathan’s heart skipping a beat as he left one soft kiss each on both her cheeks.

“Is it one of those times?” Jonathan asked quietly as he began to move the pair over to Y/N’s bed, helping her sit and then lay down; watching her nod as her head rested on the pillow.

“I-I,” Y/N began, clearing her throat and trying to organise her thoughts and how she was truly feeling into words, “I-um, I just wish I didn’t feel so terrible in my own body. I wish my body felt like my own. I want to feel beautiful and I wish my brain allowed me to see myself how I really am. Why can’t I?”

Jonathan was momentarily at a loss for words as he tucked Y/N back into bed, making sure she was completely comfortable surrounded by her duvet before getting into bed with her; sitting up against the wall so she could rest her head on the pillow on his lap. Y/N’s eyes fluttered as Jonathan began to run a hand softly through her hair, the motion bringing her a comfort that her heart and clouded mind needed. There was a welcomed silence that blanketed the couple for a few moments, the sound of rain making the bedroom feel all the more homely.

“I want you to know that I’m proud of you.” Jonathan began, his voice a controlled whisper while his voice was kind.

Y/N didn’t have the strength or energy to verbally retort, choosing instead to slightly turn her head and look up at her love while smiling softly; her heart skipping a beat at the sight of him.

“I’m so proud that you took another day one hour at a time and that you looked after yourself.”

The words meant a lot to Y/N as she had so much difficulty each day dealing with the crippling side effects of depression and her body dysmorphia, wishing more than words could contend that she was better and not so inside her head; grateful that Jonathan did his best to try and understand along with help.

“Th-Thank you.” Y/N whispered before turning her head and nuzzling her face into his stomach, the larger than life smile on his face going unnoticed.

“I love you.”

The three words left Jonathan’s lips while he went back to playing with Y/N’s hair, her whispering ‘i love you too’ into the fabric of his shirt while a pretty rose blush covered her cheeks. It went unnoticed by both Jonathan and Y/N that someone was walking up the stairs, the pair enjoying each other’s company while the rain fell outside and Jonathan told Y/N what was new in the Byers’ household. There were two knocks before the bedroom door opened and Y/N’s mother walked in, two cups of tea in one hand while she smiled at the couple.

“I brought some tea for you both. Y/N you need someone in your system.” Y/N’s mother spoke with an air of loving patience as she settled the tea on the bedside table close to Jonathan, leaving shortly after.

“Alright darling, come on let’s drink the tea.”

It was a slow process but Jonathan finally helped Y/N to sit up, leaning against him while her head rested on his shoulder. The cup was warm in Y/N’s hands as she held it while allowing the steam to warm her face, Jonathan doing the same before both took a sip; enjoying the feeling of the sweltering beverage filling every inch of their being.

“I’m going to be with you for as long as you’ll have me my love.” Jonathan spoke after a sip, his voice thick yet genuine.

“Do you promise?”

“I promise.”

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oliverwxod · 5 years

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Whatever It Takes (part 6) - Steve Rogers

Pairing: Steve Rogers x reader (but in this part it’s mostly Bucky Barnes x reader)

Warnings: swearing

Summary: Angels and Demons have been sworn enemies their whole lives, that’s just how it is. When Bucky decides to go against these unsaid rules, it brings a set of consequences into the lives of those who spend time with him. In Y/n’s case that consequence is an angel named Steve Rogers.

(Part 2) (Part 3) (Part 4) (Part 5) (Part 6) (Part 7) (Part 8) (Part 9)

The more time Bucky spent with Natasha, the more time Y/N spent with Steve.

They were friends. Completely opposite to each other but it taught them a lot, changing each others perspectives on a range of topics and learning from each other. A lot of the time they would have very different opinions but they both learnt to respect each other.

Respect was hard to gain in a Demon and Angel friendship. They were very rare as it never usually worked, but with Steve and Y/n it all came naturally once they got past the first few days of hostility upon their first meeting.

“this rain is absolutely horrible” Y/n spoke, gritting her teeth and glaring up at the sky as she fell into step with Steve. It was dark out and the streets were almost abandoned.

“There’s beauty in everything y/n and that includes the rain... you’ve just got to think that way” he spoke teasingly.

“you would say that, you’re a god damn Angel” she glared, watching Steve flinch at her words.

“It’s the truth. Trust me, I’m an Angel. Angel’s don’t lie” he spoke meeting her stare and winking at her. It was so unlike Steve to do something like that, it took her aback. She played off the stutter of her heart by giving him a small sarcastic smile.

“fine.” she spoke, dreading the words that fell out of of her mouth next. “romanticise this then?” she challenged looking slightly smug. Because she knew there was no way rain could ever be romantic, not when it was falling down in buckets and freezing their skin; clouding their visions.

“rain is one of the most romantic things to exist!” Steve spoke frowning while he gave her an odd look. Everyone knew rain was romantic right? had she never seen a film?

“go on then how would you make this romantic.” she said, gesturing around them at the deserted street, rain splashing from cars going past and headlights reflecting off of the puddles in a blinding manner.

“well, first I would take the hand of the person I was with” he spoke, looking directly at her, but he made no move to act on what he was saying. “then...” he said with a small smile on his face and a brief chuckle “I'd make her dance with me”

“but the rains cold, why would you want to spend unnecessary time in it?” she asked confused and trying to ask as many questions as possible so she would stop imaging the situation he was explaining, trying to stop herself from thinking about dancing with him in the rain.

“Because the rain shouldn’t matter when the person you love is there. Nothing can cloud your vision.” He said finally looking away from her for the first time since he started talking.

“I think they would be very underwhelmed” she said, trying to act like she wasn’t slowly falling apart at his soft words. She silently cursed the charm of an Angel.

“maybe... but then... I’d take her hand again” he spoke, this time doing as he said.

“then what?” she asked, one eyebrow raising slightly in question, a challenging look in her eyes daring him to carry on.

“then I would kiss her” he spoke simply, finishing his previous sentence.

Y/n stared back at him, the both of them silent, holding her breath in anticipation. What the hell was she doing? Why wasn’t she laughing at the idea? Why was she just silently watching him to make his next move?

But Steve didn’t. Instead he dropped her hand pulling away from her completely.

“So... do you believe me now?” he asked, glancing at her timidly before looking back down to the pavement.

Y/n shook herself mentally out of her speechlessness.

“nope. Still hate the rain” she shrugged before walking ahead of him.

He sighed watching her walk in front of him, shaking his head with a small smile. He couldn’t ever let himself go for someone like her he told himself, as tempting as it was.

------------------------------------------------------------------------------

“where have you been all day?” Bucky demanded as soon as she stepped into the apartment. He had failed to notice Steve’s figure behind her, the both of them drenched by the rain outside.

“sorry Mum” Y/n spoke rolling her eyes as she stepped further into their apartment.

“I’m being serious Y/n.” Bucky was angry she could tell, but he had no right to be. “If you’ve been with him again...” Y/n could hear the hatred in his voice.

“um... sorry to impose” Steve spoke up, Bucky’s eyes falling on him immediately, eyes flashing black as he glared. “I should probably just go..” Steve said, the look in Bucky’s eyes telling him it was best for him to leave when he was not wanted.

“no.” Y/n spoke harshly, glaring at the demon.. “you don’t have to leave” she said to Steve. “go dry off, my room and bathroom are behind that door” she said pointing towards the only closed door in the apartment.

Steve did as she said, disappearing behind the door.

“why the hell have you brought him here?” Bucky spat, making his way towards her until he was a few feet away.

“he’s my friend. Why wouldn’t I?” she asked calmly. She knew if she started raising her voice too that it would not end well.

“He’s an Angel Y/n.” he glared.

“I know! and so is Natasha and you have her round here every bloody day!” she spoke meeting his glare with her own.

“Look, you’ve made your point, you can stop now” he spoke.

“Stop what?”

“Using him. You and I both know what game you’re playing here” he spoke dangerously close to her now.

“fuck you” she said coldly, before leaving him standing alone in anger, staring after her in the middle of the apartment, disappearing into her room.

Steve was sitting on the end of her bed facing the door when she walked in, slamming it behind her.

She stared at him, sitting there awkwardly, his white t-shirt wet against his skin, clinging tightly to him as he ran a towel through the top of his hair.

She breathed deeply before walking to her bathroom, stripping off her clothes and putting a dressing gown on.

Entering the room again she gained Steve’s attention as he sat not knowing what to do. He had heard every word her and Bucky had said to each other.

“Hey Y/n.” Steve spoke quietly.

“Yes?”she asked, making her way over to sit down next to him, glancing at his expression concerned at how his featured were pulled into a frown.

“are you using me?” he asked softly.

She frowned at his question, knowing he had heard the conversation from moments ago. She felt terrible, the look on Steves face was one of disappointment. In a way she was using him, but that was before she actually became fond of him, appreciating his company and friendship over the past month.

“No” she replied.

“are you just saying that to make me feel better?” he asked, smiling in amusement.

“No. I’m a demon. If I was using you, you would know by now” she said. “you’re my friend Steve” she spoke, seeing his disbelief. “I don’t stick around many people for more than a day, we’ve been hanging out for over a month now”

He smiled gently at her. “You’re right” he said. “Sorry I doubted you. IT’s just... you know... the whole Angel and Demons enemy thing, It’s sometimes hard to get my head around.” He shrugged.

“it’s fine, I completely understand” she nodded.

“Anyway, I better get going” he spoke. “I’ve got a couple jobs to do tonight.”

“need company?” she asked.

“Angel jobs” he spoke, laughing at how she rolled her eyes.

“ah okay. Well... go do your ‘angel duties’” she spoke laughing, her eyes following his frame until he had left her room, shutting the door behind. She couldn’t help but smile after him, sitting alone and thinking about the day she had with him.

She could feel herself becoming weaker. Her inner demon flinching every time a pure thought ran through her mind.

Bucky was waiting on the sofa when Steve left her room, seeing the smile Steve held. A smirk falling onto his face as soon as Steve spotted him.

“Someone looks a bit too happy” he snarled.

“I don’t want any trouble” Steve spoke making him laugh. Such an angel Bucky thought.

“you’re in the wrong place then” he spoke, eyes glancing at Y/n’s bedroom door, Steve’s following where he had looked.

“She’s a good friend” Steve spoke.

“Yeah... a good friend” he replied. “But thing is, Demons can’t be friends with your lot. And Y/n is only good friends with those who she sleeps with and that’s just me. Have you slept with her yet?” he asked, knowing the answer.

“no” Steve replied looking at him with a small glare, his jaw clenched as he tried to calm himself down from getting angry. He knew Bucky was just trying to get a reaction.

“There’s your answer then. You’re not friends” Bucky smirked.

“I'm not trying to compete with you” he spoke.

“good because you won’t win. She was in my bed last night and I can guarantee as soon as you leave she’ll find her way back to me” he spoke watching as Steve no longer held his anger very well.

Bucky laughed aloud as Steve stormed towards the front door, opening it with force and slamming it behind him as he left, Bucky’s laugh still prominent and ringing in his ears.

Steve paused at the top of the apartment block stairs having to take a deep breath.

Y/n was his friend. Just his friend, they could never be something more. Just friends. He repeated it over and over in his mind. Just friends. He had accepted the fact a while ago, but he still had to remind himself every so often.

TAGS: Thank you for reading!! All the comments on part 5 really motivated me to write the next part and I love reading them all because it’s so nice to hear what you think!!! thank you so much, (also I'm v curious if people are rooting for Bucky or Steve rn) xx

Forever tags:

@dreambigbeawesome @hellosafie @linheliano @extreme-supernatural-lover @thisismysecrethappyplace @mannls @1elboomdemsechevarria @what-the-hell-is–a-hufflepuff @myrabbitholetoneverland @jbarnes87 @permanent-lines @alyssaj23 @piensa-bonito @maresmiley @soldierplum @jjsoccer11 @les-bio-lie @dewy-biitch @despelllestrange @kingdomcage @unlikelygalaxygiver @hiddles-rose @httpmcrvel @breezy1415 @artisticlales @imthegirlyourparentswarnedyouof @maladaptive-ninja-returns @xinyourdreamsx

Bucky Barnes tags: (it’s going to have a lot of Bucky x reader in but if you don’t wanna be tagged just message me xx)

@tranquility-or-chaos @analovesseb @jamesbarnesappreciationsociety @australianhorrorstory @chloe-skywalker @bexboo616

Whatever it takes tags:

@melimelbean @piensa-bonito @midnightmondaze @maladaptive-ninja-returns @delusionsofnostalgia @sectumsempra-beaches @marveldivergentouatdctvfangirl @rainbowkisses31 @black-sunday1412 @jcc04220 @albinotigerpython @tatertot1097 @hiken-no-stark @theshekinahb @hiddles-rose @enchantedreadersworld @fairytaleprincess8314 @tinyglamdramaqueen @jaebom @bit-of-a-timelord @spangled-starbucky @winterboo-bearloverhere @teenwolfbitches2 @kendrawr-kitkat @zigadaba-stitch @momma-loves-her-some-capnbucky @disagreetoagree @midnightmondaze @budlitebitch @rraise-a-glass-to-freedom @blondekel77 @vulpecula-minor @trashforfictionalpeople @maladaptive-ninja-returns @slytherinrising @slowly-gently @sad-me-space

#Steve Rogers #steve rogers fanfic #steve rogers au #steve rogers x reader #Steve rogers imagine #steve rogers smut #Bucky barnes imagine #Bucky barnes x reader #Bucky barnes au #Bucky barnes smut #marvel au #avengers au #angels and demons AU #Angel!Steve #demon!Bucky #demon!reader #captain america fanfiction #chris evans imagine #sebastian stan imagine

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antoniasteffens · 4 years

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MANUALIS IN VACUO ( part 1: November 2019)

(intro with a soft hysteric undertone that you can skip but it offers a moody ambient as an entrance):

We don’t need to kick our own ass if we are peaceful beings. Sometimes in masked peace we will encounter situations that kick our ass in such ways, that we will necessarily respond. So the notion of ass kicking is not to take for granted as a necessary “lesson of life” itself ( oh how poetic ) but an implicit byproduct of (mh.. maybe ..?) Capitalism- for those of us that can’t help but being sensitive.

SO NO, these lesson are not meant to produce another product that masks and embodies the masked and embodied violence of a capitalist society.

That would mean to become the provider of a placebo of a lack. Rather TRY (and fail a million times since you swim against the stream to ) to respond to violence, by attempting to demask your environment.

Capitalist realism could also be called:

Me dying from you, you dying from me.

Is it a responsibility? Is there no alternative?

Is it a duty to provide for killing the other?

A force of nature of universe ☀️☀️☀️ that pretends to romanticise ONLY

Fake gardeners ( since they intervene in the virgin eco system), fake trees (since they pretend to be generous air recycler, but grow only high to overthrow their neighbour tree) , fake sunlight (since without light there would be no brain, but it provides skin cancer in exchange and depressive thoughts)- it seems to me that some basics of capitalism were never and option but always a rule. Seems we have to deal with some basics of being then:

May Darwin win. WIN WIN.

ONLY REAL COMPETITION.

Perma culture is another word for eternal life. Eternal life another word for paradise. Paradise another word for death. Let the middle age fetichism come back. Put your money on the after life.

Since you know better. You extinct.

FOR THOSE STILL ALIVE

When I encountered the void few years ago I made temporary peace with my sexual organ and declared infinite war to each and everyone maintaining psychological intactness in my direct environment. If you look closely, of course, there are not many left, to truly have an upright fight with anyhow ( most of us suffer anxiety, sleep disorder, depression already or still). But there are a lot of those, that for many apparent reasons keep up pretending to maintain psychological intactness. I may call this a coping mechanism.

All of you depressed, suicidal, frustrated, rebelling, confused- all of you are still standing (if you have not died yet) and all of you that did not give in yet even if deformed, distorted, disfigured by us- I love you and it is you I believe in - your depression is a poetic response to the madness around - your tears are thunders releasing tension within a field of human consciousness, completely corrupted in a cloud of dense ignorance of daily inattentiveness.

You are the absolute absolute absolute reason I can be hopeful. Every and each of your doubt is a holy grail, a guideline to paradise. Even if that means we won’t survive this, which we anyhow won’t.

When knifes smile to your wrist, balconies invite you to fall off from them, waters seduce you to drown, dreams are your only refuge, but sleep starts to become harder to reach, I have a single one and only solution!!!!!

1st. chapter:

Stay with your environment! STAY STAY STAY.

The remains of a sandwich lie on the ground of a public space. You can see the traces of the teeth that bit of the toast bread, ham and cheese in between. The quality is this cheap paper like bread that cannot really be called bread but is the dutch joke for nutrition. Still, the bread is not responsible for its own ridiculousness- I pity it for being such bread without any pride and respect for the history of bread. But as in pity lies always love, I cannot help but love it. I sincerely honour it for revealing to me the dishonour of those that are in charge of producing it, along side so many other breads, equally dishonoured.

The humiliated bread has its own pride because it is transparently showing to me all that is left of its former idea. And that is indeed very complex, validating and demasking a history of bread and capitalism, nutrition and mass production.

It has dignity by itself because each and every detail of the cosmos has dignity and respect, as long as being attended. It has dignity because it is. And it really is. It truly lies there on the ground, with its whole pride of being.

Some cheese and ham rest inside, or if you want, the elaboration of an idea of value of a cow in our un loyal society, hostile to animals, humans and plants, now presented in a sliced format that can fit perfectly the two bread pieces. Cutting edge technology towards how stupid one should become to grasp ones own nutrition in the manual sense and in the metaphorical one.

They became a temporary company of their own. They ended up being a small family of textures tracing history, half eaten and then thrown on the ground. There, on the ground that is a public space and supposed to be held clean by someone.

Here, someone else, that is not the cleaning personal, disrupted the order. We know the toast should not be there. But here it is, singing silently a song about hope.

Why and how to be hopeful about that sandwich?

Look at the details of the grains, the cheese, the bite trace. Look at what it wants to tell you. It becomes slightly comical, this revelation of dysfunctionality.

It is more than that, it is a real trace, that within the urban habitat, hints towards the fact, that there has been life here. A living thing, a prey for the hunter, which is the human. But first you have to understand what you are looking for, hunting. While looking at the bread, you may hunt for another kind of sense of nutrition. A nutrition, that goes beyond the functionality the bread stands for, which is to feed. Now halfway eaten, halfway used and thrown on the ground its obvious function got dishonoured as it is put into a place where it is deprived from meaning. As it does not invite to be eaten and do its task for nurturing, maybe you that you are looking at it, maybe you look for another kind of nurture, that it has to offer to you. The nurture that lies within the bread on the ground may be in experiencing its functionality by listening to what it has to tell you, in relation to its direct and indirect context.

Yes I know, the context of the public space can seem pretty empty, so scheduled and untouchable, that all you feel is being alienated from any source of nutrition.

You are a hunter deprived from your prey, and instead capitalism gives you a placebo effect that temporary stills and steals your desire to encounter your world by letting you buy sandwiches in supermarkets. That you may then half way eaten, throw on the ground. Here they become a true trace for an alternative nutrition, an alternative prey.

Think about this kind of prey as a prayer. When praying, you might be led to a sense of hope, a nutrition that grants you with a sensation of crating mechanisms of belonging to this world. In the toast bread case, before it becoming your prayer, you need to learn to read the language of the traces, otherwise you cannot become a hunter of the prayer.

So read the bread well. Can you figure, that this trace can bring you out of a labyrinth of mechanisms operating on the appearance of “for grantedness” in a world where nothing ever was for granted and therefore everything is precious. Even that toast? In days where you had to read your environment in order to survive, the world revealed itself as a speaking scenario, with present, history and future, with character and humour, with multilayered and playful pathways of things and beings ending up and meeting each other. A toast bread would be a curiosity and not a default. It was a place where things could be touched and felt, smelled and seen, interpreted and misunderstood. We were in a speaking world. Not a muted, ignorant one that pretends to be overthrown by algorithms, have clean public spaces, where people eat perfectly packed sandwiches, that disappear in their stomachs as if eating is nothing else but an oiling of the machinery, that has to happen in the meantime of one metro line and another.

The algorithm failed, the toast lies on the floor. Let’s start by the hope that the algorithm fails constantly. In minor and major gestures. People will throw the bread on the ground for you to read and at the same time trash the algorithm. Thanks GOD! Or whoever.

So, This is just an example. Look at your world. The toast can speak. It can tell you about its history in just one slightly elongated blink of an eye, where you recognise the toast and what brought it there. Become a listener, a friend to the toast. Half way eaten, humiliated on the ground. And never ever take it for granted for what it is and became since it came there by a complexity of relations.

This is how you learn the language of loyalty with your environment- do that with trees, animals, buildings, empty bottles, rain drops, trash, clothing, packages, super market signs - do that with the back of the neighbour you never talk to, see how it is hunched or maybe in perfect upright position of a spine. but ask yourself if that speaks necessarily for the metaphorical dimension of this person actually having a spine, however.

Stay with your environment. And let it reveal itself to you. Love every message and let it linger and resonate before thinking you know how things have to be, should be, if they have relevance or importance or not. Read your traces as messages from the environment. Let them speak their poetry, songs, their stories and just listen. But you must stay. Stay stay stay stay stay. Reading traces is still the only way to survive.

Why life can always be a gift if you are not totally fucked up, dead sick, traumatised and a victim of mayor relational conflicts of humans and their environment, such as war, crisis, violence and situation where the gift of life is impossible to elaborate on itself

When you let the traces of your world speak to you, the house wall, lid by daylight, every single brick, the trash on the ground, the colour of the clothes of people in the street, the rattling of the leafs of the trees, the giggling of the water in the rivers, the song of the nightingale in the absurd cold night of November, the weird sound of people using language and laughing about their jokes, will become aware of you, they will start to flirt with your perception, and thank you in showing you how complex, masterfully weird, intense, jolly, annoying but cute, rewarding they can be. When you let those traces reveal how they came into the world in a long and precise development of steps that made love to each other, merged and accumulated, excavated and fought, went through the hole range of whatever their expression and impression of emotionality may be in order to come to being, then you can see each gesture of life as a powerful gift elaborating itself to you. Almost like a daily choir of encounters and things singing and reflecting upon its own sometimes sad, sometimes funny, sometimes beautiful existence. That what seems mundane becomes a playground of sensations telling their own story through you, being the perceiving human. If you perceive you make yourself available to receive. If you are able to receive life on a level of such profanity you will encounter richness. Abundance of a sort, that is so mystical, complex, useless in a sense of beyond capital utility, lonely, collective, temporary and fleeting, that you might feel glad to be alive. Not juts glad you will vibrate a sense of aliveness that can connect you to your environment as an intrinsic experience of itself. And you will not feel that alone any longer. Try it for a bit.

More of will you see, lonely drives, defaults and mistakes implemented in a world, that is not perfect. A world that tries to push through its ideologies, desires, ideas, that has a crazy, malicious and fascinating drive of being. Since it loves being so much, and so too much that all that it can think of is to be, All the time. A narcissist choice of an imperative of being that reveals itself in the defaults of relations. Birds fighting for food, cars fighting for space, humans that stop connecting with love, but talk in between the lines, anxiousness of being left to die, disgust towards decomposing materials or toast breads on the ground and so on. There again, is also space for humour, to lean back and discover how decisions are being made, reactions are hysterical ticks, things will be postponed by fear, fear will be clumsily integrated in the bigger picture of traces, organising our life and being and its dramaturgy.

Cynicism in a neoliberal embrace

At some point in the story we have been encountering a desire for organisation and form. The expressing world, the traces that changed in the course of time and locality wanted to get fixed, to hold on to them. With symbols emerged language, as writings, gestures as ambitions for creating, cave drawings, into memoirs, into Torahs, Bibles, practices, into constitutions into positions in between humans in relations to agreements, animals, plants, into functions defining what the drive strives towards. And those into ideas of what serves who and who serves what, into a system we are dying from right now that is not called life only but now also capitalism.

A brand of capitalism behaves as Neo liberalism. As I become a neo liberal being, with every breath I take I immerse myself into the logics of those ropes holding my hands into place, my thoughts on track, my feelings in a rhythm of its metronome, steadily accelerating. It seems an economical structure is embracing me, keeping me alive, and making others die, or vice versa, with every toast bread I buy, every plastic bottle of water I consume, every job I say yes to, as a contribution to a bigger picture. An annoy of my own voice rages inside me, comes to judge upon my feeling, saying: we know that. Bring me solutions, bring me answers. Or shut up. I know this annoy is a byproduct of my fear of being submitted to the structure. A byproduct of a history of separating content and form. I am the content that holds the form, I think. The form indoctrinates me with content, with what I am, I think. Very Brecht. This idea of the product of environment.

As I choose to shut up, to not bother myself, the other or the ideology, what expresses in me is an alternative of some cynical sort. So cynical that tears show up to resist the bitterness of a system that entered us in our most private and intimate encounters of our world, our friends, our steps, our relations and choose to corporate anything and anyone’s effort to make sense of their own being. A system that tries to keep us away from making use of our ability to read our world, to talk to our world, to listen to our world. There it comes dark and sad. Cynicism.. it feels toxic but at the same time it measures my engagement simply in a cryptical way, diminishing a message underneath that might be coming from a true desire to express. Letting it revolt my fake humbleness of shutting up and showing me the face I carry out while facing a mask of a world.

The cynicism is a form of hope. So don’t you disguise it when it comes your way. And its only way of being operative is by choosing to customise itself in the form of a dark joke. But again, if you were to read your traces well you would not ignore the cynical dimension of life and try to read its origin, so keep in mind my hint: STAY with it. When it comes our way. Stay.

So here it comes:

The handbook for spineless beings in post somatic realism. For dancers and non dancers and people that lack a sort of directionality or have terrible back pain. How to live without loyalty.

The era of centre is over. There is no central authority, giving direction to the system. There is no central exchange. Emerging decentralised markets are connecting sellers to buyers by peer-to-peer trading. Exchange is not a meeting point of different interests but an operative chain of motion, weaving a web through gigantesque and sensible systems of advertisement and promotions, connecting the “(a)like” minded in a market philosophy that works through confirmation rather than communication. We congratulate each other and shake hands. The perpetuation of the 20th century ontologies, that are based on the idea of use and abuse, implode in an infinite chain of copy-paste algorithms, that completely deprive anything and anyone from being worthy enough to be seen on a distinctive expressive level of being a being, that can speak and move, humans, animals, plants, objects, matter in its singularity and in its encounter with matter. Capitalism has led us into a world where we can only think in quantities, in masses, in fragmentation against a sum of things, where this equals and unequals that. On the other side, waves of identity politics emerge, calls from perspectives that are over jumped, overran by those that cannot make sense or money out of the perspective of difference, or those that are simply “riding a ( for some king of reason mysteriously unquestioned) wave“ of a career. As Bracha Ettinger describes it well, the phallocentric psychoanalyst world view is a binary one. It is you or the other in the oedipal conflict, marked by the fear of castration. And the other side of that thought is indeed the naive idea of eternal and infinite symbiosis. In both cases “difference” cannot be acknowledged. Neoliberal societies then throw identity politics back into the machinery, where they become a distributable good in the decentralised organism of production and consumption. When everything can be consumed, nothing matters. Matter is just there to be strategically dispersed, organised, being made available, demystified, objectified and distributed. No one sees the matter crying, dying, being compressed into toast bread, being compressed into depression. An idea of matter has triumphed over spirit, like the tarot card of the 5 of swords:

Geburah(Severity on the Tree of Life) always supplies disruption. In the 5 of Swords, Venus rules Aquarius which implies weakness rather than excess of strength. Hence, weakness is the cause of the disaster. Here, one has succumbed to the body's fear of discomfort, and losses the will to "fight on". If you're still breathing, you can't be defeated, for the Soul is the one who provides the breath in the body. So your immortal "secret lover", is still within you. However, if you are not in communication with your soul, because your identity is controlled by "fear of rejection" and/or the survival mind of the material world, whom you have made as Foundation/ Master of your own body, you'll be defeated by your own fear of death, which translates into all other fears.

To deprive matter but also to deprive the moment when something matters, from its own sensibility is the ignorant core of a capitalist and neoliberal society. What is deeply connected to this ignorance, is the fear of meaninglessness “that nothing matters” once the system of value collapses. The idea of being or having to encounter a sort of nothingness is still the core believe driving the binary of “to be or not to be”.

Once the sneaky mask, identifying and distributing our values ( good, thoughts, relations) for the favour of that binary, which means giving value to only parts of the environment and the inhabitants while devaluing others parts of the environment and exploiting their inhabitants as unworthy of being- once this mask was to slide down- what could it mean for our goods, thoughts, relations, how could they bloom, flourish, express what they always had to say? Could that maybe happen if one was to give up- And then what is to truly give up? Is it just to give away? How to give up even?

I say it is about reanimating our perception towards an intelligence, sensibility and spirit of the forms we encounter and let them express what they do, can do, could do. To understand that these forms are never fixed and always in vibration through communication. Even the toast bread wants to communicate. It is a form that wants to have a form of conversation with its environment, one could say.

A form of conversation means that conversation is a form. A form of something that can livingly exchange and express itself through an architecture or a system, incorporating different expressions that encounter one another. So if capitalism itself could be seen as such a conversation could we think of altering the way how we speak and listen to one another within that relation. If we were doomed to capitulate to that form, as the only possible way of living, we truly had no alternative. We were truly speechless and in ourselves unintelligible to exchange. We were to make an important mistake, as Negarestani explains in Intelligence and Spirit:

if concepts themselves are absorbed by capitalism, then the very idea of capitalism becomes ineffable.Talking about capitalism and diagnosing its pathologies will then be little more than exercises in producing subjective and arbitrary narratives about something that is, in truth, unintelligible.

What does that mean? It may mean that by capitulating capitalism, we cut off ourselves from our own ability to converse in intelligible manner. Intelligence here means maybe not the driving force of creation in a product orientated sense, but a creation of a movement, or of many movements. Movements that can vibrate and alter the form and course of beings. Therefore one has to start to see forms as beings and beings as flexible, elastic encounters of vibrating matter, with frequencies that have a temporal appearance and structure but which are always fragile, malleable as they are always in relation to a synergy of a conversation. That synergy, that conversation our forms are taking part into, can alter the forms, can change their vibration. Synergy is the idea that a conversation is a meeting of energies that can alter each others frequency and therefore no form ever can be considered as something fixed. Not a thought, not a stone, not an idea, not a foundation. Let us step back further and further from the form as a fixed encounter towards forms as fluid, intelligent moments of exchange.

As our intelligence creates movement, our perception renders into our attention the intelligence of our environment. Through relation we are able to create thoughts, ideas, an attempt to express our poetics into the space we inhabit. Which means we attempt to attend that space. Again, these attempts to attend are not to be confused with fixed views, but rather temporal spirits and inspirations that chant towards and in the meeting with our environment. The meetings become tangible as movement traces, incorporating the reflection of past events and the hope or desire for future vibrations.

Here and very important when elaborating those, we need to make sure that the creations of those movement traces, which can be our identity politics, our socio-political ambitions, our dreams and hopes won’t be eaten up and incorporated as ready-made sellable products within the neoliberal ideology of a corpus itself.

Going back to the neoliberal decentralised market, one might recognise that wether by default or strategy, this market is often targeting our most intimate and private relations and takes our goods, that is sometimes all that we have, in order to feed it ideology of movement and finally product orientated organisation. How those encounters are being capitalised upon is mostly more easily felt for, let’s say, a freelancer working within a small community, than a worker in a big company. But what is urgent to understand by all of us, is that the system we operate inside of, where each and every gesture we place into, has a real effect and creates a direct reality to the world we inhabit and thus, right back at us.

Acknowledging the intimate conversation at the threshold of each encounter with the neoliberal system is a first step towards altering the communication we can have with and inside of it. SO again STAY STAY STAY.

Let me dare to make an analogy. If we see the loss of centre as having psychological and physical consequences within our bodies or body-beings, what would it mean to us as individuals and our way of moving and being moved within a neoliberal, decentralised fluctuation. Instead of one centre, we encounter a couple of centres that take over the conversation around value, on different levels of existence. Being doomed to being, being doomed to survive, the body-being will experience a certain stream or locomotion that it has to follow up with and feed such being fed by. True critic is suicide, as it appears that a true critic will only catapult you out of what seems to be the only choice in the 21st century.

I dare to say, that as we are pulled and pushed around and against this mechanism of decentralisation, we become deprived from directing our own intelligence to make conversations with our environment. As the era of centre is over, the era of conversation and direction as well. What is masked in the idea of “decentralisation” is not that power truly exists and operates, that is pretty obvious and smoothly functioning. Whats is masked instead is rather the notion that someone’s actions and motion can be held responsible, that someone can enter a conversation and their activity can leave a trace in the environment to reveal what brought it there, for what reason, with which agenda and default mechanism. That trace that leads into communicating with the environment is what is masked by the operation of decentralisation. The only loyal environment to hold on to is one that is in a complete state of flux with a constant alteration of “what a front” is and “what it means to confront something or someone”, and thus multi-directionality acting upon the directions of the body-being and its attempt to receive and direct expressions from its environment.

One could also say that attention will be all the time distracted producing a sort of soccer play, where the eye of the mass is focused on the ball and not on the environment and in a hypnotic survival exctacy the bigger picture will have to be left out. The focus is permanent but what to focus on is forever exchangeable.

When the social being, the human being is deprived from its way of directing conversations and attending its environment, by such manner the physical and psychological experience results ultimately in a loss of communication finally resulting in a general “loss of spine”, as the delicate arrangements of vertebras collapse inside the speed of a vortex and the stretch of a hyper elastic moral, being twisted and intertwined, for whatever reason may sell us further. Spineless beings. Spineless beings that cannot attend one another.

This happens not just in the human bound body but also in the body that binds humans to generate bigger corporations, as in communities, collectives, scenes. And here is where intimacy get corrupted into a game, that I am not sure who wants to really play it in the end.

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lightn1ng-sparks · 6 years

Text

Winter

In my family, we don’t celebrate Christmas.

Not really anyways.

We do however try to act like we do. I was brought up Catholic, went to a Catholic school and I was in a Catholic church choir. Attended mass every day for a decade and sang over the holiday periods.

This meant I had rehearsals every day in December. This meant that my local church became my playground.

We used it when it was closed, used it in half dark (to save on the bill), used it so much it stopped being a place of worship and became somewhere I found solace in.

When I try and recount things, I always find myself mentioning this aspect of my life. How Christmas for us didn’t mean gift sharing. How I never had anything ‘new’ to show off in the New Year. How trying to make people understand this concept, especially in England made me feel like I had landed in unknown territory and no one could understand how I lived before.

It’s probably why I was bullied so much.

It’s probably also why I tried so hard to fit in so badly.

The hair straightened out over time. The glasses came off, showing off aspects of my big, beautiful body became something shameful. It wasn’t my fault I was here, but it was definitely my fault in the way I was treated. I remember in the first week of school, some boy whose name fails me made a comment about how it felt to be the biggest girl in the year. It never occurred to me that this was perceived as a bad thing. I didn’t anticipate my body being put on display, to poke fun at, to laugh at, just because it was different, within seconds of entering the school gates, and in effect entering a very brand-new life.

It was traumatising.

I remember now that all I could think of was the way I could swim to save your life. How I can swim so strongly, I could take a 20-stone man out of water and resuscitate him back to life. How, I could save your life in a few well-timed seconds.

So big, so strong, so wrong.

I used to be so proud of that though.

I used to believe that everyone had their own set of strengths and weaknesses. I used to believe that everyone should be given a chance. But that all changed that day. The walls came up, and they haven’t fully come down. I don’t particularly think they ever will.

Sometimes I sit down and think about all the changes I’ve made over the years to try and pass off as British. The biggest I could ever deduce is how I pronounce things. My language is harsh to the ear. It is loud. It is so present and obvious in my tongue even when I wasn’t speaking it. I learnt slang, tried to copy accents, made myself believe that this is the only way I’d ever be normal.

Nowadays I don’t share the fact that my family don’t share gifts during Christmas. Or on birthday’s. But that’s another story, for another day. It’s became easy to automatically omit aspects of my life. Just to make it a little bit easier to survive.

I remember the first Christmas I spent here. We lived in a rent free, heating free, lock free apartment in the middle of the roughest area in Nottingham provided to my dad by the company before it went bust. He didn’t believe anything was wrong. I still remember the way my mum used to panic when the light outside started to dim, because she wasn’t used to this, she wasn’t used to strange places, and people and a life she didn’t ask for. It had snowed for 4 months straight that year and it felt like we pretty much lived outside. For a while, we romanticised the snow. Just because it not what we were used to, but after a while, everything was just numb.

We lived with three other Maltese men, one of which gave up his bed for my brother and I. The only thing that mattered that year was when *Garret held a knife up to my dad’s throat in order to protect my mother. The funny thing is, he’d done that to her three times in three months and only then did any of them snap.

It was also the year my mother decided it was time to leave.

Only it took her 5 years to actually leave. We counted down those years privately, until it was the only reason, both of us were still alive.

Sometimes I wonder what life would have been like if we never left the island. Sometimes I wonder how different I’d be. Sometimes I wonder if we never came here in the first place, I wouldn’t have forced her to plan my funeral. I wouldn’t have forced her to hold vigils by my stark grey hospital bed whilst strangers came in to console her wailing.

My mother is strong woman. My mother has moved the tectonic plates of our lives and made them fit whole again. I still remember the day she just left. The house was in disarray. My brothers toy cars all over the living rooms concreate floor. There were wet clothes sitting in their laundry basket by the door, like she was still trying to get on with everyday life, till the moment she couldn’t. The house was cold that day. Uninviting. It was raining. And it felt like we were living in black and white.

In hindsight I knew it was coming.

It’s what happens when you give life to unwanted children. They learn to live with their very unwantedness.

My father though didn’t expect it to happen. He was very sure that he was King and we were all tightly under his control. She didn’t tell him that she was only giving him half her monthly pay check. Didn’t tell him, she had booked both flights and a taxi home. He couldn’t see how strong she was, how willingly she sacrificed her own happiness to build a new life alone.

Because he made us believe we weren’t capable of living alone.

He made us believe that without him within the very fabric of all aspect of our lives, we’d be lost souls.

My brother was 13. An infantilised child up till that moment. He’s always been his favourite. He’s always had my dad bend over backwards for him.

But that day, I watched my little brother grow up. I watched him as he picked up the laundry to hang it up to dry. Watched him as he opened up our usually empty fridge to find it stacked full with food.

Watched him break down.

I watched him rebuild himself too.

We weren’t close up till that point. Designed by my dad to keep us apart and emotionally unstable.

Everything changed that day.

That day changed the very tapestry of our lives.

It took me three years to get out.

In between parenting and work and trying to survive, time passed and suddenly I wasn’t 18 anymore.

The moment I started to put my life back together again, was the moment things started falling into place.

Last Christmas was the first time I went home in nearly 2 years. Went back to the church I grew up in. Went back to a life I had forgotten.

It was the first time I heard my mother talk about life with so much gusto.

Talk about a man that treats her right.

We shared gifts.

We shared stories of our lives we’ve all tried to forget.

We shared happiness together, for the first time in a very long time.

In my family, we don’t celebrate Christmas.

We celebrate milestones.

We celebrate the things that usually pass everyone by.

My brother moved out this summer.

He moved right back in with my mum.

Money is tight.

And he can’t have the latest Nike trainers he’s obsessed with every other month.

But he’s breathed life back into my mum.

Breathed life back into me too.

In my family we don’t celebrate Christmas, we celebrate life.

Because breathing and living are two things we learnt to never take for granted.

*Names changed for privacy

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