#we don't have to be enough

[weirdly-specific-but-ok]

thoughts on fanfiction, perfectionism, and being enough

I'm pretty sure I'm ill and half-asleep and the Good Omens fandom has destroyed my last tenuous grasp on reality, but I am making a post anyway not knowing what I'm going to say. Because that's what this site is for, is it not?

*holds out hand* *waits for you to take it* Hey, you know, you're never going to be done. You're never going to look at something you made and think it's perfect. It's never going to be enough. It's okay to stop and it let it be imperfect. The earth didn't just birth life into just the right conditions, it made creatures which evolved and went extinct, ice ages which ended, volcanos that destroyed life and volcanos that preserved cities for millennia. It made jagged rocks that would be smoothened by rivers and stomachs that would hunger, rivers that would flood and rivers that would run dry.

Create imperfect things and give them to the world. Let the world create from it in turn in an endless cycle. Like Milton on the Bible, like BBC with Sherlock Holmes, like anyone writing fanfiction of their favourite show... Let your creation be imperfect, so you can see all the million ways in which people try to perfect it. All the million ways in which perfection can exist. That's the beauty of fandoms and fanworks. It keeps the creation evolving, keeps it breathing and alive. It becomes the work of a million people, and carries their stories with it in a little back pocket.

And maybe we were made to be imperfect too. Our hair tangles just to be brushed, our arm itches just to be scratches, our hand clenches just to be held and unclenched. There are odd shapes that make us up but they fit in with everyone else's, in handshakes, in bridal carries, in a parent lifting a child, a rescue worker lifting a victim, a girl kissing her wife, a child hugging his toy, a person holding their hands in prayer or in pain.

I'm trying to remind myself of that, because it's so easy to keep wanting more, to believe that there will be a point at which I will be satisfied with what I have done. Even in this fandom, I look at my ridiculous summaries I accidentally wound up making, and look at someone's beautiful meta blog and I feel like shrinking a little bit. But in real life, I'm a designer and an artist, a reader and poet and songwriter, and someone who has been a writer the past eight years, if not all my life. Have I done enough to qualify for any of these roles? Who knows? It shouldn't matter to me, and it shouldn't matter to you, whatever you love doing or are doing.

It will never be enough, you will never be enough for yourself. Can we try to make peace with that little gap in ourselves that acts like a vacuum to keep sucking in more and more effort and things? It'll never be filled. That's okay.

*squeezes your hand before letting go* Isn't it amazing how imperfect and fucked up we all are? Isn't it beautiful that we don't have to sit and stare at statues we cannot touch, but we get stone that we can keep carving all we like? That creation starts with imperfection? I don't know if I'm making sense anymore, the medications are kicking in and my eyes are closing. But I love all of you, everyone who is a maggot and everyone reading this post, too.

Take this *holds out a seashell* it's pretty and it's broken and the animal that made it his home changed it, the sea changed it, and I hope you change it, too. That's all.

#good omens mascot #thoughts #feeling #late night thoughts #emotions #perfectionism #mental health #people pleasing #fanfiction #fandoms #i am enough #you are enough #or are we #we don't have to be enough #creativity #creation #create #imperfection #beauty #stream of consciousness

[refugeed-kim]

YES YES I NEED THIS SIGN IN EVERY SINGLE PARK PLEASE

This is my daily struggle, I had so many arguments with people with off-leash dogs (in a mandatory leash area!!!). Thanks to this behavior I'm struggling with Kim being anxious/aggressive with other females as she often gets involved in unpleased interactions with free females while on leash. And every single time that I ask for the dog to be at least recalled, I'm being called names and insulted of course.

Also 9 out of 10 their dog isn't really that friendly at all.

#dogblr #dog #dog training #petblr #the most unpleasant part of owning a dog is having to deal with awful dog owners... #the richer the neighbourhood the worst are the owners #but of course the only park that isn't a hour-long drive from home it's full of this kind of people #I want to live in a city where there is enough space to actually walk without meeting anyone if we don't feel like it

[mcmissileproof]

favorite hobby when I'm driving is to catch someone trying to climb up my back bumper while I'm going a completely reasonable speed and just slowly take my foot off the gas. you seem upset, brother. why don't we slow down and enjoy the view awhile

#if you won't maintain enough space to stop if I have to slam on brakes then I will just have to go slow enough that it won't kill us both. #kisses 💜 #goes double if you have your brights on #some guy tried to tailgate me with brights on in the rain at night a while ago and I was like beloved we are going 20 until you stop that. #like at that point it's not even spite it's literally that I can't see to safely go any faster than that #lights off back off go around or accept the pace I've set for us #I don't like driving. also.

[egophiliac]

LET THE BOY HAVE AN EDUCATION

officially at the point where we're starting to see where it's all headed and I am just going NYEEHEEHEE in delight at it all. ahhh...next week can't come soon enough...

#art #twisted wonderland #twisted wonderland spoilers #stage in playful land #stage in playfulland #leona: (devises an actually somewhat clever plan to take out the staff-puppets without breaking any rules) #leona: (taken out two seconds later because he sat down in the wrong place) #at this point i'm half expecting the ssr boys to actually bust in with a big sandwich platter or something #a cake with 'please don't kidnap people :)' written on it in shaky icing #kalim isn't good at plans but he DOES throw a good shindig and by god he's going to play to his strengths #also IT WASN'T SHINY TICKETS IT WAS GIDEL?! #MY BOY #MY BEAUTIFUL MAGICAL FELINE BOY #i mean i'm assuming at this point but that seems to be the implication #genuinely kind of shocked that they actually WERE being magicked into being extra gullible #it was ✨foreshadowing✨ all along... #the blot though! what about the blot! #is that going to be an issue or are we going to have enough to deal with already! #i have rocketed from 'i find these villains entertaining' to 'i am suddenly incredibly invested in them as characters' #LOOK there is one thing better than characters with sort of unhealthy codependent relationships #and that is characters with sort of unhealthy codependent relationships but TWIST IT'S NOT THE WAY YOU THINK #nyeeheeheeeeeee

[aueua]

love these guys. the musical chairs

#[art #.png] #[2023.zip] #deltarune #dr sweet cap'n cakes #have been meaning to do something with my verse of guys. this is close enough and now.. i am . uh. free #gif #oh. you're reading this? well. #DON'T TELL ME YOU HAVEN'T HEARD OF THE SWEET CAP'N CAKES. SWEET CAP'N CAKES CYBER FIELDS' BEST MUSICAL TRIO AND THE LAST RESISTANCE AGAINST #THE BIG BAD QUEEN AND ALL HER CREW AND THAT STARTS WITH RESISTING YOU NUH UH UH C #WHAT WANNA SEE WHAT WE GOT YO YO CAN YOU HANDLE THIS hold ONTO your ANTENNAS !! how was THAT did you get ROCKED

[inkskinned]

one of the things about being an educator is that you hear what parents want their kids to be able to do a lot. they want their kid to be an astronaut or a ballerina or a politician. they want them to get off that damn phone. be better about socializing. stop spending so much time indoors. learn to control their own temper. to just "fucking listen", which means to be obedient.

one of the things i learned in my pedagogy classes is that it's almost always easier to roleplay how you want someone to act. it's almost always easier to explain why a rule exists, rather than simply setting the rule and demanding adherence.

i want my kids to be kind. i want them to ask me what book they should read next, and i want to read that book with them so we can discuss it. i want my kid to be able to tell me hey that hurt my feelings without worrying i'll punish them. i want my kid to be proud of small things and come running up to me to tell me about them. i want them to say "nah, i get why this rule exists, but i get to hate it" and know that i don't need them to be grateful-for-the-roof-overhead while washing the dishes. i want them to teach me things. i want them to say - this isn't safe. i'm calling my mom and getting out of this. i want them to hear me apologize when i do fuck up; and i want them to want to come home.

the other day a parent was telling me she didn't understand why her kid "just got so angry." this woman had flown off the handle at me.

my dad - traditional catholic that he is - resents my sentiment of "gentle parenting". he says they'll grow up spoiled, horrible, pretentious. granola, he spits.

i am going to be kind to them. i am going to set the example, i think. and whatever they choose become in the meantime - i'm going to love them for it.

#writeblr #i was doing a lot with high school students. over and over again #other teachers kept asking me what i was doing differently - why the kids listened to me. i am not particularly foreboding #and i have a pretty firm personal policy of never reacting in anger #godhelpme. #i was always kind of taken aback #because in general the kids were pretty easy. i explained i needed to keep everything “PG-13” because this was my workplace #and it was kind of their workplace #too. besides #i love swearing #and since i couldn't swear #neither could they - so if they were going to say “fuck” or become violent #they needed to choose a really specific time #because we only get “the one”.. sure enough - nobody wanted to waste the one very specific “fuck” utterance. kids listened. #i think just because - that rule makes sense. the kids understand that i don't want to be unfair to them #that censorship is stupid #but that i'm under these rules too so like let's ride it out together #also i look young and tbh between me and u nobody wants to make the nice english teacher cry #the way these kids defended me to their friends was really genuinely so heartwarming bc the Grouchy Frat Boy #would be like MISS RAQUEL DOESN'T DESERVE THAT KIND OF AN ATTITUDE BRO DON'T TALK BACK TO HER

[bumbleboa]

of all the good reasons to have an ace headcanon for him, why would you land on this

#not maintagging this #and I wish I could say this was a singular instance #but sadly it isn't #people can be uninterested in sex without being reduced to children or having their intelligence insulted #not even mentioning that a-spectrum experience is so varied in general #the two sides of terrible asexual generalisation: unfeeling robots and children #if you say someone is too dumb or emotionally immature to understand sex #you imply that if they just grew up a little or learned a bit more they would change their mind #ace people get that kind of patronising enough we don't need the call to come from inside the house as well

[ruubesz-draws]

Quality time with the eldest (Earth) and the youngest (Minus One)! Whatever could go wrong??

Yet again, another cat moment for Minus One. He likes Legendary the most out of all the brothers

Goodbye, Minus One... you will be missed :'(

(Pro tip! Be careful with your belongings at the beach. You never know what might happen to it)

#godzilla #godzilla x kong: the new empire #godzilla minus one #godzilla earth #godzilla ultima #shin godzilla #godzilla x mothra #earth and minus one having some quality time #but then ion dragon had to ruin it #it's always that guy #at least minus one is strong enough to defeat him lol #and he's safe! #he enjoyed his lil flight #but do it again and Earth will defo have a heart attack #and probs destroy the whole planet #and we don't want that now... #do we? #btw #I STILL SHIP GODZILLA AND MOTHRA AND I AM GOING TO DRAW SHIP ART JUST YOU WATCH ME HHHHHHHRRRGGGG #anyway Ultima is into science so he's been... busy ig #shin is just shin #i wish i could sleep like shin #do not repost #my art

[cheeseanonioncrisps]

Emotional scene from Muppets Star Trek.

#star trek #muppets #data tng #picard #tng #kermit #fan art #next gen #okay so like… #this is obviously mostly intended as a joke but also #human is arbitrary #especially in star trek where every other planet seems to have its own sapient nonhuman species #human is fucking arbitrary #data holds humanhood as the ideal because he was built by humans #but also because the qualities that are most often used to define him as 'lesser' are qualities that humans especially seem to prize #nobody's tries to claim that vulcans aren't real people because they don't feel emotion #or that ferengi don't show enough empathy to qualify #we don't get any betazoids going around saying that true personhood is defined by how good you are at mindreading #in a world where the enterprise was crewed by muppets #and data genuinely was the closest thing to a human onboard #Measure Of A Man would have been about Picard trying to prove that you can't have someone dismantled #just because they can't sing or travel by map

[crimeronan]

i've seen a couple people in the notes of this very good post about fictional polyamory by @thebibliosphere say things along the lines of "oh, i've been doing it wrong :(" or "how do i know if i did this right??" or "i should probably give up and start over, i wrote this badly :(" and. no!!!!

(i AM seeing far MORE people say "oh, this clarified and helped me so much, i think i know how to fix issues i've been having with my own story" which. YES!!!!)

listen. if you're a monogamous person who's writing a polyamorous relationship, and you've been focusing mainly on The Triad and All Three Together All The Time as the endgame, that's literally fine. that's a perfectly acceptable and strong starting point for your plotting, imo. you do not need to give up on a story that you've started like this.

but the things discussed in the post Can and Should improve your execution!

you can keep the same plot beats and overall relationship arc 100%. polyamorous relationships are infinite in their formations, every one is unique. "basically a monogamous romance but with three people" Does exist, as a relationship type. you're not hashtag Misrepresenting (TM) poly people with it

BUT i do think it will help to read up on some poly people talking about how their relationships Differ from monogamous ones.

so i have outlined some basic important concepts about polyamory.

MORE IMPORTANTLY though, i've broken down some questions that you can answer throughout the writing process to strengthen your individual dyad relationships, your individual characterization, & your characters' individual feelings/experiences. this is a writing resource have fun

future kitkat butting in to say i spent over two hours writing this and it definitely needs a readmore. it is also NOT comprehensive. but everything should be pretty simple to follow! feel free to reblog if you find it helpful yourself or just want to reward me for how gotdan long this took KSLDKFJKDL.

i've grabbed quick links for a couple of the important concepts, some have SEO pitches in them but the info largely seems to be good. (if i missed anything Egregiously Gross on these sites i should be able to update the links with better ones later, since they're under the readmore.)

sidenote: this is NOT meant to be overwhelming, despite the length. if you can't read all of this, that's Okay. you do not need to give up on your writing.

here we go:

compersion!

compersion is a BIG thing in a lot of polyamorous relationships. it's joy derived from seeing two (or more) of your partners happy together, or joy derived from seeing your partner happy with someone else.

compersion is really important as a concept because it highlights that every individual relationship within a polycule is different -- and that that's a GOOD thing. it's sort of the inverse of jealousy.

by the "inverse of jealousy," i mean that instead of feeling left out and upset and possessive, you feel happy/joyous/content.

i can use personal experience as an example: it's a Relief for me when my partners receive joy/support/sex/romance/etc that i can't (or prefer not to) give them. and i love seeing my partners make each other laugh and be silly together.

it's 100% okay for a poly triad not to be together 100% of the time, it doesn't mean that the third member is being left out or not treated equally when two people do things alone together.

(i have individual dates with my partners all the time! PLUS larger 3-and-4-person date nights.)

if the third member DOES feel jealous or left out, then the polycule can have a conversation to figure out what needs/wants aren't being met, and solve that. this happens semi-regularly in my polycule, as it will happen in any relationship (including monogamous ones)! it's just part of being an adult, sometimes you have to talk about feelings.

metamours!

a metamour is someone who is dating your partner, but ISN'T dating you. this may not be relevant for people writing closed three-person romantic sexual triads, but it's a super helpful term to know.

the linked article also lists different types of metamour relationships with some fun phrasing i hadn't heard before. the tl;dr is: sometimes you'll be domestic cohabitation friends, sometimes you'll be buddies with your own friendship, sometimes you might not interact much outside of parties, every relationship is different.

there's no one-size-fits-all requirement for metamour relationships. sometimes polyamorous people will end up dating their metamour after a while (has happened to me), sometimes polyamorous people will break up with one partner for normal life reasons, but remain friendly metamours.

the goal of polyamory is NOT for EVERYONE to fall in love. it is 100% okay if this happens in your story, it happens in real life too! but it is also 100% okay for characters to be metamours without ever becoming "more than friends."

(sidenote: try to kill any internalized "more than" that you have when it comes to friendship. friends are just as important and special and vital as partners.)

of course there are a million ways for messiness to occur with metamours within a complex polycule, exactly like with close-knit platonic friend groups. however this post is not about that! there's enough "here's how polyamory can go wrong" stuff out there already, so i'm focusing on the positives here :)

open versus closed polyamorous relationships!

i'm struggling to find an online article that reflects my experience without directly contradicting at least SOME stuff. so i'll give a quick rundown

google has a bunch of conflicting definitions of open relationships and whether open relationships are different from polyamory. the general consensus seems to be that an open relationship prioritizes one partnership (often a marriage), but that each partner can have extraneous flings or long-term commitments (most often sexual in nature).

this is not typically how i use the term wrt polyamory. the poly concept is pretty simple. a closed polyamorous relationship is one with boundaries like a monogamous one. there are multiple partners in the polycule, but they are not interested in having anybody new join said polycule.

an open polyamorous relationship tends to be more flexible -- it just means that IF someone in the polycule develops mutual feelings for a new person, it's fine for them to become part of said polycule if they want to! the relationship/person is open to newcomers.

some groups will need to negotiate this all together, others will just go "haha, you kids have fun." just depends on the individuals!

with open AND closed polyamorous relationships, the most important thing is making sure that there's respectful communication and that everyone is on the same page. but there's no one-size-fits-all way to do that.

i wish i could give you guys a prescriptive "You Must Do It This Way" guide, but that's.... basically the opposite of what polyamory is about, HAHA.

feelings for multiple people!

i was gonna tack this on to the previous section but decided it warranted its own lil bit.

a defining feature (....i'm told?) of monogamous relationships is that a monogamous person only has feelings for One individual at a time. they only want a relationship with one individual at a time. or, if they DO have feelings for multiple people simultaneously, they're still only comfortable dating one person at a time & being exclusive with that one person.

this is perfectly fine!

the poly experience is generally different from this. but once again..... polyamorous people all have different individual perspectives on this.

for me, i have never been able to draw hard boxes around romantic vs sexual vs platonic relationships, & i love many people at once. my personal polycule lacks many strict definitions beyond "these are my chosen people, i want to forge a life with them indefinitely, whatever shape that life takes"

some poly people feel explicit romantic or sexual attraction to multiple people at once, some poly people feel almost no romantic or sexual attraction at all. i'd say that MOST poly people feel different things for different partners, which is not a bad thing!

some poly people are even monogamous-leaning -- they have just chosen one romantic partner who is themselves part of a larger polycule. (so this monogamous-leaning person has at least one metamour!)

or alternatively, they might have one romantic partner AND a qpr, or other ways of defining relationships. (this is a factor in my own polycule!)

i made this its own point because if you're writing a straightforward triad, this is unlikely to come up in the story itself -- but it's worth thinking about how your characters develop/handle feelings outside of their partnerships.

like, is this sort of a soulmateship, 'these are the only ones for me' type deal? in which they won't fall in love with anyone else, and can be fairly certain of that?

that's pretty close to typical monogamous standards but you Can make it work. just be thoughtful with it

alternatively, can you see any of these characters falling in love Again after the happily-ever-after? and how would the triad approach it, if so? what would they all need to talk about beforehand, and what feelings would everybody have about the situation?

it's worth considering these questions even if the hypothetical will never feature in your actual canon, because knowing the answers to these questions will help you understand all of the individuals & their relationship(s) MUCH better.

i've been typing this for nearly two hours and there's a lot more i COULD say because... there's just a lot to say. i'll close out with some quick questions that you can ask yourself when developing the dyad dynamics within your triad

first, take a page and create a separate section for each individual dyad. then answer these questions for every pair:

how does each pair act when alone?

how do they act differently alone compared to when they're with their third partner?

are there any elements of this dyad (romantic, sexual, financial, domestic, etc) that these two people DON'T have with the third partner?

if so, what are they?

are there any boundaries or hard limits within this dyad that aren't shared with the third partner?

if so, what are they?

partner 3 goes out of town alone for a few weeks. what are the remaining two doing in their absence?

(doesn't have to be anything special, it's just to get a sense of how the two interact on a day-by-day basis without the third there)

what is something that each partner in the dyad admires about the other -- that they DON'T necessarily see in the third partner?

what problem do These Two Specifically need to solve in the story before their relationship will work?

how is that problem DIFFERENT from the problems being solved within the other two dyads?

doing this for ALL THREE dyads is VITAL imo. that way, you develop complex and nuanced and different relationships that all have unique dynamics.

those questions should be enough to get you started, i hope

then After you've charted the differences in relationships, you can start to jot down similarities in the overarching triad. what does one person admire in Both of their partners? what are activities that all three like to do together? what are boundaries or discussions that all three share?

but the main goal is to figure out how to Differentiate each relationship!

a polycule is only as strong as the individual relationships within it. if two people are struggling with their own relationship, adding a third person won't fix that.

(UNLESS the third person is the catalyst for those two to, like, Actually Communicate And Work Their Shit Out. i just mean that the old adage of "maybe if we just add a third-" works about as well to fix a miserable non-communicative marriage as, uh, "maybe if we have a baby-")

AND FINALLY.

if you're not sure whether your poly romance reads organically to poly people, you can hire a sensitivity reader with poly experience. if you can't afford that, you can read up on polyamorous resources like a glossary of terms & articles actually written by poly people. (and stories written by poly people!)

you can also just.... ask poly people questions, if they're open to it. i like talking about polyamory and my own relationships so you're welcome to send asks if u want, i just can't guarantee i'll answer bc my energy levels fluctuate a lot and i don't always have time.

polyamorous people are in an uphill battle for positive representation right now & so the LAST thing i want to see is authors giving up on their stories bc they're worried about getting things Wrong. well-meaning and positive stories that treat this kind of love as normal, healthy, & aspirational are So So So Needed. even if you guys end up with some funky-feeling details.

seriously, if you're monogamous then you probably don't have a full idea of Just How Nasty a lot of people can get about polyamory. i wish it DIDN'T mean so much for you guys to want to write nice stories about us, but it does mean a lot. and it means a lot that you want to do it WELL.

in conclusion. this is not a prescriptive guide, it's just a way to raise questions. and also, you all are doing FINE.

#thebibliosphere i apologize for tagging u when we don't know each other at all i just want u to get credit for the initial discussion #given that it is so much more thoughtful and clear than anything i'd think to write. #i did NOT mean to spend multiple hours on this but once i started writing i was like #oh god i actually do have like a lot i can tell monogamous people about writing poly people & the poly perspective #anyway. i mention it in the post but people can send me (respectful. obviously) asks if they have questions #i cant promise to answer all of them bc i am bad at this. but if i'm well enough then i'll try #polyamory #non-monogamy #ethical non-monogamy #writing #my writing #writing advice #relationships

[thelongestwalk]

fig and gorgug as animals!

#my art #dimension 20 #fantasy high #fig faeth #gorgug thistlespring #a frilled lizard and a moose #lots of thought went into this trust me #also i realised recently that I don't have enough experience drawing animals/anthro stuff so here we are

[bixels]

Jesus man, relax.

#this was in response to me saying “lunar new year” on the rarity art #personal #delete later #what in insane nonproblem to get this angry about #i asked my parents (taiwanese immigrants) about this and they said we use either but prefer lunar new year #because it's inclusive to koreans and vietnamese people who celebrate on the same day #lunar new year is an umbrella term same as “happy holidays.” this person is basically getting mad i said happy holidays instead of #merry christmas. #my family and i identify more as taiwanese than chinese so. we're not gonna say chinese new year much anyways #i sent this to my mom btw and she replied with basically “die mad i guess.” love you ma #this literally doesn't matter anyways i could have said “chinese new year” to caption that post and it wouldn't have mattered #the only reason i didn't is because i plan on drawing another art including carol (coco pommel) who's korean and celebrates the same day #like. most people in china/taiwan don't care they just say “happy new year” cuz it's the fuckin new year. someone saying lunar new year is #not erasure it's not flattening asian identities into a monolith. it's just an umbrella term. #anyways happy lunar new year happy chinese new year happy tet happy spring festival happy seollal #like i cannot stress enough to you guys that these holidays are on the exact same day and celebrate basically the same exact thing. #this is not an issue.

[canisalbus]

Love your art so much. Will you show us cool nature pics from your country? I'm literally so stoned I forgot where you live sorry.

Sure anon, why not. I'm not a photographer so the quality of these is kind of slushy at best. I like nature and wander around a little bit, but I rarely hike properly, so I don't go to that many scenic places. These are mostly from regular walks. Long post warning.

Summers are short but very green, and since we're at the arctic circle we get sunlight around the clock. Some of these were taken at midnight or early morning small hours. Most of Finland is very sparsely populated and covered in boreal forests.

Finland is a very watery country, lots of lakes in particular.

Sometimes you get intense sunsets

And winters are very cold, snowy and last about six months. In summer we have midnight sun and in winter there's the polar night to counter it. Around late December sun only rises for about two hours per day where I live so it's very dark for many, many weeks on end (which is wonderful if you get seasonal depression like I do). But sometimes the weather and lighting are just right and you get this ethereal pastel effect that I love.

#we also have northern lights pretty regularly and those can be magical but I'm not enough of a wizard to take good pictures of them #I have a friend who Photographs Nature With Intent and goes to all these natural parks to do it #but I'm not them so this is the best I can do #I particularly regret that I don't have any bog/swamp/marsh pictures to show you because they're actually really aesthetic locations #believe it or not #and an iconic part of Finnish nature #anonymous #long post #answered #lamentably the best ethereal pastel effect only happens on very cold days like from -20°C to -30°C #so if you take out your phone and remove gloves to snap a photo your phone battery dies very quickly and your fingers freeze #so it's a bit inconvenient

[dreadark]

that ivan loves till is the most obvious thing about them

but. does ivan know that…?

the ivan that regards his own feelings as shallow, the ivan that learned how emotions are expressed only from copying others… does he even know that the love he’s felt for so long is love? probably not. and part of the reason is the one he loves himself

because the easiest example he has of love is till's feelings to mizi. till outright calls it love, and ivan watches him so much he has to be aware of this and till’s love to mizi is totally unselfish, right. he doesn’t seem to actually want much from her—just that she's still there and still "mizi"

but ivan can't be satisfied with just watching he… wants. ivan wants till’s attention, till’s affection—

surely this selfish wanting can’t be love

...no wonder he was never able to express his feelings straightforwardly when he belittles them so much but he can’t stand not having anything either, so he does… whatever he does instead to get any scraps of attention he can, from someone he's convinced doesn't care about him at all only showing affection when till can't see it, right until he knows he's going to die

but ivan's feelings for till are all he still has of himself... to think of them as shallow...

I've seen this translated as "I should've been kinder" to him (till) or to her (sua)

but really, the one he should've been kinder to was himself

#alien stage #alnst #alnst ivan #ivantill #i have a lot of thoughts on till -> mizi too but this is long enough #just attempting to rewrite my twt rambles more coherently #idk why i wrote this so dramatically tho... #'thank you for being the victim of my shallow emotions' is going to haunt me to my grave #ivan's character is just a careful balance between his natural freak nature and his extreme depths of self-loathing #making him the most miserable guy ever #...really once you realize so much of what went wrong is thanks to ivan just hating himself too much to even think of them as friends. well #c...can we bring him back... don't die like this..... #(also you know. with the implications of how 'pets' are treated #wanting someone physically must feel... even more wrong

[egophiliac]

innocently logging in to look at the Twst schedule for May like

#art #twisted wonderland #twisted wonderland spoilers #twisted wonderland episode 7 spoilers #twisted wonderland book 7 spoilers #twisted wonderland episode 7 part 8 spoilers #twisted wonderland book 7 part 8 spoilers #tsumsted wonderland #i-is that enough spoiler tags #anyway twst just absolutely obliterating me with the schedule again #i saw the story completion campaign ended in june and was like 'oh okay that'll be when we get the next part' NOPE HA HA #oh my god rook. oh my god savana rook is real. #w...why is this a story card. hey twst wHY IS THIS A STORY CARD -- #is rook dreaming of still being a rowdy boy or #and why is he...(squints) why is he in a pomefiore bedroom #never mind i'm actually terrified of this card now #god. the STETSON. i'm crying. #he really is just applejack huh #also vil i don't know what your problem was this man's mane is LUSCIOUS #and what's this? it's twst following up that first punch with the right hook of EVEN MORE of the best and silliest event #malleus is going to be in the middle of an angsty flashback while dangling us over a pit of spikes or something #and then we're going to cut directly to him having a charming little tea party with a small plush version of himself #oh twst your sense of pacing remains exquisitely incomprehensible #(no i love this though)

[leupagus]

On Voting in America

So one of the most profound comments on routine chores that I've ever encountered was, hilariously, the Pickle Rick episode of "Rick & Morty," where (after a lot of shenanigans have already ensued) this therapist absolutely lays Rick out:

"I have no doubt that you would be bored senseless by therapy, the same way I'm bored when I brush my teeth and wipe my ass. Because the thing about repairing, maintaining, and cleaning is: it's not an adventure. There's no way to do it so wrong you might die. It's just work. And the bottom line is some people are okay going to work and some people, well, some people would rather die. Each of us gets to choose."

I think about this at least once a week — usually while I'm doing my laundry or sweeping or some other task that needs doing and won't get me anything more than clean clothing or a dog-hair-free floor. There's no Pulitzer for wiping down your microwave or scrubbing your toilet; no one's awarding you for getting all the dishes out of the sink. At best you have the satisfaction of crossing it off your list.

Voting is very much the same (and I'm talking about the US here, as an American). Sure, you sometimes get a sticker; but nobody's going to cheer for you. There's no adventure here, no potential for anything more than crossing something off of a list. It's a chore, something that needs doing in order to repair, maintain, and yes even clean. So I get why people don't like doing it.

And I've decided I don't give a shit.

Do it anyway. Your country takes astonishingly little from you — taxes, the once-in-a-blue-moon jury duty, and a theoretical draft that hasn't been used in over half a century and likely will never be again — but it asks you (asks! not requires! not demands!) to vote once a year. It's not always easy; especially in conservative states, the impediments to vote can be ridiculous. But it is once a year and unlike in our nation's all-too-recent past, you will not die if you do it.

In fact, the worst outcome from voting these days is that the person or issue that you vote for loses — but you won't know if they lose until after the election. Polls are less accurate now, for a whole host of reasons; you cannot know until after the election who or what will win. This makes your vote more valuable than possibly ever before.

Use that power. Not because it's exciting or even rewarding, but because your vote is what keeps our country's metaphorical teeth from falling out and our metaphorical ass from stinking.

Brush, wipe, vote.

#ok the metaphor may've gotten a little gross but rick & morty chose it not me #anyway if voting didn't matter then rich people wouldn't do it #and I can assure you: they do #also: please don't think of voting like a reward for the person you're voting for #or as a punishment for the person you're not voting for #my mom's advice was: #think about the most vulnerable people you care about and vote for the person or issue that will make their lives better #and you'll rarely go wrong #yes there are often two bad options but if you're old enough to vote you're old enough to understand the difference between bad and less ba #anyway that's all the political lecturing I'll do this year #except maybe to complain about the 18-hour day I'll be having on Tuesday #oh also SIGN UP TO WORK ELECTIONS WE NEED MORE HELP #thank you #politics!