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snuggleboots · 4 years

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Omg I just read the akatsuki hug headcanons and it was so good🥰 Could you please write headcanons for kisame in a relationship with a fem s/o 🥺💕

Thank you!! I'm tickled pink that my lil headcanons were received so well! 💚 I hope you enjoy these headcanons!

Romance revolving Kisame always gives me real Not In Nottingham vibes tbh. Slow, tentative; full of fuzzy good feelings and overwhelming grief.

I have a lot more than this in terms of headcanons, so if you have any specific requests or scenarios in mind don't be shy! Thank you so much again for reaching out!! 💚

Kisame and dfab (fem) S/O! Here we go!

Kisame is one of the most enthusiastic and self deprecating men you will ever meet. He craves any love and attention you're willing to lay on him, and he returns it generously. Something as simple as holding your hand is enough to make his heavy heart burst- there is never a point in your relationship that you doubt he cherishes every kindness you rain upon him.

Despite the fact he's a titan of a man, he adores being held on occasion. He doesn't have any stupid pride hinging on his masculinity to hold him back here. Let him lay his head in your lap and trace meaningless patterns into the back of his neck. Better yet, squirm your way behind him when it's time to sleep. Drape your body around his and surround him in a veil of warmth and certainty that when he wakes, your comforting embrace will still be waiting.

Sex isn't something that will make or break your relationship. If it happens, he is more than willing and happy to try his best and provide. If it doesn't, tender moments full of kisses and laughter are more than enough to make him happy. Let him cradle you close as you fall asleep- give him the chance to memorize your peaceful visage and mid-dream murmurs and you'll have him wrapped around your little finger. The love he has for you is sacred and grounding, and every moment- no matter how intimate or innocent- will keep him dedicated and content until the day he dies.

Kisame knows his life will likely not be long- that the chances of him quietly fading out of existance are laughably slim. For these reasons he makes a point of doing something with you whenever he sees you. Dates, if you could even call them that, happen every time he gets the chance to see you. They're never public for obvious reasons- that heavy old cloak and hat would put you in far too much danger if anyone ever connected the dots. Instead he finds peace in sightseeing with you, or quaint little picnics whenever you surprise him with a basket of treats and drinks; whether they're home cooked or bought from kindly vendors doesn't matter to him. The sentiment is so pure and heartwarming he's sure he falls a little more in love with you every time you come running to your meeting place with that blinding grin and cute little basket.

Itachi is aware of your relationship with Kisame. Whether or not Kisame told him, he knows. He won't go destroying this little slice of domesticity and bliss for his friend. If you aren't going to endanger the secrecy of the Akatsuki, the Uchiha sees no harm in letting the typically merciless Hoshigaki indulge- it's plain to see how happy you make him. The wider smiles and barely contained excitement leading up to those secret visits to you speak volumes. If you're a shinobi, Itachi would probably keep a loose tab on you and your activity for safety's sake.

Kisame absolutely does not care if you're a shinobi or civilian. In fact he would find it impressive if someone so disconnected from the gruesome existence of war and bloodshed had the guts to approach him at all. However, if you are a civilian he would show a massive territorial imperative due to the fact that if you were discovered, interrogation would surely follow. You would never witness the vicious and indiscriminate slaughter unleashed on any shinobi he suspects of seeing the two of you together. Kisame would sit you down somewhere in absolute privacy to lay out a plan in case of your connection to him being discovered. If you were ever made to suffer just because you chose to love him, the devastation he would unleash through his guilt and shame would be primal and nightmarish.

With a civilian, he would adore showcasing his abilities to you. Have you ever seen a shark? No? He'll bring the experience to you. You can't touch them- but you can certainly see them. The more inquisitive and invested you are in the sea-bound predators, the more he gets to stroke his ego by unleashing every useless fact he can share with you. Is your quiet little village suffering a drought? By god can he fix it fast- the awe and gratitude pouring out of you would be a nice little reward for his effort. If he saw a celebration sweep through your neighbours and elders it would be all that more endearing- and just incredibly humbling, really, to see something so simple to him be the cause of such a joyous uproar. It would be a happy memory and secret, kept safe in both of your hearts.

If you're a shinobi, Kisame would feel a lot safer carrying on a relationship with you. He has no doubt in your ability to defend yourself against any prying eyes, though he would still be very strict about secrecy regarding the connection you share with him. A lot of the principles in the civilian relationship would still very much apply to a partner trained in combat.

He would also most likely love sparring with you, if you were willing. Never seriously- just as a fun way to bond and share your abilities with one another. Would you ever win? Unlikely, due to Kisame's competitive nature, but he'd never hold it against you. Instead he would offer tips and advice on your stances, timing, or awareness during a fight. He would take sick delight in seeing you put your practice with him to use in a real fight- because honestly, strength is very attractive to him in a significant other.

Regardless of strength or status, Kisame accepts you for who you are. You chose to let him into your life and show him love and kindness, so as far as he's concerned he has no right to demand anything more than what you've already given him. He loves you for who you are. Nothing more, nothing less. A lonesome existence was singlehandedly enriched by something as simple as your companionship. Cherish that, the same way he cherishes you.

#akatsuki #naruto #kisame #kisame x reader #hope this is okay!#i love kisame so much #and I'll admit I got a lil invested in the Kisame-civilian relationship lmao #lowkey believe that in Kisame's last moments through his interrogation Ino would get to see fleeting glances of you before the big guy died #moroseu #writing

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dxmedstudent · 4 years

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As a longterm single person... or a person who was single for long times during parts of my life, I’m usually very onboard with shifting the focus. But it feels like this entire article is a lazy missed opportunity. It somehow manages to alienate me even though I really, really want to be able to agee with it. For a start, the article does nothing to address that yes, society does highly value romantic relationships at the expense of other meaningful relationships, and pressures people - particularly young women, to conform to the expectation to be in one. The expectation to be in a relationship and how we are treated when we’re not in one goes far beyond people valuing sex. I’ve talked about this at length before, so I’ll skip over that part for now. It doesn’t even touch on how ace or aro people experience such a ban - you don’t have to be in love or having sex to miss a significant other - the key is in the ‘significant’ bit.

“And while I know there could be some troubling long-term consequences to this legal accident, I can’t help but feel that the frustration of many is misplaced.”

No. This is your first mistake. People are allowed to be frustrated that such a rule renders physically continuing intimate relationships if you live apart illegal. People are allowed to be frustrated that they can go to primark, risk coronavirus at work, use the tube, but aren’t allowed to hug their GF. Hell, people are allowed to just be annoyed they can’t go to the pub. It might not be a priority, but I wouldn’t write in whining about how other people miss something that I am not personally fussed about. “It means we can’t go to the pub, to a party, or to a friend’s house to sit on the sofa with a bottle of wine laughing our heads off; we can't have our families round for Sunday roast; we can’t even go inside if it starts to rain during one of the permitted back garden gatherings of six.”

But fundamentally, we can have a party. We can see 6 friends or family outside. We can share food with them. We can use the bathroom. We will soon be allowed to start going to establishments to eat and drink. However rather hilariously, the article somehow manages to paint sitting on someone’s sofa as equally (or more) important than romantic and physical intimacy with a life partner. Who cares that some people haven’t been able to see their intimate partner at all, much less so much as hold hands in 3 months, when I wanna sit on someones sofa!

I get it. These rules are still wildly different to our usual lives. You’re right, it sucks that we also can’t enjoy platonic touch. Hugging a friend, patting someone on the back. Just being able to be indoors and have a meal. But the rules let us live out a much closer approximaiton of life with friends - which is a start. Now, I have friends who run the full tactile spectrum from ‘absolute huggers’ to ‘don’t touch me’. I miss a good hug or just being able to sit beside each other, but for the most part I can easily enjoy most of what I can do with friends under the current rules. Apart from sit around playing board games together, cos you can’t do that 2m apart and it’d be less than ideal to do outside. This has still had a big impact on our social lives - particularly if you live apart from friends as I do. So I feel you. I can’t just up and drive over to most of my friends’, and even if I did, sitting around outside for a couple of hours wouldn’t be with the long trip. When you’re not allowed indoors or to stay the night it makes the kind of socialising many of us do much harder. It’s the same for me seeing my family, too. So I get it. It’s just that being banned from being within 2m of someone has a much bigger impact if you’re in a romantic relationship. Because physicality (and not just sex), and spending lots of time together is a bigger part of the deal when it comes to having a significant other. Many people aren’t overly physically affectionate with friends - I know many people who barely do beyond a handshake or stiff hug - and that’s fine. These laws just take away a much bigger dimension from a romantic relationship, than from most platonic ones.

On the Facebook group I run for single people, those who live alone simply want to know when they will be touched again. And by touch I mean simply a pat on the arm, a cuddle from their mum, their best friend holding their hand. These are simple things, but are so important. They matter to people just as much, if not more, as whether they have a 'significant other' sharing their bed - but you wouldn't know that from the discussion around these new rules.

See, this is important, so maybe lead with this? It’s heartbreaing that many of us effectively have been banned from all human physical contact. But that doesn’t mean intimate relationships aren’t important to others - and complaining that those people are commenting on how it affects them is misplaced. Ths is not a competition between whether it’s worse that we can’t hug our friends or our boyfriends. Not being allowed to see an intimate partner is also depriving you of cuddles or simple gestures - a lot more than just sex.And yet the article frequently chooses to frame it as a ban against hookups when it also affects many people in relationships who can’t move in at this point in time. I’ve seen people complain that they can’t spend time with or touch their partners of several years, for example. But actually, we also shouldn’t have to minimise the importance of sex, even in a casual setting. So let’s get onto that. “Those grieving for those they've lost to Covid-19, I’m sure, are far more interested in when they can hold their loved ones than when they can next hook up. Headlines about sex bans must feel particularly grating to them.” News just in: holding your loved ones and sex are mutually exclusive. You know, if any of us lose loved ones, we’ll be heartbroken and it will suck whether we can’t hug our sister who lives far away, or our boyfriend who we don’t live with. Please don’t use cheap emotional blackmail to suggest people can’t miss both or that both can’t be one and the same if you love your partner. I’d argue this probably says a lot about what the author thinks about relationships or sex, but I hope it’s just poor writing. “The uproar about the apparent ban on sex also plays into the rather sixth form idea that absolutely everyone is having loads of sex all the time. God forbid a few of us have to wait a few months for our next chance.” Also, tangential much? People aren’t upset because they can’t go 3 months without sex, they are upset because 3 months in a pandemic without any intimacy with a loved one is hard, especially if you’re in an intimate relationship that got suddenly cut off. Because that person and their support and cuddles is particularly important to you. This is also a weird double standard: It’s apparently OK to be devastated because nobody can give you a hug, but god forbid you are sad about being entirely separated from a significant other against your will. Also, apparently we’re all fantasists playing up how much sex we’re having. I don’t understand why this article comes across as so weridly moralising, but it does. Reducing sex to hooking up is moralising behaviour: and as someone with an interest in sexual health I have to state that it’s not up to you to put a value on sex for someone else. I don’t like it being illegal for me to hug my sister, or ... yes, have sex with my boyfriend- or you know, hug him too since this isn’t about sex alone. But I’m not here to police if someone doesn’t like the rules because they just miss sex. Whoever they have sex with. Sex is a fundamental part of being human for most people. Intimacy is core to many people’s mental health, particularly in a relationship, and that need is valid. Physical intimacy in general is a massive part of intimate relationships. It’s taken decades of progress for people to accept that sex is valid and enriching, not shameful. I’m worried that yes, behind our attitudes lies the still pervasive social attitudes that sex is dirty, wrong, and something for us to police if it doesn’t fit the bounds of what we consider acceptable. We haven’t eliminated harmful attitudes to sex, and the desire that others get to decide if vulerable populations like disabled people or the poor are allowed to have initmate lives. This is about how easily rules can be used to oppress or police others - as they have been in the past. What happens to sex workers? To our LGBTQ friends if someone decides that gay sex is riskier? It’s worth noting that intimacy is only illegal if you live apart - favouring those rich enough to have the space to move in together and the married. The poor, those living with others, those who aren’t ready to take that step, those who rely on sex to make a living - face an entirely different set of rules. It’s worth asking yourself why it’s OK to move in (and risk exposing each other) but not OK to visit the person you’d be allowed to expose all the time. Why it’s OK for the government to draw a line on which relationships matter, and when - and what hoops you have to jump through. This isn’t new - out LGBTQ friends will tell us this was always a thing. But we need to be ever more vigilant as our personal lives are policed more and more. “Nobody is talking about this” is legitimate criticism when we’re talking about a horrifying event people may be unaware of, but lazy writing when we’re talking about something that both evidently affects many people and ... is being discussed. It allows you to fill an article with righteous indignation about how people aren’t doing something rather than just... doing it. As it is, I’ve read multiple articles about people missing grandchildren, wanting to see recently born babies, missing their friends, struggling with this whilst being single. I’ve read articles about the lonely and vulnerable. And actually, more articles about all those things when you add them up, than I’ve seen about romantic relationships. Which is great - because this pandemic and the lockdown are having a massive effect on a lot of people in many ways, and it personally interests me that we record those experiences and share them. I’ve even seen so many articles about people missing going to the pub, or which restaurants they wish they could visit. And that’s OK, it can be the little things about normality that we miss. I miss museum dates, for example, and there wasn’t even any sex involved! We all miss normality. And I’ve had those conversations in real life, too. These conversations are important, but it’s possible to have them without downplaying something that doesn’t matter to you when it obviously matters to other people. I have been single for long periods of time; I’d be the first to suggest here’s more to life than romantic relationships. Hell, at times that was my absolute last priority. I’ve lived away from friends and family - I am not new to loving people at a distance, and it’s still been hard despite my having the experience to deal with it. If anything, this pandemic just shows how those links feel very different, when we’re not able to travel. Suddenly everyone feels much further away, and I re-evaluate just how happy I am to live far away. For what it’s worth, I think we need more articles highlighting how difficult it is to manage all sorts of interpersonal relatioships at a distance as lockdowns ease. And as someone who’s in a romantic relationship, the pain of bieng isolated in all these spheres just isn’t the same. I miss hugging my mum. And I miss my friends. And I miss my boyfriend. It all hurts. Looking at her own personal examples, the crux of the matter isn’t that she can’t see her family or friends - it’s that most of them live far away, and even if they live nearby, she’s not allowed to hug them. I’d love to hear more about people’s lives - what they are missing, what they hope to be able to do soon. And I can completely empathise with her: I wish I could see my sister, too: I’ve only seen her once since lockdown, briefly and under social distancing. I miss my friends - we live far apart but that used to be easier to bridge when we weren’t under lockdown. I have friends’ babies I’m yet to meet. New BFs yet to be introduced, etc. Weddings we’ve all missed. I can fully empathise with the author’s frustration at being unable to do these things - it has truly had a significant impact on my life this year that I’m mssing out on many of these things too. But that doesn’t in the slightest make it any less awful that I can’t be with my boyfriend, too.

#sex and relationships #jesus christ #i would never have predicted I'd be out here talking about how sex is important to people #it isn't even that important to me personally most of the time #but come on #long post #covid-19 journal

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dhominis · 5 years

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Life updates! Rambling, happy. CW for disordered eating and Bad Family Dynamics. (Happy despite this.)

I’ve been in my new apartment for a while; it‘s amazing and I love having a place that is mine. A few days after I moved in, I stayed over at my girlfriend’s house because I didn’t really want to put the effort into going all the way back to my apartment and I had this thought: I want to go home.

This is not something I’ve experienced before. Home always has been my parents’ house, and home’s always been a place for caution, for guardedness. It has not historically been a place I wanted to stay. It’s been a place that’s better than the alternatives, but never somewhere that was itself comforting.

...And now going home means I get to go into my room (and it’s mine, I would be entirely justified in being angry if someone went into it and looked through my things and took things and questioned me about what they found). And then I can reorganize my room if I want (I can move furniture around! I can buy furniture! I can throw broken things away if I want to!), I can cook something, take a shower without having to justify why I’m taking a shower, I can clean up the side yard if I’m restless, I can clean the apartment. I can be in my room on my phone talking to my girlfriend, and probably nobody is listening in, and if somebody is listening in that’s still not dangerous. I can go on a walk, I can go over to a friend’s place, I can meet people somewhere, and I don’t have to explain this.

I don’t have to be on guard.

Been doing social things – poly community and, uh, adjacent less-SFW communities. Socializing is... easier now. (A lot of things are easier!) I am still extremely awkward but not in an intractable way; I expect this to dissipate with practice. People like me. They’ll like me more when I have better social skills and this is achievable.

...I asked a cute girl what her favorite pathogen/parasite was (this was relevant to the conversation!) and she said she really liked botflies and just. I can’t. I have always had to be the one who brings up botflies! Talking about botflies historically has worked out really well for me – it’s a great filter? – and I am so incredibly enthused about this. (We’re getting coffee tomorrow. I really need evo-bio disease-bio friends, and she is smart and nice and extroverted and gives great hugs. Things like “asking cool people to get coffee with me” also are easier. And “sending an email” and “answering the phone” and a lot of things along those lines. There has been a strangely global reduction in inhibition and anxiety.)

I got a job. Not the call center one I mentioned, instead entry-level healthcare. It’s pretty much ideal! Learning skills, interacting with people, IIRC they’ll do some tuition reimbursement if I go into healthcare (that’ll help until I hit the FAFSA independent student age cutoff). Fast-paced work, twelve-hour shifts and free time on my days off. Not having to self-motivate. I think I need that right now. The person who suggested I apply for this job can model my brain surprisingly well.

(In some contexts better than I can. I hadn’t generated this as a career option, hadn’t thought it would be even sort of good until he explained how it might fit. A post a while ago: "...he understands, I think, the need to be active and moving, doing a lot of different things, short feedback cycles. For me – probably for him as well – high-intensity stressful periods of limited duration are regulating or calming, not harmful. I keep fantasizing about getting the job, just going nonstop at maximum intensity for those twelve-hour shifts, and then coming home and… not doing that. Being able to use the time for other things, hopefully having burned off some of the excess energy so I’m not pacing around organizing things really fast for twelve hours at home.”)

And they’re giving me health insurance after a few months.

It’s... I really need enrichment. I need to be busy. Right now I am not in a high-stress environment and I am waiting for things to happen, there is not much I can get done right now (lots of cooking, going on walks, occasional bodyweight exercise, self-teaching reading ECG strips, but I am not yet good at self-motivation). I am the human equivalent of a pretty competent border collie that will, if left without adequate stimulation, herd every squirrel in the neighborhood into your kitchen.

But I start work Monday, and after that things will be easier.

Almost everything has, in fact, been easy. I can feel many of the anxieties falling away, many of the maladaptive behaviors. I am investing effort in this, but not enough to merit the improvement.

I have been realizing that living with my parents took up so much mental bandwidth. The personality and cognitive and life-skills improvements that I’ve seen in the few brief periods I’ve been away from them... I should’ve left earlier, of course. I would have been okay. I didn’t know that before recently, but it would’ve have been better.

So the cognitive changes are substantial. Behavioral too. I have for a while had great difficulty in eating adequate food – I mean, often going a few days without eating, going months with inadequate caloric intake, rapid enough unintentional weight loss that doctors have been loudly concerned. (There is a physical thing that I have been blaming completely for this, but honestly it’s not just that, there’s an irrational aversion to eating. Caloric deprivation always makes me want to eat less – want to hoard food, conserve it for when I really need it. I go into a famine mindset very easily; when hungry, I find it difficult to alieve that food is available. And the physical problems are worsened by not wanting to eat. I tolerate food worse when I don’t make myself eat regularly.)

It’s not effortless; minor inconveniences tend to make me want to stop eating and I don’t ever really want food. (Cooking and baking my own food helps. It is easier to want to eat when eating is part of a skill-building process.) But now, and not before: I need adequate nutrition and when I don’t want to eat I can just tell myself no, you need food, you want to feed yourself, you don’t want to lose muscle mass, you don’t want to lose fat, you don’t have to conserve food because there will always be enough. And I miss meals sometimes, still... but when that happens, I can make myself eat when I notice. Peanut butter interspersed with enough water doesn’t really feel like food and I can pretty much always do that.

And sleeping. And physical activity. And social interaction. It is getting easier to give myself the things I need. Sometimes when you do not have any realistic chance of global comfort, when your life will despite your best efforts be almost unbearably unpleasant, choosing your own mode of suffering makes it easier to tolerate. Adjusting to a situation in which I do not need to expect suffering is... strange.

So – I got a job and an apartment and I’m finding a friend group and I am doing okay with finances, and long-term things will be okay, and my brain has so many things wrong with it but I am fixing myself.

This all has been startlingly easy so far and I am waiting for something to go wrong. This is prudent – something will go wrong eventually, I’ll be able to handle it but it will happen – and also just really neurotic. Still I’m less neurotic than at any other point in my life.

And I have health insurance! I probably can get an ADHD evaluation and treatment, therapy if I decide that’s a good idea, whatever. (Potential issue with ADHD treatment: I’d have to go to the pharmacy like every month, it would suck so much, I have never done this successfully. Thankfully there is a pharmacy in my workplace. I am so lucky.) And I have social supports, I have a community. My roommates are great. I have my partner; she’s unbelievably amazing.

Leaving has gone better than the realistic best-case scenarios I’d generated. It’s been like a month and there is definitely time for things to go badly but I also think things going badly will be less bad than I had expected it to be, if that makes sense.

I’m happy. I expect to stay that way.

#news from meatspace #personal #original post #happyblogging #disordered eating cw #brain wrangling

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christinaroseandrews · 6 years

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Part 5

*Crawls out of her weekend writing binge* What do you mean I haven’t finished with this yet? *Cries*

This is the last actual post where I sum up the most egregious offenses Faleena Hopkins committed, and then there will be a masterpost linking to all of the posts related to this travesty of a book.

There are a lot of little things that went wrong. Things that would have dropped stars on their own, but nothing I haven’t seen a million times before. Things like bad proofreading, weak heroes and heroines, bad sex scenes, lack of research. Ultimately if those had been the only problems with this book, it would have been rated two or three stars. Mediocre and unmemorable. Not throw the book across the room worthy.

This book is.

I’m still angry at it.

And that’s a problem.

So what are the things that on their own make this a one star?

For starters: Sean.

“Wait!” I hear you say, “But you liked Sean. He was your favorite character.” And he was. I’m not about to deny that, but the problem with Sean is several-fold.

His story arc of coming out to his family wasn’t relevant and is part of what made this book Not A Romance.

His POV wasn’t needed and again is part of what made this book Not A Romance.

His being gay was not handled well and featured some very hurtful stereotypes.

Once he was out in the book, his entire character changed. And he became sex-obsessed and attention-whoring. Gone was the empathetic generous man. He became Jack... only Gay. And we all know my feelings about Jack.

I’ll cover points one and two later when I get to the part about how this book wasn’t a romance.

I wish Sean had been openly gay from the start. Not because we needed another hurtful stereotype of the “Sassy Gay Friend” which BTW we totally got. But because it would have been better than what we did have. Which to refresh your memory, is this:

So why is this so wrong? Because it contains the following harmful implications:

Queer people must be either completely celibate or...

Queer people must fuck everything that lives.

Never being in love at the ripe old age of 23 is a problem.

Being a virgin at that same age is a problem.

Celibacy is unnatural and wrong.

The first is a huge problem. Currently in the Mormon community, this is the official stance. LBGT+ people must either choose to live a heterosexual life or be completely celibate... no kissing, hugging, or touching of anyone of the same sex. This is leading to a huge rise in Mormon LBGT+ youth in Utah committing suicide because they feel that their families and community won’t love and accept them. There was a whole documentary about it recently on HBO called “Believer.”

The second is a problem because it reinforces the stereotype that all homosexuals are raging sex fiends and unable to be in long term relationships. Or form long term bonds. It’s one of the excuses used by adoption agencies when denying same-sex couples. And worse, it’s why those in the LBGT+ community were blamed for contracting HIV/AIDS and it was seen as divine retribution for the disease, which can affect anyone.

The third is an issue, because it unreasonably puts pressure on young people to hurry up and find love. Love, real love, not infatuation, can happen at any time. That’s part of how love works. I have friends who didn’t find their first love until they were in their thirties or forties. While I know others who found their someone when they were children (a friend met their now spouse when they were in nursery school - they grew up as friends and eventually fell in love). People should be allowed to look for love at their own pace and when they are ready. Not by some arbitrary due date.

The fourth is a huge issue because of the implication that virginity, especially male virginity, is a problem. This thought is one of many that leads to toxic masculinity and the culture where men are predators and women victims. It leads to young men and boys shooting up their schools and workplaces because they were rejected by a woman and couldn’t deal with the repercussions. This thought, that male virginity is bad, is deadly. There is nothing wrong with being a virgin. There is nothing wrong with waiting until you’re ready to have sex. You don’t owe any partner anything. You don’t owe society anything. Male virgins can be awesome lovers. I know. I’ve had two myself.

Finally, there is nothing wrong with celibacy. No one owes you sex. If someone doesn’t want to have sex, then they don’t have to. There are even some people out there who find the whole concept of sex off-putting and there is nothing wrong with that. There are victims of abuse who find sex triggering. Celibacy can be a choice. And if if people are “involuntarily celibate” there is always something called masturbation, and in some places prostitution is legal. No one owes you sex, even if you want it. Period.

It’s really that easy.

The second reason this book would get one star is what is essentially plot-whiplash coupled with an unsatisfying ending. The antagonist doesn’t get his comeuppance and doesn’t actually apologize for what he did. In fact, Jack gets off scot-free because of plot whiplash.

There’s an art to telling a good story. You need to have a good hook early. The longer the story, the more concurrent plots you need juggle. And you need to have a good sense of pacing. Draw things out too long, and your readers will lose interest. Wrap things up too quickly and you leave your audience reeling. Faleena Hopkins manages to do both.

She drags out plots that have no reason being strung along for as long as they are. Things like Rue’s parentage. You told us this in the summary, why does it take you over 6 chapters to get to it in the book? Or Sean’s sexuality - which really shouldn’t have been central to the overall plot of the book yet somehow took it over (when it’s the last line of the book, that means that is also the core plot, FYI endings matter).

But for the most part, Hopkins suffers from plot-whiplash. AKA moving from plot to plot so fast that your head goes back and forth like you’re at a tennis match.

Seriously, the whole novel takes place in less than a week. It took me going back and making a timeline to realize that no really the whole thing takes place that quickly.

The problem with doing things too quickly is that you don’t give the audience time to process what happened. Crucial details get left out. Continuity gets ignored. The whole thing feels rushed. It’s like the author is afraid that if they doesn’t resolve the subplot or conflict quickly they’ll lose readers.

But here’s the thing. Readers don’t want instant happy endings. They want the happy ending to be earned. And that is true in romance as it is in other genres. If, for instance, Poirot immediately solved the Murder on the Orient Express, the story wouldn’t be nearly as iconic.

You’d feel cheated.

As Hitchcock said - "There is no terror in the bang, only in the anticipation of it."

The same is true in romance. Or any story. It’s the journey that’s important, not the destination.

Which is why I got so angry when I reached the end. Jack hadn’t gotten a valid redemption arc and he’s still the same awful person that he was at the beginning of the novel. Sean actually got worse and his story ended up overshadowing what was ostensibly the more important of the plots (give him his own book, don’t shoehorn it into what is supposed to be a het romance). The Romance wasn’t really resolved in a positive manner. And the answer to the overarching plot -- will success ruin Rue Calliwell? - was an overwhelming yes. It may be realistic.... but it’s not satisfying.

The third and biggest reason why this book is deserving of a one-star (I’d give no stars if possible) is because it isn’t a Romance, yet it bills itself as such. I know there’s a lot of problem with Authors miscategorizing their works in order to get that elusive “Bestseller” tag. But this isn’t that. This is the author falling into the pitfall of “Trying to change romance” and ending up not being a romance at all.

Interestingly, Hopkins does miscategorize her book... but in a weird way.

Her book is not an inspirational romance. That category is reserved for “wholesome, faith-filled stories that enrich the lives of readers” - that definition is straight from Harlequin. That means no sex. No swearing. And lots of references to religion (it can be any religion but Christianity is most likely). This is why there are a lot of reviews angry about the sex and the language.

So how did I come to the conclusion that this wasn’t a romance?

To make sure we’re all on the same page, here’s RWA’s definition of Romance.

1. The over-arching plot.

The plot of the story is pretty much spelled out in the summary. “How will fame and fortune change Rue Calliwell as well as how will she handle finding out about the family she never knew she had?”

The romance is secondary. It’s part of how she handles fame, fortune, and her family. Her brother puts his best friend up to seducing her (amusingly I wrote a fanfic with this EXACT plot 14 years ago). The brother is testing his new sibling. The fact that his BFF and sister fall in lust is a side-effect. Not the main plot.

In order for this to be a romance, the characters falling in love and making the relationship work has to be the main focus. And in this book, it just isn’t.

2. The Points of View.

The book is 52 chapters long. Jack, the antagonist brother, has 8 POV chapters. Sean, the sympathetic brother, has 7 POV chapters. Alec, the love interest, has 7 POV chapters. While the rest are in Rue’s POV. What does that indicate?

Well, that the author considered the brothers equally or more important than the love interest. We don’t even meet Alec until page 60-something out of 300 pages. That’s waaaaaay too long for a romance novel. The love interest needs to be introduced quickly. Not a fifth of the way through the book.

3. The “I Love You’s”

You know there’s something wrong with a romance novel when the heroine says “I love you” to all of the other main characters other than love interest. Rue says “I love you” to Jenna. To Sean. To Jack. But not to Alec. Nor does he say it to her.

4. No actual relationship.

The story between Alec and Rue is a pure Lust and Erotica story. It’s a story of obsession. Of possession. The characters don’t talk. They don’t date. They just engage in tonsil hockey and longing looks.

And the way it’s written is about as sexy as that gif.

The thing is, there is a relationship story in this book. But it’s between Rue and her brothers. In fact, everything with Alec can be seen as supporting that story, not the other way around.

5. The ending.

Again the ending needs to be emotionally satisfying and optimistic. To her credit, she kind of gets the optimistic. Rue and Alec are going to try to make things work on a long term basis and he’s going to go public about liking her.

Sounds good, right?

Except that’s not the actual ending of the book. The ending of the book focuses on the siblings and nothing is resolved there. I was left going “is that it?”

I wasn’t satisfied. I wasn’t happy.

I was angry.

Each of those things would make this book ranked one star. (So would the fact that stalking is portrayed as romantic, but I’ve gone into that before so I don’t need to go into it here.)

So it should come as no surprise that this book gets:

One star

You can read the hot mess for FREE here.

If you’re enjoying these reviews, you can buy us a kofi.

#Romance review #contemporary romance #new adult romance #faleena hopkins #billionaire romance #musician romance #cockygate #this is so bad #like I want my life back bad #one star #I wish I could give it negative stars #it's that bad #Rose and Lark review books #book review

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longstoriesfaraway · 6 years

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A Year in Retrospect

Man, a blink of the eye and 2 years pass me by.

2016 was without doubt the worst year of my life. So it doesn’t really come as a surprise that 2017 was better, to say the least. But still, if you had asked me whether it was a good year, I’d still be hard-pressed to say that it was.

I encountered so many people and I tried my best to branch out, investing considerable time, effort and money to do so. But the return? It feels almost negligible. I feel like I’ve taken more harm than good. If you want me to talk about the postive highlights of my year, they’re pretty much all when friend from the UK came to visit me. That’s crazy.

I joined a church for a bit. A friend invited me along thinking that when I did this back in my second year of university, after the first year which, at that time, had been my worst year, it did wonders for me, so that this should be like that too, right? Man, I felt like I was connecting for a while. Then the differences in culture began to diverge. Or maybe it was just their church way. In any cases, it became extremely suppressing instead and I left, though not without upsetting my group leader, to whom I bore an almost malicious disrespect. Though I think I still spend time with some of the church members from time to time, I doubt I’ll return to that church again.

Church should really be a place where you can culture and mature yourself. Put too many rules and strictures in place and you’ll soon find yourself constricted - unable or unwilling to do certain things for fear of dying by condemnation and judgement of your peers. I felt like a number and not an individual and, truth be told quite frankly, language barrier simply proved too much. On my way out, I fear I may have damaged relationships that I would have found valuable along my life, with very little short of returning to that church able to repair such damage. So therein my first endeavour of the year to network and enrich my life failed.

Trying to find a date is a goddamn disaster. If you’re not white or handsome or rich or have some other outstanding feature, you’re practically invisible. Then, there’s the whole culture of women not starting dating until they’ve established a career at the age of ~30. And by God, do I know how to choose them. Those very few that I might by chance happen to meet and take an interest in, either they’re not interested in dating (for aforementioned reason) or they already have a SO. It takes so much out of me to ask someone on a date, take the time to build the relationship up, find out about them. Then, if ever I do pop the question, they never talk to me again. Like, I don’t mind staying friends, ladies. I just move on to someone else and try my luck elsewhere. This just kills me every time. Just for once, I’d really like it if someone I liked took the effort to ask me out. I’m all suckered out for this; I feel lilke I lose a bit of my soul each time I try. The universe just does not give me a goddamn break on this one.

Comfort. Oh boy. Been thinking about this one for some time. Korea just does not do physical contact, which includes the most simple and soothing mental health aid - hugging. I can’t hug ANYONE. Foreigner friends aside (who I see few and far between anyway), Koreans just don’t do skinship. They’re like bloody children, thinking you’ll get lurgies or something if you make physical contact with someone of the opposite sex. When people say goodbye, it’s not with hugs and fist bumps, but a bow or nod of the head, formal goodbyes and a-dropping my heart on the goddamn floor because it feels like no-one gives a crap. I’m not sure I feel close to anyone in particular. Guys are nice enough and all bro-like, but it’s definitely not the same as getting a hug from a female friend from time to time and knowing AND feeling like someone gives a damn about you. As it is, everyone often feels like an acquaintance and not actually a friend. Which transitions into my next problem.

Managing emotional stress. I’m all cried out. Pretty much. Today I cried whilst in the shower for once. Can you guess why? I cried because I have been unable to cry ever since before I came to Korea. And it upsets me. I couldn’t cry because it felt futile. Like crying would do no good. I didn’t even cry when my girlfriend broke up with me in 2016. Because a part of me already felt like some crap was about due in my life and I had already grieved its coming and going. I cried because I thought seriously about when I had last properly cried (I’m not counting superficial instances with dramas/movies/etc) and I remembered. Summer 2015. I had just moved to Macau. I screwed up bad then. I was with a friend and due to bring them to a dinner date with my parents who had taken the effort to reserve an extremely well-known bistro on the other side of the island. Due to a misunderstanding of the meeting time, as well running into traffic, I ended up never being able to make it there with my friend and I returned home with her to wait. My dad was furious to say the least and didn’t talk to me when he got home. Mum told me just to take my friend to a good restaurant nearby to have dinner, since we hadn’t eaten yet. Before leaving, I told my friend to wait by the elevator while I apologised to dad. He kind of acknowledged I said something, but otherwise we didn’t talk until the end of the night before we went to sleep where we had our reconcilatory talk. As I walked to the elevator and got in, my friend saw my expression and knew that I was the furthest thing from alright. I felt like I had failed everyone that night and someone I cared intensely for saw witness to it and the absolute wrath my father could bring to display. My soul was laid bare and I had no choice but to cry.

I thought about how that was how long it had been since I properly cried LIKE THAT and lamented my own soul. The thought of becoming devoid of my soul, my emotions, my ability to CARE, this terrified me. I want to care. I want someone to care. I was so upset as I came to the realisation that I was becoming sick and tired of becoming sick and tired of being upset and being able to express it to no avail, with no one to comfort me except my comfort toys. Inanimate soft toys that aren’t even big enough to cuddle properly.

I have been jumping so much between “God helps those who help themselves, so get my ass in gear and take control!” and “Well, I am a piece of crap anyway and nothing I do is going to change that...”. I just don’t know what to do any more. I don’t have the answers, I’m not even sure I have the questions. I’m not even sure I have the words to say anything any more. Well, I guess that’s ironic given how much I’ve written to this point.

It’s not all been bad. Though the bad does seem to outweigh what little good I seem to have in this year. I have been blessed with at least some consistent friends. Some who do take time out of their lives to spend their time with me weekly, studying. I owe a great thanks to the 2-3 that did this for any period of time. It did, in part, stop me from simply stagnating at home.

And school. Oh boy. What a fantastic place. I’m very lucky to have had this school. It gives me a lot of freedom, but grounds me enough to keep me consistent and, somewhat, professional. It gives me things to do. And I see wondrous things from the children, week in and week out. I reckon if I didn’t have my job this whole time, I’d probably have given it all up by now, hope and all. But work gave me some consistent purpose; grounding and no time to dwell too much on bad things. The children are bright young sparks to whom I share their emotions vicariously.

But children are just children and not a suitable replacement for someone who can actually understand the depth of your emotions and accept them. They are brilliant, fantastical and nothing short of amazing. I am not as they are.

But, well, as long as I am alive, tomorrow may bring something new. Maybe this year is the year.

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imspardagus · 4 years

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The Worst Version of Myself

It was, on the face of it, just a hug. A long lingering hug. It started when she put her arms around me and it ended when she released me but all the while I was hoping it would never stop. I needed it. But more than that, I found myself thinking that I needed, and wanted, her.

Just two facts are needed for any romantic thoughts you are having to dissipate before a ripple of concern or a tide of disgust. She, Carrie, is 21. I am 68.

I have known Carrie for more than 5 years. She is a friend of my daughter. Like her mother, she is astonishingly lovely but I have always treated her as a second daughter and she has treated me like a second father. She has been a frequent visitor to our house, until last year staying over at least once or twice most weeks, only stopping when my daughter’s interest in a new boyfriend relegated their friendship to a more distant acquaintance. At any time since she first started coming to our home, my first and foremost concern has been that she should be safe and comfortable and I feel no different now.

I know her family - her parents and her brother. I admire them and love them all as friends. I would be appalled to have hurt or even disappointed any of them.

So what happened that night has been preying on my mind. I know, pretty much, why it happened - by which I mean why a simple hug became, to me, for that moment, something more, something more dangerous, something unacceptable. I know that it must not happen again and that it probably won’t. But I can’t let it go. Because, after all the years of making scrupulous efforts to maintain a decent standard of behaviour I became, in an instant and for a brief time, the worst version of myself.

Carrie and I both know that, even though nothing more occurred beyond an awkward hanging silence and then a few trite words, a line was crossed that night - that I crossed a line that night - and there is now a wariness between us. I see it in her and I hear it in her voice. And I feel it in myself. I cannot see her without feeling guilty and wanting to remove my hideous self from her company. However arch it may seem, I can’t forgive myself.

We have hugged before. Every time, Carrie has instigated it. There are two reasons for that.

First, it has been in the forefront of my mind, since Helen, at the age of 13, became my sole charge and began bringing her friends to visit, that I owed it to each and every one of them to behave with absolute propriety. They were lovely, naturally affectionate but quite innocent and worryingly unaware of dress malfunctions. To a number of them, coming from broken homes, I was the only stable adult male in their lives. I knew I had to hold fast the trust all this created.

So when the girls were carelessly, and occasionally testingly, uninhibited, I trained myself to look away. Not to push them away. That would make them feel uncomfortable. There had to be awareness and quiet avoidance. And I learned the sideways hug that ensures no inappropriate body contact. And the hug had to come from them, never me.

I was their sheepdog. They were my flock. I needed to protect them from the wolf, including the one in me. And it worked. They felt safe, at ease. And they were safe.

They have all grown up now, mostly into fine young women. But I am still greeted, in my home and in the street, with an exuberant affection that leaves passers-by puzzled as to who this old man is to merit such treatment.

But I said there were two reasons. Way before I became a husband and then a father, I had had to learn to be demonstrative. Until I was in my 30s all physical contact with other humans was shut off to me by a frightening self-conscious fear of offending. For a brief period in my 30s I was at least allowed into the room of earthly pleasures and in that time I found love and something close to happiness in the form of a beautiful woman. But it was not to last. I realised it was over between us when one day I put my arms around Heather and felt her shrink back and pull away. It was a feeling so awfully, rippingly painful that I wished I had never experienced the pleasure that I had been anticipating. Joy was once again ousted from my life and fear once again replaced it.

And so it has been since then. For almost a quarter of a century, I have been celibate not from choice but from the terror of involvement and the fear that it will bring that pain again. Much as I wish I were not so alone, much as I wish for a warm and willing body to be close to and hold, the fear is greater and I cannot move for it.

I want to say something now: something that will probably not go down well in some quarters. It has become fashionable, fuelled in part by the Weinstein and Epstein scandals, to decry the very thought that older men find younger women attractive. It is a generalisation that I cannot go along with.

There have always been “dirty old men”. The seaside postcards of my childhood abounded with them. Benny Hill made a career out of leering at the pumped up chests of twenty-somethings. And there have always been men who exploit their position, wealth or power to gain access to the bodies and favours of young women. I offer no defence for such men. I find their behaviour excruciating and reprehensible. I hate that, as a man, I have to be associated with them even remotely.

But to suggest that a man is not permitted to find and acknowledge beauty in a women because of the age difference between them is arrant and oppressive nonsense. The ability to appreciate beauty is one of the greatest gifts of humanity. It is a positive thing, enriching and ennobling and it teaches us in turn to abhor the wanton defiling or destruction of beauty. To insist that we deny this reality is as futile as to deny that we exist. But it is also dangerous.

The issue is not whether an old man is entitled to find a young woman – or man – or any person or thing – beautiful. It is how we behave in response to what we see. And for that there needs to be awareness.

I am not being naïve here. There is a problem. In the brain, the appreciation of beauty is closely associated with sexual desire. Dangerously so. It is not only so in the relationships of humans. Beautiful music, beautiful images, beautiful textures, even beautiful foods and drinks can raise us to near ecstasy (just as ugliness can move us to disgust). These are feelings the arrival of which we have little control over.

But hopefully we learn to control how we express them. You do not crush a rosebud.

I learned a version of that control in a devastatingly repressive way early on in my life. I learned it from my mother’s expressed distaste for “men’s ways” and I took it to heart because I wanted so much for her to love me. And though she is now long gone, this repression has not. It dogged my marriage, made my responses stilted and uncomfortable to receive and when, because of that, Heather pulled away from me, it was my first thought: that I had transgressed by wanting her so.

But all these years of repression have never diminished my wonder at the sheer beauty of the female form. It is not, however, a salivating, leering, rapacious desire I feel. It is closer to envy.

I have never liked my body. So much so that I have always taken great pains not to expose it to what I have always assumed would be ridicule. It started very young. My parents used to joke that even as a two year old I would not take my shirt off on a beach. Growing impossibly tall and thin at an early age did nothing to rid me of my embarrassment. And once I reached puberty and that stupid pipe between my legs started making demands on me, I felt mortified. How could anyone find me anything other than hideous?

I looked at the slender girls around me, their hair, the easy grace with which they moved, their curves and shadows and I wanted to be like them.

And so it has remained. I have learned more freedom in the last ten years. I take pride in trying to dress well. But when I see a beautiful woman, it is not so much sexual desire that I feel as humble, and sometimes stupefied, appreciation. It is imbued with yearning and a renewed sense of my own heavy ugliness.

So what happened, why after all these years did a hug from Carrie send me spiralling into carnal desires that made me dizzy and frightened of myself? Why did I feel that I had to take urgent control of my hands in case they strayed, why did I have to make my neck rigid to stop from imposing my lips on hers?

I assume it was always there. That close association between beauty and sex always present, just held in check. And then, that night, the check was broken down. I had been undergoing great stress and my nights were filled with longings that the next day should not come. To numb the pain, I had increased my intake of alcohol on a daily basis. I was drinking whisky not for the pleasure of it but to get drunk enough to fall into a stupor and shut out the voices.

But alcohol is a disinhibitor. It strips away the controls that you have set on your behaviour. Sometimes that can be a good thing, when the controls have been harming you.

But sometimes, if you are not careful, you can become the worst version of yourself.

I don’t know what to do now. Poor wonderful, exceptional Jimmy Carter, probably one of only two honest and truly decent men to have achieved the Presidency of the United States, once publicly admitted “I have committed adultery in my head.” And cynical people laughed at the poor sap’s desire to confront his conscience. I too feel I have stepped over a line, even if only “in my head”, and with it I have defiled a relationship that was good and happy. And it can never be taken back.

#Beauty #desire

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viridian99 · 7 years

Text

Gratitude for your support.

The past few days saw a terrible slew of anon hate faced by the lovely @fureiaa . Unfortunately several other members were wrongfully implicated and it resulted in a thoroughly ugly episode. I do not wish to rehash what happened. I would like to thank each and every one of you who supported the fandom, supported me personally, by texting me on pm and / or commenting on my anon hate post and made posts of their own in support. Thank you very much. I would like to apologize to @uxoremmikael @han-pan @kindasouta @minminami @rainbowatnight @dreamfar628 . I could not reply to your posts and texts earlier in a timely manner. I was not online yesterday. I am deeply grateful to you and abashed at the wonderful pouring of love and support i received. Sincerely thank you. You are all wonderful special people who deeply enriched my life and taught me so much. @minminami no need to be upset dear, i know u r busy studying these days smol bean. You and @moonlight-nightingale are my two favourite special smol beans. Thank you for your ever loving presence. * squishes you in hug and gives you kisses* @uxoremmikael thank you for your message. Your presence in my life is also wonderfully appreciated. @dreamfar628 jalebi sister you are the best 😚😏 @rainbowatnight Odas' smoking hot pistol!! Rock on. @dreamsinparadise sister angst i love your semi violent rants. They make my day. Never stop being you. @moonlight-nightingale honestly i was really hurt when i read the anon hate and was thinking on quitting but your loving and kind words changed my mind. I love you. Seriously. You brighten up my day with your sincerity a innocence . @kindasouta you r my fav person to fangirl about all my different interests. Never change. 😚 you are a wonderful warm person. @han-pan i am so glad to have met you. I am grateful you included me in your Japanese sweet hunt adventures and cat love (lol). Thank you , sincerely. I WOULD ESPECIALLY LIKE TO THANK @small-and-nerdy THE FIRST PERSON TO RESPOND AFTER THE ANON HATE POST WENT UP. thank you very much. I was so upset at that time i could not properly say anything. My hands were shaking cuz i was so angry , i couldn't type properly. Thankyou. Really. You helped a lot. I WOULD LIKE TO THANK @jemchew for making a wonderful post and coming out of hibernation to defend my virtue , flying to my defence like a knight in shinning armour. Lolol. Thank you bae. 💖💖💖 *extra sparkly starry hearts in they eyes , just for you* NEXT I WOULD LIKE TO THANK ALL THE LADIES WHO MADE SUPPORTIVE POSTS. @sugoileo @frywen-babbles @bmp-slbp-matchup (u gave very measured logical comments. I applaud your wisdom and temperance. ) @moonlight-nightingale @dreamsinparadise @dreamfar628 @rainbowatnight @jane-runs-fast @sengokugenkigirl @shingenelena @slbp-drains-my-pearls @lomololita (loved your comment!! ) @jane-runs-fast (thank you for your support, glad you have a new tablet. Looking forward to your new pieces of art.) @nikkihime (congrats ur hubby is here!!!) @suzunesays @frywen-babbles @thedaydreamingotaku (loved your post sachiko!!) several other wonderful ladies. Please excuse me for not mentioning your names. I am typing this by memory. I read all your supportive comments and i am deeply grateful for your support. NEXT I WOULD LIKE TO APPLAUD AND THANK FELLOW SLANDER SUFFERERS WHO MADE SUCH COURAGEOUS POSTS TO DENOUNCE ANON HATE. @quincette @rose-of-yonezawa . Kudos to you for your wonderfully decisive statements, emphatically and effectively worded denouncements of the anon hater. I am in complete awe of your strength and courage. It was awe inspiring to be witness to your righteous fury. How you brought the whole fandom together in support of this issue, while trying to find ways to solve this problem was a magical feat in itself. It is a testament to your moral fiber and strength as an upstanding member of our community. (Geisha chan you are one hell of a smoking pistol yooo!! And Lady Quin!! You are my Salt queen. So much swearing! ! Cracked me up. Lololol) honestly you are the back bone, the very integral parts of our fandom. Stay strong , forever. FINALLY I WOULD LIKE TO THANK @fureiaa for her wonderful courage , her honesty for coming out in public about her problem. I cannot imagine what you must be going through. Making your pain public must be a Herculean task, one you performed with enormous grace and fortitude. I hope this event has not completely turned your heart away from this fandom. There are good people here who love and support you. And a lot of them did not know about you earlier but now are more than willing to be your friends( @thedaydreamingotaku you made a wonderful supportive post. Hats off to you mrs. Masabunny. You are as lovely as your name sachiko.) I hope you take this outstretched hand of friendship and continue to enjoy your love for 2D men. More importantly i hope and pray that this distasteful event did not drive you to harm yourself in anyway. You are precious and your life is important. Please do not think about going down that path. We are here to talk and to share whenever you need it. Thank you for trusting us with your truth. Thank you for being so brave and honest. Please continue to enjoy what you love. LASTLY A COLLECTIVE HUG TO ALL THE LOVELY LADIES WHO STOP BY AT THIS BLOG, FOR ALL MY FANDOM COMRADES, PARTNERS IN CRIME AND MISCHIEF, MY FRIENDS, IN SHORT THE WHOLE COLLECTIVE OF BEAUTIFUL STRONG PEOPLE WHO HAVE JOINED ME IN MY JOURNEY IN SLBP. THANK YOU FOR YOUR SUPPORT. THANK YOU FOR BEING PART OF MY LIFE.

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homme-in-um · 7 years

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Unsubscribe from the Honeymoon Phase

I definitely bought into the idea of ‘’the friend zone’’ as an adolescent. I know why so many do, it’s a comfort to those of us who didn’t realize that they weren’t mac-daddy’s, surrounded by their own personal harem, they were just alright at making friends with girls. A sad and probably unsettling fact for many of my close friends is that I began our friendships by pining over them and getting real into lingering hugs. As we get older our faithful teachers; television and cinema began to teach that the friend zone is (A) not a thing and (B) an awful way to interpret human relationships. We move away from this view, and learn to accept our romantic failures with a little more grace. Part of this comes as we learn to see rejection as not so world-ending a phenomena, and part of it comes from experiencing the truth of it first hand. There is admittedly, a common moment in new interpersonal relationships( heretofore described as ‘’relationships’’, whether it be parent-child, customer-shop clerk, and friend-friend , as it’s too easy to think of romance as something other than two people’s interactions with one another), where one person feels the need to define what they’re angling for. When you’re 15 and interaction with your particular gender of infatuation is very much life and death , it does feel like failure when you swing for the fences and get struck down. The older I get and the longer my relationships go on, the more I realize that it’s easier to roll with the punches, as the roles people play in your life change, swap and repeat as they please.

Romantic relationships have been probably my number one obsession since I started having them at 15. I don’t necessarily love being in a relationship, and I certainly don’t want to be defined by being in one, but I can’t deny that since 15 , the acquisition, retainment, or recovery from romance has been my number one passion and obsession, which I’ve already mentioned, but such is obsession. I fall for people quite hard, and it takes me what I consider too long to get over heartbreak, so I suppose my brain is prioritizing my interests based on that. I’m in a new relationship, so I spend a lot of my time thinking about relationships in a broad sense. As i take another dip into my own neurosis, another phrase used to define important moments in human relationships, but generally in romantic relationships ’’the honeymoon phase’’ comes to mind. Like ‘’The friend zone’’, this phrase oversimplifies our understanding of the complexities of relationships, and can even harm those relationships.

Scientifically, there’s plenty of grounding for the phenomena we call ‘’The Honeymoon phase’’. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/24643282?report=abstract%20

There’s one, cards on the table though I’m not going to read it, it’ll only depress me I’m sure or, God forbid, undo my argument, but dammit man I’m a doctor* not a scientist. Point being, I’ve heard that before, and like anyone who’s been in a relationship or, particularly, come out of one, I can personally attest to the sensation. Now after a breakup, there’s a natural tendency in all of us to rewrite the story of the coupling, to trace back the seeds of separation that caused the unthinkable inevitable. My last relationship was very happy, but I became worried early on about how it would feel a few months down the road. In a way I became a little obsessed with this thought.’’ Sure it’s good now, has been for quite a while, but what's this going to be like in 6, 12. 24 months?’’. When that relationship ended I searched and searched for where the break began, looking for the end of the honeymoon. I found plenty of contenders. A snappy moment, a cold kiss, an unreturned smile, scattered throughout the relationship. I’m happy to get very ahistorical and ignore any and all other possible factors with these moments because when you seek, you will find. ‘’The Honeymoon phase’’ is predicated on this thought process. It comforts us by reinforcing that relationships get harder and less fun as time goes on, it gives us somewhere to trace the decline. The friend zone helps us cope in that heart sinking moment when it’s made clear you’re barking up the wrong tree; but as this coping mechanism stunts our understanding of the multi-faceted, complex relationships that we constantly interact with, the honeymoon coping tool stunts both our ability to fully understand relationships in the past and, dangerously, can affect how we approach them in the future. Obsession and desire , two things that we’re told go into decline after time, are not the only valuable facets of our relationships. Look to how time enriches our friendships, our relationships with our parents , or co-workers. We don’t necessarily recycle any of these purely based on the passing of an emotional expiry date. Romantic relationships by their very nature demand a higher level of involvement , and it can be hard, at least for me, to stop dissecting my past relationships for a moment where everything went wrong , to stop it happening again. This is where this tool stops helping me to cope with past trauma, and starts to impair my present happiness. Relationships are not stories, they’re not entertainment, their mechanics are not readily legible even for those involved. They enrich us, hurt us and change us, but for all their importance, I think the best way to deal with them is to let them grow and change unchecked and naturally.

Now I find myself back in the saddle of a new relationship. The same thoughts swam into my head again. It’s tricky business trying to ‘’get better’’ and relationships. A relationship is not necessarily something you can succeed at, it’s not a tool for enjoyment, the nuts and bolts of it’s operation often exist solely in the perceptions of those involved. If you take your relationship seriously however, you’re always going to try to nurture them, and maybe the only way to really do this is to understand at least yourself. Ideas like ‘’the friend zone’’ and the ‘’honeymoon phase’’ are catch-all phrases popularized to help us explain common phenomena, but , as with most metaphorical short-cuts, they hold perilous misunderstandings. If we can improve how we interact with others, I think the route of it is navigating our own behavior and understanding what affects the way we think and act, and unsubscribing from coping mechanisms we no longer need as we grow in our understanding of how we interact with one another.

*A lie.

#relationship #personal essay #friendzone #honeymoon phase #nuerotic

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