#1949 the most beautiful Baby in France

[tina-aumont]

THE SNACK OF FAMOUS CHILDREN

A couturier from the Champs Elysées offered today a snack to children whose parents occupy a prominent place in the Arts, Literature or Politics. NPM - Jean-Pierre AUMONT's little girl plays on a wooden horse with little GUEZ who was the most beautiful baby in France.

C. 6457 Intercontinentale 9/12/49

Ebay.

[dweemeister]

The complete list of films featured in 2021′s “31 Days of Oscar” marathon

What follows is the exhaustive list of all 403 short- and feature-length films featured on this blog over the last thirty-one days for the 31 Days of Oscar marathon. This number is up from last year’s count of 327 and is the second-highest number of films I have ever featured in this marathon (behind the 410 films from 2016). Despite the number, this remains only a fraction of the nearly 5,000 films that have been nominated for Academy Awards. This year’s marathon was harder to plan than usual due to the fact it was presented in alphabetical order - with the exception of any write-ups I did.

BREAKDOWN BY DECADE 1927-1929: 7 1930s: 44 1940s: 63 1950s: 63 1960s: 46 1970s: 25 1980s: 29 1990s: 28 2000s: 25 2010s: 43 2020s: 30

Year with most representation (2020 excluded): 1940 (ten films) Median year: 1964

And now, the list. Best Picture winners and the one (and only) winner for Unique and Artistic Production are in bold. Asterisked (*) films are films I haven’t seen in their entirety as of the publishing of this post.

A.I. Artificial Intelligence (2001)

Ace in the Hole (1951)

Adam’s Rib (1949)*

The Adventures of Robin Hood (1938)

After the Thin Man (1936)*

Airport (1970)*

Aladdin (1992)

Albert Nobbs (2011)

Alexander’s Ragtime Band (1938)

All Quiet on the Western Front (1930)

Almost Famous (2000)

An American in Paris (1951)

Anastasia (1956)

Anatomy of a Murder (1959)

Annie (1982)

Around the World in Eighty Days (1956)

Arrival (2016)

Au Revoir Les Enfants (1987, France)

The Awful Truth (1937)

Babe (1995)

Baby Doll (1956)*

Ballad of a Soldier (1959, Soviet Union)*

The Band Wagon (1953)

Bao (2018 short)

Ben-Hur (1959)

Berkeley Square (1933)

The Best Man (1964)

Better Days (2019, Hong Kong)*

The Big Chill (1983)*

The Birds (1963)

Birds Anonymous (1957 short)

Black Orpheus (1959, Brazil)

BlacKkKlansman (2018)

Blue Velvet (1986)

Borat: Cultural Learnings of America for Make Benefit Glorious Nation of Kazakhstan (2006)*

Borat Subsequent Moviefilm: Delivery of Prodigious Bribe to American Regime for Make Benefit Once Glorious Nation of Kazakhstan (2020)*

The Bridge on the River Kwai (1957)

Brief Encounter (1945)

Brotherhood (2018 short, Tunisia/Canada/Qatar/Sweden)

Cabin in the Sky (1943)

Calamity Jane (1953)

Carol (2015)*

Casablanca (1942)

Casino (1995)*

Charade (1963)

The Circus (1928)

Citizen Kane (1941)

City of God (2002, Brazil)*

Claudine (1974)*

Closely Watched Trains (1966, Czechoslovakia)

Coraline (2009)*

Da 5 Bloods (2020)*

Dances with Wolves (1990)

Death in Venice (1971)*

Destination Moon (1950)*

The Devil and Daniel Webster (1941)

Down Argentine Way (1940)

Dunkirk (2017)

Easter Parade (1948)

The Edge of Democracy (2019, Brazil)*

Educated Fish (1937 short)*

El Cid (1961)*

Elmer Gantry (1960)

The End of the Affair (1999)*

Ernest & Celestine (2012, France/Belgium)

Face to Face (1976, Sweden)*

The Fallen Idol (1948)

Fantasia (1940)

A Fantastic Woman (2017, Chile)*

Far from the Madding Crowd (1967)*

A Farewell to Arms (1932)*

A Few Good Men (1992)*

Five Easy Pieces (1970)*

The Five Pennies (1959)

The 5,000 Fingers of Dr. T. (1953)

Flower Drum Song (1961)

Flowers and Trees (1932 short)

Flying Down to Rio (1933)*

For All Mankind (1989)

For Sama (2019)*

Forbidden Planet (1956)

Forrest Gump (1994)

42nd Street (1933)

Four Days in November (1964)*

The Four Feathers (1939)

The 400 Blows (1959, France)

Four Weddings and a Funeral (1994)*

From Here to Eternity (1953)

Funny Face (1957)

Funny Girl (1968)

Fury (1936)*

Gandhi (1982)

The Garden of Allah (1936)

Garden Party (2017 short, France)

Gaslight (1944)

Giant (1956)

Gigi (1958)

Gladiator (2000)

The Godfather (1972)

The Godfather, Part II (1974)

Goodbye, Mr. Chips (1939)

Gorillas in the Mist (1988)*

Gosford Park (2001)

Grand Hotel (1932)

Grand Prix (1966)*

The Great Beauty (2013, Italy)

The Great Race (1965)

The Great Ziegfeld (1936)

Green Book (2018)

Green Dolphin Street (1947)*

The Green Mile (1999)*

Guess Who’s Coming to Dinner (1967)

Gunfight at the O.K. Corral (1957)

Gunga Din (1939)

Hair Love (2019 short)

Hallelujah (1929)*

Hamlet (1948)

Hamlet (1990)

Hamlet (1996)

Hangmen Also Die! (1943)*

The Happiest Millionaire (1967)

A Hard Day’s Night (1964)

Harlan County U.S.A. (1976)

The Harvey Girls (1946)

Heartbreak Ridge (1986)*

The Heiress (1949)

Hell’s Angels (1930)*

Henry V (1989)

Here Comes Mr. Jordan (1941)

Hero (2002, China)*

Hidden Figures (2016)

The High and the Mighty (1954)*

High Noon (1952)

High Society (1956)

Himalaya (1999, France/Switzerland/United Kingdom/Nepal)*

Home Alone (1990)

Honeysuckle Rose (1980)*

Hoosiers (1986)

The House on 92nd Street (1945)*

How the West Was Won (1962)

How to Survive a Plague (2012)*

I Am a Fugitive from a Chain Gang (1932)

I Married a Witch (1942)*

I Never Sang for My Father (1970)

I Vitelloni (1953, Italy)*

I Wanted Wings (1941)*

I, Tonya (2017)*

Ida (2013, Poland)

Imitation of Life (1959)

In Cold Blood (1967)

In the Absence (2018 short, South Korea)

In the Heat of the Night (1967)

Inherit the Wind (1960)

Inside Daisy Clover (1965)*

Inside Moves (1980)*

It Happened One Night (1934)

It Happened Tomorrow (1944)*

It Should Happen to You (1954)*

It’s Always Fair Weather (1955)

Jackie Brown (1997)*

Jammin’ the Blues (1944 short)*

Jaws (1975)

The Jazz Singer (1927)

Jerry’s Cousin (1951 short)

Jesus Camp (2006)*

Jezebel (1938)

Jim: The James Foley Story (2016)*

Joe’s Violin (2016 short)

The Journey of Natty Gann (1985)

Joyeux Noel (2005, France)

Judgment at Nuremberg (1961)

Julia (1977)*

Juliet of the Spirits (1965, Italy)

Kagemusha (1980, Japan)

The Karate Kid (1984)

The Killers (1946)*

The King and I (1956)

The King’s Speech (2010)

The Kite Runner (2007)

Knights of the Round Table (1953)*

Knives Out (2019)

Kundun (1997)*

La Ronde (1950, France)*

La Strada (1954, Italy)

La Traviata (1982, Italy)*

Lady Be Good (1941)*

The Lady Eve (1941)

The Ladykillers (1955)*

The Last Emperor (1987)

A Letter to Three Wives (1949)

The Life Ahead (2020, Italy)*

Life is Beautiful (1997, Italy)

Life with Feathers (1945 short)

Lili (1953)

Lilies of the Field (1963)

The Lion in Winter (1968)*

Little Caesar (1931)

A Little Romance (1979)

Little Women (2019)

Logan (2017)

The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King (2003)

Lost Horizon (1937)

Love Affair (1939)*

Love Story (1970)*

Loving Vincent (2017)

The Magic Flute (1975, Sweden)

The Magnificent Ambersons (1942)

Malcolm X (1992)

The Maltese Falcon (1941)

A Man for All Seasons (1966)

The Man Who Knew Too Much (1956)

The Manchurian Candidate (1962)

Maria Full of Grace (2004, Colombia)*

Meet Me in Las Vegas (1956)*

Meet Me in St. Louis (1944)

Mighty Joe Young (1949)*

Milk (2008)

Million Dollar Mermaid (1952)*

The Miracle Worker (1962)*

Mon Oncle (1958, France)

Monsieur Hulot’s Holiday (1953, France)*

Mutiny on the Bounty (1935)

My Fair Lady (1964)

My Favorite Wife (1940)

My Favorite Year (1982)

My Night at Maud’s (1969)*

The Narrow Margin (1952)

The Natural (1984)

Nebraska (2013)

Network (1976)

Night Must Fall (1937)*

Nightcrawler (2014)*

The Nightmare Before Christmas (1993)

Ninotchka (1939)

Nowhere in Africa (2001, Germany)*

Odd Man Out (1947)*

The Official Story (1985, Argentina)*

Oklahoma! (1955)*

Oliver! (1968)

On Golden Pond (1981)*

On the Riviera (1951)*

On the Waterfront (1954)

One Day in September (1999)*

One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest (1975)

One Foot in Heaven (1941)

One Hour with You (1932)

One Potato, Two Potato (1964)*

Only Angels Have Wings (1939)*

Our Town (1940)

Paisan (1946, Italy)

Pal Joey (1957)*

Pan’s Labyrinth (2006, Mexico)

Paper Moon (1973)*

Parasite (2019, South Korea)

The Parent Trap (1961)

A Passage to India (1984)*

Patton (1970)

Pelle the Conqueror (1987, Denmark)*

Period. End of Sentence. (2018 short)

Persepolis (2007, France)

The Philadelphia Story (1940)

The Picture of Dorian Gray (1945)

Pigs in a Polka (1943 short)*

Pillow Talk (1959)*

Pinocchio (1940)

Places in the Heart (1984)*

Poltergeist (1982)

Portrait of Jennie (1948)

Precious (2009)*

The Prisoner of Zenda (1937)

The Private Life of Helen of Troy (1927)*

The Private Lives of Elizabeth and Essex (1939)*

The Producers (1967)

Psycho (1960)

Pulp Fiction (1994)

Purple Rain (1984)

Puss Gets the Boot (1940 short)

Pygmalion (1938)

Quiet Please! (1945 short)

Quo Vadis, Aida? (2020, Bosnia-Herzegovina)*

Rachel, Rachel (1968)*

Ran (1985, Japan)

Random Harvest (1942)

Rashômon (1950, Japan)

Rasputin and the Empress (1932)*

Rear Window (1954)

Rebecca (1940)

Red River (1948)

The Red Shoes (1948)

A River Runs Through It (1992)

Road to Perdition (2002)

Roma (2018, Mexico)

Saludos Amigos (1942)

Same Time, Next Year (1978)*

The Secret of Kells (2009)

Sense and Sensibility (1995)*

Sergeant York (1941)

Seven Brides for Seven Brothers (1954)

Seven Samurai (1954, Japan)

Shadow of a Doubt (1943)

The Shape of Water (2017)

Shaun the Sheep Movie (2015)*

She Done Him Wrong (1933)*

She Wore a Yellow Ribbon (1949)

The Shootist (1976)

The Shop on Main Street (1965, Czechoslovakia)

The Silence of the Lambs (1991)

Silverado (1985)

Singin’ in the Rain (1952)

Sleeping Beauty (1959)

The Smiling Lieutenant (1931)

The Snake Pit (1948)*

Song of the Sea (2014)

Sounder (1972)

The Sound of Music (1965)

The Spanish Main (1945)*

Speedy (1928)

Speedy Gonzales (1955 short)

Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse (2018)

Spirited Away (2001, Japan)

Stagecoach (1939)

A Star is Born (1937)

A Star is Born (1954)

A Star is Born (1976)*

A Star is Born (2018)

Star Trek: First Contact (1996)

Star Wars (1977)

Starship Troopers (1997)

The Sting (1973)

A Stolen Life (1946)*

The Story of Three Loves (1953)*

The Story of the Weeping Camel (2003, Mongolia)*

The Strange Love of Martha Ivers (1946)*

The Stranger (1946)*

A Streetcar Named Desire (1951)

Strike Up the Band (1940)

Strings (1991 short)*

The Sundowners (1960)*

Sunrise: A Song of Two Humans (1927)

Superman (1978)

Sweet Bird of Youth (1962)

Swing Time (1936)

T-Men (1947)*

The Tale of the Princess Kaguya (2013, Japan)

Tangerines (2013, Estonia)*

Tenet (2020)

Them! (1954)

Theodora Goes Wild (1936)*

Thirty Seconds Over Tokyo (1944)*

This is Cinerama (1952)*

The Three Musketeers (1948)

Three Orphan Kittens (1935 short)

Time (2020)*

Timecode (2016 short, Spain)

Tom Jones (1963)

Toni Erdmann (2016, Germany)*

Top Hat (1935)

The Triplets of Belleville (2003, France)*

The Truman Show (1998)*

12 Angry Men (1957)

Twilight of Honor (1963)*

Two Girls and a Sailor (1944)*

2001: A Space Odyssey (1968)

Umberto D. (1952, Italy)

The Umbrellas of Cherbourg (1964, France)

Unforgiven (1992)

Up (2009)

Vertigo (1958)

Victor/Victoria (1982)

WALL-E (2008)

Watch on the Rhine (1943)*

Waterloo Bridge (1940)

Weary River (1929)*

West Side Story (1961)

Winnie the Pooh and the Blustery Day (1968 short)

The Wizard of Oz (1939)

Wolfwalkers (2020)

X-Men: Days of Future Past (2014)

You Can’t Take It with You (1938)

Zorba the Greek (1964)*

The 15 nominated short films for the 93rd Academy Awards

The 8 nominees for Best Picture at the 93rd Academy Awards, including the winner, Nomadland

Until next year’s ceremony, folks - February will be here before we know it!

[the-homicidediaries]

Issei Sagawa

“Sometimes I wonder why I did such a horrible thing. Maybe it’s because I come from another planet, or another dimension and accidentally fell to Earth like a meteorite, disguised as a baby crying on the street. My mother walked by and took pity on me. I must have come from a place of cannibals, and I’m the only one of my kind who exists on this planet.”

Good afternoon, everyone who takes the time to read this!

Today, I have the very displeasure of telling you about one of the most.. bizarre human beings I have ever read about.

I have been interested in true crime ever since I could remember. My father is really interested in it as well, so growing up there were always books laying around about the worst of the worst kind of people. Even to this day, my dad and I share stories we heard or a new podcast we listened to or swap books; it’s real fun.  And when you are heavily interested in true crime, you hear and see so many similar stories. This person had an abusive childhood and became a serial killer, this person was not longer interested in being a family man so he killed his whole family and moved away to start a new life, this person was strung out on drugs, this person caught her husband cheating on her and stabbed him as a crime of passion, etc. And while I am not downplaying or excusing these murders AT ALL, because no one should be murdered, I do find myself skipping stories like that. They don’t check my boxes.

Cannibals check my box.  And I have, admittedly, unconsciously, been surrounding myself with cannibalistic aspects. I just finished (another) three part podcast about Jeffrey Dahmer, I’m reading My Friend Dahmer, and watching Attack on Titan like my life depends on it. (Attack on Titan is a Japanese manga series turned into a long running anime about three conjoined towns who are constantly being attacked and eaten by the HUGE human-like zombie creatures, but that is for another day.)

Have I rambled enough? Yes. Yes, I think so. Let’s get into ittttt.

Issei Sagawa, known as Pang or The Kobe Cannibal, was born on April 26th, 1949 in Kobe, Japan to a very wealthy family. Issei has said himself that his childhood was the happiest time of his life and he was a carefree child. He said his parents love him deeply. One thing to note about Issei is that he was born prematurely (and he looks.. off) and doctors did not think he would survive. Issei said because of this, he has always seen himself as an undesirable person. So, instead of friends, Issei had books! Because his family was so wealthy, Issei was afforded an incredible education and was able to travel all over the world and learn about music, art, literature, etc.  He was very interested in art. This will come back around later.

So how does a rich, seemingly normal, intelligent child become a cannibal?  Issei contributes a few things to this: *Issei said his first cannibalistic urge happened when he was in first grade and saw a fellow classmate’s thighs. *Issei said sex was a taboo subject around his household. He said when he had reached a certain age, he began having erections, like all boys do, but he thought he was sick and was too embarrassed to tell anyone. He didn’t know how to relieve himself at this time.. soooo. He, uh, got help from his dog.  Yeah. Yeeeah. (I watched an interview he did with Vice about ten years ago, which I will link below, and watching him describe this so nonchalantly made me the most uncomfortable. Actually, he is nonchalant the entire interview and it’s so disturbing and uncomfy. At one point he says, “I think my sexual desires began to distort around that time.”  Yeah, I would say so, buddy.) *Issei said he would have a reoccurring dream where he and his brother were being boiled in a large pot to be eaten. Issei said he flipped the script and began to fantasize about what it would be like to eat someone. As with most premeditated killers, his fantasies escalated from curiosity to behavior. *Issei was obsessed with western women. He said they are tall and beautiful and he has described himself as a “weak, ugly, and small man”. In an interview after what he keeps calling an “incident”, Issei claimed one of the reasons he consumed human flesh was to “absorb her energy”. 

Issei said he did practice a good amount of restraint for his cannibalistic urges until his college years. While attending Wako University in Tokyo, Issei said he saw a beautiful, blonde, German woman walking by and he was “dazzled by her white thighs”.  One day, he broke into this woman’s apartment on the ground floor. He said his plan was to hit her in the head with an umbrella so he could get a knife from her kitchen and cut into her buttocks and eat it. He was extremely hesitant and his knees accidentally brushed against her stomach, waking her up. She screamed and Issei fled. Police charged him with attempted rape.  Issei said he did explain to psychiatrists about his sexual urges but they didn’t consider it cannibalism and let him go. 

After this, Akira (his father) sent Issei to study comparative literature at Sorbonne University in France in 1981. In the interview, as Issei is recalling this, he said his mother had the an extremely sad look on her face the day he was leaving, “like she knew something horrible was going to happen”. (I could think of a reason why.)

Issei had not forgotten about how close he had gotten to fulfilling his fantasy of eating a European woman back in Tokyo. He was convinced if he was more prepared he could follow through with it flawlessly. He said when he moved to France, he would bring home a sex worker almost every night, but everytime he tried to shoot her, his fingers would freeze. While studying at Sorbonne University, Issei set his eyes on 25-year old Dutch student, Renée Hartevelt. Issei said Renée was so beautiful and he had never seen anyone like her before. (She really was stunning and looked like such a sweet person.) He also said he didn’t want to get caught staring at her, so he began making sketches of her.  From what I read, and I do not know how accurate this is, the two started as friends and eventually Issei began to pursue Renée romantically. He would take her on dates to art museums and dinner. When he confessed his feelings for her, she insisted they just remain friends because she was not sexually attracted to him.  So Issei lied to Renée and told her his professor wanted him to record some German poetry. Renée didn’t think anything about helping out a fellow classmate, so she was happy to come over and help.  Issei said he picked out the poem she read, and as she was reading the poem out loud at his desk, he pulled a rifle out of a closet and shot her in the neck. He said she kept reciting the poem after he shot her, then she just.. stopped. Issei said he fainted after he shot her and when he came to he almost called an ambulance for her, but he knew he would regret it if he lost this opportunity to act out his fantasies.

I am going to quote Issei verbatim from his interview with Vice.

TRIGGER WARNING

“I lied to her that my professor wanted some German poetry recorded. That was the pretext. She didn’t doubt a thing. I chose the poetry. I reached for the gun while she was reading. I was talking to her with a smile on my face. I was really scared. Yet I did pull the trigger. She... kept on talking... until suddenly she fell silent. First she collapsed onto the desk, then fell to the ground with the chair. I laid a towel under her head then undressed her. I had everything planned out in my head from which part i would start feasting on and such. Starting with her ass. I thought it looked the most delicious. It had to be the right cheek, not the left. The left cheek is closer to the heart and I’m scared of blood. I abruptly bit into it, but it was too hard to bite into. It hurt my jaw. I tried cutting in with a fruit knife but it didn’t go through. I gave up and went to the market. I bought a curved meat knife. Finally it went through the flesh. I thought I’d see red meat right away, but there was a yellow corn-like substance, which I later found out was fat. I had to cut deeply to reach the red meat. I don’t remember if I sliced it off, or tore it off with my fingers. I put most of my favorite parts, like the thighs, in the fridge.”

My face right now.

He’s leaving out a lot of details on this.. right after he shot Renée, he had sex with her corpse. And, like I said before, he is so nonchalant about all of this. He ate a LOT of her. I saw a picture of eleven paper plates loaded with human flesh, muscles, and fat. Both of her breasts, her nose, her tongue, her bottom lip, and most of her lower half (her hips, middle of her stomach, and thighs) was missing. He did say he tried to eat her breast, but it was mostly fat and he didn’t enjoy it. Her buttocks, however, “(It) melted in my mouth like raw tuna in a sushi restaurant.” He continued to try different parts of Renée’s body. He would fry pieces of her and eat other parts with mustard. He even decapitated her. He took pictures of Renée’s mutilated body and would have sex with it while listening to the recording of her reading the German poem.

For four days.

He mentioned how June is the hottest month in Paris and he was worried the body would start to rot. So he took Renée’s body to the bathroom and cut her up so he could get rid of it. (He also mentioned after finishing his graduate program, he wanted to go to Greece. He said he took a big luxurious boat and actually shared a table with a butcher and his wife during dinner. He said the butcher was a fat, jolly man and told him how to butcher meat. Issei wrote a letter to the butcher after “the incident” thanking him. He said the butcher never wrote back.)

One he had cut the body up into pieces, he placed the pieces into two suitcases and, made plans to dump the body in a lake in Bois de Boulogne, called in a cab.  “It wasn’t easy getting the body into [the suitcases]. The torso is extremely heavy. It’s really hard to cut to begin with. It’s nothing like a horror movie.” When the cab driver picked up Issei’s suitcases to put them in the cab, he asked Issei if he had a dead body in them. (That tidbit made me really sad.)

Once Issei reached the lake, he pushed the suitcases down the slope. He vastly underestimated how light it still was outside at 8 pm. He said several people were sunbathing still. The sun was setting across the lake, and Issei said for the first time, he saw color. He was fascinated watching a young boy and his grandfather at the top of a hill and while he was distracted, another man came up, opened one of the suitcases, and saw a bloody bedsheet with legs wrapped in it. A woman screamed and someone else yelled, “Murderer!”  Issei said he just walked away.

Issei was, of course, arrested. He was interrogated by three psychiatrists who deemed him mentally insane. Issei was sent to a criminal psych ward, but before he could even begin treatment, he was deported back to Japan because the French people were very uncomfortable with him being there at their expense.  Once Issei arrived back in Japan, he mentioned the hospital he was staying at didn’t conclude that he was mentally ill, just that he had a personality disorder. Issei was forced to leave the hospital without undergoing any treatment. He did not serve any time in prison for ungodly crimes he had committed.  Actually, in a weird turn of events, he became a local celebrity. He became an author, had several interviews, has illustrated mangas (that’s why I mentioned he loves art), made porn, and was even a food critic. He even travelled to Canada, Mexico, and Iceland with two friends of him. I don’t have time to cover all of that because that in itself could be a whole other essay, but like I said, I will link the YouTube video I watched below.

And that is the gruesome, awful, gut wrenching story of Issei Sagawa.

Below are pictures of Issei Sagawa and his victim, Renée Hartevelt. I am also linking the Vice interview on YouTube as well as the crime scene photos. Please view at your own risk.

Thank you for reading. <3

Crime scene photos: https://murderpedia.org/male.S/s/sagawa-issei-photos-2.htm Vice Interview: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BosZxa1bYcE&t=336s

[tcm]

I Could Have Danced...Danced...Danced All Night By Theresa Brown

No one can show sensual longing or manic desperation like Jennifer Jones. It’s all on full display in Vincente Minnelli’s MADAME BOVARY (‘49). For my money, Jones is one of the most underrated actresses of the classic era. Now, if you listen to the film’s trailer, the narrator will describe her as:

“Emma Bovary, this corrupt, loathsome, contemptible creature...this woman of insatiable passions...this monstrous creation of a degenerate imagination.”

That’s a bit rich. I’m not trying to sugarcoat anything, but I’ve got to go the “glass half-empty / glass half-full” route with Emma. I disagree with what the narrator describes; I think she is a fascinating example of the lengths a woman will go for happiness in mid-19th century France, where all cobble-stoned streets are paved with roadblocks for women with few avenues for success laid out unless through a man. I think all women can relate to Emma, especially the women in the time period this MGM film is released. It’s 1949 and men have been coming back for their jobs after the war and Rosie the Riveter has to go back into the kitchen to bake cakes.

Emma’s lot in life as a peasant’s daughter offers no advancement in class and society, though she is “cruelly” blessed with uncommon beauty. (Jennifer Jones is absolutely beautiful!) Being fed romance novels and poetry in the convent, nothing is preparing her to make a living. Seeds of an unrealistic view of life are planted. When she’s back home, she’s like an 1850’s teenager with posters on her wall from Tiger Beat magazine – dashing illustrations of being swept away by love. Her view of reality is a bit skewed. When Charles, a new local doctor (Van Heflin) arrives to care for her father, it’s love at first sledgehammer for him...and an escape hatch for her. He is the first of several men she seduces and uses via withholding before submitting.

She’s terribly unhappy in her new married life. She gives it the good ol’ college try, fixing up their humble abode, charging materials from the local merchant – the start of living above her means via the merchant as ‘pusher’ who provides all...but then demands payment aka blackmail. Charles, the doctor/husband, cannot give her what she truly craves: riches, high society, passion. “Craves” is an understatement and his love for her is not enough. In one of her manic moments of breaking down, she desperately implores:

“Charles, I want a child. I want a boy, Charles. A boy grows to be a man. A man can be free. If he doesn’t like his life he can change it. If there’s anything beautiful, if there’s anything grand anywhere in the world, he can go out and find it. I want a baby, Charles. I want a boy.”

How sad. I’d love to say it’s the desperation of motherhood fueling her mania, but it’s really the desperation of wanting to escape. No suburban housewife could ever put herself in those shoes, right? Emma’s only hope is to live vicariously through a baby son.

So, of course, fate hands her a daughter.

Fate also gives Jones and Heflin an invitation to a fancy dress ball—the impetus of the story hence my title—where the die is really cast for her. See, it’s one thing to wish for things you never had. But when you are given a taste of something that is snatched away, can life be any crueler? Minnelli crafts a pivotally fantastic scene at this ball where not only is the full Monty of Emma’s beauty revealed, but it serves as a metaphor for so many things.

With its stunning production values, the scene is opulent and men can’t take their eyes off her. She’s sought for dances. But poor Charles is shunted off to the sidelines, never being allowed entry into the inner circle of the elite to spoil Emma’s illusion...delusion. He’s even looked down on by a waiter, while Emma is elevated to the belle of the ball. And right then and there, she is suddenly swept off her feet by the handsome and rich Rodolphe played by the drop-dead gorgeous Louis Jourdan in only his fourth American movie. Did I say gorgeous?! She is living the dreams she dreamt...being the center of attention, picked to dance by the handsome ‘prince.’ That whole dance sequence of Minnelli’s is a dizzying scene, serving as a sexual stand-in. And when the windows are broken...

Her beauty is her only currency. She seduces men. She pays the price for that. One man tells her:

“I am a fairly courageous man, Emma but I was afraid of you. You ask for something that consumes while it burns...that destroys everything it touches. I didn’t want to be destroyed.”

Should a woman be satisfied with her lot in life? She is trapped, with fleeting escapes that lead her right back where she started. Things close in on her. She’s in over her head. Everything is about to come crashing down on her. Jones does a fine job portraying a woman who is coquettish, calculating, seductive and trapped. She got me wondering if she could have played Blanche DuBois in Kazan’s capable hands. She only made 27 movies. She was a five-time Oscar nominee, winning her Best Actress Academy Award once for THE SONG OF BERNADETTE (‘44). She’s as different there as she was in CLUNY BROWN (‘46), as she was in the overwrought DUEL IN THE SUN (‘46), as she was in LOVE IS A MANY SPLENDORED THING (‘55) or as she was in my personal favorite, LOVE LETTERS (‘45). There’s a quality of vulnerability, sensuality and mania about Jennifer Jones. Yeh, I’m a fan.

I’ve finally come to respect Van Heflin though it took a long time. (Better late than never.) He could play so many different shades of men, I have newly come to appreciate him in SHANE (‘53), THE STRANGE LOVE OF MARTHA IVERS (‘46), ACT OF VIOLENCE (‘49), THE PROWLER (‘51), EAST SIDE, WEST SIDE (‘49) or his Oscar-winning performance in JOHNNY EAGER (‘41). In MADAME BOVARY, he’s besotted by her, defeated by her, stern with her and wants to care for her. But ultimately, she is too much for him.

The movie is peppered with character actors we all know, like Gene Lockhart, Henry Morgan, Ellen Corby and John Abbott. Like my good friend always says about classic movies: Everybody worked. And you need only to IMDB director Vincente Minnelli to see the depth and breadth of his talent. He could direct a film taking place in modern times as with UNDERCURRENT (‘46) or the turn of the century like in MEET ME IN ST. LOUIS (‘44). He could do comedy as with THE LONG, LONG TRAILER (‘54); drama with THE BAD AND THE BEAUTIFUL (‘52); and the light touch of musicals like in CABIN IN THE SKY (‘43), AN AMERICAN IN PARIS (‘51) and his Oscar-winning GIGI (‘58).

Hope you make the time to watch MADAME BOVARY. You can live vicariously through her, so you don’t make the same mistakes she made.

[mamapriest]

More Than 30 Years Later, Where Is the Cast of ‘Dirty Dancing’ Now?

Source: definition.org

The movie Dirty Dancing took the world by storm back in 1987. Everyone wanted to be Jennifer Grey’s “Baby,” dancing with Patrick Swayze’s character, “Johnny,” in his tight black pants and low-cut shirt (and stellar body). It was a journey of young love in a turbulent time, and it became a timeless, iconic movie, much to the surprise of everyone involved. The song at the end of the film, “(I’ve Had) The Time of My Life,” has inspired people to dance in the decades since. It’s been more than 30 years since the film smashed box office expectations, and it remains beloved by people of all ages to this day. Where is the Dirty Dancing cast now?

Jerry Orbach (Dr. Jake Houseman) - Deceased

Jerry Orbach played the poor dad in Dirty Dancing who just wanted his two girls to behave like ladies. Everyone wanted Baby’s dad to be their own when they saw the movie. Orbach was already a successful actor when he got the part, having received two Tony nominations for his roles in Chicago and Guys and Dolls. After the film, he went on to land many film and television roles, including the voice of Lumiere in Disney’s animated classic Beauty and the Beast. If you don’t know him from that, you most likely know him from his 12-year stint as Lennie Briscoe on Law and Order.

Sadly, he passed away from prostate cancer in 2004 at the age of 69. When he died, he donated his 20/20 eyes to medicine, and now it is confirmed that two different unnamed people are walking around with one of Jerry Orbach’s eyes!

Cynthia Rhodes (Penny Johnson)

Cynthia Rhodes was the tall, statuesque beauty who played Johnny’s dancing partner. Her long legs and professional dance moves made people either want to be her or want to be with her. Cynthia has had a long career as an actress. In addition to Dirty Dancing, she was in Flashdance and Staying Alive. After filming Dirty Dancing, she retired from acting to raise her three sons with her husband, singer Richard Marx. Sadly, though it lasted 25 years, the marriage ended in divorce in 2014.

Jane Brucker (Lisa Houseman)

Jane Brucker, who played Baby’s annoying older sister, was every teens’ version of a nightmare sibling. Jane played Lisa with great style, even with her off-key singing voice in the talent show. She had a couple of other movie roles right after Dirty Dancing, including one in a movie called Bloodhounds of Broadway, but she’s spent the last number of years raising her two daughters. Maybe once they’re all grown up we’ll start seeing more from her again!

Miranda Garrison (Vivian Pressman)

Miranda Garrison played the vixen Vivian, who just wanted a few “dance lessons” with Johnny because her own marriage was lacking desire. She may have been unfulfilled in her movie role, but her real life has had no such issue. Not only did she assist with the choreography in Dirty Dancing, but she also went on to choreograph a number of other high-profile films, including Evita, Selena and, if you can believe it, The Skeleton Key. (We bet you didn’t know that thrillers have choreography, too.) All in all, she has nearly 50 acting credits on her resume, and an equal number of choreography credits. Wow!

Patrick Swayze (Johnny Castle) - Deceased

Patrick Swayze was every woman’s favorite part of Dirty Dancing. With his slick moves, good looks, and charming demeanor, he managed to steal the hearts of all his fans. As almost everyone knows, Swayze starred in many successful movies after Dirty Dancing. Most notably, he played lead roles in Ghost, Roadhouse, and Point Break. He tragically passed away in 2009, at the age of 57, after a brutal battle with pancreatic cancer. He left behind his loving wife, Lisa Niemi, of 34 years.

Jennifer Grey (Frances 'Baby' Houseman)

Jennifer Grey, with her off-kilter beauty, stole the hearts of everyone who saw Dirty Dancing in the 80s. Small acting roles and a 2010 win on Dancing with the Stars — fitting, right? — kept her in the public spotlight until 2015, when she landed a starring role in the Amazon Studios comedy Red Oaks. The show ran for three seasons and ended in 2017. She’s married to actor Clark Gregg, who is famous for his role as agent Phil Coulson in the Marvel Cinematic Universe.

Kelly Bishop (Marjorie Houseman)

Kelly Bishop played Baby’s oblivious mom in the movie, and boy, did she make her mark. (Not that she needed too much help; she had already made a splash as Sheila in the famous musical A Chorus Line, for which she won the Tony Award for Best Supporting Actress.) After Dirty Dancing, she went on to have a long career in film and television. She’s best known for her role as the matriarch Emily Gilmore on Gilmore Girls, which she played for seven years. She is still actively acting, and in 2016 she reprised her role as Emily Gilmore in the miniseries Gilmore Girls: A Year in the Life.

Neal Jones (Billy Kostecki)

Neal Jones played Johnny’s younger cousin in Dirty Dancing (the one who helped Baby carry the watermelon). Billy has had a long career in both films and TV, with roles in The Devil’s Advocate, Law and Order, The Sopranos, Sex and the City, and Criminal Minds (pictured above). His last television appearance was in 2009. He may be finished with acting, but we hope to see him again!

Jack Weston (Max Kellerman) - Deceased

Jack Weston played the owner of the resort in Dirty Dancing. He had already had a long career in film and television, having acted professionally since 1949. He appeared in such films as The Incredible Mr. Limpet and The Four Seasons. After Dirty Dancing, he appeared in two more films: Ishtar and Short Circuit 2 in 1987 and 1988, respectively. In 1996, at 71 years old, he died of lymphoma after a seven-year battle. He was survived by his wife, Laurie Gilkes, and his stepdaughter, Amy.

DID YOU KNOW?

Jennifer Grey’s father is none other than legendary dancer and actor Joel Grey, of Broadway fame. He played the Master of Ceremonies in the 1966 musical Cabaret, and he reprised that role a few years later, in the 1972 movie version, alongside Liza Minelli. If you don’t know him from that, you may know one of his more recent roles: He played the original Wizard of Oz, alongside Idina Menzel and Kristen Chenoweth, in the smash-hit musical Wicked.

Not many expected Dirty Dancing to be such a hit. Not only did it exceed its box office expectations by hundreds of millions of dollars, but it exceeded its stay in theaters by months! The movie was actually popular with every demographic, but it really appealed to teenagers. They continued to see it in theaters. It was in theaters for so long after its initial release, in fact, that it was actually still playing after it came out on VHS. (Remember VHS?) This movie, with a budget of only $5 million, generated $219 million in revenue, and was the 11th biggest moneymaker of 1987.

[papermoonloveslucy]

MARY WICKES

June 13, 1910 - October 22, 1995

Mary Wickes (nee Mary Isabella Wickenhauser) was born in St. Louis, Missouri, to parents who were theatre buffs. A smart student, Mary skipped two grades and graduated from High School at age 16. In college, she majored in English and Political Science, though shifted her career goals to acting at the suggestion of a professor. 

Wickes’ first Broadway play was Spring Dance in 1934, acting alongside Phil Ober, who married Vivian Vance in 1941. Her second Broadway role was in Stage Door (1936) although she was not asked to repeat her role in the 1937 film. One of the RKO contract players cast in the film version was Lucille Ball. 

In The Man Who Came to Dinner, her seventh Broadway show in 1939, she played Nurse Preen, a role she repeated in the 1942 film, her Hollywood debut. She did the role twice more on television in 1949 and 1972. During her busy film and television career, she often played prim, professional women, secretaries, nurses, nuns, and housekeepers, who made sarcastic quips. She left Broadway in 1948, and did not return for another 30 years. 

Wickes did not do nearly as much radio work as many actors in Hollywood did, probably because she was busy on Broadway, but she did act opposite Lucy and Desi’s friend and house guest Orson Welles doing radio plays for  the “Mercury Theatre” program. She was also sometimes heard in the 1950 series “Crime Does Not Pay.” 

On December 19, 1949, in a one-hour live “Studio One in Hollywood” presentation on CBS (a weekly anthology series), Mary Wickes became the first actor to play Mary Poppins, almost 15 years before Julie Andrews immortalized the magical nanny on screen. 

Lucille Ball and Mary Wickes were more than just co-stars. Wickes was a close personal friend to Lucille Ball, who often went on vacation with the family.  According to Ball’s daughter, Lucie Arnaz, Wickes was her mother’s most constant friend throughout her life.     

Wickes was actually a regular on television a couple of years before Lucille Ball, as part of the cast of “Inside U.S.A.” (1949-1950).  Lucille Ball guest-starred on the series in November 1949. The show was done in New York and Lucy was delayed in getting to the studio for rehearsals, so Mary Wickes was asked to stand in for her. When she finally arrived, Lucy observed Wickes and was impressed with her work. They were friends from then on. 

A year later, Ball joined her film co-star Bob Hope on his television show, “The Star Spangled Revue”, which also featured Mary Wickes. 

In February 1952, Ball hired Wickes to play one of her most memorable characters, Lucy Ricardo’s ballet mistress, Madam LaMond, on “I Love Lucy.” This would be Wickes’ only performance on the series. 

Although she did not return to “I Love Lucy”, Wickes still maintained a relationship with Desilu, appearing on 21 episodes of “The Danny Thomas Show” from 1956 to 1958. She played Danny’s no-nonsense Press Agent, Liz O’Neill. 

At the end of the first season of “The Lucy Show,” however, Wickes returned to Lucy’s TV family. In her first appearance, her character actually used her birth name, Mrs. Wickenhauser in “Lucy and the Runaway Butterfly” (TLS S1;E29) in 1963. 

A few months later, Wickes is back. This time as Frances, one of Lucy’s friends, at the start of season two, which was shot (but not aired) in color. Fran takes the role of Charmian, opposite Lucy’s Cleopatra, at the Danfield Community Theatre. 

Fran was also a member of the Danfield Women’s Auxiliary Fire Department, alongside Lucy and Viv. So when they form a softball team, Fran and Audrey (Mary Jane Croft) also get involved. 

Fran’s final appearance finds her and the other volunteer fire fighters taking life-saving courses in order to impress Mr. Mooney and the bank trustees to save their brigade.  When that fails, Lucy sets a small fire in the bank, intending to be the hero and put it out - but naturally the plan fails. 

When the series re-set the action in Los Angeles, Fran was left behind, and Wickes instead appeared as a series of different characters, starting with Lucy’s Aunt Gussie, in “Lucy and the Sleeping Beauty” (TLS S4;E9) in 1965. The dozing beauty of the title is not Wickes, but guest star Clint Walker. 

In 1966, Lucille Ball’s favorite game show, “Password”, hosted not one, but two ‘Lucille Ball & Friends’ weeks!  Mary Wickes played during the November week. When Mary Wickes learns they are playing for money, she says “We have to give it to Lucy and Gary.”  Lucy says “That’s not true!”  Lucy and Mary win the second game in 28 seconds.

In 1967, Wickes returns to “The Lucy Show” to play Mrs. Winslow, a mother in urgent need of a babysitter.  Lucy answers the call, not knowing her little ones are actually chimpanzees!  Oh, and there’s a baby elephant, too! 

A few months later, when Robert Goulet guest stars, Wickes plays his frazzled assistant, Miss Hurlow. With Goulet having three personalities, it’s no wonder she’s frazzled. 

On her final “Lucy Show” appearance (her 8th), Wickes plays another eccentric aunt of Lucy Carmichael’s, Aunt Agatha, a mystery guest who comes to visit  and makes turns Lucy’s life upside down by making her take part in her strenuous health and fitness routine. 

Once Lucille Ball re-boots “The Lucy Show” as “Here’s Lucy” there is an attempt to make Wickes into a recurring character. She plays Isabel, a secretary in the same building as The Unique Employment Agency.  

The attempt only lasts two episodes, however: “Lucy Goes on Strike” (HL S1;E16)...

...and “Lucy Gets Her Man” (HL S1;E21). Wickes only has 40 seconds of screen time at the very start of the episode. Mary Jane Croft joined the show shortly afterwards as Mary Jane Lewis, serving much the same function. 

A few months later, however, she was back. This time returning to her nurse’s uniform she filled out so expertly in The Man Who Came To Dinner (inset photo), to play Nurse Hurlow in “Lucy and Harry’s Tonsils” (HL S2;E5). Perhaps coincidentally, Wickes uses the same surname she used as Robert Goulet’s secretary on “The Lucy Show.”  Perhaps it was the same woman who got fed up with the craziness of show business and went into nursing?  Or, more likely,  the writers just ran out of names!

For the first time, Wickes’ character doesn’t have a name, but she gets most of the laughs, as the personal care attendant of a germ-phobic little old lady with a gigantic diamond that needs cutting. Wickes spends most of her screen time spraying everyone she meets with an aerosol disinfectant!  Wally Cox plays the nervous jeweler. 

Wickes then gets into a habit she finds hard to break, when she plays Lucy’s sister-in-law, Sister Paula, in “Lucy’s All-Nun Band” (HL S4;E8) in 1971. Although Wickes only played two nuns on the big screen, in The Trouble with Angels (1966) and Sister Act (1992), both films had sequels where she reprised her roles. 

“Women like me. They think I'm wholesome or something.” ~ Mary Wickes

At the start of season 5, with Lucille Ball / Lucy Carter’s leg in a cast, she naturally returned to her whites to play Nurse Sylvia Ogilvy in both “Lucy's Big Break” (HL S5;E1) and the next episode, “Lucy and Eva Gabor are Hospital Roomies” (HL S5;E2).  The two episodes are both linked by Lucy’s recovery in the hospital. 

In “Lucy Plays Cops and Robbers” (HL S6;E14), Wickes plays Violet Barker, Lucy’s neighbor. Her husband is played by sitcom veteran Al Lewis of “Car 54″ and “The Munsters”. They are part of Lucy’s neighborhood watch group. The surname Barker will also be used for Lucy’s character on her final sitcom, “Life With Lucy.”  

In her final appearance on the series, Wickes goes to the old west when Lucy is elected honorary sheriff of a one-horse town called Cartridge Belt. Wickes plays Clara Simpson, the town philanthropist. 

In the last episode aired of “Here’s Lucy” there is a character named Mary Winters, a character written to be played by Mary Wickes, or at the very least, with Mary Wickes in mind. The role was filled by a very Mary Wickes-like actress, also named Mary, Mary Treen. 

Lucille Ball and Mary Wickes collaborated one last time on television in “Lucy Calls The President” a 1977 TV special that reunited Lucy with many of her favorite supporting cast members. Wickes once again plays Lucy’s aunt, Miss Millie Baker.  The special has the Whittaker family rolling out the red carpet because they believe that President Jimmy Carter and family are going to visit! 

Life after Lucy included appearing as a recurring character on “The Father Dowling Mysteries” from 1989 to 1991, as well as her film roles in Sister Act and Little Women. 

In 2013, Steve Taravella wrote a biography of Wickes titled Mary Wickes: I Know I’ve Seen That Face Before. 

Mary Wickes died of complications following hip surgery on October 22, 1995, aged 85. She made a $2 million bequest in memory of her parents, establishing the Isabella and Frank Wickenhauser Memorial Library Fund for Television, Film and Theater Arts at the Washington University in St. Louis.

“I love playing good comedy with a heart, comedy which touches the audience.” ~ Mary Wickes

[parkeraul]

pull me in  — 2 

a/n: this series is my new baby, pls don’t get mad at me. heads up: emotions ahead.  warnings: cursing, fluff, smut & use of other languages.  words: 5,258k.

pull me in — 1 | masterlist

The Sunday morning had never felt this warm before — which was weird, since the rain washed Pickering all over during the night and turned the waterdrops into snowflakes, colouring the glass of her still opened window in a vivid white — and home had never felt so cozy. She’s thankful he’s asleep in front of her instead of giving that typical stare that insists on discovering every single thought passing through her mind, because he would definitely make fun of her poker face and tickle her body until she says those three words she never says. And it’s so hard to resist when Shawn is finally quiet and peacefully asleep on her bed. Not the she doesn’t enjoy his voice or those weird whimpers of his that he always lets out when he’s falling asleep more deeply, but she never thought that words were necessary as long as you’re showing your love with attitudes. Shawn, on the other hand, is the complete opposite ��� his notebook pages are never blank because the papers are filled with loving words for Alyssa. There are songs he plays for her until nowadays and there are songs he’ll probably never let her know about, fearing rejection or the possibility that they’re not in the same place. It’s been tricky since the beginning, and Shawn’s the only one being patient and polite, he thinks. 

“May I call you just Lyssa?” He asks with pity eyes, feeling his frame softening to the sight of Alyssa blushing while she curls a strand of her hair with her forefinger. Her smile is timid, but he doesn’t stick to this impression. Ever since Alyssa and Daniel stepped into that school, the rumours were all around for everyone to hear. ‘Oh, he’s got a car!’ ‘Oh, she knows five languages!’ ‘Oh, their mom is Spanish!’ ‘Oh, their grandfather fought in the World War II!’ ‘Oh, they’ve just arrived from France!’ So he knew she wasn’t just another one. No. Being the helpless passionate guy that he is, he puts himself into an internal bet between him & himself — impressing her in all possible ways, more than he regularly does with the other girls. “Lyssa?” She looks him in the eyes, pursing her pink lips into an intimidating grin. “Is it that hard to pronounce the letter A?” The time seems to stop for Shawn. People from school are filling up the diner, some looking at them inquiringly as he places his hand under his chin, analyzing her features and feeling his mouth water everytime her lips touch to speak her words, wishing he could fit his lower lip in between her parted mouth and taste the chapstick glossing the plump flesh. Alyssa knows he’s having problems resisting her, and she’s obviously going to take advantage on this. She just needs to wait for the perfect opportunity. “What, babygirl?” He tries to recover his confidence, more than observant to see if he can break her self-assurance somehow by being the typical Shawn Mendes: seductive in the cockiest way possible. “Not a fan of nicknames?” Alyssa analyses Shawn as he spreads his arm on top of the headrest of the diner sofa, chewing his gum and exhaling big rebel—boy energy in a very overbearing mode. She finds it fun how hard he’s trying to get her weakening when it’s going to be the other way around. She can count on her fingers how many boys with this same attitude she humiliated all around the globe and there would never be enough hands to fit the amount onto. “Listen…” Squinting her eyes, she plays a thoughtful face as she gets closer, inching her middle towards the table. “Shawn.” He says, swallowing harshly and clearing his throat. How can someone let Shawn Mendes pass just like this? Impossible. “Shawn,” Alyssa confirms, snapping two of her digits in the air like she’s just remembered of something practically unmanageable to get inside her mind. “I don’t know what type of girls you’ve been fooling around with, but I guarantee you that you’ll need to come off stronger than ‘babygirl’ and ‘Lyssa’ if you’re planning to get under my skirt,” She maintains eye contact with his hazel irises, oftentimes dropping her glance to his lips parting in surprise. Yes, she wouldn’t be easy but no one has ever seen Shawn denying a good challenge. That’s what keeps him eager and starving for those pretty lips and incomparable personality. If it’s a game, then game on. “I—“ “Mongola!” A tall guy approaches their table, making the two of them take distance from each other again. He’s got his hair pushed back with gel and his features are different from what Shawn is used to see. Other than that, he’s also got his gang behind him and keys spinning around his forefinger repeatedly, still speaking a language he’s never seen before. “¿Terminaste con tu estúpida charla?” Alyssa rolls her eyes, taking some dollars out of her pocket to place right beside the milkshake she ended ages ago before the flirting started. At this point, the other guy was impatiently waiting for her to finally get her jacket and backpack to slide towards the end of the red long chair, staring at her with a devilish smile while the people from school decide to pay more attention to what’s going on. “Yes, I’m done with my conversation,” She gets up, tossing the jacket on top of her elbows and shifting her bag into the guy’s chest. “And you? Done with your show? Or do you really wanna try to stand out from the others by being a dork?” The boy closes his eyes and squeezes the fabric of her nearly empty bag with his strong hand, exhaling strongly and shooting an intimidating look at Shawn after prompting his eyelids open, the curly haired boy glancing at Alyssa and the man he still doesn’t know totally confused. “What now, Dani? Cat got your tongue?” His friends were at the merge of wetting themselves with silent laughs as she wore a winning smile, shaking her head slightly to move her bangs away from her eyes. They’d never get enough of her sassy attitude, putting her own brother down like he’s nothing. “Better be outside in 2 if you want a proper ride home.” The guy hisses and turns on his heels to get outside, never forgetting to give Shawn a last look and drop her bag on the floor before walking to the parking lot, obviously winking at some pretty girls on his way like he hadn’t put out a whole scene seconds ago. Shawn gets up and grabs her backpack, jaw clenched and mind still lost. What the fuck just happened? When he turns to face Alyssa, her eyes are threatening to water but they don’t. They’ll never. Not because of her brother, not because of the people staring at her — the past 9 years were the worst and they’d always come back to haunt her regardless of the day, regardless of the moment. They made her learn on how to act tough and fierce even though the truth was the complete opposite, so these people would need to come off a lot stronger than this to break the wall she’s been building ever since 1949. “Your bag, Alyssa,” He says while straightening his spine up again, offering her the object with his eyes glued on the door. “Who was-“ “My brother. Nothing you should worry about.” “Are you gonna be okay?” His eyes moves slowly to glance at her. Alyssa’s expression tells him nothing and everything at the same time. He can sense she’s kinda in pain, kinda embarrassed but his mind repeats unstoppably that she can’t fear a thing. Although it’s not the moment, this quick second of weakness gets him more than curious to unravel all the mystery that’s Alyssa. “I am okay.” “Want me to-“ “Thank you,” She cuts him off, giving him a forced smile but sincere look of gratefulness. The wind breaking into the diner by the semi-opened windows blows her hair softly and he can’t understand how can a girl look like both the angel and the devil at the same time. “Mm…?” “Shawn—Peter—Raul—Mendes.” Shawn repeats again, his ego begging to be caressed instead of hurt. He wants to be done by now, hates the heavy magnetism that brings him closer and closer to her frame. She’s hugged gracefully by a white shirt tucked into a light-pink skirt that defines her waist and cascades at her thighs, covering all the way almost to the end of them and it’s probably the first time he sees a girl showing her knees and a little bit more in public. How can teeny-tiny pieces of skin can drive his mind to somewhere else? He’ll never comprehend. “Peter Raul,” Smiling — sincerely, this time — she winks at him and it looks like she haven’t even been through a moment of stress minutes ago. He widens his eyebrows in surprise and her smile widens as well, welcoming a laugh that shoots a wave of dopamine right down his senses. It’s the most beautiful sound he’s ever heard and sure he’s exaggerating, but he doesn’t give a fuck at this point. He could watch her laughing the whole day, just like he can watch the way her necklace moves along with her chest when she catches her breath again. “Creo que tendremos que terminar esta conversación en otro momento,” And the time stops. Again. Her tone lowering a little bit while her words come out to poke his heart and make it miss the beats. Shawn can’t figure out a single word but, if her accent keeps on being this sexy while her tongue touches the back of her front teeth so beautifully, he’ll start paying attention to Spanish classes just to talk to her like this everyday. “Hasta luego, guapo.” She dares to inch closer give him a kiss right on the corner of his lips, but before her mouth can press a warm smooch, she hears the motor of the car getting started outside and she can’t help but leave him with the softest graze of her wet lips that could never fulfill the desire consuming his entire being right now. “What the hell did she say?” Shawn asks to himself while she walks away, her scent stuck on the spot she just left. “It’s latin for ‘you’re totally fucked for the hispanic’.” Brian joked between laughs, elbowing Matt beside him as the guys had the most fun with his face screaming ‘Sucker for Alyssa’ in their imagination. Although Brian couldn’t have been quite correct with the ‘latin’ and ‘hispanic’, he wasn’t totally wrong. 

━ ━ ━

His broad frame is taking most of the space on her bed when she’s back from the bathroom. She’s sure he might have had his limbs all stretched to get spread on her mattress while she was gone to brush her teeth and hair. It’s the only downside of sleeping with Shawn, Alyssa thinks. He’ll either curl and cuddle her body to keep her warm or throw his leg or arm on top of her frame in the middle of the night, looking for the space that her bed doesn’t have to fit his big body. It’s cutely annoying. Just like him. She gets rid of her slippers after closing the door carefully, slipping back under the covers now with Shawn’s serene expression right in front of her. He’s slowly waking up with eyes still closed, but he starts to take deep breaths and grab her waist lazily, pulling her even closer and hiding his face on the crook of her neck. He takes a moment to smell the moisturizer she uses, enjoying that unmistakable scent of what he thinks it might be a mix of roses and vanilla. He could stay like this for the rest of his days, immersed on the craziest ride of his life that’s Alyssa. He’s in love with the mess, the danger, the uncertainty and the undefined thing that’s their relationship. What they have is somewhere lost between very-frequent hook ups and a proper relationship that includes some I-love-you’s and jealousy. Shawn would define as a couple walking with baby-steps, taking their time while Alyssa would say it’s complicated. Period. And it’s hard for her to care when he’s tilting his head back up and opening his eyes, giving her a lovely look with those tired chocolate eyes and a weak smile. His curls are messy and fluffy, making him look angelic and innocent. As if. “Morning Lyssa,” He greets with that raspy tone that always gets her thighs clenching. She smiles in response, kissing the tip of his nose delicately. “Gonna have to brush my teeth to get a decent kiss?” “Rhetorical question, I hope.” “Still have my toothbrush?” Shawn asks yawning, sniffing and rubbing his eyes. He’s got soft dark circles that draws their ways to the apple of his cheeks, face all marked from sleeping heavily. It’s such a sight that she wishes she could take photos and put them all in frames to embellish her bedroom. “First drawer, it’s the transparent one,” She warns and he blinks deliberately. ‘You think I’ve forgotten?’ He ruminates in silence as he prompts his body up to sit and crawl his way to the end of the bed. “Just in case…” Alyssa defends herself, lifting both hands to the sides of her head. “Be silent, asshole. My dad has a light sleep.” Shawn smirks in response, drinking her in by the way her body’s splayed shyly on her bed with the untidy blankets covering her legs partly — her thighs are bare, capturing his attention as he notices that her nightdress is messy, exposing the swell of her round ass. No one would look at this so accurately — at least he hopes no one would — but the way her tanned skin begs for his lips drives him insane little by little. “You pervert!” She realizes what he’s doing and pushes the fabric back to where it should be, her cheeks burning and turning pink. “Go before someone wakes up. I need to kick you out sometime soon.” When Shawn looks down, it’s just what he was expecting. His hardened member started to nudge the fabric of his underwear still timidly, but nothing that would escape from Alyssa’s attention. It’s been almost ten minutes since he left to freshen up and Alyssa can’t think about something else. That vision got her mouth watering and her brain working twice as faster. But she couldn’t. Could she? She’s toying with the silver foil, looking at it as she twirls the object unstoppably. Her throat goes dry and she feels the urge to gulp, her lungs searching for more air when she thinks about how painful it might be. But oh, it might be so wonderful as well… When she hears footsteps coming closer, she tucks the condom under her back rapidly and covers her body with the blanket just to make sure it’s all well hidden. “Looks like you just saw a ghost,” Shawn teases her, closing the door and copying her intentions on doing it as quiet as possible. “Qué happened?” “¿Qué pasa?” She corrects his terrible Spanish and thinks to herself. She had never felt brave enough to ask Shawn to be her first time, fearing he would say no because of her brother. And father. And their overprotective personalities. And what if she gets pregnant at 16? What if she’s not hot enough or pretty enough? “No pasa nada.” “What?” “Nothing’s going on.” Alyssa lies, her tone flat and unhappy. He gets closer and sits beside her, choosing a strand of her hair to caress and brush it off her face so he can graze her cheek. “Tell me, Lyssa,” Immediately, she shakes her head in denial and stares at the wall. His eyes would get her failing. “If you don’t want to then I’ll go say good morning to Mr. Stempford. He sure would like to know me better—“ “Sit your ass down, Peter Raul,” She hisses, tossing the blanket away and grabbing his arm instantly when he threatens to get up. He ends up falling on top of her upper half, noses touching and she closes her eyes, breathing deeply. It shouldn’t be this hard. “I want you to promise me you’ll be nice.” “May I know when I’m not nice with you?” “Promise me, asshole.” She pinches his arm. Nothing hard already that Shawn can’t make it harder. “I promise, asshole.” “Great!” She starts, opening her eyes but not looking directly at him. Playing with her fingers, she chooses to stare at them like they’re doing the most interesting thing in the world. “See, I was thinking to myself…” “Mm…” “We’ve never… Well…” Clearing her throat, she shakes her head slightly to move her bangs away from her eyes. “Fucked.” “What?” “Fucked,” He repeats. “That’s one thing we’ve never done.” Her heart races. “Fucked… Right…” The stress begins to show up as Shawn fixes his body on top of hers, laying down gently. “We made out lots of times, of course, and they were—“ “Incredible.” “Incredible,” She smiles, finally looking at his face. He’s so close she can hear his heartbeat and smell the minty scent of toothpaste coming out of his parted lips. “Breathtaking…” Whispering, she swallows harshly before being interrupted by him again. “Hun, what’s going on?” It takes all of her not to freak out. It’s simple, Alyssa. Spit. It. Out. Now. “I…” “You?” She covers her eyes with both hands and enjoys the lack of shyness that takes over her. “Iwantustofuck.” “What?” Shawn squeaks, getting shushed by Alyssa at the same instant. His chest prompts up a little and he’s frowning. It’s all very confusing because Alyssa never asks, she practically demands. And she always stops right when they’re about to unbutton their clothes properly. “I’m tired of the ‘what’ question,” She rolls her eyes, masking her apprehension and hoping he wasn’t able to understand a single word of what she just said. “We should come up with another word like… Pardon? Or… Or maybe ne razumijem! Možete li molim vas govoriti malo sporije?” “You want me—“ He’s now sitting on top of her, running his hand through his wild curls and staring at her totally in shock. “You want us to—“ He clutches his own chest while she covers her entire face with her hands, both their chests heaving and screaming for oxygen. “Shut up! No one’s up yet!” “You…” Shawn sobs a little, blinking rapidly as he tries to process the information. “You want me to make love to you, Lys?” He mumbles. “Vielleicht—“ Her voice is muffled by her palms, shoulders shrugging bashfully. “English, Alyssa.” He grabs her wrists carefully, holding them up away from her worried face and entwining their fingers softly. For the first time in years, she feels that knot on her throat begging to be loosened through a cry. “Maybe, Shawn,” She admits, so nervous that her hands aren’t shaking because his giant ones are keeping them stable. “Maybe I do wanna feel you… Inside… Of me?!” “God!” He breathes out, putting her hands on the curve of his shoulders so he can lean down and pin his forehead on hers. “What are you doing to me, Alyssa Stempford?” “You know I love it when you say my whole name?” “Oh yeah?” He smiles against her smile, licking his lips and placing a kiss on the corner of her lips — the way she does when she wants to tease him. “What else?” “W-What else?” Alyssa stutters, feeling her breath now unpatterning as he lets go of her hands to support his body with one arm, traveling his free palm along her side and peppering kisses from down her face to her jawline. She’s turning cold due to the nervousness but he makes sure to cling to her frame so the hotness spreading through his flesh can comfort her somehow. “I…” He kisses the sensitive spot a little down below her ear precisely, making her get chills and he sees those goosebumps coming to the surface, announcing that he’s starting to get the best of her. “I love it when you drag your lips down my throat and…” She has to stop and focus, because he does exactly as she says and ends with a light suction at the base of her neck. Fanning his breath on the wet region he just sucked, Shawn kisses the other side of her neck intensely, unhurriedly. “Fuck, like this…” “Like this, eh?” He mouths against her, lowly and raspy while his teeth scratch her skin tenderly. She’s quiet, eyes squinting close as she thinks about how the hell is she going to ease that aching sensation that’s making her heat pulsate in anticipation. Shawn’s lips goes to her collarbones, loving every single piece of skin and feeling the expansion of her bone being touched by him, being appreciated so devotedly just like his girl deserves. He moves his hand up from her waist to trace her arm and reach the strap of her nightdress. “Are you sure, Lyssa?” He twirls the fabric, face tilted down as he closes his eyes and waits for a yes. “I am,” Alyssa responds, tugging his thick locks and bringing his face to hers. “Will you be gentle?” If heaven has a specific appearance, it sure is Alyssa’s face softening up as she asks sweetly for his kindness. She looks blissful with her bright brown eyes connected with his, honey hair adorning the pillow and her features. Shawn had never felt the need to be nice and gentle to anyone like he does right now. His chest tempers and hurts at the same time with love. Nothing could mess up with him like this; nobody can fuck Shawn up like Alyssa does. “I will, babe,” He pecks her lips. “I always will.” She cups his face with both hands and kisses him deeply. Their lips pressing together is enough to drive them all the way to the edge, her bottom lip in between his mouth as his tongue pokes out to touch hers. The tenderness of their affection is enough to ease her nerves and encourage her to pass her hands through his curls, going further to the back of his head and scrape the nape of his neck lovingly. She pulls him in, impossibly closer to taste all of him as her hands wanders to his back, feeling the muscles moving under her palm due to the way he’s shifting to keep his frame established not to crush her. Shawn finally drags the strap down her arm, slow and as polite as possible, caressing all the spots of her arm where the fabric passed by with his skilled hand. When Alyssa releases her arm from the cloth, she instantly squeezes her breast — now uncovered — with the inner part of her elbow, pressing down on the flesh to hide her nipple from his sight. He breaks the kiss with a smack sound, bringing his tattooed hand back to hers. “Want me to dress you back, baby?” Shawn asks concernedly, his thumb grazing the back of her palm. “I don’t, actually,” She knows she doesn’t want to, but she fears the shame will become too much. “I don’t know.” “Lys, look at me.” “Yes?!” “What makes you think I wouldn’t love you in every single way?” He holds her hand more forcefully, as if he could assure her even physically that he doesn’t give a damn if she’s dressed in her most expensive clothes or naked under the plain white sheets. He wants her no matter what, no matter how, no matter when. Her smile shows some pain, but somehow he knows it has a pinch of happiness behind it. “I know you’re afraid and needs more time to figure out what you feel, but I want you to know that I’m already there,” Shawn catches himself confessing his emotions to her again. He did it before a thousand times and there’s no turning back. His feelings seem to be fresh new even though they showed up a long time ago and everyday feels like it’s the first day he saw her standing there, being her charming self with a sassy attitude. Nobody compares to her. “I see, it’s awkward for you, but I am in love with you. I love you, Alyssa.” And then Shawn gives her no time to feel joy or guilt for not being entirely there, because his lips are on hers again and his touch is firm on her hand, setting it once more on his own body. Alyssa now palms his bare chest as his member presses against her core and lower stomach, spurring her to move her fingers down —still reservedly — and he decides to help her through. With his hand on top of hers, he guides it down his toned abdomen and intensifies the kiss at the same time, taking her breath away. She’s grateful his soaked clothes from last night were long gone under her bed so she wouldn’t need to go through the ceremony of undressing him. Her hesitant hand reaches the waistband of his briefs, making the both of them hitch their respirations suddenly, his mouth leaving hers slowly. “Can I… touch you?” Alyssa asks, eyeing his white underwear between their bodies as her forefinger toys with the elastic band. “Sure you want to? You don’t have to. This is about you, not me.” Shawn’s eyes are darkening, analyzing her expression and he prepares himself to stop at anytime if she asks him to. His hand stays still above hers. “Please?” It’s innocent but it makes him twitch inside the material of his underwear. Fuck, Alyssa. Fuck. Obviously she can. She can do whatever she wants to do. Shawn’s answer will always be yes. He looks down at her small hand threatening to slip inside and he can’t help but contort his face in pleasure even though he hasn’t been touched yet. “Shit,” He hisses out. “’Course.” “But I need you to teach me how—“ “Babe, I know,” Her desperation is clear so he wants to give her the freedom and confidence to move on, because he’s here for her. “Tell me if you want to stop, ‘kay?” Alyssa only nods in agreement, feeling his hand guiding hers inside the fabric leisurely and Shawn watches her breast being released from the harsh touch of her arm. When she touches the head of his cock, touching the tip lightly, her nipple hardens and Shawn gulps to the sight of her. Alyssa is all flushed, from face to chest, and she starts to take a handful of his length. It feels warm against her icy hand and oh so smooth, totally different from what she had previously imagined. He impulsively thrusts into her fist, kissing her chest not to moan in relief while her other hand pulls the underwear past his crotch and it rests on his muscular thighs. She’s still unsure of what to do, so her touch is fragile and insecure. His hand goes back to hers and he embraces her fingers with a gentle strength, squeezing his own cock. Alyssa finds it so hot that the wetness down on her slit and panties is becoming irritating; she can’t quite understand how her hesitation turns into a fiery desire so fast. “You can hold it like this,” Shawn tells her in a whisper as his palm guides hers up and down gradually. “And pump it like this, eh?” She’s too weak to do anything else rather than murmur in confirmation and, to add more to this weakness of hers, he circles her nipple with the tip of his tongue to capture it in between his lips. It makes Alyssa hold him tighter, pumping all the way down to the base and back up to the leaking rosy tip. A sweet whine flies past her lips when he sucks at her bud, tender plump lips enveloping her in the most delicious way as his throbbing cock is massaged by her careful hand. “Gotta keep quiet, hun,” He manages to say between suctions on her wet skin. “Be good for me, hm?” She huffs and Shawn’s hand leaves hers to travel along the inner part of her thigh, grabbing the delicious soft skin with a force that’s definitely not very gentle. At this point, he’s starving and insatiable. His middle finger accidentally touches her clothed entrance and she whines once more, bucking her hips towards his touch. “Holy fuckin’ shit,” He mutters against her chest, squeezing her leg intensely. “Babe I can’t take this for too long.” Shawn confesses, feeling the vein on the underside of his aching length pounding painfully. There’s pre-cum leaking and her hand picks up the pace just a little, testing to see if this is what he needs. Alyssa takes the condom from under her back, managing to pump him meanwhile, and hands him the foil. “Lucky you I was prepared.” “Where the hell did you get this?” He takes the condom from her hand and sits up, her hand never releasing him. The view is far too pornographic: his defined abs clenching as his thick cock gets pumped by her with some inability, but sure leading him somewhere. He runs a hand through his chocolate hair and waits for her to stop looking at his member and face him. “My eyes are up here, Lys.” “Stole from Dani’s wallet while you were in the bathroom.” She says simply, daring to twist her wrist as she edges him and the unexpected sensation makes Shawn growl. Going back to her, he inches down and steals a kiss. “You’re fuckin’ awesome, you know that?” Shawn pecks her lips repeatedly until he cups her face with one hand to lick inside her mouth and make the most of this abrupt kiss. The atmosphere is too pleasant to let them be aware of anything else. Maybe that’s pretty much the reason why she haven’t heard steps coming to her bedroom door before a loud knock brought them back to reality. “Alyssa?” A strong voice calls out and Shawn opens his eyes, utterly scared. “Alyssa, who’s inside there with you?” She pushes him away, the both of them immediately getting up — Shawn searches for the keys to his motorcycle and pulls his underwear back up while Alyssa is bent down on the floor, arm stretched under her bed to get his clothes. “Alyssa if you don’t open this door right now…” “Hold on, dada!” She promptly warns, throwing Shawn’s jeans at his face and tossing the shirt up on her bed with the leather jacket. “Go, go, go!” “If you haven’t noticed yet, my dick’s still—“ The door slams open no longer after, making Alyssa get up on her heels and Shawn cover his hard cock with both hands. The jeans are covering nothing but his shins and knees, the fabric too tough to fit his legs because of the rain that soaked them last night. She crosses her arms in front of her chest to hide her bare chest and they force a smile towards Alyssa’s father, dripping tenseness and fear. “Gareth—“ Shawn greets with an odd smile but stops at the moment Alyssa elbows him mightly. Fuckin’ dumbass. “Mr. Stempford. Good morning!”

[writtenthroughtime]

Master Fanfiction List | July 2017

For those of you who have been asking me for my updated master list, ask and you shall receive!

Here is the Master List for all of my current completed and works in progress Fanfictions for Outlander.  All of my stories can be found on AO3 under the same name of WrittenThrough Time. I do NOT write about real people, so please don’t ask or expect to find those on here.

Enjoy!

My Blog Prompts

A Life Unseen - An AU, Frank cheats on Claire story. Frank cheats right before Claire falls through time and how her relationships/experiences will differ from the books since she doesn’t have that anchor of Frank trying to get back to. Part 1, Part 2, Part 3, Part 4, Part 5, Part 6, Part 7, Part 8, Part 9, Part 10

Mo Chridhe - Modern AU of Claire and Jamie’s lives Part 1, Part 2, Part 3, Part 4, Part 5, Part 6, Part 7, Part 8, Part 9, Part 10, Part 11, Part 12

Briste - Modern AU where Claire believes she is unlovable and will never find love. However, life doesn't always turn out the way she believes it will... Chapter 1, Chapter 2, Chapter 3, Chapter 4, Chapter 5, Chapter 6, Chapter 7, Chapter 8, Chapter 9, Chapter 10, Chapter 11, Chapter 12, Chapter 13

The Crook Chronicles - My half is set for Mr. Crook Part 1, Mr. Crook Part , Mr. Crook Part 3, Mr. Crook Part 4 COMPLETE

@lenny9987 and I have paired up for this series and she has written Mrs. Crook Part 1,Mrs. Crook Part 2, Mrs. Crook Part 3, Mrs. Crook Part 4 COMPLETE

Endlessly - Story based on @gotham-ruaidh‘s Endless Loop Theory Part 2

For the Love of a Soldier - Also known as 1940s Claire and Jamie, it’s an AU set in the 1940s with Jamie a Scottish soldier and Claire a nurse meeting during WWII. Part 1, Part 2, Part 3, Part 4, Part 5, Part 6, Part 7, Part 8 COMPLETE

A Second Chance - Yet another AU where Claire goes back through the stones with Bree, 2 years after leaving the past before Culloden. Part 1, Part 2, Part 3, Part 4

Changing History - One shot AU where Jamie and Claire were successful in getting the Bonnie Prince to go back to Italy and not start the rebellion. Their experience after with a certain Captain of Dragoons. COMPLETE

Just a Man - Currently a one shot, but soon to be multi-post, from Jamie’s point of view. Current post is set (book world) right after the wedding when Claire faints. COMPLETE

25 Days of Outlander - Posts are tagged with 25 Days of Outlander, Gotham-ruiadh,& Lenny9987. There are a series of 25 “Favorites” that I’ve chosen to writeshort fanfictions based upon. Currently there are 11 posts for that particular set. Day 1, Day 2, Day 3, Day 4, Day 5, Day 6, Day 7, Day 8, Day 9, Day 10, Day 11

Claire’s Not a Fetch - Completed AU where Claire goes back and stops Jamie from marrying Laoghaire in Voyager. COMPLETE

The Sorcerer and the Stones - Master Raymond based story (currently complete. Future chapters possible) COMPLETE

A Flurry of Green and Red - Bree goes through the stones before Claire. deviation from Voyager Part 2 COMPLETE

Christmas Faith - Christmas themed one shots based with Faith Fraser as a main character. Alternate Christmas Faith    COMPLETE

Christmas on the Ridge - Fluffy Christmas day story COMPLETE

From One to Another - Frank has a child with another woman, abandoning Claire hours after giving birth to Brianna. COMPLETE

Ma Famille - Fluffy Fergus AU at Lallybroch with Claire & Jamie. COMPLETE

Mutually Beneficial Pleasure - Fic based on an image and the caption “Imagine him looking down at you like that.” SMUT COMPLETE

Untitled Ramblings - Meet cute for Jamie and Claire set in an unidentified Modern Universe. (completely separate from Mo Chridhe.) This fic could also be continued for now marked complete. Untitled Surprise COMPLETE

La Bibliotheque Parisinne - Modern standalone piece of Jamie and Claire in Paris. Smut for Smut’s Sake.SMUT COMPLETE

Forever and A Day… - Rewrite of DiA where Claire stays in the past. Written for @mybeautifuldecay

A Whole New World- JPOV s2ep13: Dragonfly in Amber AU

Scottish Sun - Sweet Jamie and Claire moment COMPLETE

Outlander Drabbles - Collection of Drabbles based in any setting of Outlander Wedding Night Drabbles, The Newsroom, Smut Drabble, Motorcyclist, Drunken Night, Obedience School, Anniversary Gift, Trouble, First Night Alone, Puppy Days, Walks, Ring Bearer, The Halloween Party, Happy Second Anniversary, Happy Halloween

Singin’ in the Rain - ONE SHOT: Roger and Bree moment on the Ridge.Book 9 setting SMUT COMPLETE

A Kiss a Day Keeps the Whores at Bay - Claire saves Jamie from Laoghaire COMPLETE

Life Drawing - This would totally be an AU fic but I would love to see Claire teaching a figure drawing class and Jamie being one of the students draws her.

Letters For Christmas - Secret Santa 2016 for @akb723. For Christmas Jamie writes a letter to his wife remembering different moments in their shared history.  Letter One - 1944 Letter Two - 1946 Letter Three - 1949 Letter Four - 1953 Letter Five - 1957 Letter Six - 1959 Letter Seven - 1969 COMPLETE

Prompts for Imagine

Always With Me - Imagine Jamie going all proud poppa mode with baby Faith if she had lived COMPLETE

Born Out of Time - Bree is sick in the 20th Century and Claire has to bring her back to the 18th Century to heal her. Part 2: I Need A Healer, Part 3: Return of the Red Man and Red Child COMPLETE

Main Du Chroi - Faith asks Jamie if Claire is really a faerie Part: 2 COMPLETE

The Darkness That Leads to Remembrance - Sir Fletcher allows Claire to see Jamie. (Endlessly Spin-Off) COMPLETE

The Steam Rises - The hot baths did win….for both of them. SMUT COMPLETE

Oidche Math - AU where Jamie has premonitions/dreams of his Sassenach before they meet in person. Part 2: Et Somniatores    COMPLETE

An Aching Wish - The stones failed the second time around and Claire goes to France. Chapter 2 COMPLETE

Lallybroch’s Newest Healer - Rewrite of Always With Me where Faith Lives and is NOT a dream. COMPLETE

There Can Only Be One (aka Legwhore Smackdown)- Claire goes back slightly earlier just before Jamie leaves for Edinburgh and he still lives with Laoghaire COMPLETE

Together in Paris - Life for the Frasers had they stayed in Paris instead of fighting in the uprising. (AU where Faith lives) Part 2: Older Brother, Older Sister, Part 3: La Petite Mort

Wanting to Be….A Daddy’s Girl - Fic about Brianna never bonding/having that fatherly relationship with Frank and her reaction when she finds out who her father really is. AU with wee Bree and Frank dies early, Part 2 COMPLETE (for now)

Petit Mircale - Multi-part rewrite of what I believe should have happened in ep. 207. *Spoiler Alert* FAITH LIVES. Part 1, Part 2, Part 3, Part 4, & Part 5  COMPLETE

Neighboring Love - Set in the 18th Century. Young lovers Jamie and Claire. Prompt: So there’s this post on tumblr that’s like “the most beautiful man in the world lives in my building but every time I see him I’m a mess” and I was like OMG THIS NEEDS TO BE A FIC, so imagine Jamie and Claire in this situation. Part 2: 362 Days…, Part 3: Unwanted Affections, Part 4: Since the Very First Day, Part 5: Hidden Letters

Èirigh na Grèine - Set in the 18th Century where Bree is born and grows up then. Jamie talking to, showing, and explaining things to a baby Bree. Part 2  COMPLETE

Away with the Faeries -  In season 2 finale, Bree said Claire is always away with the faeries…Coult you do a prompt of instances of Bree at different ages like 5,9, 14 and 20where she notices Claire is far away (thinking about Jamie and such) and at those different ages what Bree thinks of her mother because thoughts change when you get older :)  COMPLETE

Of Innocents & Voyeurs - Imagine if Mary and/or Louise walked in on Jamie and Claire in the throws ;) SMUT COMPLETE

Sticky Fingers - #5 Claire catches a bairn in her surgery. (this is a multi-fic post where each of Imagine’s mods wrote a piece based on a list of prompts. You’ll find Stick Fingers as number 5 on the list) COMPLETE

Cruinne Malartach - Imagine there are stones that don’t send you through time but into alternative universes.

Owl Post - Imagine Bree explaining Harry Potter to Jamie. Gotham graciously let me borrow her Modern Glasgow world and add this little gem to the universe. Gotham’s Modern Glasgow

Tales From the Past - Claire and Uncle Lamb are folklorists and discover a Scottish Legend deep in the North Carolian Mountains Part I, Part II, Part III, Part IV COMPLETE

Angel Baby - Anonymous submitted: Could you please write a prompt where little Bree asks Claire for a sister, Claire tells her about Faith but Frank overhears and confronts Claire? Thanks :) COMPLETE

Guardian Scotsman - What about a story about Claire as a child or a teenager and somehow gets raised by Murtagh?

Baking Disasters - Imagine Claire trying to be the perfect WI wife for her husband doing baking and crafts and gardening and she's kind of awful at it. Chapter 1, Chapter 2

A Shock to the System - Hi, could You write a Fic where Jamie managed to avoid Geneva´s blackmailing (that never happened) and later she met Frasers and SEE THEM TOGETHER (gladly with bairns)? Love to see Claire give her (G) a hard time – kill that little brat!!! COMPLETE

Separate Beds- "Do you wish for us to live separately?" What if Claire wasn't ready to forgive Jamie yet? How would he gain back her trust? COMPLETE

The Laird’s Foster - Because I am missing my favorite characters of late, can I get some Roger and Bree story? I'd like to see the evolution of them falling in love with each other. Too much? Anything from you will do. Pretty please? Thank you!

On the Road - Could you do an story where Claire and Jamie return to Castle Leoch before going to the colonies. Bonus points for one where Jamie never married Laogherie :) (up to you!!) COMPLETE

In the Eye of the Beholder - Using a mirror, Bree paints a picture of her and William together and they give it to Jamie for his birthday. Jamie is so touched he tells them a dream he had in the cave of the two of them playing together. COMPLETE

The Arrangement - Christmas Special with @mybeautifuldecay  This little fic is a combined work from both of us with no chapter separation or author separation. We wrote this in tandem, inspiring one another as we went. We hope you will enjoy this Christmas Wedding Bells edition of The Arrangement!

The French Frasers - Imagine a French family (couple, kids and a granny) arriving to the Ridge. They recognised the gran as Suzette, the Paris maid and making counts about her son age they noticed he could be also Murtagh's son. COMPLETE (for now)

Maman’s Boy - Fergus making his way from the battlefield, just wanting to see Claire and Jamie. He realizes that he thinks of them as his parents. COMPLETE

Drunken Nights - Write a scene where Jamie returns home in Paris, completely drunk and the effort Claire has to put in just to get him into bed with him fighting all the way because he wants his Sassenach. COMPLETE

SAWNY -  Jamie's first meeting with Fergus in the tv show where you find out he's the one who took Sawny so I thought a story about Jamie actually giving it to him either just before Culloden or before he arranges to get himself arrested would be really nice. COMPLETE

With Unseeing Eyes - What if someone had told Claire that Jamie was in love with her when she was first staying at Leoch? Chapter 1, Chapter 2   COMPLETE

The Cat’s Delight - Drabble on Imagine for the 2nd Anniversary of the Wedding Episode. COMPLETE

The Historian, the Healer and the Warrior - Imagine Frank had already remarried when Claire came back.

[tumblingintosociology]

Simone de Beauvoir is rightly best known for declaring: “One is not born, but rather becomes, woman.” A less well-known facet of her philosophy, particularly relevant today, is her political activism, a viewpoint that follows directly from her metaphysical stance on the self, namely that we have no fixed essences. The existential maxim “existence precedes essence” underpins de Beauvoir’s philosophy. For her, as for Jean-Paul Sartre, we are first thrown into the world and then create our being through our actions. While there are facts of our existence that we can’t choose, such as being born, who our parents were, and our genetic inheritance, we shouldn’t use our biology or history as excuses not to act. The existential goal is to be an agent, to take control over our life, actively transcending the facts of our existence by pursuing self-chosen goals. It’s easy to find excuses not to act. So easy that many of us spend much of our lives doing so. Many of us believe that we don’t have free will — even as some neuroscientists are discovering that our conscious will can override our impulses. We tell ourselves that our vote won’t make any difference, instead of actively shaping the world in which we want to live. We point fingers at Facebook for facilitating fake news, instead of critically assessing what we’re reading and reposting. It’s not just lazy to push away responsibility in such ways, but it’s what de Beauvoir called a “moral fault.” Since we’re all affected by politics, if we choose not to be involved in creating the conditions of our own lives this reduces us to what de Beauvoir called “absurd vegetation.” It’s tantamount to rejecting existence. We must take a side. The problem is, it’s not always clear which side we ought to choose. Even de Beauvoir failed to navigate through this question safely. She adopted questionable political stances: She once, for example, dismissed Chairman Mao — responsible for the murder of over 45 million people — as being “no more dictatorial” than Franklin D Roosevelt. De Beauvoir’s philosophy of political commitment has a dark side, and she personally made some grave errors of judgement, yet within her philosophy, there’s an opening to address this issue. In The Ethics of Ambiguity (1947) she argues that to be free is to be able to stretch ourselves into an open future full of possibilities. Having this kind of freedom may be dizzying, but it doesn’t mean we get to do whatever we like. We share the earth, and have concern for one another; if we respect freedom for ourselves, then we should respect it for others, too. Using our freedom to exploit and oppress others, or to support the side that promotes such policies, is inconsistent with this radical existential freedom. With oppressive regimes, de Beauvoir acknowledged that individuals usually pay a high price for standing up to dictators and the tyranny of the majority, but demonstrated concretely — through her writing and political engagement — the power of collective action to bring about structural change. An intellectual vigilante, de Beauvoir used her pen as a weapon, breaking down gendered stereotypes and challenging laws that prohibited women from having control over their own bodies. She authored and signed the Manifesto of the 343 in 1971, which paved the way for birth control and abortion in France. Her most famous work, The Second Sex (1949), sparked a new wave of feminism across the world. Today more than ever it’s vital to recognize that freedom can’t be assumed. Some of the freedoms that de Beauvoir fought so hard for in the mid-20th century have since come under threat. De Beauvoir warns that we should expect appeals to “nature” and “utility” to be used as justifications for restrictions on our freedom. And she has been proved correct. For example, the argument that Donald Trump and others have used that pregnancy is inconvenient for businesses is an implicit way of communicating the view that it is natural and economical for women to be baby-making machines while men work. However, de Beauvoir points out “anatomy and hormones never define anything but a situation,” and making birth control, abortion, and parental leave unavailable closes down men’s and women’s ability to reach beyond their given situations, reinforcing stereotypical roles that keep women chained to unpaid home labour and men on a treadmill of paid labour. In times of political turmoil, one may feel overwhelmed with anxiety and can even be tempted with Sartre to think that “hell is other people.” De Beauvoir encourages us to consider that others also give us the world because they infuse it with meaning: We can only make sense of ourselves in relation to others, and can only make sense of the world around us by understanding others’ goals. We strive to understand our differences and to embrace the tension between us. World peace is a stretch, since we don’t all choose the same goals, but we can still look for ways to create solidarities — such as by working to agitate authoritarians, to revolt against tyrants, to amplify marginalized voices — to abolish oppression. Persistence is essential since, as de Beauvoir says, “One’s life has value so long as one attributes value to the life of others, by means of love, friendship, indignation and compassion.” De Beauvoir is surely right that this is the risk, the anguish, and the beauty of human existence.

Skye Cleary on why Simone De Beauvoir’s political philosophy resonates today