#Allen is much better at sustaining relationships

[alfredosauce50]

I know this may sound like a silly question, but how come your headcanons of Allen and Alfred don't get along in most of your stories? I've read over your interpretations of them, and I can understand where their differences lie. However, I have also seen a lot of places where their personalities can actually compliment each other quite nicely. [For example: Both are very loyal individuals, Alfreds a complete goof, and Allen could be a stand-up comedian if he really wanted to, etc]

(Sorry for the long ask. I'm borderline obsessed with your headcanons of these characters 😭😭.)

(Also, if you're busy w/ university n' stuff, pls dont feel the need to answer right away (`･ω･)ゞ✨️)

It comes down to circumstances. The thing with headcanons is that they’re just isolated descriptors, but in a story, a lot of other factors come into play. They’re more than likely to end up in very different places in the world and have clashing motivations.

In Avatar, Alfred was a human being and Allen was a Na’Vi. In The Place Beyond the Pines, Allen was the father of your child, and Alfred was your boyfriend. In What makes me human, Allen was living a cushy life as a suit and yakuza member, Alfred was a terrorist that wanted to destroy any and all semblance of that.

You can understand why they would naturally hate each other in those situations. But towards the end, they usually set their differences aside for a common cause that’s more important than the both of them. So unless they were in an agreeable setting that let them complement each other, they wouldn’t.

My headcanons are also a lot tamer because they’re for a broader audience. These two have a lot of traits that would pit them against each other that go unmentioned in them, but show up in stories.

TLDR: Allen and Alfred may have some similarities, but environment is very important in influencing their relationship with each other. But they’re also very emotional beings with flaws and demons. Maybe they have stigma toward each other, or are jealous of each other for doing something better.

[papermoonloveslucy]

TV TIMES

June 27, 1965

Every so often a new comedienne is hailed and toasted by the critics and public. None of them in the past 15 years has shown the talent or endurance of Lucille Ball. 

Cara Williams (1) was touted as "the new Lucy." She never came close because the old Lucy was too good for her. Carol Burnett (2) has had some good innings, but is discovering that it takes more than a rubbery mouth and a knack for slapstick to be a great comedienne. 

Nanette Fabray (3) skyrocketed briefly as Imogene Coca's successor with Sid Caesar, but without Caesar both gals found their comedy careers progressing at a very uneven gait. 

Elaine May (4) - of Nichols and May - is more a method actress than a comedienne and hasn't much of a track record without her partner in comedy. Audrey Meadows (5) never found herself as a comedienne after The Honeymooners (with Jackie Gleason). 

Connie Stevens (6) tried to follow in the late Gracie Allen's path of non sequiturs, but her timing is way off the mark. Elizabeth Montgomery (7) rang the Nielsen rating bell consistently this season, but no one knows for sure if she can do it without an imaginary broomstick for a prop. 

Martha Raye (8), who is a veteran at the business like Lucy, is the only comedienne that comes to mind as a genuine competitor in this league. Lucy beats her out in the versatility department because she can play it for the quick chuckle or the big belly laugh. With Martha it's the big boffola or nothing. 

Lucy has that rare faculty for bringing a wild line of dialogue or an almost ludicrous situation into the realm of believability. When she and former husband Desi Arnaz were about to embark on the I Love Lucy TV series 14 years ago, a nervous CBS-TV program executive inquired, "But will people believe she is married to a Cuban bandleader?" 

His fears were groundless. It didn't matter if it was a Cuban bandleader or a bowlegged Martian. Lucy can stare at the most hard-boiled skeptics with that wide-eyed by-golly-it's-true look and convince them of 'most anything’. 

Even within the cramped confines of weekly domestic situation TV comedy, Lucy is able to display enough sides of her many-faceted comedy personality to sustain threadbare plots. As with Charlie Chaplin, the audience savors the technique employed, even though they can foresee every turn in the script. 

At a CBS convention of affiliated station managers in Los Angeles last May, Lucy and Don Knotts posed as owners of a "35-watt TV station" in a short skit which wasn't particularly loaded with laugh-lines. But Lucy in an old blue hat and a wraparound fur neckpiece, and Don in a luau shirt, knew just the attitude to strike. Just their way of standing there was enough to give this audience the message. Sinclair Lewis never said it any better in his novel "Main Street." 

Next season (her fourth without Desi) Lucy will play it minus the kids and Vivian Vance, who wanted no more of TV's weekly treadmill. Lucy may be doing it only because she is responsible for a huge TV production corporation, but underneath that she may also have a feeling of responsibility to a talent she has spent many years developing. It's fun to be the champion, too.

#   #   #

FOOTNOTES FROM THE FUTURE

(1) On the Desilu sitcom “December Bride” (1954) had Harry Morgan’s Pete stealing many scenes griping about scatterbrained wife Gladys (who was never shown on camera). When Morgan moved into his own spinoff series, Gladys was finally revealed in the form of Cara Williams on the initially popular “Pete and Gladys” (1960), a show not produced by Desilu. The program did not last long but Cara came was escorted directly into her own series “The Cara Williams Show” (1964). Molded by CBS as the next wacky redhead to follow in the comedy heels of Lucille Ball, the plans quickly went askew following an unfavorable network power shuffle and the canceling of her sitcom after only one season. With her momentum completely gone, her career went into rapid decline. 

(2) Although Lucille Ball did not give Carol Burnett her first big break (Broadway and Garry Moore did that), Lucy was her biggest fan and the two developed a life-long relationship that saw them both take turns starring on each other’s television shows.  If anyone can claim to be the heir to Lucille Ball’s Queen of Comedy title, it is Burnett. 

(3) Yet another funny redhead, Nanette Fabray was born in a trunk and was more known for her Broadway musicals than her television shows.  In 1974, Lucille Ball cast her in her first post-sitcom TV special, “Happy Anniversary and Goodbye”.  

(4) Elaine May was best known as a writer and monologist. She would be nominated for an Oscar for screenwriting in 1979.  She was best known for performing with Mike Nichols.  Not really a contender to Lucy’s throne, but in a class of her own. 

(5) Audrey Meadows was a real rival for TV’s 1950s housewife as Alice Kramden in “The Honeymooners”. They only problem was that Alice wasn’t funny, like Lucy, but tolerant and in love - like Ricky.  In 1986, redhaired Meadows played Lucille Ball’s sister on “Life With Lucy”.  Although critics admired the chemistry between Ball and Meadows, they hated the show, which was canceled after that episode aired.

(6) Connie Stevens was a sparkling strawberry blonde, as sexy as she was ditzy. At the time of this article, she was appearing in a ABC sitcom titled “Wendy and Me” in which George Burns (as himself) was her landlord!  

(7) Elizabeth Montgomery had remarkable success playing Samantha Stephens, a witch married to a modern-day mortal in “Bewitched”.  Montgomery’s father Robert was an Oscar-winning film director. Her husband was William Asher, who was one of the original directors of “I Love Lucy.”  As director of his wife in “Bewitched” the show often strongly resembled “I Love Lucy”. Montgomery was more an actress than comedienne but she had the most fun playing Samantha’s mischievous twin cousin, Serena. 

(8) Martha Raye was known as "The Big Mouth" and considered the female equivalent to Bob Hope, combing her comedy with work for the USO during World War II and beyond. 

~ INSIDE TV WEEK ~

Monday, June 28, 1965 ~ a network re-run of “Lucy and the Old Mansion” (TLS S3;E22), first aired on March 1, 1965.

One redhead replaced another for the summer of 1965. “The Lucy-Desi Comedy Hour” (a rarely re-run series), replaced “The Danny Kaye Show.” 

Wednesday, June 30, 1965 ~ The re-runs kick off with “Lucy Makes Room for Danny” (LDCH S2;E2), first aired on December 1, 1958.  It was a cross-over between “The Danny Thomas Show” aka “Make Room for Daddy” and “The Lucy-Desi Comedy Hour” aka “I Love Lucy” to mark the fact that “Danny Thomas” was taking “Lucy’s” time slot and ‘moving’ to CBS.  Lucy and Desi did a reciprocal appearance as the Ricardos on Thomas’s sitcom, which was filmed at Desilu. 

The day this TV Times supplement was included in the newspaper, this was the headline. 

[msclaritea]

"Judith Whitmer won her election on Saturday to become chair of the Nevada Democratic Party, she got an email from the party’s executive director, Alana Mounce. The message from Mounce began with a note of congratulations, before getting to her main point.

She was quitting. So was every other employee. And so were all the consultants. And the staff would be taking severance checks with them, thank you very much.

On March 6, a coalition of progressive candidates backed by the local chapter of the Democratic Socialists of America took over the leadership of the Nevada Democratic Party, sweeping all five party leadership positions in a contested election that evening. Whitmer, who had been chair of the Clark County Democratic Party, was elected chair. The establishment had prepared for the loss, having recently moved $450,000 out of the party’s coffers and into the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee’s account. The DSCC will put the money toward the 2022 reelection bid of Sen. Catherine Cortez Masto, a vulnerable first-term Democrat.

While Whitmer’s opponents say she was planning to fire them anyway, Whitmer denies that claim. “I’ve been putting in the work,” Whitmer told The Intercept for the latest episode of Deconstructed. “What they just didn’t expect is that we got better and better at organizing and out-organizing them at every turn.”

THE BATTLE BETWEEN the insurgent progressive wing of the party and what’s known in Nevada as the Reid machine — a tightly run operation still guided by former Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid — began five years ago, when Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders organized support for his 2016 presidential primary run, while Reid was working behind the scenes to help his opponent, Hillary Clinton.

Over the next four years, outside organizations like DSA exploded in size and strength. The Sanders campaign focused on organizing tens of thousands of young Latino voters in the state, with the goal of activating people whom the party hadn’t bothered with before. And it worked: In the 2020 cycle, after investing heavily in Nevada, Sanders won a commanding victory in the Nevada caucuses.

When the Sanders campaign ended, the organizers behind it were ready to take their project to the next level. Progressive groups like the Clark County Left Caucus, of which Whitmer was chair, and local DSA chapters had been organizing for Sanders across Nevada since 2016. They used their momentum, and the state-level delegates they picked up during the caucuses, to continue activating progressive pockets in the state with a focus on local office. Progressives led by the Left Caucus won a majority on the state Democratic board this summer, a sign that their momentum was growing even without a candidate at the top of the Democratic ticket to get behind.

“This was certainly kind of immediately made possible by the caucus outcome,” Keenan Korth, a member of the state party’s central committee who is supporting Whitmer, told The Intercept. “But it really started before then, in that the caucus results were in and of themselves the result of a sustained organizing effort, and the slow accumulation of organizing infrastructure here post-2016, in large part through the campaign in 2018 for Amy Vilela.” Vilela ran for Congress in Nevada in 2018 and later became Sanders’s Nevada campaign co-chair.

During the presidential race, the conflict between the Sanders element and the Reid machine had been kept below a boil partly as a result of the personal relationships at play. Sanders’s 2020 brain trust was significantly made up of former aides to Reid who remain on good terms with the former majority leader, including campaign manager Faiz Shakir; deputy Ari Rabin-Havt, who has since returned to Sanders’s Senate office; and national policy director Josh Orton.

But when the Sanders campaign ended, the establishment was ready to maneuver against them.

The Left Caucus and DSA organizers ran a slate of candidates for state party leadership under the name “The NV Dems Progressive Slate.” All but one candidate on the slate was a dues-paying member of a local DSA chapter. The Democratic Party ran candidates on a slate titled “The Progressive Unity Slate,” playing on a theme they’d been pushing the entire cycle: The groups angling for change from the left were trying to divide the party, they said, while they were trying to save it.

Whitmer faced pressure to drop out of the race, and allies of Reid were working their connections to try to keep the party structure intact. A letter circulated accusing Whitmer of blocking the creation of diversity caucuses, though Whitmer told The Intercept it was a disagreement over process. The fight also drew the attention of Cortez Masto, who asked Whitmer to drop out and approached her opponent, Clark County Commissioner Tick Segerblom, about running. Segerblom had chaired the party in the 1990s and wasn’t considering running for the seat.

Segerblom, who supported Sanders in both 2016 and 2020 and chaired his state campaign, confirmed that Cortez Masto approached him about running. He sees the current fallout as an unfortunate culmination of a back-and-forth that’s been happening since 2016. “There’s been a lot of disagreement within the party since 2016,” Segerblom told The Intercept. “This is just a situation where the Bernie team won, and the old guard so to speak were not gonna stick around.” Cortez Masto’s office did not respond to a request for comment.

Despite the pushback, Whitmer ultimately won the election, in which the state party’s governing members voted. In the certified election results, she received 244 to Segerblom’s 214; Jacob Allen won first vice chair by 101 votes; Dr. Zaffar Iqbal, on Whitmer’s progressive slate, was reelected second vice chair by 127 votes; Ahmad Adé won secretary by 39 votes; and Howard Beckerman won treasurer by three votes.

After the results, Mounce sent the email making clear that everyone on the small staff had resigned, including the party operations director, communications director, research director, and finance director.

The mass exodus of party staff, despite the rhetoric around unity, wasn’t a shock, Whitmer told The Intercept. “We weren’t really surprised, in that we were prepared for it,” she said. “But what hit us by surprise and was sort of shocking is that for a slate that claimed that they were all about unity, and kept this false narrative of division going on throughout the entire campaign — in fact they kept intensifying that — that’s what was surprising about it, was the willingness to just walk away, instead of working with us.”

“For a slate that claimed that they were all about unity … that’s what was surprising about it, was the willingness to just walk away, instead of working with us.”

Mounce, the Nevada Democrats director who notified Whitmer of the staff resignations, didn’t respond to a request for comment. Korth told The Intercept Mounce is now providing access to logins and other information to Whitmer and her team. But the ruthlessness on display in her email to Whitmer is part of what has made the Reid machine so effective against Republicans in the state, but it’s unclear how it’ll work against the party’s progressive wing. The Democratic National Committee hired Mounce as their new political director last month.

Whitmer’s predecessor, former Clark County Democratic Chair Donna West, said Whitmer did not try to bridge gaps within the party. She “does not listen to others’ opinions and really take those on board,” West said. “I found that working with her could be really difficult, that she doesn’t really collaborate well, and doesn’t work to build consensus.” West resigned last summer.

A former Nevada Democratic Party staffer, who requested anonymity to speak freely, told The Intercept they quit out of a belief that Whitmer hadn’t built relationships across the party as Clark County chair and was at times unfairly critical of the state Democratic Party. “I knew I couldn’t work with her and watch her destroy the years of hard work so many operatives put into making our state party the best state party in the country.”

In a twist of history, Reid himself actually produced the conditions that led to his own lieutenants getting tossed from office. It was Reid who successfully maneuvered in 2008 to make Nevada the first presidential caucus in the West. His reasoning was simple: He wanted presidential candidates to have to take a position on whether nuclear waste should be stored at Yucca Mountain. More precisely, he wanted that position to be no. In exchange for Barack Obama’s promise to scuttle the Yucca Mountain project, Reid endorsed him, after encouraging him to run. It worked: Obama appointed a former aide of Reid’s to the Nuclear Regulatory Commission with instructions to halt the project.

Reid also wanted the caucus to help build the party’s infrastructure, and that worked too. After years of Republican control, Democrats now hold the governor’s mansion, the state Senate, and the state House, as well as both U.S. Senate seats. Without those two senators, there’d be no Democratic majority in the Senate today. But the caucuses also created an opening for Sanders, and his supporters have run through it to swamp the party. Instead of finding a way to work with the newcomers, the Reid machine is setting up an independent shop. Reid declined to comment."

[saiilorstars]

Rise Up

Ch.3: Lonesome Rogues

Previous Story: It Had To Be You || Current Masterlist

Pairings: Barry Allen x Female OC

Chapter Summary: The Snarts have made their way back to STAR Labs only this time they're in need of help.

Pronunciation of OC: Bell-en. The last syllable has an emphasis so it’s not pronounced like ‘Helen’ would be.

Taglist: @ocfairygodmother @anotherunreadblog​

Maritza Palayta knew by now not to expect many visits for her, from anyone. She counted herself lucky if Belén decided to stop by once a month. Having her mother sitting in front of her now was something beyond shocking.

"Mom?" the word tumbled from Maritza's mouth before she could even finished thinking.

Veronica stood on the other side of the glass, her facial features not as readable as they once were. She didn't know what to make of her eldest daughter now. She'd been there for Maritza's sentencing, head held high but nothing but disapproving of Maritza. Never in Veronica's mind did she ever consider her daughter becoming a metahuman and much less a criminal.

"I didn't expect you to visit me..." Maritza said after a minute of awkward silence. "At all."

"Should I?" Veronica's tone was cold, but Maritza knew she deserved it. In her mother's perspective, she ruined their reputation in the police department both in Central City and in Starling City.

"I don't know," Maritza answered honestly. "I don't let Axel visit, and I'm lucky if Belén decides to give me the time of day, so...to what do I owe this visit?"

Veronica closed her eyes, sighing. "If you haven't seen Belén already, I think you know what my situation is right now..."

"Ah," Maritza slightly raised her head. "Are you still bothering Belén about my son's custody? You know I left instructions, written out legally, of who I wanted to look after my son, right?"

"Maritza, we both know that Belén is neither ready nor has the means to sustain herself and a child," Veronica remained adamant in that aspect. She viewed this as logically as she could and it was the simple truth. On her own, Belén was able to pay for herself and do her own things, but having a child was something completely life-changing. "You and I, we had our children at a decent age. At a time where we were physically, emotionally and economically ready to care for a child."

"Well, one of us was," Maritza corrected coldly. "Because I may have gone down the wrong path, killed people, but I was always there for my son no matter what. Can you say the same? Where the hell were you?"

"I accept my faults," Veronica lowered her gaze, surprising Maritza for a second there. She'd never won a small disagreement like that, ever. "And after seeing how each of my children have ended up...I realize I should've been there more. It's why I want to try and get close to Belén."

"Your words are nice but your actions say something else," Maritza sighed. "You want Belén, fine, but on your terms and that's not going to work, Mom. And that's the problem. Mom, I love you, I really do. In your own way I know you love us back but you are making the biggest mistake of your life. You lost Dad, Rayan, me...do you really want to lose Belén too?" Maritza so desired for her mother to see the errors she was making. She would want nothing more than the last remaining family of hers to be together.

Veronica swallowed hard and looked down. "I am trying-"

"No, you're fighting," Maritza corrected her softly. "Mom-" she laughed softly, "-stop fighting and help Belén instead. You think it doesn't kill me to know she's struggling because she has to raise my son? I wish nothing more than to change what I did, but I can't. But you...you still have a chance to mend your errors. You want to have a relationship with Belén? Prove to her that you are committed to seeing her perspective for once."

Maritza hoped her mother would heed her words because she was sure if Veronica kept going forth with her plan, Belén would never forgive her.

~ 0 ~

"So my mother has filed for custody of Axel," Belén sighed as she explained to Barry. The two were sitting on the steps of her front porch. Little by little, they had scooted closer to each other. "Like, she actually filed for it. I thought she was angry and bluffing but she wasn't. And you know she did it because I said 'no' to going back with her to Star City."

Barry was honestly shocked to hear what Veronica did. He never had the pleasure of meeting her and actually talking with her in a full conversation, but this was enough to put her on his bad list. "I'm so sorry Belén..."

Belén sighed and glanced at him with a sad smile. "I'm sorry too. I didn't mean to spread my depressive news to you."

Barry smiled back for a moment before assuring her everything was fine. He'd come by with the intention of asking her to lunch since they still hadn't had the chance of going on a date since their break up. But as soon as he'd taken a look at her face - which was after asking her to lunch - he saw something was wrong. And boy was he right.

He took her hand and gave it a gentle kiss. "We'll figure something out, Bells."

"C'mon. I'm 26 I don't know the first clue about being a pseudo-mother to a four year old. I'm selling my childhood house to keep up with bills. Maybe, on some level, my mom's right to file for custody..."

"You're doing everything you can, and you know what? If your mother is truly concerned then maybe she could help instead of doing...this!" Barry couldn't help the anger lacing his words the more he thought about Veronica's actions. "If she wants to fight, then let's make sure our fight is a damn good one."

Belén was smiling softly, and he had no idea why. The way he'd automatically joined her side with 'our fight' made her feel...warm. She missed that. A lot. "I'm glad you're around again."

The smile that came to Barry's face was automatic. His hand gripped hers and there was a moment where he thought he couldn't ever let go of her hand. "So am I."

"And...I'm sorry about the whole...date thing...I'm-"

"-I get it Bells," Barry reassured her again. "We can go another time."

"Are you sure?" Belén asked, still mighty guilty. It'd been some time since they technically were trying to be together again and it was rather hard to do when there were no dates involved.

"Yes! C'mon," Barry stood up and, with his hand still holding hers, made her get up as well. "Let's go to STAR Labs. Cisco might be done with the breach search, remember? Portals into another world might be something fun to see, you know..."

Belén dramatically sighed. "For nerds, I guess." Barry deadpanned her until she laughed. "Alright, let's go see this breach thing. I need to pick up Axel anyways."

~0~

Indeed Cisco had finished with the breach search and found quite more than he would've thought. Down in the basement of STAR Labs gathered the group save for Stein, Iris and Joe to look at the biggest breach of them all...which turned out to be out of 53 in the entire city. It resembled a blue, moving blob suspended in air over a small platform.

"Pretty amazing, isn't it?" Cisco couldn't stop looking at the breach.

"It looks like a blob," Belén crinkled her nose. Cisco immediately shot her a look of offence for diminishing the breach's worth.

"Still can't believe what I'm looking at," Jay admitted.

"52 breaches in Central City, and the biggest one just happens to be in our basement," Caitlin remarked, totally unsurprised by the turn of events.

"We need a name for it," Cisco popped a finger in the air.

"It's not a pet, dude," Barry's words meant nothing for Cisco who was already on a brainstorming path.

"No," professor Stein walked in carrying a squared monitor hanging on a strap, "It's a wormhole."

Caitlin immediately turned for the man. "Professor Stein, what are you doing? Your blood pressure is 147 over 82! You could pass out again."

Stein didn't look the least bit worried over his condition despite the fact he had collapsed a few days ago while giving the group a lecture. "Oh, it's merely a few points above the 140 average for someone my age. Besides, I have some ideas I would like to contribute to this discussion, Dr. Snow."

"And I want to hear them. This isn't just a wormhole. It's my way home," Jay reminded them all. "Back to Earth Two."

"Jay, you really think that we can use this as some kind of bridge from your world to ours?" asked Barry.

"Zoom uses the breaches. Why can't we?"

"We don't know how. Everything I put through just bounces back," Cisco sighed.

Axel, who had been left sitting at a nearby desk looked up from his drawings he was working on. "Can we throw more things!?" he excitedly asked.

Not even waiting for the answer, he grabbed his crayon box and hopped off his chair to run for the breach. He and Cisco had taken turns throwing things into the breach earlier to see if they would come back and he was mighty disappointed when Caitlin came in to tell them not to do it anymore. He liked seeing everything they threw be bounced back at them.

"Cisco!" Belén exclaimed as the boy made a beeline for the breach, his arm already raised to throw the crayon box.

"Got him!" Cisco snagged Axel of his feet as he passed by him.

"Aw," Axel frowned. Everyone laughed at the young boy.

"I can't believe you," Belén shook her head at Cisco for yet again teaching something wrong to her nephew.

"If Zoom's using these breaches to transport people from Earth Two, maybe it takes a speedster," Barry suddenly theorized and gave a smirk.

"Barry don't-" Belén didn't get to finish when he sped out of the room. "He wouldn't…" she dared to think that Barry wouldn't be that impulsive.

But...Jay knew better. "Yeah, he is," he answered with eyes shut.

A second later, Barry sped into the room straight for the breach only to be thrown backwards. He landed in a small roll on the floor and groaned. "Maybe I'm not fast enough."

This time it was only Axel who burst into laughter. "Boom! Barry went boom!"

"Yeah!" Cisco gave him a high-five, missing Barry throwing them a mini-glare as he got back on his feet.

"I don't believe your speed is the entirety of the issue, Barry. It might be the breach's stability or lack thereof," Stein hypothesized more correctly.

"He's right," Jay nodded. "We need to think of the breach as a door, and on Earth Two, there's another door. In between, we have a hallway, but the hallway's constantly shifting, twisting, collapsing upon itself. And the doors keep moving with it."

"So we stabilize the door, we stabilize the hallway," Cisco understood the idea.

"And then I can jump through it," Barry beamed.

"Exactly, it would serve as a kind of cannon," Jay smiled but no one like Cisco.

"A speed cannon. Mm. We should hang out more," Cisco pointed at him, making the others laugh.

"Alright," Stein cut into the laughter. "No more tests today. All of you are leaving now, as am I. Cherish the gift of youth as I will go cherish my much needed nap." He motioned the entire group to get going. "Clarissa's already on her way to pick me up. Why not go get some coffee?"

"That is a fantastic idea!" Cisco agreed, already rubbing his hands together at the thought of some sweet coffee. "Jitters anyone?"

"You paying?" Belén teased.

"Can I get some chocolate milk?" Axel rushed up to Belén with his own hands put together. When Belén saw that she sighed do deeply.

"You have got to stop spending so much time with Cisco, buddy."

The others snickered while Cisco let out a mighty offended gasp with a hand over his chest.

~0~

Iris joined the group for some midday coffee and was excited to hear about the breach discovery, though not so much after she learned there 53 in their city. While Barry went to get their coffee, the others remained at the table chatting. Belén, however, was pulled away from the conversation when her phone started ringing. Seeing it was her mother calling, she dumped her phone into her purse and decided to go help Barry bring back their drinks.

"Need some help?" she asked him.

"Still waiting," Barry motioned to the barista running behind the counter. "You okay?" he noticed her anxious expression.

"Yeah," she said a bit too fast to be convincing. "Mom's calling and all."

"And you're not going to answer?"

"Not if I don't trust myself not to shout."

Barry thought that was fair enough. He pressed a kiss to her temple and wrapped an arm around her shoulder, bringing her closer to him. Belén smiled to herself and got to thinking about the fact they hadn't really kissed either.

What kind of getting-back-together is this? Belén wondered if Barry had thought about it too. If he had, then he was being really good about it.

"Order 20!" A barista slid a coffee on the counter then hurried to continue with other orders.

A blonde woman leaned on the couple's side to reach for her drink then offered a shy smile at them once they could see her clearly. Only a couple days were needed to learn that Patty Spivot was a shy woman.

"Hey guys," she greeted with a wave of her free hand. She seemed far more cheery than when they first met her (separately). It stemmed from the fact she was finally on the metahuman task force at the precinct.

"Hey, Patty," Barry greeted. He looked down at Belén and realized he never introduced them, not that they didn't know each other already. "Oh, this is-"

Belén chuckled and lowered his gesturing hand before he could finish. "We already know each other, don't we?" she looked at Patty who laughed as well.

"Yeah, she's the one that gave me the advice to continue hassling Joe for a spot on the task force."

"I've been meaning to congratulate you, actually," Belén said. "Barry told me Joe let you in. I'm sure you'll be great."

Patty sheepishly smiling. "I'm hoping." Her smile sort of faltered when she noticed Belén's injured arm was...no longer injured. "Sorry, um...how's your arm?"

"Hm?" Belén quickly looked at her perfect arms. Her metahuman abilities kicked in and aided her in healing quicker than a normal human.

"Oh, um, it's fine. It's still a little sore but since the bullet didn't actually hit my arm it healed quicker," Belén cleared her throat and looked at the counter that was being filled with their drinks. Patty seemed to buy it since she gave an 'oh' and smiled about it.

As Barry tried gathering all of the, together, Belén laughed and decided to help. "Bells, it's hot," he said and then motioned to her hands.

"Oh shut up," she playfully rolled her eyes and took at two cups. She glanced back at Patty who was taking a sip of her coffee. "Do you want to have some coffee with us?"

Patty's eyes snapped back to the two. "Hm? Oh, no thanks," she shook her head. "I was stopping here on my way to work. Another day? I owe you for your help."

"Sure," Belén beamed at the idea.

"Great," Patty stepped aside to let the two get on with their coffee.

"C'mon," Belén led Barry away. "I like her."

"I do too. She's lively and she knows her way around a crime scene," Barry said, missing Belén's sarcastic glance.

"Hmm, young, pretty, blonde and a nerd? Should I be worried?"

"Wh-what!?" At that point he nearly did dropped the cups in his hands. "I-I no! That's...that's not at all what I meant, Bells!"

Belén laughed as they approached their table.

"What's with you two?" Iris eyed them.

"Oh, nothing, just teasing Barry on his new girlfriend," Belén said calmly as she took her seat next to Axel.

"She's not-" Barry began rather adamantly before he realized this was just another play of hers. He sighed and shook his head. "That's not funny," he pointed at her with a stern finger.

"Seems pretty funny from my end," she said slyly and picked up her coffee.

"Hey, you guys think Professor Stein is okay, right?" Caitlin didn't even pick up her own cup before thinking yet again on Professor Stein. "I mean, Clarissa would call if there was anything wrong."

"Yeah, of course," Barry said to her, but apparently it wasn't enough to convince her.

She grabbed her phone and started getting up. "All right. I'm just gonna call and check in. I'll be back."

"Uh- I don't see that call going well," Cisco said right before he started imitating Stein. "Young lady, these repeated intrusions are interrupting what should be a speedy recov-" but in the midst of his mockery he bumped into a passing brunette woman. "Oh, I'm so sorry."

The brunette looked up and revealed herself as Lisa Snart who answered in her usual flirty tone. "Don't apologize. You can bump into me any day, Cisco."

"Lisa Snart," Cisco's eyes widened.

"Oh, hell no," Belén said outright annoyed. Meanwhile, Barry tried hiding behind his coffee cup.

"You here to double-cross us again, or are you and your big bro holding up coffee shops now?" asked Cisco.

"Auntie Belén," Axel once again tugged on her good arm. "Who's she?"

"Someone who needs to go," Belén answered loudly for Lisa to get the point. "I would think you and your brother would stay away from places where there's children present."

Lisa didn't respond in her usual snarky tone. "I need your help," she said instead.

"In your dreams, Sister Cold," Cisco nearly laughed.

"I think her brain was finally frozen," Belén stared at the woman. "You do realize we could call in the Flash and the Azalea at any moment, right?"

Lisa nodded. "Call him. I know you two have a thing, so call him."

Barry nearly choked on his coffee while Belén gaped. Iris just smirked - she kinda liked this Lisa Snart.

"Unbelievable," Belén looked away, her face rather warm. "Was it that obvious?"

Her response was a very loud scoff from Iris.

Cisco had been studying Lisa in the meanwhile and had noticed something was just off with her. There was an actual shred of fear sitting in her eyes, and...concern? Was that even possible in a Snart?

"You really want us to call then," he said in realization.

"I need their help too," Lisa confessed. "My brother's been kidnapped."

~ 0 ~

Of course very curious to see what Lisa meant, the group took her back to STAR Labs to get the full story. However, both Belén and Barry made the excuse they had to go take Axel somewhere else - they may have forgotten their excuse as soon as Lisa was gone with Caitlin and Cisco. Instead, they let Iris take Axel and the two beat the trio to STAR Labs to get changed.

"I saw it happen," Lisa swore. She stood in the middle of the cortex, explaining her situation to the group before they would send her off. "Last night, Lenny, me, and Mick were knocking over the cashier's cage at Central City Racetrack-"

"Does it physically pain your family not to rob people?" Belén blamed herself for being so surprised when she knew she was dealing with a family of criminals.

Lisa rolled her eyes. "I never finished the job. After Mick torched through the side entrance, I looked back for Lenny and saw him getting thrown into the back of a van."

"And why didn't you and Mick follow?" asked Barry.

"I would have. Someone hit me from behind and knocked me out," Lisa gestured to her head. "When I came to, Lenny was gone, and Mick already made off with the cash."

"How do we know this isn't some kind of a trap?" Cisco logically wondered.

"If Lenny wanted Flash dead, he would have let Mardon, Simmons, and Bivolo take that honor, remember?"

"Yeah, I remember," Barry mumbled, thinking of it as yet another logical reason not to help them again.

"Good. Then you'll also recall that you owe Lenny a favor for saving your life. Time to make good on that debt."

"Even if we wanted to help, how are we supposed to find him?" Barry asked honestly.

Cisco turned on his feet and walked for the desk. "Not a problem. See, when I rebuilt the cold gun, I didn't have time to place a tracker on it, so I devised a method of locating it by borrowing some military technology." He started typing on the computer. "See, the gun works the same as thermal imaging, only instead of infrared heat signatures, it's looking for ultraviolet cold signatures. Whoa, look at that. The gun's UV thermal reading was last picked up at 5th and Hoyt eight minutes ago."

"All right. Let's see if you're a liar," Barry said to Lisa before speeding out.

"I'm not," Lisa argued but he had already left.

"That's debatable," Belén said under her breath, but not as quiet as she thought because Lisa had heard perfectly.

As it turned out, Cisco was right on where to find Snart. However, they did not account for Snart being with his father. As a result, Barry ended up being nearly frozen to death. Thanks to Cisco's new addition to the suit, the ice melted into nothing and he was able to return to STAR Labs where he had half a mind to tell Lisa Snart off.

"So your brother was not kidnapped. He was pulling a job with your father," he sourly informed Lisa upon arriving.

Lisa was nothing but confused. "What? No, Lenny would never do that."

"Oh, just like he would never try and kill The Flash with his cold gun?" Belén pretended to think. "Do you know your brother?"

Lisa still couldn't get over the confusion. It was the first clue that perhaps she wasn't lying to them. "Are you sure it was my dad?"

Cisco pulled up a reference file of her father. Caitlin walked over to the computer hanging on the wall. "That's him. Lewis Snart. Convicted of larceny, armed robbery, aggravated assault, assault with a deadly weapon."

"You have to believe me," Lisa pleaded. "Lenny would never work with him," she then added, like it was a secret no one in the room knew, "He's a bad guy."

"Did you miss the memo or something?" Belén honestly wondered if Lisa was just pretending she and her family weren't criminals. She was aware she was being ruder than usual but when it came to the Snarts she had no control.

"Why should we trust anything you say?" Caitlin crossed her arms.

Lisa stared at them a minute and then pulled on her jacket and blouse's collar to reveal a long scar running around the side of her neck. "I didn't get this scar being a criminal. I got it being a daughter," she mumbled and walked away.

The others, feeling a bit guilty, meant to follow her and get her back when Cisco stopped them. "Let me go. I got this," he made a gesture and left the room.

"I have to get to work," Belén knew she couldn't last long in the same room as a Snart. She was going to crack. "Every time I see a Snart all I think of is my sister's secret. Maybe the Azalea can take a rain check here."

"Don't worry," Barry said, understanding this wasn't one of her best moments. "We'll call you if something comes up."

Belén thanked him for it and took her leave. However when Barry got to thinking what she was planning on doing at work, he followed her out to the elevators.

"Uh, Bells, hold on a minute," his call stopped her in time. "About that article you, Linda and Iris are doing..."

Belén nodded, already knowing where this was going. She'd talked to him and the others about what they were doing and needless to say he was a little concerned with her decision.

"Barry, it'll be fine," she tried to say but he just couldn't agree so easily.

"I just don't think it's a good idea looking at where we are right now," he sighed. "You wanting to be the Azalea isn't the problem here, you know..."

"I do," Belén agreed, crossing her arms. "But if I live my life in fear because someone from another world decided to hunt me down...I'll never be happy."

"Datura is hunting you down for whatever reason and you letting the city know that the Azalea is alive might just give her more fuel to hurt you."

"Either way, Barry, she's coming to hurt me," Belén stepped closer to him, putting on her best encouraging smile for him. "Might as well let her know who she's dealing with."

Barry's lips briefly quirked into a smile. He loved hearing her so brave and sure of herself. He didn't want to be the reason it disappeared, but he just wished he could stop worrying so much.

~ 0 ~

Belén met with Linda to look over their almost finished draft. Since it was Iris' day off, they wanted to have everything finished for tomorrow so they could just give it another proofread and turn it in.

"This is really good," Linda said after reading some of Belén's lines. "Your perspective on the Azalea's disappearance is really interesting."

"Thanks," Belén felt a little ridiculous for taking a comment about a piece she did about herself. "I just think the city should wonder if this woman was away for so long then maybe it's for a big reason."

"I think they'll believe it," Linda said with absolute certainty. "And you know what, maybe reading this might encourage the Azalea to come back."

Belén smiled at their draft. "I think so."

"Belén?"

Belén inwardly groaned when she heard her mother's voice. "Mom," she turned away from her desk to find Veronica approaching her. "Seriously? You can't do this at my job-"

But Veronica calmly raised a hand to stop her. "I'm not here to argue. I want to talk. For real."

Admittedly this did stump Belén for a minute. Her mother seemed calm, calmer than any time she'd seen her as of late.

"You can talk in the conference room," Linda suggested, nodding her head towards the empty room behind her. "No one will bother you there."

"Thank you," Veronica told her before walking towards the room, leaving not much of a choice for Belén.

"I'll be back soon," Belén promised Linda then followed her mother. She closed the glass doors and readied herself for whatever her mother threw at her.

"Bells, your mother's here…" Caitlin's eyes were widened as a gesture that she was pretty nervous of Veronica's appearance.

"Belén, please. I have a proposition," Veronica came out with it in one go, however Belén had a different idea of what she meant by a proposition.

"If it's me and Axel getting out of the city then you can forget-"

"I want to stay," Veronica surprised Belén so much that for the next minute Veronica had free range in the conversation to say what she needed to. "I've been going wrong about this, and I get it, and I'm sorry. I'm just...I've lost my kids, and not just from the divorce, but from life. Rayan's gone, Maritza's gone, even David's gone. And I thought that staying away was the best thing. I've always done better when I'm alone..."

"How'd that work out for you this time?" Belén crossed her arms, unable to keep her resentment at bay. "Because for us it didn't go too well."

"I was wrong," Veronica knew those three words would become part of her daily vocabulary. "I have never been very good at expressing my feelings and when I do they're always in the wrong manner. But you just have to know that I do love you, okay? You're my daughter, how could I not?"

"I have never doubted that," Belén said quietly, shifting on her feet. "But you have never, ever, tried to see things from another person's perspective. Everything always has to be your way or it just blows up."

"I know, I see that now," Veronica nodded her head. "That's why I want to stay here in the city, and change, so that I can be that mother you need. I know things will never be perfect, but I want to try."

"You say that now but by Sunday you'll be back to your regular self," Belén remarked.

"Not this time. I mean it. I already made calls to SCPD to transfer here."

Belén's eyes widened. "You...you did that?"

"Mhm. I'm hoping to get transferred here, at the CCPD. And look," Veronica went back to her purse where she pulled out a manila folder, "this is something else I think could be good for both of us." She walked up to Belén and held out the folder.

Eyes glued on her mother, Belén took the folder and opened it up. She skimmed a couple of lines which resulted in a contract...and proposition?

"What the hell is this?" she looked up.

"I want to buy the house off you," Veronica declared. Belén's mouth fell open once again. "It's clear you and I can't live together, and maybe it's for the best now. You're a young woman who, as you've said, is trying to make her life now. You're selling the house and I would like to buy it."

Belén's eyes nearly popped out from her head from how wide they were.

"And-" Veronica continued with a gesture that Belén should keep looking through the papers, "-I want you to sign Axel's custody over to me, but-" she raised a finger when she saw Belén opening her mouth to argue, "-with conditions. I honestly don't think you are ready to take on the responsibility of a child. It's not that I think you are incapable. I just think you're too young for this."

"I am-"

"Belén please just stop being stubborn and view things logically for a moment," Veronica pleaded. Belén snapped shut the folder but adhered to the request. "You're at the starting point of your life. You just had an accident, your job is barely beginning, and I even hear you're starting a relationship again, and all that gets complicated when you have a child to look after. Tell me you haven't gone crazy looking for babysitters? Axel goes to school now and that can't be easy when it's only three hours a day. Plus, I can't imagine the sleepless nights you've had trying to look after him. He's four and he doesn't have his mother anymore. I know you're trying, but...it has to be hard for you, right?"

Belén bit her lip, her initial annoyance subsiding when she got to thinking. Of course there'd been days where she just couldn't find someone to look after Axel while she went to train for the aerial show or even just to go to work. There were sleepless nights that often had her nearly falling asleep at work. Then there were moments that she just didn't know how to talk to Axel, especially when he asked about Maritza.

"I'm not trying to take Axel away from you. On the contrary, I want to stay here in the city, live in the old house with Axel where you and I can make plans to see each other more often. I'm going to get old eventually," Veronica smiled lightly, "And when that time comes, you'll probably have a family of your own and then you'll know how to care for Axel and your children. It'll be your decision to have them."

Belén re-opened the folder to look things over again. Her mind was fumbling with different ideas but they were all screaming at her to agree. This was the closest thing her mother had ever done to benefit her and Belén couldn't find it in her to disagree when her mother seemed to be honest. Because in the end, she did love her mom and she did want to form some sort of relationship before it was too late.

~ 0 ~

Returning to STAR Labs (as the Azalea), Belén came to quite a sight. Lisa was sitting on a stool with Barry and Caitlin, the former as the Flash and holding some sort of whirring device in front of Lisa's neck.

"What in the hell is going on here?" Belén walked over to them.

"There's a bomb inside Lisa's that her father put," Caitlin responded then moved on to tell Barry, "Once you hold it steady with the magnet, I can surgically excise it."

Cisco came running into the room shouting for them to stop. "Put the magnet down! This is a really concentrated bomb. It's gonna combust if it's exposed to magnetic friction and an oxidant."

Caitlin and Barry retracted one large step away from Lisa who shared the same confused face as Belén.

"In English please?" Belén asked them.

"Air. Uh, the bomb will explode if it comes in contact with air," Barry replied.

"Scientific minds. Can we confer, please?" Cisco motioned to be followed into a side room.

"Yeah, I'm not scientific but I don't want to be near her," Belén mumbled and flashed an apologetic smile at Lisa. "This time no offence."

For once Lisa smiled back.

"What if Flash speed extracts it?" Caitlin wondered once they were in a separate room.

"Nope, it's too risky," Cisco shook his head. "I'm gonna find a way to get it out. I just need a little time."

"But you could lose track of Snart and his dad," Belén pointed out.

"I wish we knew what he was gonna steal next and when," Barry said, thinking. It only took a moment for an idea to pop into his head. "Maybe I can get them to tell me. Their tech guy is dead, so I'm betting they're gonna need a new one. I should infiltrate Lewis' crew."

Belén burst into a fit of laughter but abruptly stopped when she met Barry's offended face. "Oh, you weren't kidding?"

"No, I wasn't," Barry frowned.

"You're gonna pretend to be a criminal?" even Caitlin was surprised of the idea.

"How hard can it be?" Barry shrugged, not thinking about it too much.

"How do I say it nicely…?" Belén mumbled, thinking for a minute before coming up with, "...you're kind of a dork."

Barry tilted his head at her. Was this the best she could come up with? And she was trying to be nice. "Well, as long as you're being nice."

Belén smiled. "You know I mean that affectionately, but...you just have a thing about you that screams…"

"Nerd?" Cisco finished, or blurted.

Belén laughed again. "That's the word!"

Barry shook his head at them. "Thanks guys, really."

"Oh, c'mon," Belén couldn't stop laughing however and so Barry left the room before they added more to his apparent persona.

~0~

"He actually went through with it," Belén couldn't say she was surprised Barry went through with his idea to pretend to be a criminal and tag along with Snart and his dad.

Caitlin laughed as the two walked for the cortex holding respective cups of coffee in their hands. "I think he might have done it just to prove us wrong."

When the two women returned to the cortex Cisco had devised a new way to retrieve the bomb from inside Lisa. He had fashioned a gun-like device with a fitted clear tube sticking above from it.

"What exactly are you gonna do to me with that thing?" Lisa hadn't stopped staring at the big gun she knew was going to be aimed at her pretty soon.

"Operating pressure on this is over 1,000 PSI. This will easily suck the micro-bomb out of your neck and into the barrel of this with one high-powered sho," Cisco tapped the top of the gun. "There is one slight risk."

"Besides shooting a high-powered weapon directly against my neck? "

"The gun does use compressed air," Cisco admitted and looked at the other two women.

Lisa reached a hand on his arm and softly said. "I trust you, Cisco."

"Maybe that's one thing we have in common," Belén smiled at Cisco. "Do your thing. But, uh...we'll be over here," she gestured to herself, Axel and Caitlin.

Cisco nodded a thanks and moved a bit to the side to finish the last bit of the gun. Almost at the same time, Belén's cellphone went off. She took it and walked to the side to take Iris' call, not that she had much of a conversation since Iris was in a fit.

"Bells? I need you!" Iris blurted frantically, worrying Belén she was in trouble.

"What? What is it!?"

"It's just...my dad told me that...that my Mom was actually alive and-"

"He what?" Belén's mouth fell open. "She's...like...breathing-alive?"

"Oh yeah, the whole thing. Please, I just...I really need someone I can talk to with 'mom problems'. Didn't even know I could have those," she mumbled in the end.

"Y-yeah, don't worry. Are you home?"

"Yes."

"Okay, I'll be right over," Belén promised and hung up. "I have to go but I'll be back as soon as I can."

"Is everything alright?" Caitlin asked once she detected something was off in Belén's tone.

"Yeah, um...I hope," Belén pushed herself up from her chair. "I'll be back later, promise."

"We'll handle things," Caitlin assured.

Belén thanked her once more and hurried to find Iris. Like the woman had said, Iris was sitting at home completely alone. She had Axel coloring at the dining table actually quiet. She had pulled up several of her old albums that happened to contain some of her mother's pictures. It was all completely crazy to her. First, she thought her mother was dead and now apparently Francine was more than alive. But then...her father told her that Francine was dying. How was she supposed to think when there was all that behind it?

She nearly jumped from the couch when she heard someone knocking. She opened it up and was relieved to find Belén on the other side. "Thanks for coming, Bells."

"Yeah, of course," Belén walked in but not before giving her a hug. "I can't believe your mom's alive."

"Me neither," Iris said and closed the door. "I didn't have anyone to talk to about this. I mean, I tried getting through to Barry but he wasn't answering-"

"Oh, he's off being a criminal," Belén waved that off and headed into the living room. Iris made a face behind but filed that under 'ask later'.

"Bells, I'm so confused. I saw her today," Iris stopped by the couch, allowing Belén to sit down first. Belén reached for an open photo album with a picture of a baby Iris and her mother. "Like...she was there, and…" Iris shook her head, still unable to believe it.

"How is she?" Belén thought to ask.

"She's...put together," Iris took a seat beside her. "My Dad said that...she used to be a drug addict. She was put together and I told her...to go away. That's what I said to her."

"I think that's completely understandable. I mean, if she left…"

"Oh, she left," Iris said with a bit of resentment in her tone. "She just got up and left and then suddenly decided she wanted to see me again." But even then Iris knew that wasn't the complete truth. "She's...sick. That's what she told my dad. But...I don't know if I can believe her. She's made my dad lie this whole time who knows what comes out of her mouth now."

"Well, you're a reporter, research her," Belén instructed. "You're the daughter of a cop, and a badass of a reporter. This is your perfect talent. Use it."

"And if it turns out to be true?" Iris asked quietly. "If my mom...is dying...what do I do?"

"I can't tell you what to do," Belén shook her head. "I mean, you see the problems I'm having with my own mother, but if Francine came back at this moment...she probably wanted to make amends before she…" made a gesture and sighed. "But you have to be really committed. You can't do it out of guilt. It's okay if you don't want to know her because the truth of the matter is, while biologically she's your mother...she was never A a mother to you. I think she would understand that."

Iris nodded. "Yeah," she mumbled.

Belén stared at her for a minute before reaching over and hugging her again. "Come here!" Iris smiled as she was rocked a bit by the woman. "If you want we could research together."

Iris truly thought about it for a minute but went against it in the end. "I need to do it alone. But thank you so much."

"Don't worry, I understand," Belén nodded her head. "But you also need to understand that I'm gonna hug you for five more minutes."

Iris laughed.

~ 0 ~

At one point in the heist he was being forced to pull, Barry wondered how he would rub it in Belén's face that his plan had gone right so far. She thought he was too dorky to actually play off being a trained techy criminal. She so owed him, that much he knew.

Now as the Flash, he appeared to Snart and his father right at the end of their heist, ready to stop them. Both of them were getting ready to leave the vault with all the diamonds they found.

"Only place you're going is back to Iron Heights, Lewis," Barry spat at the older man he really disliked, and not just because he had shot him five minutes ago.

Snart raised his cold gun at Barry but did not shoot. Lewis, on the other hand, just smiled. "Ah, you wanna bet?"

That was the question wasn't it? Barry raised a hand to his earpod. "Do I wanna bet?

"Do not bet!" he immediately heard Cisco's shout. "Give me a minute."

"Tell me this, what kind of man puts a bomb in his own daughter?" Barry started to ask, hoping Cisco wouldn't be too long.

"A very rich man," Lewis smirked. "Shoot him, son." But as Snart failed to do so, Lewis pulled out a small, silver device that Barry assumed was the controller of the bomb inside Lisa. "Kill him or you'll never see your sister alive."

Barry wondered how this could play out where both he and Lisa got out alive. Thankfully, he didn't have to think for too long before he heard Cisco's 'okay'.

"Lisa's safe," he told Snart. Almost on reflex, Snart redirected his cold gun at his father and shot him square in the chest.

Lewis fell on his knees with nearly his entire body covered in ice. "You're working with The Flash? I thought you hated him?"

"Not as much as I... hate you," Snart responded, almost trembling from the hatred he felt for the man now dead on the floor.

Barry cautiously moved up to Snart and gently pulled the cold gun from his hands - to which the other man didn't even fight for. "Lisa was safe. Why did you do that?"

Snart looked up with cold eyes. "He broke my sister's heart. Only fair I break his."

~0~

With the Snarts' dilemma finished - however badly it was - the rest of the team called it a day. Belén hadn't stopped by STAR Labs anymore due to the time, so she left Iris' place with Axel and returned home. She put Axel to bed, with the promise that things would be looking better for them now. He was certainly excited to learn his grandmother would be staying in the city. His excitement deterred his sleep but eventually, after two or three bedtime stories, Belén got him to fall asleep.

She had to admit, the idea of having her mother around - on good terms - was something that made her smile.

Her thoughts about the new arrangement were interrupted when she found her dining table decorated with candles and dinner she'd most certainly hadn't cooked. (She may or may not have bought Axel take out and called it dinner).

"This is a surprise," she admitted when she saw Barry standing next to the table. He was holding one azalea in his hand and was wearing a nice outfit.

"The many perks of being a speedster means I can basically be a ninja," Barry smirked which just made her laugh. He moved up to her and held the azalea out for her. "I know we didn't have a chance for a nice date outside and I know it's just harder for you right now, so...I thought maybe a house-date might work better."

"House date," Belén repeated with a soft chuckle. "Thank you for that." She took her azalea from his hand and gave it a sniff. "And thank you for my flower. My deadly, poisonous flower."

"Yeah, keep that away from Axel..."

Belén playfully rolled her eyes and gazed at the dinner table. "Thank you for this. All of it. I really love it. I'm just sad I'm not better dressed."

"What are you talking about? You're looking lovely as usual," Barry dramatically gestured at her.

"Barry, stop," Belén laughed but Barry continued on with his compliments, from her hair to her shoes. Eventually she managed to quiet him down only to keep Axel from waking up.

The two sat close to each other at the table and started on their dinner. It was from the same restaurant they visited on their first date.

"Good points, Mr. Allen," Belén pointed her fork at Barry. "Only this time I'm not going to spit anything out."

Barry nearly laughed when he remembered her spitting out a spicy meal she'd ordered on their first date. "I thought it was cute."

"It was awful. I'm surprised you didn't walk out there and then," Belén reached for a sip of her drink.

"Why would I? You were gorgeous then, and now I know you're the best thing that could ever happen to me."

Belén lowered her fork for a moment to smile at him. "You're smooth tonight. Thanks."

"I'm just glad you're smiling again," Barry passed a finger under her chin, widening her smile.

It was then that Belén realized she hadn't told him about her mother's latest visit that day. "My mom stopped by again..."

"Oh, Belén..." Barry figured Veronica pushed her again and was prepared to comfort her.

"No! Um...things actually got better," Belén felt weird just saying that sentence about her mother. She was so used to always having problems with Veronica. "She um, she...she made a proposition. She's buying the house from me. She's going to live here, actually, with Axel."

"She still made you give up custody?"

"No, uuh...I agreed," Belén nodded. She drew in a big breath before explaining her reasoning. "I love my nephew, I do, but I'm fully aware that I'm not ready to take care of him nor any child for that matter. I'm trying my best but if things keep going the way the were...I'm going to drown, Barry. I'm just...I'm not ready for it and I just want Axel to be okay..."

Barry set his hands on her shoulders to keep her from going into a long ramble that would eventually turn her face purple due to lack of oxygen. "I get it. You don't need to explain it to me."

"I don't want you to think I'm giving him up like if he were nothing."

"I would never think that. I've seen firsthand how much you love him. If you're making this choice it's because you're sure Axel is going to be okay. He's going to be good."

"I think he will be," Belén said with absolute certainty. "Mom's transferring to the precinct so she'll be around. Who knows, maybe this is our chance at actually having a relationship."

"I'm really happy for you, Bells," Barry said, taking his hands off her shoulders. "I'm glad Veronica finally came to her senses."

"Well..." Belén cleared her throat. Barry noticed her shifting on her chair and wondered what else she had to say. "She didn't come up with it entirely on her own. Maritza...actually inspired her." Barry's eyebrows raised together in shock. "I know," Belén chuckled lightly. "I was just as surprised as you were. Mom told me she visited Maritza and that Maritza basically called her out on everything."

"I mean...that was..." Barry couldn't even find the proper words to commend Maritza for her actions. It certainly brought a lot of happiness for Belén and that made him see Maritza in a new light.

"I'm thankful," Belén bit her lip nervously. "I'm basically getting a second chance with my Mom thanks to Maritza."

"I'm happy for you, a lot," Barry smiled.

Belén stared at him for a minute with a soft smile. "Yeah, things are finally getting better for me."

She got up from her chair and surprised Barry by sitting on his lap. She looped an arm around his neck and pressed her lips to his for a kiss. It was a much awaited kiss that was filled with feelings - some of those feelings were from the very day they'd broken up. Barry wrapped an arm of his around Belén's waist, keeping her steady as well keeping her close to his body. His free hand came to rest on her cheek and repeatedly stroked circles over her skin with his thumb.

They remained like that for a couple minutes until they felt their feelings for each other had been rekindled.

They gazed at each other with the same dazed smiles until someone spoke up.

"I need more dates like this," Belén spoke for the two of them.

Barry thought the same thing and went ahead and kissed her again.

Dinner was pushed back for a couple minutes.

[sciencespies]

From the moon to the Earth: How the Biden administration might reshape NASA

https://sciencespies.com/space/from-the-moon-to-the-earth-how-the-biden-administration-might-reshape-nasa/

From the moon to the Earth: How the Biden administration might reshape NASA

NASA Deputy Administrator Jim Morhard had perhaps one of the more understated public reactions to the outcome of the presidential election.

“It’s quite a day for everybody, to say the least,” he said at the start of a presentation Nov. 7 to the Space Generation Advisory Council’s SpaceGen Summit, just three hours after a range of media projections, from The Associated Press to Fox News, declared Joe Biden the winner. He didn’t elaborate on that comment and dove into his previously scheduled talk about the agency’s activities.

Whether the outcome prompted elation or disappointment, the election of Joe Biden has left the space industry wondering what comes next. While Biden is a familiar figure in politics, after decades in the Senate and eight years as Barack Obama’s vice president, his views on space, and his plans for NASA, are far less clear.

BIDEN SPACE POLICY

The Biden campaign said almost nothing about space during the race for the White House, other than a couple statements congratulating NASA on the successful launch and return of the Demo-2 commercial crew mission this summer. “As president, I look forward to leading a bold space program that will continue to send astronaut heroes to expand our exploration and scientific frontiers through investments in research and technology to help millions of people here on Earth,” he said in one of those statements.

“One of the things that I found surprising is that the Biden campaign did not issue a space policy statement,” said John Logsdon, founder and former director of George Washington University’s Space Policy Institute. “So, we’re left with the Democratic Party platform said.”

That platform included one paragraph about space which Logsdon considered “very positive,” if not without much detail. The platform endorsed, in broad terms, much of what NASA was currently doing, from science and technology development to continued operation of the International Space Station and human space exploration.

Most in the space industry who read that passage took away two major changes a Biden administration would pursue. The platform mentions “strengthening” Earth observation programs at both NASA and NOAA “to better understand how climate change is impacting our home planet.” That fits into a broader interest in climate change, which is one of four priorities identified by the incoming Biden administration alongside COVID-19, economic recovery and racial equity.

“Managing the Earth’s ability to sustain human life and biodiversity will likely, in my view, dominate a civil space agenda for a Biden-Harris administration,” predicted Lori Garver, a former NASA deputy administrator during the Obama administration, during a Nov. 7 speech at the SpaceVision 2020 conference by Students for the Exploration and Development of Space.

Biden’s focus on climate change doesn’t bode well for putting NASA’s underfunded Human Landing System back on track for reaching the moon by 2024, a Trump mandate few took literally. Credit: NASA illustration

Exactly how that will be implemented remains unclear. One possibility would be to accelerate implementation of the Earth science decadal survey though additional funding. “NASA is a national asset, and if properly directed and incentivized, we can make meaningful contributions to sustaining humanity,” Garver said.

The other change is in human space exploration. While the platform stated the party supported “NASA’s work to return Americans to the moon and go beyond to Mars,” it made no mention of a date for doing so, in particular the 2024 date set by the Trump administration last year. That’s led to speculation that the Biden administration will, at the very least, slow down the Artemis program, perhaps freeing up money for Earth science and other priorities elsewhere in the agency.

“I don’t think Artemis will get canceled. I also don’t think it will get any more money than what it’s currently getting,” said Wendy Whitman Cobb, a professor at the U.S. Air Force School of Advanced Air and Space Studies whose research includes space policy.

A 2024 human lunar landing might be ruled out even before Biden is sworn in on Jan. 20. NASA’s fiscal year 2021 budget proposal requested $3.2 billion for the Human Landing System (HLS) program to develop the landers needed to transport astronauts to and from the surface of the moon. The House, though, provided only about $600 million for HLS in a spending bill it passed in July.

NASA Administrator Jim Bridenstine, while publicly thanking the House for providing at least some money for HLS, lobbied the Senate for full funding to keep a 2024 landing on schedule. “Accelerating it to 2024 requires a $3.2 billion budget for 2021 for the Human Landing System, which is in the president’s budget request,” he told Senate appropriators in September.

Those appropriators released their draft spending bills Nov. 10, which will serve as the basis for negotiations with the House on a final version. For NASA, they provided $1 billion for the HLS program, more than the House but still far short of the budget request. In the report accompanying the bill, Senate appropriators noted the uncertainty surrounding the program “makes it difficult to analyze the future impacts that funding the accelerated Moon mission will have on NASA’s other important missions.”

The HLS funding was just one obstacle to a 2024 human landing identified in a report by NASA’s Office of Inspector General Nov. 12 that discussed the agency’s top challenges, also citing delays in the Space Launch System and Orion. It concluded that NASA “will be hard-pressed to land astronauts on the Moon by the end of 2024.”

“I don’t know anyone who thinks we’re going to get there by 2024,” Garver said. “No matter who won, this was going to be an impossible goal.”

TRANSITION TEAM

While the incoming administration’s plans for NASA aren’t certain, it is working quickly on that transition. On Nov. 10, it announced the rosters of the agency review teams, or transition teams, that will fan out across the federal government to gather information to guide the new administration’s planning.

“The transition teams really come in to see how things are doing and make recommendations going forward,” said Garver, who led the NASA transition team for the incoming Obama administration in 2008.

The agency review team for NASA is filled with people who either used to work at the agency or who are otherwise very familiar with it. Leading the team is Ellen Stofan, a planetary scientist who served as NASA chief scientist during the Obama administration and is now director of the National Air and Space Museum. Waleed Abdalati, her predecessor as NASA chief scientist, is also on the team. He was co-chair of the most recent Earth science decadal survey.

Others have a range of NASA experience. Pam Melroy is a former NASA astronaut who flew on three shuttle missions and later worked at the FAA’s commercial space office and at DARPA. Dave Noble, Shannon Valley and David Weaver all held policy and communications posts at NASA during the Obama administration; Valley is also a climate scientist.

Bhavya Lal, a researcher at the Science and Technology Policy Institute, has studied a wide range of space-related topics for NASA and other government agencies. Jedidah Isler, an assistant professor at Dartmouth, hasn’t previously worked for NASA, but her research in astrophysics complements the scientific backgrounds of other members of the team.

When the team will be able to start work, though, isn’t clear. The Trump administration has been slow to recognize Biden’s win, and the head of the General Services Administration, which controls the resources for presidential transitions, has yet to release those resources to the Biden transition. NASA officials did not respond to questions Nov. 12 about whether it had started discussions with the agency review team or what guidance it had received from the White House about supporting the transition.

ADMINISTRATOR CANDIDATES

Another priority for the Biden transition is picking a new NASA administrator. Despite being confirmed on a close, party-line vote in the Senate in April 2018, Bridenstine had won over members of Congress on both sides of the aisle for his leadership of the agency. Some in the space community hoped that, even in the event of a Biden victory, Bridenstine could be kept on.

Bridenstine, though, plans to leave the agency at the end of the Trump administration, telling Aerospace Daily that he “would not be the right person” to lead the agency in a Biden administration. President-elect Biden’s NASA Transition Team The NASA administrator, he said, needed to have a “close relationship” with the White House, something that he, a former Republican congressman, lacked.

While the Biden transition has been quiet about its choice for a new administrator, there’s been plenty of speculation, dating back long before the election, about potential candidates for the job. That list is dominated by women, such as Melroy, the former astronaut on the transition team. Others include Wanda Austin, former president and chief executive of The Aerospace Corporation; Gretchen McClain, a former NASA official who later worked in industry and serves on the board of several companies, such as Booz Allen Hamilton; and Wanda Sigur, former vice president and general manager for civil space at Lockheed Martin.

Another possibility is Rep. Kendra Horn (D-Okla.), who lost her bid for a second term in November’s elections. Horn serves as chair of the House Science space subcommittee and has expressed skepticism about aspects of the Artemis program, including NASA’s ability to achieve a 2024 landing.

When a new administrator would take office isn’t clear, but experience suggests it may be months after inauguration day. The Obama administration did not nominate Charlie Bolden as administrator (and Garver as deputy administrator) until May 2009; the Senate confirmed them in July. Bridenstine, despite emerging as a top candidate for NASA administrator days after Trump won the 2016 election, was not nominated until early September of 2017.

Morhard, the current deputy administrator, will also likely be departing, something he quietly acknowledged in his SpaceGen Summit talk hours after Biden won. “Things are changing in the United States, we know that,” he said. “I’m certainly looking forward to the future and what comes next.”

This article originally appeared in the Nov. 16, 2020 issue of SpaceNews magazine.

#Space

[princessyennenga]

Linked from ElseworldsClips: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y_W32zM60dA

If the writers wanted to demonize Iris and put more baggage on Candice for playing Iris West, this would surely be one way to do it. 

So many writing errors are present here, and it would be a challenge to unpack them all, but I’ll try to keep it brief: 

Iris isn’t bothered that Nora worked with Thawne? Yikes. This is going to whiplash on Iris so badly. And clearly, according to the promo, it is wrong. There is Iris, at Iron Heights in front of Thawne’s cell, beseeching Nora to get away from Thawne. Obviously, she doesn’t think Thawne needs to influence her child, her and Barry’s child. But you cannot tell that to racist fanboys and fangirls, who viscerally hate Iris and frequently bubble over with that venom for no reason at all. 

The Insecure Girlfriend/Wife archetype. You know the kind of writing where the girlfriend is pouty and upset because her boyfriend won’t “open up” or “share” about all the life-altering burdens he is carrying on his shoulders. Alone. This is outdated and regressive. This leads to Iris ... 

Failing to Acknowledge Facts. Iris, I love you and will forever be a proud member of the IWDS. But girl. Barry didn’t walk into the Speedforce at the end of S3 to take a pre-wedding vacay. Did you not notice that said entity was tearing up Central City, being all extra and striking people with lightning? Either Barry paid his penance or Central City would have been a Black Hole. And girl, you SPOKE TO the Speedforce iteration of Nora Allen. It was not an invitation. Barry did not leave you. Barry was being apprehended, tried, convicted and locked up.   

Flashpoint. Please leave Barry alone about this, already. Not just Iris, but everyone. He was at the lowest point of his life, crushed by grief and despair. And the Flashpoint/Paradox episodes were rife with inconsistency and logic holes, so much so that even a Forbes writer pointed out one in particular. Personally, it is only dogmatic comic canon that Nora’s death was necessary to keep the world together. Has there ever been a plausible, credible or sustainable connection to things going wrong in Season 3 because of Flashpoint -- other than “just because?” Everything that Barry was blamed for in that season was retconned away or forgiven, so I’m personally tired of hearing about it. Oh, about John Diggle Jr.; please explain to me how Nora’s survival connects with John Diggle shooting male versus female swimmers on any given day and then we can have a conversation about why Lila should be perpetually pissed at Barry. The need to make the hero look like a dunderhead on his own show doesn’t count. 

Barry was a knucklehead. This time, the fandom is split on whether Barry’s decision was an “about damn time” moment where he starts acting like a leader, or selfish and emotional. Honestly, he was right to send Nora home. But he was also written terribly, not looking into her story for himself, always being blindsided and outsmarted by everyone around him. Barry Allen, genius? Have we seen him lately? Also, like Barry’s other decisions, this was poorly thought out, impulsive and emotionally driven. It will have consequences. Consequence #1: Where do we find Nora after this? Not figuring out how her ‘Flashpoint’ has changed Central City or her relationship with Iris. No. Back to Thawne, asking for help on a new speedster trick -- the very thing that made her father so angry in the first place. The reason this show doesn’t need strong villains is because the hero keeps creating problems that get in his way.

As it stands now, Iris is the only character on the show that consistently draws irrational, blinding rage from fanboys and fangirls all over the world. Particularly white racist American fanboys and Snowbarry crazies still predicting a WestAllen breakup and romance between Barry and Caitlin, like those prophets of doom who keep changing the date for the end of days. If I’m totally honest, fanboys from Asian countries with INTENSELY misogynistic and anti-Black cultures, viscerally HATE Iris and they go into Candice’s SM mentions relentlessly with abusive comments. Constantly wishing her character dead and often harassing Candice personally. Over something her character said two years ago!! But Iris being unbothered by Nora working with Barry’s “arch nemesis” and lying about it for months? This just reloaded their quivers, stupid writers! 

I know that the CW is known for teen angst. Teen melodrama and blah, blah. But aren’t a significant portion of its viewers in their late 20s and 30s by now? Some are grown with kids of their own and some of the recappers on SM have salt & pepper in their beards. In the era of peak TV, streaming content and roles for women and for Black women that have evolved, TV writing has to be smart or your show won’t make it. Tension can be done in a smart way. Arguments can make sense, instead of being muddied with bonkers logic from previous eras when TV and women characters were weak. 

Which brings me to my next point: This wouldn’t have happened unless Black women writers or other women of color were in the writing room. Maybe Barry and Iris would have discussed sending Nora back, and maybe people would say that’s not dramatic or exciting enough. But isn’t there a meta serial killer out there, still? This is unfolding over a single day (a looong day!) But in terms of the story itself, Cicada needs to be dealt with and then we can deal with Nora’s secret. But they’ve chosen to suspend the Cicada storyline so that we can waste our time on Snow Family troubles, where the anchor character is sure to be retconned -- again -- and the “actress” to delivers her lines struggles and twitches through her efforts to make us care.  Black girls who follow shows like this are smart, you hear me? They sniff out continuity errors, lapses in logic and they could have made this so much better.   

Enjoy Candice and Grant’s performances. I will. For them, it’s a day at work. Well, for Grant. But Iris haters who cannot forgive Candice for being a Black woman adored by the white male lead have more reasons to hate her, and the writers just handed it to them. 

[thedevianthunterrk800]

Response Time (Captain Allen x Reader)

Request: Could you do a gender neutral EMT!reader who's always patching up the swat team and just goes "If I didn't know any better I'd think you guys were trying to get hurt"

This honestly reminds me of that episode of 30 Rock when Jenna makes Kenneth eat strawberries to get an allergic reaction so that the cute EMT comes lol like big mood™️

i don’t actually know anything about being an EMT so pls excuse if i don’t portray that correctly ahhh

Tags: @connorfixinghistie @wiredhawkes 

Masterlist

The first time you’re dispatched to treat the Detroit Police SWAT unit, you admittedly prepare for the worst. After all, you’ve only ever had to deal with local emergencies so far, like car accidents, scuffles that’d gone south, and the occasional call to bring elderly to the hospital. While you’ve aided your fair share of officers and detectives, you’ve never once been in contact with the SWAT unit.

Until today, that is.

Now, you watched a lot of television growing up, and so you’re well aware what kind of situations the SWAT team normally responds to. You expect there to be bloodshed, explosions, fatal gunshot wounds; you know, the standard stuff you see in action movies.

That’s not the case, however.

The SWAT team comes out unharmed. Well, mostly unharmed. You treat a few of them for some cuts and grazes, but nothing that requires immediate transportation to the ER, surprisingly.

Not to mention, you notice that the guys don’t seem to be bothered by the whole ordeal. Whatever situation they dealt with must’ve been child’s play—or maybe they’re simply used to responding to all sorts of violence by now. Still, it’s unsettling to see them joking around as if they weren’t being shot at by armed hostiles only a few minutes ago, but you suppose all that means is that you aren’t cut out to join the SWAT team. 

There’s just one guy in particular who remains quiet the whole time you examine him, which is unnerving in a different way because he’s the most handsome of the lot. Hell, he’s the most handsome guy you’ve ever met, and you wish he’d talk more because it’s getting increasingly difficult not to gawk at his perfectly sculpted face while dressing the cut on his neck.

Still, it’s not his obligation to make small-talk with you.

Not that you don’t try.

“Any other injuries?” you ask once you finish up, smiling at the expressionless SWAT member. He doesn’t return your smile, simply getting to his feet.

“That’s it. Thanks,” he says, giving you a curt nod. You offer him a small wave as he walks off, and you have to stop yourself from staring at his retreating back.

.

You don’t expect to see him again as quickly as you do, but not even a week later you’re once again gazing into the unimpressed face of who you mentally refer to as “SWAT Guy”. Of course, you know that there are other members in the squad, but only one of them looks like there’s a piece of shit right under his nose all the fucking time.

The situation they just handled appears to have been more dangerous than the last one, considering this time a few of the guys actually did sustain gunshot wounds. They’re immediately sent to the ER, and you’re left to check the other officers.

SWAT Guy at first glance looks alright, but you notice that he winces when you ask him to take a seat. He’s not bleeding, to your relief, but there’s no doubt he’s in pain. You have him remove his gear when he admits that he’s suffered a pretty nasty fall, and while your only goal is to tend to his injuries, you still can’t help yourself from feeling slightly flushed when he removes his black hoodie and shirt so you can examine his bruises.

You really try not to stare at his scarred six-pack and tattooed biceps.

..

It’s truly unfair that the only time an extremely gorgeous man strips in front of you is when he needs you to clean and bandage his wounds, but you would honestly consider these frequent exchanges with SWAT Guy to be one of the most intimate relationships in your life right now.

At this point, you’ve gotten used to working with Michigan’s finest SWAT unit. Either Detroit truly is in shambles or the DPD just sends these guys out for every little thing because there’s no way it’s normal how often you’re called to deal with them.

“If I didn’t know any better, I’d say you guys are trying to get hurt,” you tell SWAT Guy one day. Considering he’s barely started speaking more than three words to you at a time, you never thought you’d live to see him actually laugh at one of your jokes but he suddenly does and the first thing you think is that it’s beautiful and you’d love to hear more of it.

“Shouldn’t this be good for you?” SWAT Guy replies with a small smirk, and you subconsciously swallow at the sight. “This means you’ll always have a job.”

“That’s true,” you agree with a devilish grin of your own, handing him an icepack for his many bruises. “I get paid per bone that you break.”

“I haven’t broken any bones.”

“Well, that’s why I keep telling you ‘break a leg’ every time we’re done here, huh?”

SWAT Guy shakes his head, but you swear you see the corners of his lips twitch upwards.

.

“I should really start handing out stamp cards,” you say jokingly as you apply antiseptic to the large cut on the SWAT captain’s forehead. You’ve already finished patching up the rest of the squad because the man always insists on being the last one checked out, regardless of the injuries he’s sustained. It’s pretty stupid, and on more than one occasion you’ve ignored his request, but still, you can’t help but admire his stubborn dedication.

In response to your teasing, Captain Allen—whose name you only discovered a few days ago—rolls his eyes, but he’s too slow to hide the smile that always seems to grace his lips during your brief exchanges. You grin and finish bandaging the wound, and you’re too focused on the task at hand to notice that Allen’s eyes never leave your face.

“All better!” you chirp, patting the freshly-dressed wound lightly. 

“That was quick.”

“Thanks to you guys, I’ve gotten really good at dressing cuts. I can do it with my eyes closed.”

Allen fake-scowls and you’re furious how someone can look so effortlessly attractive. “You better fucking not.”

“What, don’t you trust me? After everything we’ve been through?” you gasp, holding a hand over your heart, which hammering in your chest at a thousand beats per minute right now. You can’t help it; not with Captain Allen sitting in front of you looking so calm and edible. He’s unbelievably charismatic and you’re a little annoyed that it took him so long to open up because he’s actually quite hilarious and you can’t get enough of him.

His job worries the shit out of you and of course you’d never wish for him to have to be sent out just so you can see him, but you definitely get a thrill every time you’re told to aid the SWAT team.

At your questions, Allen raises an eyebrow, and fuck if that isn’t the hottest thing you’ve ever seen a man do. “What makes you think I don’t trust you?”

“I can see the doubt in your eyes, Captain,” you sniff dramatically, pretending to wipe a tear from your eye. Allen chuckles at your antics once again before a more serious expression crosses his face.

You take note of this and frown. “What’s wrong?”

He suddenly hops to his feet, eyes wandering over to the SWAT vans where the rest of his team is mulling about.

His answer is unexpectedly sharp. “Nothing. Thanks again for your help.”

So much for trust, you think disappointedly as he stalks off.

..

Seeing Captain Allen evokes a combination of giddiness and fear in you that’s morally questionable for someone in your profession but regardless, you can’t help but look forward to treating him. Sometimes you find yourself feeling disappointed when you’re sent on a regular call, which is pretty fucked up because you’re definitely not supposed to have preferences as an EMT, but it’s gotten really hard to control yourself around a certain SWAT member.

Besides being unforgivingly handsome, he’s an exceptional leader and more level-headed than you can ever hope to be. He’s stoic and fearless to a fault, sure, but then he smiles and it knocks the wind out of you.

Uhm...you definitely don’t have a crush on him, though. That would be entirely unprofessional.

No, no. You just admire the man.

Really.

“Yesterday a kid called us because he didn’t want to go to school,” you tell Allen, who hasn’t sustained any injuries but decided to come talk to you anyway. You try not to read into that but you’ll be lying if you say you’re not extremely giddy right now. “We spent like, thirty minutes trying to figure out whether or not we actually had to take him anywhere.”

Captain Allen snorts, crossing his arms as he leans against the ambulance doors next to you. “You’ve got to be kidding me.”

“Nope. His mom eventually figured it out and I’m pretty sure he’s dead by now.”

“You should be fired for leaving someone to die then.”

“But then who’ll be there to patch up the local SWAT team?” you ask playfully, glancing up at the captain with a mischievous glint in your eye. The man is obviously trying not to smile but he almost gives in when he sees you waggling your eyebrows at him.

“I’m sure we’ll find a replacement.”

“Yeah, right. Who else is willing to come out every other day just to take care of your asses?”

Allen is full-on grinning now. You suddenly feel the urge to wipe it off his face with your lips. “Are you getting tired of us?”

Never, you think right away, but fuck if you’ll actually admit it. “Maybe a little. You take up all my free time, you know.”

“I apologize you have to do your job,” Captain Allen replies sarcastically and you laugh at that.

“I don’t mind if it’s you,” you reply without really thinking, and your eyes widen when you realize what you’ve said. Allen looks a little surprised but it’s nothing compared to how horrified you are right now by your own careless words. You chuckle nervously, pushing yourself upright and taking a few steps away from the captain. “Uh, because I wouldn’t want the SWAT team succumbing to their injuries or anything. Yeah. Imagine how fucked we’d be without you guys around, you know? Anyway, I have to go now. People be dying.”

It takes Captain Allen a good few seconds to process the complete bullshit that’s just spewed from your lips before he shrugs and steps away from the ambulance. He follows you quietly as you trudge over to the driver’s side of the vehicle, and you’re too busy mentally kicking yourself to notice him until he opens the door for you.

You blink. “Oh. Uhm, thank you.”

Allen nods distractedly. He waits for you to climb inside the cab and gently shuts your door. Starting the engine, you offer him a brief, sheepish smile. 

Before you can drive away, he suddenly taps on your window and you jump.

Feeling your cheeks heat up, you lower the window, hands shaking a little in anticipation—for what, you don’t exactly know. Still, you did sort of accidentally admit to Allen that you’re interested in him, so there’s no way he’s stopping you just to say bye, right? Maybe he wants you to clarify? Does it mean he actually feels the same—?

“Hey, I think you’re forgetting someone,” Allen’s voice cuts into your thoughts, and when you only continue to gape at him, he simply points to the distance where the rest of his team is, along with…

Fuck.

You almost left your partner.

“I was just warming the car,” you spit back as Allen shamelessly laughs at your mortified expression. You flush and sink backwards into your seat, covering your warm face with your hands in an attempt to block the world out.

You’ve never felt so fucking embarrassed in your life, and the fact that Captain Allen is the one to witness everything makes you want to crawl into a hole and fucking die.

.

Your stomach drops when you hop out of the ambulance and see at least six different police cruisers and two SWAT vans haphazardly parked outside a decrepit warehouse. There’s already another ambulance on scene and you mentally curse the Detroit traffic for slowing you down.

“I heard they’ve already evacuated half the team,” you hear your partner say from beside you, and for a second your world halts as you imagine a certain grumpy someone lying cold and lifeless somewhere in that warehouse. The thought shakes you to the core and you’re momentarily floored by how terrified you are for someone you barely know.

“Do you know who’s still in there?” you ask shakily, your ears ringing as you stare at the entrance of the warehouse for any sign of movement—any indication that SWAT Guy is alive and well.

“I know as much as you.”

The sound of several gunshots in the distance silences your reply and for a split second, everything stills. The world only gets much louder and livelier when you notice that SWAT members are now entering the premises.

“Why are they going in?” you ask nobody in particular, and as much as you want to run into the warehouse to see for yourself, you know better than to be that careless. Out of the corner of your eye, you see your partner shrug.

Truthfully, you don’t realize how invested you are in Captain Allen until you finally see a group of men walking out of the warehouse doors. You suddenly find yourself charging into the sea of commotion, weaving between officers to get close enough to the SWAT team because you have to know—

And there he is.

He looks agitated, if anything, running a hand through his slicked-back hair as he barks orders over his earpiece. You’re rooted to the spot, staring at him, transfixed, as though you’ve never seen him before, and you barely notice that he’s caught sight of you and is now headed in your direction.

Captain Allen begins to say a quick greeting when he reaches you, but he doesn’t even get a word in before you’re grabbing him by the front of his gear and tugging him down for a reckless, impulsive kiss.

He makes a noise of surprise and you feel him grip your shoulders, but instead of pushing you away like you expect, his hands only slip downwards to your waist and he pulls you so close you can feel every bump on the bulky vest that always seems to be attached to him. You sigh into his lips and he smiles at your contentment.

When you finally part, Captain Allen smirks at you. “Is that what I get for filling my stamp card?”

“Shut up,” you mutter, silencing his laughter with yet another kiss, hopefully just one of many more to come.

[marvsreflections]

On Guatemala's place in global history

There are few things you might take as intrinsically unchangeable on this world, one of those is human stupidity and the other one can be “change” or a least the concept related to such word.

I’m from a little country named Guatemala a piece of land south to Mexico, about 2 hours flight from Texas, this little country has been for most of its history nothing but a pseudo-democracy resembling more a modern feudal state than a republic, however the last century big changes (there’s the word again!) have transformed Guatemala into what some people called “a young democracy”.

Well as with manny ideas it is imperative to understand the social and historical context that gave birth to such labels, so in order to understand Guatemala and more importantly, why we matter more than ever before, we have dive into Guatemala’s history and it's now very close and bound relationship with the United States of America.

A bit of global history...

It all begins back in 1944, second war world has just finished, Hitler has been defeated and Europe is looking ahead to a feature of prosperity and unity, up until now the USA has been in the same side with Russia, however the end of the war leaves the world with two massive super powers.

The USA on the west with capitalism as the economic model, judeo-christian beliefs as moral templates and their own version of Greek political machinery called republic as its structure of power. The USSR on the east with communism, a one-party nation and socialism wrapping it all up, ideas that people somehow believe were totally opposite to western values.

This landscape of power lead to a “cold war” named like that because it wasn’t a war of direct military conflicts between the USSR and the USA but instead it was a war based on ideology, with both side creating propaganda to make their people believe those who did not live like them were the enemy and needed to be eradicated before they eradicate you!

This idea was aggravated by the fact that now both nations have the destruction power of the nuclear bomb, a new weapon of mass destruction capable of erasing human life from this earth, as you might expect the stakes were high, they were threats made, missile placed in close location to the enemy like Cuba or Ukraine, none of the parties was willing to lose and used every allie they could get to gain power and push the enemy further away from their motherland.

On this side of the globe, the USA declared war against communism and started programs of all kind to make sure there were no communist influence inside the motherland or anywhere close to it, so, guess where Guatemala landed on that plan? Yep, we weren’t really there, I mean, Guatemala was a bit more than a farm for the USA you might even say we were not consider humans back then, it is inevitable to say that we were just another “banana nation” for the white upper class of the big super countries.

About Guatemala on the 1940’s

Guatemala on the the 20th century was a nation owned by a big company that took the place of the Spanish crown, our communications system, train roads and the majority of the land, belong to the United Fruit Company (UFCO), they bought land at a really low price so they didn’t have to pay much taxes, they did not pay workers for the labor instead the “rent” a pieces of land as part of a “deal” where they could use the land to survive by also “paying” a part to the company, however the land was still under UFCO’s possession.

The precarious work situations under companies like the UFCO are depicted on the famous novel 1000 years of solitude by Colombian writer Gabriel García Márquez, in a very dramatic and extreme representation, in the book after a strike by the workers demanding better conditions, the government reacts by inviting over 3000 of them to a meeting with the leadership to resolve their difference, however it was a tramp! The workers found themselves surrounded by machine guns and get methodically killed, the bodies were then thrown on a train and dropped off in the sea, after the event the government keeps exterminating any surviving union leader and denying the reports of the massacre.

Well, conditions were not that much better in Guatemala and I’m sorry to say that as in many good books, usually fiction is nothing by a reflection of reality, after years of being used for free labor, Guatemalans decided they needed a change they cannot longer live in a land that is not theirs, so in 1944 after numerous public demonstration and the killing of the teacher María Chinchilla in a protest, over 100,000 people gather to protest and stop the country for a week until the then president Jorge Ubico resigned en July 1, 1944, this initiated what some people called the first real “democratic period” in Guatemala, this new set of changes and reforms landed to a fresh-type president in 1951, it was a democratically elected president from the highlands of the country Jacobo Arbenz Guzmán .

About the CIA and UFCO

The thing with power is that is a human invention, so is fair to say that power is limited to what humans believe to be more important, as a mention before back in 40’s and 50’s we were not seen as humans by the USA or any of the companies coming from that side of the border, therefore we were not intitle of having an opinion nor to have a decent life or to be part of a country, we were only workers, just a step above from a horse or any other beast.

When a president of Guatemala decides that we can’t be a country if we don’t have land or infrastructure of our own, it is only inevitable he will have to make some changes that will not vibe with UFCO or some of its allies, and that is exactly what happened. Jacobo Arbenz Guzmán started using government power to buy the land from the UFCO and give it to the poor people that were actually leaving on it and using it, buying land from the UFCO at the same low prices the claimed the bought it, he decided that train roads should be of public use and created a plan that aim to put Guatemala on the track to development.

The UFCO did not like what was happening in the country, their lands were being taken, they now have to come out with payment for their workers and a series of restriction help create the environment for workers unions and better working conditions that were impacting profits, this went on for about 3 years and the UFCO was doing everything they could to create propaganda and manipulate Guatemalans and Americas in order to take Arbenz from power.

One thing we need to understand is the people that were in Guatemala at that time and how their connection made a coup possible, one of the lawyers working for the UFCO was John Foster Dulles a republican from Washington D.C. that would eventually become the United States Secretary of State, Dulles’s brother Allen was the director of the CIA, in order to stop the “attacks” against the company, the Dulls brother worked together to convicend the President of the United States that Guatemala was a possible location for a soviet embassy in the western hemisphere. To achieve their goal they created a PR campaign to create fear among politician and the American people.

A CIA operation was created under the code name PBSUCCESS , the goal was to take way  Guatemala’s president from power and to make sure general Carlos Castillo Armas was in the presidency so the UFCO would be able to continue business as usual, the operation was a success, however as with many thing in history “success” not necessarily means “the beginning of a peaceful and great period”, so now we need to dive a bit deeper on “What happen when you interfere with a democratic elected government and place a puppet president instead?” type of question..

About the civil-war

Castillo Armas and most of the head of states that came after him were nothing but puppets to the UFCO and the United States, they did not put Guatemalans interest and needs on the agendas, instead they were working for the top sphere of the country therefore leading to a very unhappy population that were being oppressed by their own army and their own government, this is something we need to discuss, because again it shows how bound the United States’s and Guatemala’s faith are.

Because of the fact the the USA put the general in charge people did not like him, so we did not really pay for the army nor we wanted our taxes to go to a dictator, so the USA feeling bad or wanting to keep control of the country founded Guatemala’s army and let the generals do whatever they please, this lead to an army that was not found by taxes, nor it had to respond to the people of Guatemala, the army was the tool dictators have to keep people down, either disappearing anyone who did not agree with the government or rightout killing them.

As you might expect once you start killing and disappearing people, they will start fighting back, so the paramilitary forces were born and a 36 year war started, a conflict that took some 70,000 lives and countless more were disappeared, the army sustained with US money were going to villages and killing every men, raping women, some stories from my own family even mention babies being smashed against rocks, there was some pretty bad human right violations going on and you can’t deny how Guatemala and US government officials were involved in all of this.

About the USA and its gang problems in all of this...

Well, once you take a country to its knees is just a matter of time before people that are unable or don’t want to fight get themselves out, just as we are seeing happening today with Syrians refugees, there were a lot of Guatemala and Central America refugees that ended up in the US, they created communities in places like LA and New York, however racism and violence towards latino communities made them organize to protect themselves, back in the 1980’s as their countries of origin were consumed by civil war (some of the initiated by the USA itself) they created some of the first latino gangs in the US, MS-13 and Mara Salvatrucha.

So, you might ask, what did the US did after creating a problem in Guatemala that ended up as gangs members in their backyard? Well they did what the US had been doing since its first contact with Guatemala, they ship out whatever bad shit they could to us, however we have to give them some credit, they did not think of that right away, it actually started back in the 1990’s so it is fair to say that the US had to deal with gangs for about a decade before deciding that it would be easier to ship them back to where they came from.

Even though I would not have any problem with a country kicking illegal immigrants that committed a felony to their original country, it is imperative to say that the US did not stop to think how can this change (the word again!) Guatemala and how it will affect the USA? Because if they would’ve stopped to think on that for a moment, there is a chance the would’ve realized they were making the same mistake all over again, they were creating a problem in Guatemala hopping it won't reach back to them, however we all know that is not how life works.

By 1996 “peace” was signed in Guatemala, there was even a speech by then president of the USA - Bill Clinton, promessing the Guatemalan people that human right will not be violated again and that the horrible civil-war we went through should never be repeated and the USA will not commit to the same wrong practices they did in the past, It was all good a least on a diplomatic level, however the US was on its high of deportation of gang members to our country.

There is this question I feel is worth asking at this moment… What would happen if you send a bouch of highly educated criminals (highly educated in contrast to the rest of Guatemala). that used to leave in big cities, they were resourceful, smart and on top of that we had never had to deal with a gang member or “marero” before?, in other words, the USA send criminals to a country with not infrastructure of any kind to contain them, nor it had a police force capable of facing this gang members.

Guatemala came out of the 36 years of civil war just to end up with a war with gangs that still last until today, something about 30 years dealing with a problem created by Guatemala and Central American refugees in the streets of LA, refugees that were there because a national army founded with US money were killing their families back home, this “war on gangs” lead Guatemala to a level of violence that reminded us of the war all over again, it stop the few progress we wanted to have, instead our youth was being recruited or killed by MS-13 and Mara Salvatrucha, yet again people were forced to leave the country and find land were they would not be killed or robbed or extorted.

So, yep….We are talking about another exodus to the USA!

About “Mojados” or illegal immigrants to the USA after the 1990’s

There something we have to admit about the 1990’s - today problem with gangs, it is not all fault of the USA as is never “just on person’s” fault, when you put a country in a situation like we are, people don’t usually get access to education, information, food and health care, you know, the things that once cover might lead somebody to care about what their politicians are doing or where to money goes, but as Marx used to say, seas the means of production and you will have control of the system!.. Or something like that, because, that is what the top businessman and wealthy families of the country did, they took control over the country and made money out of the always unstable status of our nation.

So by the 1990’s after 30 years of military regimes, guatemala democracy was finally flourishing, like a baby that gets into age, it started to be aware of itself and every more and more people started to understand how this democracy thing is supposed to work ( a least more people in the capital city) and what can we do to make sure it is use in benefit of the people, however our leaders still coming from the upper class, mostly spanish descendant with old money and with little interest or connection with the population of their own country., they were used to do whatever they want with  our country, they took advantage of our national institutions to control the country and steer it on the direction they saw better for them and their business, our all times lover impunity was still with us and as time passes she would reveal itself more and more clearly.

So after the war we found ourselves in a country with MS-13 and Mara Salvatrucha, with no police, with a government handle by the rich class that only cares about their business and how they can get out of Guatemala, a government dedicated to use the country to make themself richer, even if that means stealing money from heath, education and security programs that were supposed to be in place to take our country to a better future after the war ended.

We did not have (and would argue we still not have) a national identity, Mayan people made up to 65% of the population however they were being discriminated, no jobs, no services and a country that up until today is very divided. On the other had the USA in a effort to stop gangs and immigration say something like  “We’re sorry for taking your president out of power and starting a civil war” but now we will reinforced our borders, American visas would be expensive and rare for you and we start ICE to send all illegal Guatemalans in the USA back as we have been doing with gang members.

So as you might know by now this also had and effect that wasn’t what they expected. Instead of Guatemalans saying, “well I guess we can’t get to the USA anymore and here comes Juan from San Diego after he was deported”, people from all over the country started to hire human traffickers, people that knew how to move between borders and that could charge up to 5000 USD for trip, this “coyotes” as they called them are part of a organized net of crime that also includes drug traffickers, illegal gun sales, force prostitution and others, however when you come from a country where the government does care about you and the gangs want to kill you, dealing with a coyote might be the best of your options.

[marvintexts]

On Guatemala's place in global history

There are few things you might take as intrinsically unchangeable on this world, one of those is human stupidity and the other one can be “change” or a least the concept related to such word.

I’m from a little country named Guatemala a piece of land south to Mexico, about 2 hours flight from Texas, this little country has been for most of its history nothing but a pseudo-democracy resembling more a modern feudal state than a republic, however the last century big changes (there’s the word again!) have transformed Guatemala into what some people called “a young democracy”.

Well as with manny ideas it is imperative to understand the social and historical context that gave birth to such labels, so in order to understand Guatemala and more importantly, why we matter more than ever before, we have dive into Guatemala’s history and it's now very close and bound relationship with the United States of America.

A bit of global history...

It all begins back in 1944, second war world has just finished, Hitler has been defeated and Europe is looking ahead to a feature of prosperity and unity, up until now the USA has been in the same side with Russia, however the end of the war leaves the world with two massive super powers.

The USA on the west with capitalism as the economic model, judeo-christian beliefs as moral templates and their own version of Greek political machinery called republic as its structure of power. The USSR on the east with communism, a one-party nation and socialism wrapping it all up, ideas that people somehow believe were totally opposite to western values.

This landscape of power lead to a “cold war” named like that because it wasn’t a war of direct military conflicts between the USSR and the USA but instead it was a war based on ideology, with both side creating propaganda to make their people believe those who did not live like them were the enemy and needed to be eradicated before they eradicate you!

This idea was aggravated by the fact that now both nations have the destruction power of the nuclear bomb, a new weapon of mass destruction capable of erasing human life from this earth, as you might expect the stakes were high, they were threats made, missile placed in close location to the enemy like Cuba or Ukraine, none of the parties was willing to lose and used every allie they could get to gain power and push the enemy further away from their motherland.

On this side of the globe, the USA declared war against communism and started programs of all kind to make sure there were no communist influence inside the motherland or anywhere close to it, so, guess where Guatemala landed on that plan? Yep, we weren’t really there, I mean, Guatemala was a bit more than a farm for the USA you might even say we were not consider humans back then, it is inevitable to say that we were just another “banana nation” for the white upper class of the big super countries.

About Guatemala on the 1940’s

Guatemala on the the 20th century was a nation owned by a big company that took the place of the Spanish crown, our communications system, train roads and the majority of the land, belong to the United Fruit Company (UFCO), they bought land at a really low price so they didn’t have to pay much taxes, they did not pay workers for the labor instead the “rent” a pieces of land as part of a “deal” where they could use the land to survive by also “paying” a part to the company, however the land was still under UFCO’s possession.

The precarious work situations under companies like the UFCO are depicted on the famous novel 1000 years of solitude by Colombian writer Gabriel García Márquez, in a very dramatic and extreme representation, in the book after a strike by the workers demanding better conditions, the government reacts by inviting over 3000 of them to a meeting with the leadership to resolve their difference, however it was a tramp! The workers found themselves surrounded by machine guns and get methodically killed, the bodies were then thrown on a train and dropped off in the sea, after the event the government keeps exterminating any surviving union leader and denying the reports of the massacre.

Well, conditions were not that much better in Guatemala and I’m sorry to say that as in many good books, usually fiction is nothing by a reflection of reality, after years of being used for free labor, Guatemalans decided they needed a change they cannot longer live in a land that is not theirs, so in 1944 after numerous public demonstration and the killing of the teacher María Chinchilla in a protest, over 100,000 people gather to protest and stop the country for a week until the then president Jorge Ubico resigned en July 1, 1944, this initiated what some people called the first real “democratic period” in Guatemala, this new set of changes and reforms landed to a fresh-type president in 1951, it was a democratically elected president from the highlands of the country Jacobo Arbenz Guzmán .

About the CIA and UFCO

The thing with power is that is a human invention, so is fair to say that power is limited to what humans believe to be more important, as a mention before back in 40’s and 50’s we were not seen as humans by the USA or any of the companies coming from that side of the border, therefore we were not intitle of having an opinion nor to have a decent life or to be part of a country, we were only workers, just a step above from a horse or any other beast.

When a president of Guatemala decides that we can’t be a country if we don’t have land or infrastructure of our own, it is only inevitable he will have to make some changes that will not vibe with UFCO or some of its allies, and that is exactly what happened. Jacobo Arbenz Guzmán started using government power to buy the land from the UFCO and give it to the poor people that were actually leaving on it and using it, buying land from the UFCO at the same low prices the claimed the bought it, he decided that train roads should be of public use and created a plan that aim to put Guatemala on the track to development.

The UFCO did not like what was happening in the country, their lands were being taken, they now have to come out with payment for their workers and a series of restriction help create the environment for workers unions and better working conditions that were impacting profits, this went on for about 3 years and the UFCO was doing everything they could to create propaganda and manipulate Guatemalans and Americas in order to take Arbenz from power.

One thing we need to understand is the people that were in Guatemala at that time and how their connection made a coup possible, one of the lawyers working for the UFCO was John Foster Dulles a republican from Washington D.C. that would eventually become the United States Secretary of State, Dulles’s brother Allen was the director of the CIA, in order to stop the “attacks” against the company, the Dulls brother worked together to convicend the President of the United States that Guatemala was a possible location for a soviet embassy in the western hemisphere. To achieve their goal they created a PR campaign to create fear among politician and the American people.

A CIA operation was created under the code name PBSUCCESS , the goal was to take way  Guatemala’s president from power and to make sure general Carlos Castillo Armas was in the presidency so the UFCO would be able to continue business as usual, the operation was a success, however as with many thing in history “success” not necessarily means “the beginning of a peaceful and great period”, so now we need to dive a bit deeper on “What happen when you interfere with a democratic elected government and place a puppet president instead?” type of question..

About the civil-war

Castillo Armas and most of the head of states that came after him were nothing but puppets to the UFCO and the United States, they did not put Guatemalans interest and needs on the agendas, instead they were working for the top sphere of the country therefore leading to a very unhappy population that were being oppressed by their own army and their own government, this is something we need to discuss, because again it shows how bound the United States’s and Guatemala’s faith are.

Because of the fact the the USA put the general in charge people did not like him, so we did not really pay for the army nor we wanted our taxes to go to a dictator, so the USA feeling bad or wanting to keep control of the country founded Guatemala’s army and let the generals do whatever they please, this lead to an army that was not found by taxes, nor it had to respond to the people of Guatemala, the army was the tool dictators have to keep people down, either disappearing anyone who did not agree with the government or rightout killing them.

As you might expect once you start killing and disappearing people, they will start fighting back, so the paramilitary forces were born and a 36 year war started, a conflict that took some 70,000 lives and countless more were disappeared, the army sustained with US money were going to villages and killing every men, raping women, some stories from my own family even mention babies being smashed against rocks, there was some pretty bad human right violations going on and you can’t deny how Guatemala and US government officials were involved in all of this.

About the USA and its gang problems in all of this...

Well, once you take a country to its knees is just a matter of time before people that are unable or don’t want to fight get themselves out, just as we are seeing happening today with Syrians refugees, there were a lot of Guatemala and Central America refugees that ended up in the US, they created communities in places like LA and New York, however racism and violence towards latino communities made them organize to protect themselves, back in the 1980’s as their countries of origin were consumed by civil war (some of the initiated by the USA itself) they created some of the first latino gangs in the US, MS-13 and Mara Salvatrucha.

So, you might ask, what did the US did after creating a problem in Guatemala that ended up as gangs members in their backyard? Well they did what the US had been doing since its first contact with Guatemala, they ship out whatever bad shit they could to us, however we have to give them some credit, they did not think of that right away, it actually started back in the 1990’s so it is fair to say that the US had to deal with gangs for about a decade before deciding that it would be easier to ship them back to where they came from.

Even though I would not have any problem with a country kicking illegal immigrants that committed a felony to their original country, it is imperative to say that the US did not stop to think how can this change (the word again!) Guatemala and how it will affect the USA? Because if they would’ve stopped to think on that for a moment, there is a chance the would’ve realized they were making the same mistake all over again, they were creating a problem in Guatemala hopping it won't reach back to them, however we all know that is not how life works.

By 1996 “peace” was signed in Guatemala, there was even a speech by then president of the USA - Bill Clinton, promessing the Guatemalan people that human right will not be violated again and that the horrible civil-war we went through should never be repeated and the USA will not commit to the same wrong practices they did in the past, It was all good a least on a diplomatic level, however the US was on its high of deportation of gang members to our country.

There is this question I feel is worth asking at this moment… What would happen if you send a bouch of highly educated criminals (highly educated in contrast to the rest of Guatemala). that used to leave in big cities, they were resourceful, smart and on top of that we had never had to deal with a gang member or “marero” before?, in other words, the USA send criminals to a country with not infrastructure of any kind to contain them, nor it had a police force capable of facing this gang members.

Guatemala came out of the 36 years of civil war just to end up with a war with gangs that still last until today, something about 30 years dealing with a problem created by Guatemala and Central American refugees in the streets of LA, refugees that were there because a national army founded with US money were killing their families back home, this “war on gangs” lead Guatemala to a level of violence that reminded us of the war all over again, it stop the few progress we wanted to have, instead our youth was being recruited or killed by MS-13 and Mara Salvatrucha, yet again people were forced to leave the country and find land were they would not be killed or robbed or extorted.

So, yep….We are talking about another exodus to the USA!

About “Mojados” or illegal immigrants to the USA after the 1990’s

There something we have to admit about the 1990’s - today problem with gangs, it is not all fault of the USA as is never “just on person’s” fault, when you put a country in a situation like we are, people don’t usually get access to education, information, food and health care, you know, the things that once cover might lead somebody to care about what their politicians are doing or where to money goes, but as Marx used to say, seas the means of production and you will have control of the system!.. Or something like that, because, that is what the top businessman and wealthy families of the country did, they took control over the country and made money out of the always unstable status of our nation.

So by the 1990’s after 30 years of military regimes, guatemala democracy was finally flourishing, like a baby that gets into age, it started to be aware of itself and every more and more people started to understand how this democracy thing is supposed to work ( a least more people in the capital city) and what can we do to make sure it is use in benefit of the people, however our leaders still coming from the upper class, mostly spanish descendant with old money and with little interest or connection with the population of their own country., they were used to do whatever they want with  our country, they took advantage of our national institutions to control the country and steer it on the direction they saw better for them and their business, our all times lover impunity was still with us and as time passes she would reveal itself more and more clearly.

So after the war we found ourselves in a country with MS-13 and Mara Salvatrucha, with no police, with a government handle by the rich class that only cares about their business and how they can get out of Guatemala, a government dedicated to use the country to make themself richer, even if that means stealing money from heath, education and security programs that were supposed to be in place to take our country to a better future after the war ended.

We did not have (and would argue we still not have) a national identity, Mayan people made up to 65% of the population however they were being discriminated, no jobs, no services and a country that up until today is very divided. On the other had the USA in a effort to stop gangs and immigration say something like  “We’re sorry for taking your president out of power and starting a civil war” but now we will reinforced our borders, American visas would be expensive and rare for you and we start ICE to send all illegal Guatemalans in the USA back as we have been doing with gang members.

So as you might know by now this also had and effect that wasn’t what they expected. Instead of Guatemalans saying, “well I guess we can’t get to the USA anymore”, people from all over the country started to hire human traffickers, people that knew how to move between borders and that could charge up to 5000 USD for trip, this “coyotes” as they called them are part of a organized net of crime that also includes drug traffickers, illegal gun sales, force prostitution and others, however when you come from a country where the government does not care about you and the gangs want to kill you, dealing with a coyote might be the best of your options.

[tsgnashvilletennessee]

American Woman

Women-owned businesses in the United States are growing at a rate quicker than any other demographic; generating more revenue, hiring more employees, and contributing more to our national economy.  Locally, Nashville has one of the highest percentage of female-owned businesses, so it’s no surprise that our Scout Guide Nashville is filled with these leading women, with a wide range of backgrounds and passions.

What better way to cheers the red, white, and blue, than to celebrate the American dream!  We caught up with a few of the female business owners included in our guide to learn more of their story, what it’s like to run a Nashville small business, and what it means to live the American dream; each an inspiring American Woman.

Photo by Leslee Mitchell.

Kimberly Lewis, owner of Emerson Grace

TSG Nashville: There is nothing more American than creating your own business.  As a female entrepreneur, what was it that inspired you to take that first leap in starting your own business?

Lewis: The opportunity to use my years of experience in the fashion retail and wholesale arena for my own freedom and flexibility.

TSG Nashville: During your entrepreneurial journey was there anyone who helped you along the way, or a particular source of inspiration?

Lewis: My husband, Jim.  He has always pushed me to follow my passion.  He has a great business background and mindset, so together we are fortunate to have a great balance that shines through with the store.

TSG Nashville: What does a typical work day look like for you?

Lewis: I am fortunate to have a great team working in the store.  That allows me freedom and flexibility.  I now spend most of my time on the buying, merchandising, and big picture goals for Emerson Grace.

TSG Nashville: As young girls, we have so many ideas of what we dream of doing when we grow up.  When you were younger, what did you want to be?  Did you ever imagine you’d be where you are today?

Lewis: Ironically, I thought I was going to be an interior designer!  Once I started working in the retail world, I truly enjoyed it, and I was really good at it...and that’s when I started to focus on making it my career!

TSG Nashville: Success is measured in so many ways.  For you, what defines success?

Lewis: It’s personal and professional.  Building the business to a place that affords me certain luxuries, is definitely a highlight.  Albeit “just clothes,” women want to look and feel good.  Our consistent repeat clientele and words of encouragement and pride from them, reinforce that we’re on the right path.  Having a great team allows me the freedom and flexibility to do my job well, travel, and spend time with my family.

TSG Nashville: Is there a motto you live by that also reflects how you like your business to run?

Lewis: #stayfocused.  Know the goal and keep striving for it.  Do good work, it makes all the difference!

TSG Nashville: What does being an American business owner in Nashville mean to you?

Lewis: It means I am a part of a community of talented individuals in this thriving city, that share a common interest or goal.  I enjoy working with, socializing with, and seeing other female entrepreneurs in my field, or other fields, and having mutual respect and support for the journey that we have all decided to embark upon.

For more information on Emerson Grace, visit www.emersongracenashville.com

Photo by Leslee Mitchell.

Kristen Winston, owner of Kristen Winston Catering

TSG Nashville: There is nothing more American than creating your own business.  As a female entrepreneur, what was it that inspired you to take that first leap in starting your own business?

Winston: I have always had a passion for cooking and entertaining.  The suggestion of a friend helped me realize that I could turn my hobby into a profession.

TSG Nashville: During your entrepreneurial journey was there anyone who helped you along the way, or a particular source of inspiration?

Winston: My husband, John, who gave me the support and encouragement to start the business, and the knowledge and expertise to take Kristen Winston Catering from a home based business to a company.

TSG Nashville: What does a typical work day look like for you?

Winston: I wake up at the crack of dawn in order to have some alone time and a walk before my kids get up, and we head out for school.  Then it is to the office or meetings, and many times, going by an event setup at the end of the day.

TSG Nashville: As young girls, we have so many ideas of what we dream of doing when we grow up.  When you were younger, what did you want to be?  Did you ever imagine you’d be where you are today?

Winston: I wanted to be a nurse.  I took a completely different path midway through college, but I have always had a passion for serving others and foodservice ended up being my calling.

TSG Nashville: Success is measured in so many ways.  For you, what defines success?

Winston: I measure success by client satisfaction.  We strive to make our clients happy by delivering the highest level of professionalism in service, consistently great food, and memorable experiences.  Building lasting relationships means repeat business which is essential for sustainable growth.

TSG Nashville: Is there a motto you live by that also reflects how you like your business to run?

Winston: My dad has Thomas Jefferson’s 10 Rules of Life framed in his study.  Rule #1 is, “Never put off till tomorrow what you can do today.”  I have always remembered that.

TSG Nashville: What does being an American business owner in Nashville mean to you?

Winston: I feel very fortunate to live in a city with such explosive growth and popularity, especially the culinary scene.  We have a very strong community of women entrepreneurs.  

For more information on Kristen Winston Catering, visit www.kristenwinston.com

Photo by Leslee Mitchell.

Elizabeth Allen, owner of e.Allen

TSG Nashville: There is nothing more American than creating your own business.  As a female entrepreneur, what was it that inspired you to take that first leap in starting your own business?

Allen: Women! I started e.Allen when my youngest was only 2 months old.  I noticed how I had more confidence when I would pull together a look for myself, even if that meant simply throwing on a basic staple from my closet and adding some interesting accessories along with it.  I just knew other women HAD to feel the same way, and I had the inner confidence and drive to pursue a vision in a store that wasn’t already out there!

TSG Nashville: During your entrepreneurial journey was there anyone who helped you along the way, or a particular source of inspiration?

Allen: My main source of inspiration is branding.  From the beginning, I always wanted to have brand recognition that stood the test of time.  I wanted e.Allen to be a brand people could relate to and ultimately love!  I have a passion for reading about brands and their creators, be it through magazine articles or other means of communication.  Most recently, a friend of mine has turned me onto podcasts!

TSG Nashville: What does a typical work day look like for you?

Allen: No two days are the same.  We were lucky enough to invest in an e.Allen headquarters office space where a large portion of my time is spent.  I utilize that location to review lines, purchase store product, conduct photoshoots and meetings, review reports, and so much more.  Then, all of the fun is to be had at one of our locations: Nashville, Murfreesboro, or Franklin.

TSG Nashville: As young girls, we have so many ideas of what we dream of doing when we grow up.  When you were younger, what did you want to be?  Did you ever imagine you’d be where you are today?

Allen: I studied Biology and Chemistry in college; therefore, the answer to your question is I never imagined creating my own brand and owning three successful stores.  While doing so certainly isn’t brain surgery, (even though at times it feels that way) it truly is a dream come true.  I am exhausted by the end of each and every single day.  However, the reward I receive in dressing women and helping them realize their original beauty is priceless.

TSG Nashville: Success is measured in so many ways.  For you, what defines success?

Allen: Being able to do what you love for as long as you’d wish, while coincidentally helping others recognize their inner confidence and outer beauty, is what defines success.  I hope to help shape others in a positive light and repay the feeling I have had when others have done the same for me.

TSG Nashville: Is there a motto you live by that also reflects how you like your business to run?

Allen: Treat others the way you want to be treated.  With three stores, I entrust my girls with a superior level of expectation!  e.Allen has my name on the store front, and at the end of the day, our team is a reflection of that, which I certainly do not take lightly.  In order for customers to have a positive experience, and for e.Allen to have continued growing success, my stores must start with an extraordinary high level of respect that permeates from its leader to the individual customer.

TSG Nashville: What does being an American family business owner in Nashville mean to you?

Allen: Though Nashville is an extremely welcoming and supportive community, the growth of our town makes the business world highly competitive.  To achieve and maintain a growing success rate in Nashville, along with our other two locations, is incredibly empowering.  Female leaders are imperative in any area’s business world; therefore, owning and operating a brand for close to 10 years is an incredible personal and professional accomplishment that I hope encourages women to go after their initial dreams...or cultivate a new one!

For more information on e.Allen, visit www.eallenboutique.com

Photo by Leslee Mitchell.

Maggie Tucker, owner of Magpies and The Girls Shoppe

TSG Nashville: There is nothing more American than creating your own business.  As a female entrepreneur, what was it that inspired you to take that first leap in starting your own business?

Tucker: My husband!  My sweet, wonderful, always encouraging husband.  He told me every day for years that I needed to start my own business!  He held me accountable to my potential, and he made me believe I could do something I truly doubted was possible.  He continues to make me think bigger and bolder, and always offers constant support to see my dreams and ideas through fruition.  He is a true partner in every sense of the word.

TSG Nashville: During your entrepreneurial journey was there anyone who helped you along the way, or a particular source of inspiration?

Tucker: I have the most incredible mentor.  Magpies would not have been possible without her guidance and support.  My ultimate goal is to pay it all forward, and champion another woman towards her entrepreneurial dreams the way Beth has done for me.  She is my real life angel.

TSG Nashville: What does a typical work day look like for you?

Tucker: I usually go to SHED fitness at 5 a.m.  I pop into Starbucks, then head home to check emails, do our morning social media posts, reply to messages, make breakfast, and play with my dogs.  I head back to Starbucks for a refill, and onto our baby and kids store to start the day with Catherine, she’s been the head of operations there for several years.  I love getting a daily plan together with her.  I head to our Girls Shoppe for a quick check in and start gathering inventory for transfers to our Franklin store, we send inventory back and forth multiple times a week to maximize sales and serve our customers.  I run out to Franklin and spend the afternoon with Wesley, our Southside manager, the bright and beautiful face behind our newest location!  We plan upcoming events, work on product reorders, and gather up the inventory that needs to go back to Nashville.  I head back, run by the post office to ship online orders, and wrap up the day with our Nashville Girls Shoppe team.  The afternoon is usually our busiest time in that location, and I LOVE to be there for the madness!!

TSG Nashville: As young girls, we have so many ideas of what we dream of doing when we grow up.  When you were younger, what did you want to be?  Did you ever imagine you’d be where you are today?

Tucker: One summer I took the lemonade stand game to a new level and set up shop near construction sites, offering both donuts AND lemonade.  My mom made me reimburse her for supplies, so at an early age I understood the importance of a good margin!  Based on my success, I immediately envisioned being the first female president!  I was extremely confident, and when school started back that Fall, I demanded to play the role of president in my 2nd grade play.  Did I imagine being HERE one day? No!  I imagined I’d be in the White House!  But I think I’ll take my happy neon pink palaces and leave politics up to someone else.

TSG Nashville: Success is measured in so many ways.  For you, what defines success?

Tucker: For me, success in my industry is: paying myself.  So many people I meet with do not pay themselves.  For me this is a huge WIN, and something my mentor encouraged me to do from day one.  Having growth opportunities for employees within our company. Cultivating a work environment I genuinely want to be in and miss when I’m not there.  Keeping our stores relevant in the community and in the industry.  Consistently and authentically using our stores to elevate the lives of others.  Building a brand that has the potential for sale one day.  This all defines success.

TSG Nashville: Is there a motto you live by that also reflects how you like your business to run?

Tucker: Leave it better than you found it.  Be it a person, a place, or a thing.  Make sure it’s always better than before you got there!

TSG Nashville: What does being an American business owner in Nashville mean to you?

Tucker: It’s definitely a blessing that I don’t ever take for granted.  I hold it as a constant reminder and motivation to elevate rising female business owners.  The trail was blazed long before me, and I feel accountable to the previous women to do the same for others.

For more information on Magpies and the Girls Shoppe, visit www.magpiesnashville.com

[alliedmarketresearchs]

corporate training Market Segments, Opportunity, Growth And Forecast By End-Use Industry 2020 -2027

The global corporate training market size was valued at $332,931.1 million in 2019, and is projected to reach $417,212.5 million by 2027, registering a CAGR of 9.4% from 2021 to 2027.

Corporate training, which is also known as workplace learning, is a system of learning activities that are designed to train employees to perform better on the job. Corporate training enhances an employee’s productivity, motivation, performance, and their retention which in turn helps corporates to achieve their business goals. There are two types of training methods that include virtual training method and face-to-face training method.  Additionally, the corporate training market analysis is done based on regions, key players and segments.

The COVID-19 pandemic has shown a negative impact on corporate training market. The COVID-19 has caused approximately 195 million of job losses across the globe. Moreover, Europe and Arab States have seen the worst impact on employment in percentage terms during this pandemic. Thus, this global economic disruption led to budget constraints in corporate sectors, which R&D teams had to deal with along with multiple challenges to showcase the ROI of their training programs.

The global corporate training market segment is categorized into training methods, training programs, industries, and region. By training method, the corporate training market is classified into virtual and face-to-face. By training program, it is divided into technical training, soft skills training, quality training, compliance training and others. By industry, it is segmented into healthcare, banking & finance, manufacturing, IT, retail, hospitality and others. Region wise, the market is analyzed across North America (the U.S., Canada, and Mexico), Europe (Germany, France,  UK, Italy, Spain , Russia and rest of Europe), Asia-Pacific (China, India, Japan, Australia & New Zealand, ASEAN, Korea and rest of Asia-Pacific), and LAMEA (Brazil, Saudi Arabia , South Africa, Turkey and  Rest of LAMEA).

 Get a sample of the report @ https://www.alliedmarketresearch.com/request-sample/6810

On the basis of training method type, the face-to-face segment accounted for the highest corporate training market share in 2019. This training method has several benefits including the opportunity for employees to ask trainers questions which may go unanswered in other modes. Moreover, it allows for relationship building between the employee and the trainer and among the employees learning together. Thus, this in turn has driven the growth of the corporate training market in terms of value sales. However, the virtual segment is expected to witness a significant growth during the corporate training market forecast period.

By training program, the technical skill segment accounted for the highest global corporate training market share in 2019. Owing to the benefits associated with it. It helps in acquiring the skills require to develop, design, implement, support, maintain, or operate technology or any related application, product, or service in different industries. For instance, in retail industry, technical training may include teaching employee how to use computer system to ring up customers. In sales, technical training may require teaching employees how to use the customer relationship management (CRM) system to find new prospects or leads. Thus, this fact has increased the demand for technical training in corporate sectors, which in turn has fueled the growth of corporate training market.  

By industry, the health care segment accounted for the highest market share in the global corporate training market in 2019. According to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, the healthcare industry is expected to increase 15 % from 2019 to 2029, much faster than the average for all occupations, adding about 2.4 million new jobs. This is anticipated mainly due to aging population across the globe, resulting in a greater demand for healthcare services. Thereby, resulting in an increase in the demand for training employees in this sector. This in turn is projected to offer an immense opportunity to corporate training industry in terms of value sales during the forecast period.

Region wise, the market is analyzed across North America, Europe, Asia-Pacific, and LAMEA. North America accounted for the highest market share in 2019. Factors such as the presence of many MNCs and large organizations in the region and the increasing focus of many MNCs and other large organizations on expanding their geographical presence along with good employment rate in this region has significantly influence corporate training market growth in this region. 

The key players operating in the global corporate training market focus on prominent strategies to overcome competition and maintain as well as improve their share worldwide. Some of the major players in the global corporate training industry analyzed in this report include 

Bizlibrary, GP Strategies Corporation, Franklin Covey Co., City & Guilds Group, D2L Corporation, Cornerstone Ondemand Inc., Wilson Learning Worldwide Inc., Allen Communications Learning Services, Simplilearn Solutions and Skill Soft.

Request a discount on the report @ https://www.alliedmarketresearch.com/purchase-enquiry/6810

Key Benefits For Stakeholders

The     report provides a quantitative analysis of the current corporate training     market trends, estimations, and dynamics of the market size from 2021 to     2027 to identify the prevailing opportunities.

Porter’s     five forces analysis highlights the potency of buyers and suppliers to     enable stakeholders to make profit-oriented business decisions and strengthen     their supplier–buyer network.

In-depth     analysis and the corporate training market size and segmentation assists     in determining the prevailing corporate training market opportunities.

Major     countries in each region have been mapped according to their revenue     contribution to the global industry. 

Market     player positioning facilitates benchmarking and provides a clear     understanding of the present position of market players.

The     report includes the analysis of the regional as well as global market, key     players, market segments, application areas, gender areas and growth     strategies.

Key Market Segments

By Training methods

Virtual

Face-to-face

By Training Programs

Technical     training

soft     skills training

quality     training

compliance     training

others

By Industries

Healthcare

Banking     & Finance

manufacturing

IT

Retail

Hospitality

Others

By Region

 U.S.

 Canada

 Mexico

 Germany

 France

 UK

 Italy

 Spain

 Russia

 Rest      of Europe

 China

 Japan

 India

 ASEAN

 Australia      & New Zealand

 Korea

 Rest      of Asia-Pacific

 Brazil

 Saudi      Arabia

 South      Africa

 Turkey 

 Rest      of LAMEA

To know more about the report @ https://www.alliedmarketresearch.com/corporate-training-market-A06445

About Allied Market Research:

Allied Market Research (AMR) is a full-service market research and business-consulting wing of Allied Analytics LLP based in Portland, Oregon. Allied Market Research provides global enterprises as well as medium and small businesses with unmatched quality of "Market Research Reports" and "Business Intelligence Solutions." AMR has a targeted view to provide business insights and consulting services to assist its clients to make strategic business decisions and achieve sustainable growth in their respective market domains. AMR offers its services across 11 industry verticals including Life Sciences, Consumer Goods, Materials & Chemicals, Construction & Manufacturing, Food & Beverages, Energy & Power, Semiconductor & Electronics, Automotive & Transportation, ICT & Media, Aerospace & Defense, and BFSI.

We are in professional corporate relations with various companies and this helps us in digging out market data that helps us generate accurate research data tables and confirms utmost accuracy in our market forecasting. Each and every data presented in the reports published by us is extracted through primary interviews with top officials from leading companies of domain concerned. Our secondary data procurement methodology includes deep online and offline research and discussion with knowledgeable professionals and analysts in the industry.

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[ms-m-astrologer]

Transiting Juno enters Pisces

February 23 - April 28, 2018

At first glance Pisces seems a brilliant sign placement for Juno - unless you’re Ms M, who believes that the Lady Asteroids all rule Virgo; and that therefore, any Lady in Pisces is therefore in its detriment. (Someday I’ll have the time/energy to do a big long post on why I believe what I believe….) Healthy marriages have definite rules and boundaries; we also need to enter into interpersonal commitments with a clear head and open eyes. Pisces can be unrealistic, chaotic, delusional, and gullible, none of which are healthy qualities to bring to a committed relationship.

Additionally, we too often confuse Juno’s function with that of Venus. We may conclude that, since Venus is exalted in Pisces, Juno must also do well in this sign. But as Bloch and George wrote:

Traditional astrology associates Venus with mates or marriage partners. However, mythological Venus did not honor her marriage vows, and had many lovers, gods and mortals alike. She served as the goddess who taught the lessons of sexuality, desirability, taking responsibility for the affections we arouse in others, as well as sorrow, loss, rejection, and impermanence in love. Thus, while Venus represents the principle of attraction, it is the asteroid Juno, Goddess of Marriage, that gives more specific information about our capacity to sustain ongoing relationships.

That said, what can we look for with Juno through Pisces? First off, the (few) aspects she’ll make are three sextiles and one trine, with a conjunction to Neptune at about the halfway point. Pisces can drift, and with so many flowing aspects we’re liable to let our romantic commitments drift, too. Relationships take work (Virgo!), and if/when we’re confronted with something unpleasant we’re apt to cast a fog over it, in lieu of dealing honestly with the problem.

On the positive side, with so many sextiles to Capricorn and Taurus placements, we’re going to have opportunities to manifest our wildest relationship dreams. We’re going to be prudent about it, maybe in a Jane Austen way - i.e., it’s wrong to marry for money, but it’s foolish to marry without it. These sextiles can help us keep our feet firmly on the ground, even as Juno and Pisces inspire us. (If you’re scheduling a wedding, there are two nice weekends in April: the 7th/8th, and the 21st/22nd.)

For people who for, whatever reason, are not in committed relationships (raises hand): Juno has associations with women’s rights, and as protectress of the powerless. Our loftiest Piscean dreams and visions, with the help of the grounded-centered sextiles in particular, can help us build a better world.

Celebrities with Juno in Pisces: Marilyn Monroe, Leonardo DiCaprio, George Clooney, Princess Diana, Uma Thurman, Napoleon I, James Dean, Abraham Lincoln, Nostradamus, William Shakespeare, Nicolaus Copernicus, Henry Cavill, Novak Djokovic, Edgar Allen Poe, Jimmy Fallon, Alanis Morissette, Fidel Castro, Vivien Leigh, Kendrick Lamar, Albert Camus, George Sand, J.R.R. Tolkien, Diana Ross, Rhea Perlman

Monday, March 12, Saturn/Capricorn sextile Juno/Pisces, 8:06

Do you remember that with Saturn in Capricorn, we need to work on self-reliance and self-validation? Here’s an excellent time for that! We’re interested in longer-term relationships, and with this sextile we have the opportunity to learn how much self-respect has to do with successful, lasting partnerships. The Moon joins Saturn on March 11, so this may actually happen a day early.

Planets/Points affected lie between 7:06 and 9:06 of the yin signs Taurus, Cancer, Virgo, Scorpio, Capricorn, and Pisces.

Tuesday, March 27, Neptune/Pisces conjunct Juno/Pisces, 14:46

Pisces is symbolized by two fish, tied together at the tail but swimming in different directions. And, this conjunction can go two ways. We’re dealing with idealistic relationships, obviously. The problems crop up when we’re unrealistic about people: when we refuse to see them through anything except rose-colored glasses. Similarly, if our romantic ideals are so high we’ll never realistically find someone to match them, we’re bound to find disappointment. On the other hand, this can elevate our relationship urges, making us more empathetic and compassionate.

Planets/Points affected lie between 13:46 and 15:46 of all signs.

Monday, April 9, Pluto/Capricorn sextile Juno/Pisces, 21:15; Tuesday, April 10, Jupiter Rx/Scorpio trine Juno/Pisces, 21:38

If only Meghan and Harry had consulted me! This double sextile is just screaming “royal wedding,” with Pluto (power) assisting between the royal Olympian couple. Oh, well. We’re going to be similarly disposed, if this is messing around in our charts. Social justice advocates will also benefit from this pattern, as it amps up political power. On Sunday the 8th, the Moon joins in the fun, so (again) we may actually “get” this a bit early.

Planets/Points affected lie between 20:15 and 22:38 of the yin signs Taurus, Cancer, Virgo, Scorpio, Capricorn, and Pisces.

Sunday, April 22, Venus/Taurus sextile Juno/Pisces, 27:09

And this also features a day-early Moon, in Cancer this time; it turns the simple sextile into another double-sextile. The feminine energy is strong! It’s all very nice for a traditional wedding, just like Mom’s, but I’m more intrigued by the fact that April 22 is Earth Day. Juno has associations with climate and the weather, did you know? If you don’t have a steady date, get out there and do something beneficial for Mother Nature. (Maybe in the process you’ll find a date, hmmm?)

Planets/Points affected lie between 26:09 and 28:09 of the yin signs Taurus, Cancer, Virgo, Scorpio, Capricorn, and Pisces.

[orbemnews]

Restaurants Fought for Covid Survival, With Some Tech Helpers The past year has crushed independent restaurants across the country and brought a reality to their doors: Many were unprepared for a digital world. Unlike other small retailers, restaurateurs could keep the tech low, with basic websites and maybe Instagram accounts with tantalizing, well-lit photos of their food. For the past decade, Krystle Mobayeni had been trying to convince them that they needed more. Ms. Mobayeni, a first-generation Iranian-American, started her company, BentoBox, in 2013 as a side job. She wanted to use her graphic design skills to help restaurants build more robust websites with e-commerce abilities. But it was a hard sell. For many, she said, her services were a “nice to have,” not a necessity. Until 2020. The pandemic sent chefs and owners flocking to BentoBox, as they suddenly needed to add to-go ordering, delivery scheduling, gift card sales and more to their websites. Before the pandemic the company, based in New York City, had about 4,800 clients, including the high-profile Manhattan restaurant Gramercy Tavern; today it has more than 7,000 restaurants onboard and recently received a $28.8 million investment led by Goldman Sachs. “I feel like our company was built for this moment,” Ms. Mobayeni said. The moment opened a well of opportunity for companies like BentoBox that are determined to help restaurants survive. Dozens of companies have either started or scaled up sharply as they found their services in urgent demand. Meanwhile, investors and venture capitalists have been sourcing deals in the “restaurant tech” sector — particularly seeking companies that bring the big chains’ advantages to independent restaurants. “A lot of what’s happening is reminiscent of what we’ve seen in the broader retail sector in the past decade,” said R.J. Hottovy, a restaurant industry analyst and an investor at Aaron Allen & Associates. “Covid accelerated the transformation quite a bit. This is a once-in-a-lifetime chance to redefine the experience.” Part of what Ms. Mobayeni offers restaurants is a one-stop shop and the ability to own their customer data. Many restaurants rely on third-party vendors, such as DoorDash or UberEats, to handle delivery. But those companies charge significant fees and retain customers’ data because the transactions go through their websites. That’s not such a big deal when delivery is 20 percent of a restaurant’s income stream, but it’s a game-changer when delivery becomes 100 percent of income — and you can’t contact any of your customers. “Restaurants realized they had to think of themselves as larger businesses and brands,” said Camilla Marcus, co-founder of TechTable, which connects the hospitality and tech industries. “You have to expand into other things: e-commerce, delivery, products. You have to think outside the four walls.” Helping restaurants deepen relationships with customers is where Sam Bernstein saw an opportunity. Before the pandemic he ran a tech start-up that connected students to housing, similar to Airbnb; when universities sent students home last spring, his revenue fell to zero. He went to his board of directors and offered to return what investment was left and close down. Instead the board suggested he regroup with a smaller team and new vision. “It was an existential crisis, as you can imagine,” he said. Mr. Bernstein laid off all but 10 employees and took them for a brainstorming retreat. They considered dozens of business models, looking for the right problem to solve. The more they discussed options, the more the members of the team realized they were all interested in food and hospitality and wanted to help restaurants. They hit upon the idea for a site that would allow customers to “subscribe” to their favorite restaurants. The new firm, Table22, would help chefs develop and market subscriptions for monthly meal kits and wine clubs, for example, and then manage the sales, recurring billing, scheduling, data analytics and more. In exchange, Table22 takes a percentage of each transaction. Table22, which is based in New York, went live with its first restaurant in May. Since then, it has grown to more than 150 restaurants in 50 cities. Late last year, the company received about $7 million from investors, who include David Barber, owner of Blue Hill farm and restaurants. Shelby Allison signed up her Chicago bar, Lost Lake, for the service on a cold email from Table22. She was hesitant at first, planning to listen just long enough to learn how to create a cocktail subscription service herself. “We get lots and lots of calls from these tech companies trying to help — or prey upon — us struggling businesses,” she said. Today in Business Updated  April 16, 2021, 1:30 p.m. ET But she was impressed by the low service fee and the fact that Table22 shared customer data. She started the service in October, hoping for 30 sign-ups; 100 people joined. Ms. Allison now has 300 subscribers and five employees working on the make-at-home cocktail boxes. “This will 100 percent stay in the future,” she said. “I love this program. I thought it might cannibalize my to-go business, but it hasn’t at all.” Ping Ho considered signing up with Table22 to host the wine and meat clubs she offers at her Detroit restaurant and butcher shop, Marrow, and wine bar, the Royce. She decided against it, however, because her existing subscription platform, Zoho, gave her the essential tools. “It’s a bit more work, but there’s more agency,” she said. But because her website was mostly informational, she realized she did need help offering online ordering and a delivery system for the butcher shop. So Ms. Ho turned to Mercato, which enables e-commerce for independent grocers. In a bit of fortuitous timing, she had signed up a month before the pandemic struck. When stay-at-home orders were issued, she was able to quickly begin offering grocery items, such as milk and eggs, in addition to meats. Her sales jumped “tremendously” she said, although they have flattened out in recent months. Still, Ms. Ho intends to maintain the service. Mercato began in 2015, but 2020 was its year. In February 2020, the service had 400 stores across 20 states; it quickly ramped up to more than 1,000 stores in 45 states. It continues to grow and has added some big-name clients, including the Ferry Building Marketplace on San Francisco’s Embarcadero, with dozens of merchants. “We’re trying to give independent grocers a sustainable competitive advantage,” said Bobby Brannigan, founder and chief executive of the company, which is based in San Diego. It’s a mission that he has been training for all his life. Mr. Brannigan’s family owns a grocery store in the Dyker Heights area of Brooklyn, where he started working when he was 8, stocking shelves and delivering groceries. “It’s ironic that I’m back to doing what I was doing as a kid in Brooklyn,” he said. Last March and April, Mercato brought on hundreds of new grocers each week — clients that weren’t used to having online orders or weren’t used to the sudden volume of orders. Some stores that were accustomed to 10 orders in a day were flooded with hundreds, Mr. Brannigan said. Thankfully, his dad already had him build tools into the system that would allow grocers to limit the pace of orders and schedule them. Mr. Brannigan is also adding more data analytics to help his clients better understand what their customers want. They can now see what was bought and what customers searched for. “You’re amassing a valuable treasure chest of data that lets you sell the products they want today and that they want tomorrow,” he said. Of course, not all solutions are tech-centric; sometimes, it’s just a grass-roots community of chefs helping chefs. Alison Cayne, for example, has been giving free advice to chefs looking to create packaged goods, like her line of Haven’s Kitchen sauces. Having that extra revenue stream was critical when she shuttered her Manhattan restaurant and cooking school last spring, and she wants others to have the same options. “This is all very much from my perspective, not the supercapitalized, venture capital-backed, cool-kids business,” she said. “I just want to help them take a brick-and-mortar business and develop a product and build a brand that makes sense and is sustainable.” In Detroit, the grocer Raphael Wright and the chefs Ederique Goudia and Jermond Booze developed a “diabolical plan,” as Mr. Wright called it, to offer a weekly meal kit cooked by Black chefs during Black History Month. “Black food businesses are hurting in the city, so we thought, what if we created this meal box in a way that celebrates Black food and Black contributions to American cuisine?” Mr. Wright said. They named the project Taste the Diaspora Detroit and brought together Black chefs and farmers to create the weekly dishes — like gumbo z’herbes and black-eyed pea masala. The three organized all of the e-commerce and scheduling, which allowed chefs to participate even if they weren’t tech-savvy, and created the packaging and inserts that told the history of the meal. They topped it off with a paired Spotify playlist. “Being a part of this project woke everyone up and made them think they have a little hope they can push through,” Mr. Wright said. They hope to reprise the service for Juneteenth and are currently talking to funders to support the effort. Source link Orbem News #Covid #Fought #Helpers #Restaurants #Survival #Tech

[clarencenicholsonata]

The Ultimate List of Marketing Quotes: 50+ Expert Advice to Learn From

This article gives you 50+ of the most inspirational marketing quotes from top digital marketing thought-leaders.

With so much on our plate building a brand and running a business can allow you to miss the most simple yet effective ways to solve and improve your marketing ROI.

We search the high and low places of the internet to search for the most inspirational marketing quotes to help change your perspective on your latest marketing conquest.

May their words of wisdom inspire your profits!

Want to put these inspirational lessons into action?

Wishpond's marketing campaign software can help. Click here to get started with a contest, landing page, popup or email marketing campaign today!

70 Inspirational Marketing Quotes

“Good content isn’t about good storytelling. It’s about telling a true story well.” - Ann Handley Click to Tweet This Quote

“Content is fire, social media is gasoline.” - Jay Baer Click to Tweet This Quote

“Content marketing is more than a buzzword. It is the hottest trend in marketing because it is the biggest gap between what buyers want and brands produce.” - Michael Brenner Click to Tweet This Quote

“Content is King but engagement is Queen, and the lady rules the house!” - Mari Smith Click to Tweet This Quote

”If we face the truth, we know that content marketing is about making money”- James Allen Click to Tweet This Quote

“Content Marketing is all the Marketing that’s left.” - Seth Godin Click to Tweet This Quote

“Banners have 99 problems and a click ain’t one.” - Scott Sorokin Click to Tweet This Quote

“We need to stop interrupting what people are interested in and be what people are interested in.” - Craig Davis Click to Tweet This Quote

“Make your customers the hero of your stories.” - Ann Handley Click to Tweet This Quote

“Content is the reason search began in the first place.” -Lee Odden Click to Tweet This Quote

“The buyer journey is nothing more than a series of questions that must be answered.” -Michael Brenner Click to Tweet This Quote

“Great content is the best sales tool in the world.” -Marcus Sheridan Click to Tweet This Quote

“Market like the year you are in.” -Gary Vaynerchuk Click to Tweet This Quote

“You need to create ridiculously good content – content that is useful, enjoyable and inspired.”- Ann Handley Click to Tweet This Quote

“Traditional marketing talks at people. Content marketing talks with them.” - Doug Kessler Click to Tweet This Quote

“Your brand is not what you sell.” -John Iwata, IBM Click to Tweet This Quote

“The best marketing doesn’t feel like marketing.” - Tom Fishburne Click to Tweet This Quote

“Brands need to take the phrase ‘acting like a publisher’ literally.” -Dietrich Mateschitz, CEO of RedBull Click to Tweet This Quote

“If you don’t like what is being said, then change the conversation.” - Don Draper Click to Tweet This Quote

“Content marketing is really like a first date. If all you do is talk about yourself, there won’t be a second date.” - David Beebe Click to Tweet This Quote

“The only way to win at content marketing is for the reader to say, ‘This was written specifically for me.” - Jamie Turner Click to Tweet This Quote

“Your goal should be to own quality time in your customer’s inbox.” - Robert Rose Click to Tweet This Quote

“Focus more on mastering your branding and connect with customers, you’ll sell more” - Victoria Taylor Marketing Click to Tweet This Quote

“A great headline mixed with a lame opening is like inviting someone into your house, only to slam the door in their face as they approach.” - Brian Clark Click to Tweet This Quote

“Marketing is telling the world you’re a rock star. Content Marketing is showing the world you are one.” - Robert Rose Click to Tweet This Quote

“You can never go wrong by investing in communities and the human beings within them.” - Pam Moore Click to Tweet This Quote

“Don’t settle: Don’t finish crappy books. If you don’t like the menu, leave the restaurant. If you’re not on the right path, get off it.” - Chris Brogan Click to Tweet This Quote

“Content is the reason search began in the first place.” - Lee Odden Click to Tweet This Quote

“The best marketing doesn’t feel like marketing.” - Tom Fishburne Click to Tweet This Quote

“The best marketing doesn’t feel like marketing.”

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“Content: there is no easy button.” - Scott Abel Click to Tweet This Quote

“Less is more. Keeping it simple takes time and effort.” - Jeff Bullas Click to Tweet This Quote

“Content is anything that adds value to the reader"s life.” - Avinash Kaushik Click to Tweet This Quote

“Your top of the funnel content must be intellectually divorced from your product but emotionally wed to it.” - Joe Chernov Click to Tweet This Quote

“Our jobs as marketers are to understand how the customer wants to buy and help them to do so.” - Bryan Eisenberg Click to Tweet This Quote

“The future of content marketing is in your hands.” - David Hahn Click to Tweet This Quote

“If you build it… you may still need Google AdWords.” - Jennifer Mesenbrink Click to Tweet This Quote

“Content builds relationships. Relationships are built on trust. Trust drives revenue.” - Andrew Davis Click to Tweet This Quote

“Content builds relationships. Relationships are built on trust. Trust drives revenue.”

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“Leverage the strength that you have: that no one else can be you.” - Todd Wheatland Click to Tweet This Quote

"The buyer journey is nothing more than a series of questions that must be answered." - Analyst Firm IDC

"Personally, I am very fond of strawberries and cream, but I have found that for some strange reason, fish prefer worms." - Dale Carnegie Click to Tweet This Quote

“Not viewing your email marketing as content is a mistake.” - Chris Baggott Click to Tweet This Quote

“The cost of being wrong is less than the cost of doing nothing.” - Seth Godin Click to Tweet This Quote

“Don’t be afraid to get creative and experiment with your marketing.” - Mike Volpe Click to Tweet This Quote

“Failure is an option.” - Matthew Schwartz Click to Tweet This Quote

“Marketing is really just about sharing your passion.” - Michael Hyatt Click to Tweet This Quote

“Focus on the present… It"s the best gift you can give yourself.” - Carrie Kerpen Click to Tweet This Quote

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“Just as you don’t need to be on every single TV channel, I don’t believe a brand needs to be on every single social media one in a big way.” - Shiv Singh Click to Tweet This Quote

“Social media is about sociology and psychology more than technology” - Brian Solis Click to Tweet This Quote

“Nothing begets creativity like constraints.” - Christopher Mims Click to Tweet This Quote

“Sell-sell-sell sales methods simply do not work on social media.” - Kim Garst Click to Tweet This Quote

“Strong customer relationships drive sales, sustainability, and growth.” - Tom Cates Click to Tweet This Quote

“As social media grows and matures, showing a return becomes critical.” - Heidi Cohen Click to Tweet This Quote

“You can’t just place a few “Buy” buttons on your website and expect your visitors to buy.” - Neil Patel Click to Tweet This Quote

“You can’t just place a few “Buy” buttons on your website and expect your visitors to buy.”

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“Getting the Like is easy. It's a light action. Anything else requires trust.” - Jon Loomer Click to Tweet This Quote

“You can’t push your sales messages on your fans too often.” - Andrea Vahl Click to Tweet This Quote

“Incorporate easy email marketing strategies with your Facebook efforts to see bigger results (aka profits!).” - Amy Porterfield Click to Tweet This Quote

“When people feel insecure about something, they look around for validation. Show them that other people trust you.“ - Francisco Rosales Click to Tweet This Quote

“Word of mouth can be as important, if not more important, for neighborhood businesses as traditional advertising.” - Ekaterina Walter Click to Tweet This Quote

“On average, 8 out of 10 people will read your headline copy, but only 2 out 10 will read the rest.” - Brian Clark Click to Tweet This Quote

“Empower your readers with social sharing buttons.” - Mike Stelzner Click to Tweet This Quote

“Start an editorial calendar that everyone involved in your blog (writers, editors, marketing team, etc.) can access.” - Kristi Hines Click to Tweet This Quote

“Make the prospect a more informed buyer with content.” - Robert Simon Click to Tweet This Quote

“Too often, feeling intimidated becomes our excuse not to be awesome.” - Scott Stratten Click to Tweet This Quote

“The importance of gratitude is never forgotten.” - Deborah Lee Click to Tweet This Quote

“Going viral is not an outcome; it"s a happening. Sometimes it happens; sometimes it doesn't. Just remember, fans are vanity and sales are sanity.” - Lori Taylor Click to Tweet This Quote

“Our digital future is about enabling better productivity and decision making to enjoy a better quality of life.” - Yacine Baroudi Click to Tweet This Quote

“Our digital future is about enabling better productivity and decision making to enjoy a better quality of life.”

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“This is a learning process and sometimes you have to fall in order to learn things.” - Christine Korda Click to Tweet This Quote

“Successful companies in social media function more like entertainment companies, publishers, or party planners than as traditional advertisers.” - Erik Qualman Click to Tweet This Quote

“Most of us have experienced wow moments. We just haven’t taken time to think deeply about them.” - Michael Hyatt Click to Tweet This Quote

“Find your spirit, and no challenge will keep you from achieving your goals.” - Christopher Penn Click to Tweet This Quote

What do you think? What was your favorite marketing quote?

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[blackandwhitemusician]

(more) Kanda rambles

Okay, time to rant. I just have a lot of things on my mind at the moment, and I need to let some of it out. If you care about D-Gray Man as much as I do, and specifically if you care about Kanda Yuu as much as I do, you will understand how much angst I’m feeling right now. (After all, Kanda’s story is intended to fill anyone to the brim with sadness, angst, love, and more angst) But yea, you get what I mean. I just think about him a lot, and in the process of reading (too much) blogs and theories about him I just. Can’t. Take it. When people talk about him as if he’s a guilty party. Like. Seriously. I know he was a douchebag (he still is) and he stabbed Allen and he killed without mercy and he didn’t know how to be sweet and sentimental and he didn’t tell anyone about Allen’s first signs of awakening and everything but. Seriously. People think Allen did not deserve all the suffering he’s going through, and Alma did nothing wrong, and yet they are convinced that Kanda is guilty? Like seriously?

Kanda did not deserve any of the horrible things that happened to him. He DID NOT. Getting resurrected from the dead even though he had already died fighting for the good of humanity? Having the love of his life resurrected and taken away from him? Being lied to about who he was, being lied about how he had lived before as a HUMAN BEING, and how he had been turned into a half-baked fighting machine, half-human-half-monster of a disaster? Having to cut down his only friend so he could live on and find the shadow of his past that was the only proof of how he once knew loved, how he was once human? Having to face his only friend and destroy him AGAIN because that was the only thing an exorcist could do to save an AKUMA? Being manipulated by the Earl and the Noah to bring out the worst in Allen, against his own will? Being bitten by the guilt of hurting someone important to him, so much so that he couldn’t allow himself to rest in peace, AGAIN?

Kanda Yuu knows pain all too well. He’s probably one of the people who knows it best, besides Cross Marian and Nea D.Campbell. These are the people who have suffered endless sorrow, and who have had to make extremely painful decisions, one after another, to keep moving forward. I’m surprised Hoshino didn’t make more connections between these characters (Cross and Nea most likely have more canon interactions and comparisons). But yea. If Allen had to keep telling himself to move forward, Kanda Yuu must certainly did, too. He had done it so many times, it had become a drill. Every time it seems like it’s better for him to die and lay everything to rest, he gets back up, refusing to let himself die. And yes, it would have been better for him to die a long time ago. He should have died on that treatment table when those scientists tried to euthanize him. He should have died along with Alma when Alma tried to take the world down to hell with him. He should have died when Skinn Bolic burnt him with lightning. He should have died when he had to fight Alma AGAIN, years later after he was meant to kill him. He could have died and everything would have been easier. Yet, he chose to move forward. Every time. Despite the pain. Despite the guilt of leaving behind what he loved the most. Despite the self-hatred eating away at him from the inside. He made the painful decision of moving forward, and it’s all the more painful when you realize all he’d been doing before this point was living in the shadow of his past, more accurately in the shadow of the one he loved the most in a life that was over long, long ago.

Even now, after Kanda had found that love, and LOST it at the same time, he should have just ended it all and lay to rest, since his one reason to live, the one reason he refused to let himself die and kept moving, was now gone. And yet, he chose to move forward, AGAIN. This time, he set aside his own sorrow, and put himself in Death’s grasp to help Allen, someone important to him whom he felt he OWED. What Allen did for Kanda and Alma meant A LOT to Kanda. He was finally able to reconcile with the best friend he ever had, whom he had to destroy. He was finally able to find “that person”, that special someone who was the sole reason he kept on living. He was finally able to somewhat break away from the past, and once again live as himself and not a shadow of his past. What Allen did for him meant more to Kanda than Allen realized, and that’s something that hurts me a lot. It’s really sweet, and if you know Kanda from the start of the series, it is really painful to see him being so sweet. Kanda, who had managed to suppress most of his emotions, trying his best not to care about anyone as he was busy trying to bury his broken heart, Kanda who hated himself for destroying what he loved the most, and who did not even think of himself as a human capable of love or worthy of being loved, was extremely vulnerable and emotional. He was willing to go to hell in order to save Allen, because what Allen did meant the world to him, and helping Allen was more important than allowing himself to rest.

I get uneasy every time someone says that Kanda came back to “atone” for his “behavior”, to “repay Allen’s kindness”, or he “understands that he was wrong”. Sure, that’s what Kanda himself says, and what Link inferred from him being protective towards Allen. But I can’t for the life of me agree with that.

Kanda Yuu owes NOTHING to ANYONE. Yea, that’s the angsty me talking right there. He meant no harm to Allen, or anyone else who had no reason to mess with him. It is stated clearly that he just wanted to walk straight down his own path (a lot like Allen), and he simply set himself in a clear space. He was never the sweetest or kindest (not openly anyway), but he respected people’s space, too. He let Lenalee find comfort in his silence when she needed it the most. He would never poke around or disturb other people. He would fight, when he feels that it is necessary, or when he needs a form of stress relief (also, he fights when people get annoying around him, like Allen and Lavi). He also didn’t care much who or what he was fighting, if it was necessary to do so (he didn’t care if Skinn Bolic was a Noah or an Akuma, or anything for that matter, all he wanted to do was cut him down). Except in battle, Kanda Yuu didn’t mean harm to ANYONE. And yet, his space kept getting violated. He was brought back from the dead to become a demon fighting machine. Only ended up becoming a demon himself. God, he made a monster of himself when he cut down Alma, and he knew that. That was thrown upon him, he was driven into a corner to die or live on, and he decided to live. For nine years he lived on as an empty shell, a monster, a barely human. And even that was not enough. His “peace” was disrupted yet again, when the Noah revealed to him that Alma, whom he had to destroy, had lived all along, sustained by the Order to become the breeding ground for yet another kind of half human-half monster. And YET, that too, was not the worst thing. He was driven into a corner again, to try and destroy Alma one more time (I mean, given the fact that Alma had been turned into an AKUMA, what other choice did he have?). And in the midst of that, Kanda, sinking deeper and deeper into that sorrow, lost his clear head and was basically set up to stab Allen.

So Kanda, never meaning real harm to anyone, only taking action when his peace was violated or when he had to fight to defend himself and his comrades, was set up to stab Allen. Mind you, even if Kanda was always outwardly hostile towards Allen, he never wanted to hurt him. He was absolutely devastated to realize he had harmed Allen. That just proved how meaningful their relationship had become, despite the fact that other people (or even Kanda and Allen themselves) didn’t see it that way.

I believe Allen doesn’t believe that Kanda owes him a thing. I have said this many times before, I believe Allen was so moved by Kanda and Alma’s pain partially because he himself felt it, and he understood it. He experienced first hand all the sorrow Kanda had been through, and he understood why Kanda made the decision to live on, and why Alma did what he did. He stepped in to wake Kanda up from the nightmare, because he knew that was the right thing to do. He put himself in danger to give Kanda and Alma what little peace there is left, because he knew that was the least anyone could do for them, and the least they deserved. Allen knew both Kanda and Alma deserved better, and knowing Allen, he wasn’t hesitant to put himself in danger to give them the least that anyone could give them.

So now, Kanda came back - after being given that little bit of peace, after finally reconciling with Alma, being able to see Alma off, being the last person to hold Alma before he passed on, basically fulfilling his reason to exist - returned to Allen’s side. I believe he returned for the same reason that Allen sacrificed himself to give Kanda that little bit of peace. He returned because he knew Allen deserved better. He returned because seeing Allen suffer was painful, the same way Allen broke down after seeing what Kanda and Alma had to go through. He returned because he understood Allen’s pain, and knew he was suffering alone, the same way Kanda had suffered alone and the same way Alma had buried his sorrow so long ago. He returned to give Allen the least that anyone could give him: peace. He knew Allen deserved at least that much, and he wanted to do whatever possible in his own power to give him that. He knew he was going to die, possibly even before fulfilling his purpose, but he moved on anyway.

I absolutely adore Kanda and Allen, both as individual characters and especially as two players in a relationship (I don’t mean romantically). So when people imply that Allen helped Kanda out of his own kindness and Kanda just wanted to atone for his sin, I want to blow up a house. Kanda Yuu OWES NO ONE NOTHING. Even Allen knows that. Even Johnny knows that. Even Lenalee and Marie knows that, too. The only person blaming Kanda for Allen’s state is himself. And he doesn’t want to save Allen out of just guilt. He’s not just looking to repay a debt, or to clean himself of a sin he’s committed. It’s not like he’s just waiting to kill the beansprout, so that his work is done, and he can finally die in peace. That’s an extremely selfish thing to say about Kanda. Kanda wants to help Allen, and not just him, he wants to help everyone around Allen who can give him the strength and support that he can never give him. He wants the beansprout to have someone by his side to support him always, even if that person cannot be Kanda. That’s the most selfless thing I’ve ever seen, and it hurts to see Kanda like this, but it makes me admire him even more than before. Kanda’s actions are so selfless, so brave, that it is impossible for other people to understand. Lenalee and Marie didn’t understand, Johnny burst into tears the moment he understood, and Allen himself couldn’t comprehend why Kanda would do such a thing. That’s the kind of impact Kanda has. And sure, this selflessness was inspired by Allen, but Kanda himself deserves the credit too. His heart is still a pure one, no matter how I look at it. He just finally found it in him to let it show a bit more.

[rilenerocks]

The weather where I live has been hot and very dry. I keep my birdbath full and yesterday, I turned on the sprinkler as well. Lots of thirsty birds arrived within minutes to cool off and drink. This female cardinal has a nest with her partner somewhere in the tall shrubs behind her. Her color and markings are unusual so I always recognize her. I do a better job attending to my avian friends than I do for myself. I’m always sweaty and uncomfortable in the summer. Toward the end of April in many years past, I’d start complaining about the heat and Michael would say, “so long – see you in October.” I actually wasn’t quite that bad, but I’m not enamored of this annual muggy time. These days, though, I’m sending myself different messages. Right now, I’m hyper-aware of how lucky I am to be outside during these months, sticky and disgusting though I may be. My outdoor space liberates me from the claustrophobia being experienced by people who occupy small spaces in crowded cities. Icy winter will change how I manage virus time, when I’ll be on the inside, looking out. I’m consciously working on these messages to myself.  Unconsciously, too. Some of them are clear and easily explainable. I ponder over the others.

 What messages are poking out of my subconscious brain? I’ve been remembering lots of my dreams. I’m recording them so I won’t forget what’s being sorted through while I sleep. The Covid19 nightscape. Last night’s internal video made some sense to me. I dreamed that Michael and I were going to renew our marriage vows. It felt more like a first wedding for awhile because I was busily registering for gifts like dishes, silverware and serving trays. I was being really extravagant, selecting items made of gold and other fancy materials. I suddenly realized that was crazy as we already had everything we needed and I confessed that to Michael, who’d been assisting me from another room. Things moved from there to a conflict with some contractors who were working in my backyard. I’d been angry with them because they’d been doing a sloppy job. They were now being almost obsequious toward me, overly apologetic and fawning to please me. I realized that was because Michael was present, which felt like an admission of their intrinsic sexism toward me. I was relieved but also angry. I think some of this is connected to the basement cleaning project I did last week. I unearthed a set of china which belonged to either Michael’s grandmother or great grandmother. I’m not sure which. That kind of delicate fancy stuff didn’t fit with who we were or how we lived. I’d wrapped each individual piece in newspaper which was now falling apart and smelling strongly from dampness and mildew. The newspaper was dated 1983. Put away down there decades ago.  I just couldn’t throw away that table service for twelve. I hauled it all upstairs and spent hours washing each piece and peeling away the debris of all those years. Now it’s in my dining room cabinet until I figure out what to do with it. Somehow those dishes translated into me wanting to restart  my marriage and into thinking how much easier it is to have a partner sometimes than it is to be alone. Makes sense. Truthfully, I’d settle for a nice old-fashioned erotic dream.

That segues into another one of my dreams. Dream two consisted of me in an effort to relieve my frequent loneliness for physical contact, I found my way to a facility that catered to the common practices offered at a “house of ill repute.” What I was seeking however, was a person whose physique resembled Michael’s, and who would allow me to rest my head on his shoulder for just a few hours. A faceless person was found for with the right body type and for several nights, I got to go and rest, releasing the burdens of my day. Innocent though it was, I did this covertly as I knew this was not a socially acceptable thing.  However, someone found out and leaked the story to the local newspaper, where it became quite the sensation as both Michael and I were public officials well-known in our community. My pathetic behavior led to a city-wide sympathetic response which wound up generating a consensus that what I really needed was a cat.

I was presented with an orange long-haired feline who looked nothing like the collie-type dogs I’ve been surrounded by my entire adult life. I got the message about being lonely but haven’t figured out the cat thing. No offense intended to those devoted to their kitties, but for me at this point in time, I mostly think of them as bird assassins.

Another dream’s message was me evidently being kind to myself. I’m still a member of a cancer support group. Over the past three years, I’ve gotten half-way through the story of what it was like to live through the stunning orphan cancer process that consumed the last five years of my life with Michael. Writing about the experience has been much harder than I anticipated as the feelings it evokes are still sharp and painful. Part of me has been afraid to lose touch with the immediacy of what that day-to-day emotional balancing act feels like. When I read what patients and their families write in this online group, I’m reminded of the fragility of life and the struggles being faced by so many people. I don’t want to become numb to that, not just because what I read informs my own story, but because I feel a solidarity with those enjoined in their often lonely struggles. I see painful statements. The other night my brain spewed out a particularly sad confession written by a desolate stranger. It appeared as if it was written on a billboard.

‘‘I’m the husband of a cervical cancer survivor. I thought I could handle all the stress and be her rock but I crumbled like aluminum foil. It ruined our relationship and we’re separated. Has anyone else’s relationship suffered from this? I was the only one who knew her survival rate and it was not good at all. That’s ultimately what made me have a nervous breakdown.“

When I saw that sign in my dream, I was empathetic to that poor man but at the same time, I was gratified to know that I’d hung in with Michael through everything and had no regrets to haunt me. An important message indeed.

I’ve got more mysterious and obtuse dreams that I’ve recorded immediately upon waking in the morning. Enough of them for now. On the lighter side, I recently received another message from neither my conscious nor my subconscious self, but rather from Michael, the gift who keeps on giving, via one of his most loved colleagues.

Although there was a significant age gap between them, Michael and Dan were just in sync about most things, personally and professionally. When the time came for Michael to hastily leave teaching to begin systemic cancer treatment, he gave Dan his very cool red retro class stool which was shaped like the palm of a hand. The photo above looks most like it. During Michael’s years of therapy, the two of them stayed in contact, going out for beers and lunches during the good times. After Michael died, Dan had an elaborate tattoo which honored him for his personal favorites along with his mentoring talent as an educator. Dan and I have stayed in touch as he became a trusted friend.

Our local school district established a history scholarship in Michael’s name after his retirement. He was so honored and was deeply hopeful that it would be awarded long after he was gone. He lived long enough to give the first award himself. He hoped to make the initial seed money self-sustaining and I promised him I would see to his wishes. This year was the fourth time it was awarded. I knew Michael had lots of ideas about how to keep it going but so far, I’ve been able to raise enough funds for quite awhile. Last week, Dan contacted me and told me something I didn’t know. Michael had shared the idea of having an auction as a way to raise funds for the scholarship. Dan had forgotten about it until recently, when packing up to move to a new home. Then he found a box of odds and ends Michael had left with him for the sale, along with the red stool. He asked me what I wanted to do about them. I told him to keep the stool as a token of Michael’s affection. I wanted to see everything else. Oh my. What a bunch of great laughs from my ever-quirky and kitschy guy.

Look at this bizarre stuff. A Freud action figure. How about Annie Oakley or Edgar Allen Poe? Let’s not forget a flatulence machine, to be polite, which still works. My nine year old grandson is willing to pay almost anything for that. There’s a blanket with all the landmarks of our community and some academic treatises on the Viet Nam war. I haven’t had the time to give every item the attention it deserves, but I’ll get there. For the moment, this medium was the message. My funny inventive husband didn’t raise any money from his idiosyncratic collection but he raised my spirits. A little nudge to remind me to remember the good and to find a little humor in the midst of everything. I’m going to stay a receiver- message input from many sources is welcome here.

Messages The weather where I live has been hot and very dry. I keep my birdbath full and yesterday, I turned on the sprinkler as well.