#I feel like my eyes have been openes

[meltsyoutodeath]

(said wistfully as though I'm looking at far off memories) I don't think Buggy ever left that execution

[blueboyluca]

“When I first heard it, from a dog trainer who knew her behavioral science, it was a stunning moment. I remember where I was standing, what block of Brooklyn’s streets. It was like holding a piece of polished obsidian in the hand, feeling its weight and irreducibility. And its fathomless blackness. Punishment is reinforcing to the punisher. Of course. It fit the science, and it also fit the hidden memories stored in a deeply buried, rusty lockbox inside me. The people who walked down the street arbitrarily compressing their dogs’ tracheas, to which the poor beasts could only submit in uncomprehending misery; the parents who slapped their crying toddlers for the crime of being tired or hungry: These were not aberrantly malevolent villains. They were not doing what they did because they thought it was right, or even because it worked very well. They were simply caught in the same feedback loop in which all behavior is made. Their spasms of delivering small torments relieved their frustration and gave the impression of momentum toward a solution. Most potently, it immediately stopped the behavior. No matter that the effect probably won’t last: the reinforcer—the silence or the cessation of the annoyance—was exquisitely timed. Now. Boy does that feel good.”

— Melissa Holbrook Pierson, The Secret History of Kindness (2015)

[arthursfuckinghat]

"I was gonna say you're like a son to me.. but you're more than that."

"It ain't that complicated!"

How quickly that shoulder pat of comfort turned into a condescending one.

[somegrumpynerd]

It's interesting to think about how, to me at least, Dust and Killer are like mirror versions of each other.

One who joins a villain enthusiastically, jumps at the chance to leave his past behind and have a purpose again, and the other who has to be dragged in, would rather rot in the consequences of his own actions.

One who needs orders, needs the distraction and the action and the thrill, can't sit alone with his thoughts for too long lest he hear them clearly, and the other who can't bring himself to ignore the ghost over his shoulder, would rather sit in place and listen to his own self loathing parroted back at him than stand up and find a way to drown it out.

One who doesn't associate with his past anymore, that wasn't me and I wasn't him, and cannot stand the thought of going back from where he came, and the other who wants nothing more than to be his old self again but feels so strongly that he doesn't deserve to return to the life he tore down himself.

They both wear their new names like dog collars, but one is a gift given by someone else because he's theirs, he has somewhere he belongs that he's expected to return to, and the other is a choker tying him to a post, warning others of his danger while never allowing him to get out of arm's reach of his past.

And getting them both back-to-back while trying to understand mortals was probably enough to give Nightmare whiplash

[wavesoutbeingtossed]

Randomly thinking about “tolerate it” (narrator voice: it was not random) and how under the cloak of fiction it is ostensibly inspired by works like “Rebecca” (which Taylor said she read during the 2020 lockdowns I believe?), with the line of “you’re so much older and wiser” indicating that the speaker is significantly younger and inexperienced compared to the person she’s speaking to and a pretty direct reference to the plot of the book.

But I saw something somewhere once that stuck with me about how it might not be referring to relative age between the characters but chronological age as in the passage of time in a relationship. And that made me think about how in a contemporary context, it might not necessarily be referencing an actual age gap between the two characters, but rather a sarcastic or cynical response to the man’s claims that he has matured (“you’re so much older and wiser [than you were before/than you were when we met/etc.]”), which then made me think about that line in relation to the woman. And that it could be taken like, “you act like you’ve matured so much in our time together and like you know everything, while I’m supposedly still stuck as the girl I was when we first met.”

Which then made me think of the “right where you left me” of it all and did you ever hear about the girl who got frozen time went on for everyone else she won’t know it and the bit in Miss Americana where she talks about how celebrities get frozen at the age at which they got famous, and how she’s had to play catch up in a lot of ways not just in her emotional growth but kind of in general. (Which also made me wonder if she’s ever been called out for immaturity/lack of curiosity/lack of education about things in her life…)

Which then made me think about the rest of the song, and @taylortruther’s posts yesterday about “seven” and “Daylight” and the way Taylor idealizes her youth yet contrasts it with an almost sinister reality in its wake, and the line, “I sit by the door like I’m just a kid,” because the discussion raised that her relationship let her recapture some of the childlike joy and wonder she’d lost. So this line is a double-edged sword: the speaker sits by the door with childlike hope that the person will come home and cherish her, but on the darker side, feels like the child dealing with the monsters she doesn’t have names for yet and the feelings of isolation she felt as she aged.

I’m not saying the song is necessarily autobiographical; like most of the songs on folkmore, it’s clearly a fictionalized story based on media she’d consumed and created, but we know a lot of the fictional songs were infused with her own feelings and experiences and… This idea swirling in my head picked up steam and now I kind of can’t stop thinking about it. Sorry but I’m a little obsessed now.

Like maybe it might start to shed light on why she identified so strongly with the novel in the first place…

[zytes]

7.15.23

[carnivalcarriondiscarded]

if you would all allow me to be delusional for a moment - so i went back to staring Very Hard at the neighborhood map and. um. well. im chucking my marbles out the window! as always take all of this with a Hefty grain of salt!

i thought i saw a weird pixel in Frank's window so i zoomed in. then i took a screenshot, and fucked with the contrast/brightness settings. and uhhhhhh

UHHHHHH

FRANK??? HELLO???? HE'S IN THERE? i'm pretty sure im Not seeing things bc that is definitely a vague gray tube-outline with a yellow spot in the shape of Frank's nose. hidden in the dark. and i might be seeing things but in the pane next to his face it kinda looks like his hand is on the window? but! Frank's in there! what the fuck!

so naturally i slowly scrolled through the neighborhood Zoomed The Fuck In. obvi there's nothing in Home's eyes, and Barnaby's & Sally's single visible windows(?) are closed. I couldn't find any out-of-place pixels in Julie's or Poppy's.

but! Eddie's kinda freaked me out a little! look at this shit!

on the top left pane... are those fingerprints pressing into the glass? and in the lower left, is that a fucking Face peering out? a creepy ass face that almost looks like some sort of mask? there seems to be another Shape in the upper right... another face perhaps?

and then there's the weird window shine in the lower right (along with maybe Another face...). it almost looks like a string of letters. there isn't a single pattern/design like that anywhere else in the neighborhood. what's up with that....

oh and also, just went back to double check the post office's display window

there seems to be another face - all the way to the right in the darkness. judging by the shape of the paler (yellowish?) pixels between what must be eyes, i think that's Eddie. and i think i see ears and a hat... not sure though. this one is really tough to see but it's There

(side note: Eddie is totally fucked, isn't he? between the faces(?) and hands behind his door, Home sitting in his display, and the hyacinths by his building, the emphasis on his memory (or lack-thereof) in a project that is, in a sense, About memory... i'm concerned! and eating it tf up! hell yeah lets get funky!)

now i couldn't see any, like, concrete Faces or anything in Howdy's store. but! you can kinda see inside! observe~

in the big open window, you can kinda make out some sort of container on a counter and what might be shelves or a kind of brick pattern. and then above the 100% sign... hold on are those fuckign Eyes? lets take a look zoomed in & without the image adjustments!

yeah those uh. i think those are eyes. Wally-esque eyes peering out of the darkness. though they also mildly remind me of eyespots on insect wings. butterfly eyespots, perhaps. inch resting indeed...

WAIT I LIED!!! there DOES seem to be another string of letter-like symbols in the neighborhood, not just the post office's window shine. now it could be just a wild coincidence, but at the same time it seems kind of... purposeful. like that's not normal shading/coloring.

check out the blue window border on Howdy's Place, next to the apples. the lighter blue pixels seem Arranged. i think i see a clear N, and either an R or a P... along with some other symbols that i don't recognize as anything. the lower ones look kinda like faces? what could the top one be? is any of it anything or am i looking too hard?

in short: they're watching us watch them and there's way more to the map than initially meets the eye....

(edit: i've added a reblog w/ the images outlined! badly outlined but a clearer View of what i see nonetheless! + some notes on more little things outlining helped me notice)

[nbrnty]

What happens when u start binging shoujo... anyways another doodle + Kylar hair change cuz I don't wanna draw the other eye LMAO

[firenati0n]

several sentence sunday <3 :)

hello friends :) thank you to @welcometololaland @anincompletelist @suseagull04 @bigassbowlingballhead @indestructibleheart

@thedramasummer @onthewaytosomewhere @cricketnationrise @ninzied @sophie1973

@cha-melodius @orchidscript @sparklepocalypse @kiwiana-writes @tailsbeth-writes

@theprinceandagcd @hgejfmw-hgejhsf for the tags :) :) i finally have some sentences. i have been struggling a lot with reading and writing recently. so, I'm writing something that makes me happy to bring the juice back.

here is a peep at angel!henry sequel. because honestly, writing him experiencing joy at small human things is helping me recalibrate myself and find my own tiny joys. i am doing this for me. it is a love letter to humanity from me to you, but also a reminder to myself

The Victoria & Albert museum is lively today. Henry hasn’t been back to the Cast Courts since he last visited in his time of need, the heaviest he had ever felt, his whole being sagging under the weight of the world’s pain he elected to shoulder. If he stares hard enough, he can almost see a shadow of his former self staring up at Trajan’s Column, can almost run his fingers across the desperation written all over his face as he seeks comfort in Civitali’s angels; his hands clasped and cold and pleading.   Now, his hands are warm, nestled in Alex’s palms, calloused fingertips absentmindedly running over Henry’s knuckles. It makes Henry feel grounded, tethered to a reality he never thought he deserved, but has manifested nonetheless.  He takes in the statues with a new perspective, a newfound respect. Yes, they endured. Yes, they were seen, and they were loved.  But now, Henry is too. Seen and loved, in the way that matters, with an end in sight. Henry’s never been happier to reject eternity. 

xoxo roop

+ tags under the cut and open tag as always <3

@priincebutt @rmd-writes @leaves-of-laurelin @eusuntgratie @blueeyedgrlwrites

@getmehighonmagic @violetbaudelaire-quagmire @captainjunglegym @duchessdepolignaca03 @porcelainmortal

@orchidscript @myheartalivewrites @dumbpeachjuice @anchoredarchangel @nocoastposts

@wordsofhoneydew @tintagel-or-cockleshells @sherryvalli @lizzie-bennetdarcy @heysweetheart-writes

@onward--upward @celeritas2997 @inexplicablymine @affectionatelyrs @happiness-of-the-pursuit

@14carrotghoul @cultofsappho @alasse9 @nontoxic-writes @piratefalls

@ships-to-sail @itsmaybitheway @adreamareads

[lucalicatteart]

A new sculpture! Finally... I feel like I never sculpt anymore since I'm always sick or have some 500 other things going on or projects to finish, but I'm trying to schedule time to do it more often this year hopefully..! Just a generic fantasy creature as usual, but did try making the eyes a little more sparkly this time.. hrmm..

[hammill-goes-fogwalking]

I HATE AI. I HATE AI. I HATE AI. I HATE AI. I HATE AI. I HATE AI. I HATE AI. I HATE AI. I HATE AI. I HATE AI. I HATE AI. I HATE AI. I HATE AI. I HATE AI. I HATE AI. I HATE AI. I HATE AI. I HATE AI. I HATE AI. I HATE AI. I HATE AI. I HATE AI. I HATE AI. I HATE AI. I HATE AI. I HATE AI. I HATE AI. I HATE AI. I HATE AI. I HATE AI. I HATE AI. I HATE AI. I HATE AI. I HATE AI. I HATE AI. I HATE AI. I HATE AI. I HATE AI. I HATE AI. I HATE AI. I HATE AI. I HATE AI. I HATE AI. I HATE AI. I HATE AI. I HATE AI. I HATE AI. I HATE AI. I HATE AI. I HATE AI. I HATE AI. I HATE AI. I HATE AI. I HATE AI. I HATE AI. I HATE AI.

[inoreuct]

DUDE. i always didn’t get how zoro could turn right when someone said left and left when someone said right AND IT JUST OCCURED TO ME THAT IT’S PROBABLY BECAUSE HE DOESN’T KNOW WHICH SIDE’S LEFT AND RIGHT. sorry i’m just. processing this info. he’s so smart but so dumb. he’s still my directionally challenged topographically unaware socially inept babygirl tho i love him

[icewindandboringhorror]

sneeping with his legs up over his head for some reason... weird boye

[faaun]

procrastination is starting to have its consequences finally

[aceredshirt13]

gang i have to share this P. G. Wodehouse quote with you all because ever since I found it I can't stop thinking about it. it's from a letter he wrote when he was 78 years old to his friend Guy Bolton (many thanks to P. G. Wodehouse: A Life in Letters)

I have been on the sick list myself, but am better now. Inflamed bladder or chill on the bladder or something, the symptoms being agony when I passed water, as the expression is. It brought back the brave old days when I used to get clap.

he really said "yeah the pain from my bladder issue reminds of the days when I used to have so much sex I repeatedly got venereal disease"

[skunkes]

google search results for kitties cuddling