#I see we ARE allowed to publicly post our entries so I will be turning mine into a timelapse <3< /div> Explore tagged Tumblr posts

[forcedhesitation]

we have the dates for the community cosmetic contest in DBD. and I am ready to fucking GO, despite my...pessimistic outlook on my chances. I see they've changed things so that now the winners are not ultimately chosen by DBD staff. which I do believe dramatically reduces any chance I had at winning. and the chance of anyone who isn't making cosmetics for...oh idk. sable. mikaela. feng min. yun jin. nea. felix. on the survivor side. and legion? perhaps on the killer's side. whatever the case- I know hux is FAR from the most popular choice. but I will try my damned best.

[geekywritings]

JUNGKOOK X READER PART 2 - Is this real life or am I in a drama?

Part 2 of my little Jungkook x Reader story. For all who need a recap of Part 1: You are a young vet, just trying to make your way home from work when suddenly Jungkook falls right into your car, taking refuge from a group of sasaengs. You give him a ride home and he exchanges contact details with you, promising to stay in touch.

The prompt for part 2 is: “It’s pouring rain, why are you here?”

For the next few days, all you could think about was that meeting. It still seemed so very surreal. And you didn’t even dare tell anyone about the incident, because who would really believe you? Even your best friends and work colleagues would just raise and eyebrow and shake their heads most likely. Such things simply didn’t happen to people. They were part of k-drama scripts or popular web toons and after a week, you did start to wonder if it had all been some kind of strange dream.

But exactly that evening, when you had just come out of the shower to enjoy a cup of tea and a new episode of your favourite show, your phone beeped with a new Kakao Talk message. You gave your phone a lazy glance and then almost dropped your mug when you saw it was from none other than Jungkook.

JK: “I’m sorry for the late reply, Miss Vet. Things got kinda hectic. But I have not forgotten my promise. I still owe you that thank you.”

You had to reread that message a few times and for a second you wondered if it was a scam perhaps, but who else would now about that event but him? For a second you wondered what to answer before typing:

Y/N: “No problem. You are an idol after all. And you did already thank me.”

It took only a few seconds until his answer popped up.

JK: “It still doesn’t feel like enough.”

Wow, did he know how cool that sounded? 

Y/N: “You don’t have to worry. Really. I’m glad I could help.”

This time he took a bit longer to reply.

JK: “Do you like flowers?”

Y/N: “Yes of course. Who doesn’t?”

JK: “Which ones are your favourites?”

That one was harder to answer. You liked quite a few and just named them all, allowing him to make the final choice.

JK: “Great. Can I send them to your workplace? I don’t think florists deliver late in the evening.”

It was sweet that he was so dead set on sending you flowers as a proper thank you and while part of you was delighted, the other part wondered how to explain the bouquet to your colleagues at the vet office. Still, you typed in your adress and sent it out. 

From then on you thought the conversation would end, but apparently Jungkook was in a talkative mood. He revealed that he had a free evening and was just relaxing on the couch with a good meal, before asking you what you were up to. You told him about the drama and he suggested watching at the same time, sharing comments through text. 

You had never done anything like it before, least of all with a stranger, but Jungkook seemed so nice and it didn’t feel so intimidating to write with an idol over messages. And after the first few shared comments, you actually started to really enjoy it. You two ended up talking throughout the entire episode, which was almost an hour long and then even half an hour on top until Jungkook announced that he was heading to bed. Noticing the time, you realized it was time to hit the pillows yourself. 

But as you laid there in your bed, you kept reading through the chat history, as if making sure it was still real. Especially that “Goog Night” with the cute little emoji brought a smile to your face, before you finally turned off the night light.

____

For the next two weeks, he kept writing texts every other day. Sometimes it was just a random “How are you?” or a comment to your recently posted Kakao Story that he didn’t dare post publicly. But sometimes he would ask if you were watching that drama again to share comments in real time. It had become kind of a ritual when the third week started and a day without his messages felt weird. You still couldn’t tell anyone about it, but your friends and colleagues did start noticing your smiles and your eager grabs for the phone. But whenever they teased, you just said it was some guy online. Their would never believe the truth and you didn’t want to put Jungkook in trouble either. You had seen how crazy his fans could be, so the last thing he needed was your chats to become the topic of online gossip. Besides, it was kind of exhilarating to have a secret like that. At this point, you had already totally forgotten about the flowers.

During the fourth week of knowing Jungkook, you were staying late at the clinic, taking your regular night shift to take care of your little patients. You had just made your rounds, giving all the animals their medicine and checking on their bandages, before sitting down in the reception area, in case of emergencies coming in. But it was a super quiet evening, so you took out your phone. Almost on cue, a message popped up: “Finished work?”

Y/N: “Nope, having a night shift today.”

JK: “Oh, sounds tough.”

Y/N: “Not really. It’s quiet tonight.”

Nothing came after that and you put the phone away again, turning your head to the entry, the glassdoor giving you a perfect view of the rain shower outside. It really was coming down hard today. Bored, you took another round visiting your furry patients, giving them an extra round of cuddles. Suddenly the sound of the door tore through the hallway and you were quick to place the cat with the broken paw down to go and check on the new arrival.

You were utterly stunned to see Jungkook standing in the half opened door, dripping wet and with a huge bouquet of your favourite flowers in hand. 

“It’s pouring rain! Why are you here?!”, you exclaimed, approaching him with a shake of your head. 

“Well, florists dont deliver at this hour.”, he said cheekily with a shrug. “So I came personally.” 

He held out the dripping bouquet to you, which you took gratefully, enjoying the heavy fragrance of the flowers.

“You really shouldn’t have, but thank you. They are gorgeous.”, you said, sending him a smile, before inviting him to the staff room. 

“Let me make you a tea and grab you a towel.”

“You got coffee instead?”, he asked, running a hand through his hair. It had changed color, you noticed, though you also instantly thought that you prefered it black. 

A few minutes later you came back with a small towel and a steaming cup of coffee, taking a seat across from him at the small table. The entire room was tiny, but it was enough for the team.

“So this is where you work, huh?”

“Yeah, it’s a good place. It has nice people and I like how we truly take our time for each patient.”, you explained. You knew that not every clinic was like that, having done internships elsewhere during your studies. 

“Aren’t you busy though?”, it was now your turn to ask him a question.

“I am most nights, but we do get our time off as well.”, Jungkook replied. “Our agency is a good place too.” You nodded, having read up a bit about Big Hit since your meeting with one of their idols. You also realized that you did know and enjoy quite a few of BTS’ songs, even though you had never been able to put a face to them. Now you enjoyed them even more.

“Do you want a tour?”, you asked, after a minute of silence fell between you, during which Jungkook tried to dry his hair. He agreed with a nod, before following you around. There wasn’t much to show, but he did spend some time in the patient rooms, giving the animals some pets and cuddles. He was good with them, you notcied and they seemed to like him in return.

“You have two cats at home, right?”, he asked, his hand still stroking a fat tabby, who was at the clinic because of stomach problems. The owner insisted something was wrong with him, even though you had determined that he just needed a change in food and a consistent diet. 

“Yeah, Mr. Paws and Pogi.”, you replied. “I got them both from here, when the owners didn’t want them anymore.”

Jungkook’s eyes snapped to you, one of his eyebrows raised. “People do that?”

“Sometimes, unfortunately. Mr. Paws has a missing paw, ironically. We had to amputate it and the owner thought his cat would need special treatment because of it. And Pogi just needs regular medication and special food.” Small things really, but some owners just couldn’t handle it. 

“I saw pictures of them and I never notcied the missing paw.”, Jungkook said.

“I don’t make a point of making it the focus on pictures.” 

You ended the tour back in the staff room, where Jungkook took his coffee for a few sips, the drink instantly helping to warm him up. 

“I have to miss our drama this friday.”, he suddenly announced. “So you have to give me detailed updates or at least a good summary.”

“You could just watch the rerun online.”, you suggested.

“It’s no fun alone. So unless you can wait a day for the new episode...”

“I make no promises, since the last episode ended on a cliffhanger.. but I’ll try to be patient.” He smiled at your humor, but you were serous. The show was more enjoyable with him. 

“How did you get here?”, you eventually asked.

“I took a cab, but told them to let me out in front of a restaurant nearby. From there I walked.” In the pouring rain no less. Probably so the cab driver wouldn’t tell where he went. It was a clever ruse, but it was a shame that it was even necessary. 

“Need a ride home?”, you asked. “I think I’m not a bad driver and I have some minor experience with idol passengers.”

His smile grew even wider at that. “I wouldn’t have it any other way.”

“But I do stil have to work for an hour before I can take my break.”, you said, glancing at the clock on the wall.

“Just a break? What time do you go home?”

“This is just like a hospital with normal night shifts. Usually they are covered by our senior staff, but because some are on holiday, the task falls to me. So today, I’m staying till 7am. But I get the next day off.”, you explained. Those almost 24 hour shifts were draining, but rare, so you didn’t mind them at all. 

“Oh, I think I will need loads of coffee to make it until 7am...”, he said.

“What do you mean?”

“Well, I might as well keep you company. That will be the perfect way to show my gratitude.”

“You really don’t have you...”; you started. 

“I have a free day tomorrow as well, so I don’t mind.”, he insisted casually. “Besides, we get a chance to talk about that drama in person. It’s easier than typing.”

You still didn’t get why he wanted to stay. Somehow you could not imagine that it was because he simply started to enjoy your company through your online talks.

For almost the whole night, you just talked and drank copious amounts of coffee. He followed you on your patrol rounds, helping you with minor tasks whenever he could. And although it was strange, it was the best night shift ever. Most of the time, it didn’t feel like you were hanging out with an idol, but just with a really nice guy. A really handsome one at that. 

“This is nice.”, Jungkook said, voicing what you had been thinking. “But I do need another coffee.”

“You could also just take a nap.”, you offered. “I’ll wake you before it’s time to go.” It was already 4 am at this point. 

He seemed to think about the offer. “Ok, but we will grab some breakfast together to make up for lost time.”

Did he really feel like he owed you all this time? You weren’t quite sure what to answer, so you just nodded and went to grab him a blanket. There was a small sofa in the staff room specifically for the nightshift or patients who could not see blood. 

“Goodnight, Jungkook.”

“Goodnight, Y/N”

Hearing it live was so much better than reading his text you decided. And with a smile you made yourself another coffee to last the remaining hours. 

[spnfanficpond]

“China virus” is not a racial slur. Just cause you are anti-trump doesn’t make it one. You are just part of cancel culture and it’s gross that you would 1. Listen to someone who tattles on a member for saying something on their personal blog. And 2. You went on their blog in hunt of other “offensive” things. I know personally that said member is not racist or anything else that is so demeaning for you to say. Just cause your political views are different does not mean hate is required. The “I don’t like it- get rid of it” mentality of today’s society is getting out of hand. Pretty sure we could find offensive garbage on every members blog if we looked hard enough. I know I’m offended by all the nasty porn filled degrading garbage most writers put out, but I am mature enough to just scroll past. I’m sure my opening sentence offended you enough that you won’t read the rest of this... I await your hate filled response.

Sorry for the late reply, Nonnie. We wanted to make sure we were polite and respectful with our response.

1. ““China virus” is not a racial slur.”

Psychology Today and National Geographic disagree.

Reference to Covid19 as China Flu, China Virus or Kung Flu is a blame tactic and promotes a rhetoric that is harmful to Asian communities within the US and throughout the world. Furthermore, Asian communities the world over have expressed how hurtful this name is and how it engenders hate towards them. We don’t get to decide what hurts other people. They do, and they have, and they have told us, and it’s up to us to listen and adjust our behavior accordingly.

The virus has a name that offends no one. Why use the name that hurts people?

2. “Just cause [sic] you are anti-trump [sic] doesn’t make it one.”

Since the member who made the post did not mention who they voted for, it’s hard to argue that this is why we’ve done anything. Furthermore, since none of the admins here have discussed politics on this blog, what evidence do you have of who or what we support politically?

Besides, there’s nothing political about fighting racism, whether that racism is conscious and malicious or not.

3.  “You are just part of cancel culture....”

Actually, cancel culture is part of what we’re trying to keep out of the Pond. We are trying to promote positivity, not negativity. Love what you want to love. Shout about that love! Just don’t poop on what someone else loves if you don’t love it, too. That’s all we ask. Be nice to each other.

Cancel culture consists of active campaigns to turn the populace against someone. If you’re going to suggest that we are trying to cancel this person by kicking them out of the Pond, then I have to ask, who told you who it was? We didn’t. If we were on a mission to cancel them, we would have posted the original anon message notifying us of the problem, which included their name. We would have publicly shamed them and incited a riot against them. Instead, we kept their name out of it. There isn’t anything more we could have done to protect them while still addressing the issue.

Everyone has the right to say what they want. Everyone else has the right to not want to listen to it.

4. “[I]t’s gross that you would 1. Listen to someone who tattles on a member for saying something on their personal blog.”

We don’t stalk the blogs of any of our 400+ members. We don’t know what everyone is doing at all times. If someone wants us to address something from another member, they have to tell us it exists. Once we see that it exists, though, we have to act on it, whether we like it or not. It’s not fair to our other members, otherwise.

This was not “tattling”. This was someone coming to us because they didn’t feel comfortable with what they saw, knowing it was against one of our, like, two rules, and letting us know. Listening to them and acting on that concern is our job as admins of the group. Just the appearance of ignoring concerns caused us trouble in the past, because it’s our job to listen and respond.

This is what adults do. It’s why our society has court systems and newspapers. When one person is aggrieved, they tell someone, until something is done to fix it. “Tattling” is a word used by those desperate to stay out of trouble when they know they’ve done something wrong.

5. “ And 2. You went on their blog in hunt of other “offensive” things. “

Actually, we didn’t. The original message we received mentioned the racial slur and insensitive posts supporting anti behavior and either telling people, or using gifs to tell people, “to f**k off”.  

We then spent about five minutes scrolling and found exactly what we were told we would find. Definitely not a “hunt”.

6.  I know personally that said member is not racist or anything else that is so demeaning for you to say.

We never said they were racist, only that they used a racial slur. Even if the usage is “innocent” --not intended maliciously, but from ignorance-- it still needs to be addressed. We can’t correct our mistakes if we don’t know about them.

7. “Just cause [sic] your political views are different does not mean hate is required. The “I don’t like it- get rid of it” mentality of today’s society is getting out of hand.”

See above re: our political views.

We tried our best not to respond with hate. We tried to calmly inform them, and the rest of the Pond, that using hate speech is not tolerated in the Pond and set forth the consequences. The response we got was disrespectful, at the least, and included cursing.

As for the rest, see above re: cancel culture.

8. “Pretty sure we could find offensive garbage on every members [sic] blog if we looked hard enough.”

And we would hope that, once presented with the fact that they had said something hurtful, they would apologize and promise to be better in the future. Had the person in question done this, we probably would have reconsidered the expulsion.

We don’t want to be the Tumblr police, but we are the Pond police. We ask that our members be nice to everyone, and have, in the past, refused entry to some people who have filled their blogs with ant-whatever rhetoric. Depending on the level of hateful content on their blogs we have gone two ways: Some we have talked to, invited them to take some time to reconsider the content of their reblogs, and to re-apply in a few weeks or months. Some have been allowed entry, but told that we don’t like the hate in their posts, that we would prefer they keep their posts respectful, and to definitely keep it out of the Pond. Basically, they’ve had two choices: stop the hate or don’t be a member. Some have chosen to not be a member. That’s their choice. Those who have chosen to stop posting disrespectful anti-anything posts have joined and complied, to the best of our knowledge.

Our members are an example of who we want the Pond to be. We honestly don’t believe that asking people to respect others on their own blogs is that big of a deal. We’re not asking our members to love what we love or dislike what we dislike. We’re just asking them not to berate or diminish people who love what they dislike. Just don’t be hateful.

9. “I know I’m offended by all the nasty porn filled degrading garbage most writers put out, but I am mature enough to just scroll past.”

GOOD FOR YOU!!! Seriously!! This is exactly how we want our members to act! See something you don’t like? Just keep scrolling! This applies to ships, fics, and respectfully-presented opinions.

This does not apply to racial slurs or hate-filled posts intended to attack, demean, and/or hurt other people.

Using slurs or degrading language to hurt other people is not the same as disliking a ship. It’s a whole different ball of wax, and we will always treat it that way.

We don’t want a member to see something that is posted by another member and be personally HURT by it. We don’t know who sent the original message, but what if they were Chinese? Maybe the reason why they came to us was because one of our members hurt them by using a racial slur against them? We can’t let it stand. We just can’t.

10. “I’m sure my opening sentence offended you enough that you won’t read the rest of this... I await your hate filled response.”

Can’t say we were offended. Convinced that you were wrong, maybe, but not offended. We have tried to keep this as civil and respectful as possible. If anything came across hateful, that was not our intention.

We know you want to defend your friend and their values, which you obviously share. The fact that no one has reported you as having used racial slurs or posted hateful comments on your blog means that you understand where the line is in polite society and have chosen not to cross it. That’s really all we ask.

[dailynewsprime]

Why does India have so many COVID instances? | Coronavirus pandemic News

Something has gone horribly flawed in India. Today, the nation has reported 346,786 new instances of COVID-19 for the earlier 24 hours, with 2,624 deaths – the world’s highest daily toll for the reason that pandemic started final yr. Overall, almost 190,000 individuals have died from COVID within the nation, whereas greater than 16.6 million have been contaminated. The new outbreak in India is so extreme that hospitals are working out of oxygen and beds, and many individuals who have been taken unwell are being turned away. New Zealand, Hong Kong, the UK and the US have both banned direct flights to and from India, or have suggested residents towards travelling altogether; and the record could properly get longer. The UK’s prime minister, Boris Johnson, who's eager to safe a post-Brexit commerce cope with the nation, has been pressured to cancel a planned trip to India this coming week and, as an alternative, plans to fulfill with President Narendra Modi just about. For a rustic the place COVID numbers gave the impression to be dropping dramatically just some weeks in the past, what has gone so flawed in India? The Indian variant, generally known as B.1.617, seems to be wreaking havoc within the nation. Since April 15, India has been reporting greater than 200,000 instances of coronavirus on daily basis and its capital, Delhi, just lately introduced a week-long lockdown after an increase in instances there overwhelmed the healthcare system. “If we don’t impose a lockdown now, we might face a bigger calamity,” Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal mentioned as he addressed the town on Indian tv on April 19. Worryingly, mattress areas and oxygen supplies in hospitals seem like stretched, with experiences of sick sufferers being turned away from hospitals and social media feeds crammed with distraught relations whose family members can not entry the healthcare they want. On Wednesday this week, because the COVID toll was rising, Delhi’s highest court docket took the bizarre step of publicly criticising the central authorities and its method to managing the nation’s oxygen disaster. The court docket was listening to a petition filed by Max Hospitals looking for pressing assist to tide over the oxygen scarcity it was dealing with in six of its hospitals within the capital. “Human lives are not that important for the State it means. We are shocked and dismayed that government doesn’t seem to be mindful to the extremely urgent need of medical oxygen,” the Bench said. “We direct Centre to provide safe passage…so that such supplies are not obstructed for any reason whatsoever,” it mentioned. “Hell will break loose .” Damning phrases for the federal government in a time of disaster. It shouldn't be completely clear why this surge has occurred in India, however it's prone to be due to crowded occasions organised within the run-up to elections – President Modi himself hit the marketing campaign path addressing election rallies in Kerala, Tamil Nadu and Puducherry on March 30 because the upturn of instances started. Large teams and social gatherings throughout spiritual festivals have additionally performed a component, in addition to the re-opening of public areas and easing of lockdown measures which passed off steadily all through 2020 with the ultimate “unlocking” of restrictions taking place in December 2020. There can also be a lot concern in regards to the emergence of recent variants of the coronavirus in India. It is believed the dominant pressure within the nation now's the variant which was first recognized within the UK, and which has proven to be as much as 60 p.c extra transmissible between people. On March 25, it was additional introduced {that a} new “double mutant” variant had been detected in India, now generally known as the “Indian variant”. This growth is what has different international locations spooked. The Indian authorities don't assume this new variant has but change into the dominant COVID pressure within the nation, however it's prone to be contributing to the growing numbers. Genome sequencing of the brand new variant has proven that it has two vital mutations: 1. The E484Q mutation: This is just like the E484K mutation recognized within the Brazil and South African variants, which have additionally been reported in latest months. The concern is that this mutation can change elements of the coronavirus spike protein. The spike protein types a part of the coronavirus outer layer and is what the virus makes use of to make contact with human cells. Once contact has been made, the coronavirus then makes use of the spike protein to bind to the human cells, enter them and infect them. The immune response that the vaccines stimulate creates antibodies that concentrate on the spike protein of the virus particularly. Therefore, the fear is that if a mutation adjustments the form of the spike protein considerably, then the antibodies could not be capable of recognise and neutralise the virus successfully, even in those that have been vaccinated. Scientists are inspecting whether or not this may increasingly even be the case for the E484Q mutation. 2. The L452R mutation: This has additionally been present in a variant regarded as chargeable for outbreaks in California. This variant is believed to extend the spike protein’s capacity to bind to human host cells, thereby growing its infectivity. A examine of the mutation additionally suggests it could assist the virus to evade the neutralising antibodies that each the vaccine and former an infection can produce, although that is nonetheless being examined. This new wave in India has been devastating for the nation. A coordinated response is required between Indian states and central authorities to handle the provision of oxygen and important medicine if the variety of COVID-related deaths is to be introduced beneath management. There can also be a priority that we do not know the true number of deaths from COVID, as some individuals have died at house earlier than they might get to hospital and many others in India, notably in rural areas, have had issue accessing testing services. Pressure urgently must be lifted off the healthcare system and the one approach to do this is to ramp up the vaccination programme, strengthen social distancing procedures and re-introduce lockdown measures.

In the physician’s surgical procedure: Teaching medical college students throughout a pandemic

One of my passions as a physician is with the ability to move on my information to the docs of tomorrow. I have accomplished it for years and am a senior lecturer at two UK universities. A big a part of the instructing I do includes getting my college students to talk to and study sufferers. This has been a problem within the final 12 months as bringing sufferers into the surgical procedure for them to see college students has been too dangerous, and the sufferers that tended to have the sicknesses the scholars wanted to see have been usually shielding to cut back the probabilities of them catching COVID-19. Medical college students have been lending a serving to hand to COVID-ravaged hospitals everywhere in the world, and their help has been welcomed by many. But we additionally want to arrange them for a world past COVID and, within the restricted time we have with them, to make sure they're ready for a variety of medical circumstances from the bodily to the psychological. But how can we do this in the event that they have been unable to see sufferers as regular? Technology has been the reply. Our surgical procedure, the place I work as a household physician in Bradford, northern England, is fortunate sufficient to have a scientific abilities lab that college students can study in. This is a room that has “model” physique elements that the scholars can use for examination functions. Students can come into the surgical procedure and, initially, maintain phone consultations with sufferers, chatting with actual sufferers who ring in about their illnesses. The college students file a medical historical past by chatting with the sufferers and try to give you a administration plan which they then run previous me or one other physician for approval. Because the scholars can not study the sufferers bodily, we then make a listing of the examinations the scholars would have accomplished and, as soon as their clinic record is full, transfer over to the scientific abilities lab. I then ask them to observe the examination they might have accomplished on the fashions. This may embody a chest examination, a rectal or vaginal examination. The fashions will be adjusted so that every time the scholar makes use of them they may make a distinct examination discovering, equivalent to a brand new lump or irregular respiration sounds. It actually is kind of intelligent. Although it is going to by no means actually exchange the true factor, this methodology has allowed us to maintain medical schooling going all through the pandemic – one thing that has challenged medical colleges the world over.

And now, some excellent news: Exercising can cut back the dangers of COVID

A brand new study by Glasgow Caledonian University in Scotland has proven that common train can cut back the chance of getting infections like COVID-19 by as much as 37 p.c. The researchers carried out a full-scale systematic overview of 16,698 worldwide epidemiological research revealed between January 1980 and April 2020, with world-renowned immunologists and epidemiologists from University College London (UCL) within the UK and Ghent University (UGent) in Belgium, in addition to train and sports activities scientists from Cádiz University in Spain and a public well being marketing consultant from NHS Lanarkshire (NHSL) within the UK. They discovered that doing half-hour of train which will get you out of breath and a bit sweaty 5 instances every week strengthens your immune response to infectious ailments. It is believed that common train will increase the variety of immune cells within the physique appearing on the primary line of defence – the mucosal layer of antibodies. These cells are chargeable for figuring out international brokers or “germs” within the physique with out miserable the remainder of the immune system, so it’s completely protected and protects you towards infectious illness. We have recognized for a while about the advantages train can have for an individual’s general bodily and psychological well being. Now, within the time of COVID, it has been proven to assist enhance your immune system too. So the message is obvious; get open air and train in the event you can or to the health club whether it is in line with your native COVID tips. If neither is feasible, your kitchen or front room is a wonderfully good place to do half-hour of dancing, leaping or no matter floats your boat!

Reader’s query: Is it protected to go to my hospital appointment throughout a pandemic?

Over the previous 12 months, individuals have repeatedly been informed that the most secure place for them is house and that hospitals are busy coping with COVID-19 sufferers. While that's true, it is usually vital to do not forget that different sicknesses have not gone away. I have discovered that many of my sufferers are usually not attending their appointments for different circumstances as a result of they're frightened about catching COVID or assume their sickness shouldn't be as vital as coronavirus. Hospitals and GP surgical procedures everywhere in the world have gone out of their option to make massive elements of their buildings COVID-free. This implies that they can be utilized for non-COVID-related companies and workers working there is not going to be crossing over to cowl COVID wards or clinics. So, in the event you obtain an appointment to attend a clinic or hospital service, it's actually vital that you simply do go. Read the full article

[vroenis]

Mood Dependence

The first tag I drop on the entry is of-course Kentucky Route Zero.

I forget whether I’ve talked about this before so here we are talking about it again some more. While I was playing KRZ and occasionally posting about it on social media, among others, two particular friends responded to me about it and we engaged, having some good discussions on and off. I suggested that playing the game might be highly mood dependent, but that for me engaging in most art is mood dependent, the only thing that varies is to what degree. If I was still more of a wanker, I might suggest that the more artsy-fartsy a product is, the more mood dependent it is but that’s not the case. I very much have to be in the right frame of mind to engage with Marvel or Bravest Warriors as much as Gaspar Noé, it really does depend on the individual and what mood they’re most frequently in or find themselves in at the time.

I find it affects more than the consumption of and engagement with art, tho. I don’t know if it’s a bipolar thing or a human thing and I say that a lot; it affects my ability to write, create, engage with people - enact actions in the world. The only thing I have to brute-force my way thru is of-course my employment which raises particularly interesting capitalistic questions of societal structure. I’m not entirely here to smash the establishment tho - there are times where discipline is useful; on a base level, discipline and the ability to overcome how we feel assists us with survival and sure it’s disgusting to apply that to the nth degree entirely in the ultimate capitalist sense, but again on a base level, being able to hold down a job in an of itself isn’t necessarily evil. Before we go Burning Down The Corporations, I need to make careful distinctions between my mental states and my physical states, as a first example. Minds and bodies are complex systems and understanding them is my responsibility.

Nevertheless I can never stray too far from my iconoclastic nature and Art-capital-A is one of my most primary motivators. There is definitely plenty wrong in the world at large we have created over generations and the societal structures therein regarding how we understand people and psychology and I’m fairly certain we will never address it to our ultimate destruction, that is fairly observable, mundane, and an immense tragedy for literally billions of people who will luck out in the birth lottery or have already done so. Art is the only thing that from a pragmatic perspective is both meaningless and unnecessary and so becomes the most essential and important thing for humanity. We must inject the most meaning and emotion into it possible. It becomes charged with the most powerful intangible things we have; our emotions. This is why bad art must be celebrated and documented. Anger, frustration, humour is just as valuable as everything we think is noble.

It’s also why the struggle to create is very real and perhaps one of the greatest challenges. It’s probably why I pushed myself to write today. Usually I’m cautious about pushing myself to produce, and I want to again be very careful with the language I use being so capitalist, even if only by stating it. It’s hazardous discussing everything in terms of product - I know I mentioned in a previous entry and Capitalism tries to convince you that everything you create is a product and it has no value unless someone is buying it, so a reminder to myself and to you that it’s not what’s happening here. I could frame it as exercise, and I’m now thinking (typing? lol) aloud in that an exercise is effectively an investment - a preparation for ability, capability for the future and again it all sounds quite capitalist, doesn’t it? Do we always do things only with the hope of some kind of profit? A return on investment? Do we evaluate everything only if and when there is a return, at the valuation point, like a board game about speculative stocks? If the board game never concludes because of an unforeseen interruption, do we not name a winner and so the game and the stocks - the product and our labour - never had any value?

Do I write this to answer these questions, or only to ask them, and which has value?

All the philosophy majors will have a lot of angles on what has value or whether there’s any point to value at all as a frame which is great. Value as a phenomena is a whole Thing - we can discuss whether or not I have any intent to create or suggest Value capital V (that’s getting annoying, I know, so that will be the last time) but that will be fairly pointless.

(I made that; you can steal it).

Over the last few entries, I’ve not directly talked about the one monumental current event that’s dominated the attention of world at large. If you note the dates on these entries and you’re visiting from the future, you may have to look up what was happening around now if I haven’t mentioned it explicitly anywhere as I likely won’t. There was one vague reference to it in the Kaossilator post which is as close as I care to get. There are so many other things happening in our lives (J and mine) that I’d say were interruptions, but they’re not really - they’re just life, but they’re the daily challenges that make creating difficult.

It means coming here and writing weekly or bi-weekly, as is my intention, is a challenge. It means turning on all my gear and working on music is a huge challenge. It means watching films and sometimes even YouTube is a challenge. A lot of it it energy dependent, heaps of it is naturally time dependent, but for me a significant portion is mood dependent and my understanding of that is it’s more dimensional than just not feeling like it.

Over dinner a while ago, our family were discussing films released in 2019 and which was my favourite and honestly I think I got around to seeing one. I think the next most recent film I saw in the last 12 months was Hereditary which I enjoyed most, so if I see a film within 24 months of its release these days, I’m doing well. Mostly this is due to time and opportunity, but it’s mostly due to mood; I just don’t want to watch most films, even ones I’m interested in seeing and want to watch. 

Our hosts also asked us what we thought of the place as they’d just recently moved in and were still in the process of moving things around and my perspective was and is that I like subtle - and often not so subtle suggestions of separations of space for application. When I read, I read in specific places. When I create music, I only do it in the studio, tho there are exceptions when I take one or two smaller pieces of gear out of the room as that’s a ton of fun for a refreshing change. When I play games, it’s on the consoles down at the television, the same goes for when I watch films or shows - we don’t have more than one room with TVs in them, and while J can and does watch shows on her iPad in bed, it’s not something I can do. For me, I want a dedicated space in which I focus on film to engage with it.

This applies to the times when I create and engage with art, too, and I’ve mentioned before that there are even times when I do and don’t listen to certain albums or pieces of music. In this post-KRZ life I’m in, (need to change the name of this journal to Art Worth Dying For: or Life Post-Kentucky Route Zero), I’m trying to write these longer posts every Friday night after work, but it’s turning out to be either Saturday during the day, Saturday evening or on the Sunday. During the week I try to add something shorter, but I do want to maintain some semblance of regular discipline because writing is good for me, in particular in lieu of ceasing other online activities. I’ve found that engagement in general is low on other platforms, and while it does occur rarely and at a moderate level, it isn’t regular enough for my liking. Like many, I’ve taken a somewhat passive role on Instagram where the Stories are utilised to post temporary activity and engagement is higher, and on Facebook I respond to posts in the Akai Force group where necessary but only when relevant which isn’t often.

I’d rather come here and write endlessly and be orderly, in short and long-format text, and as expressed in my Instagram stories; even post images in a more static format that invites slower digestion and contemplation with a view to better interpolation of text and context of that text in relation to the images.

It doesn’t matter that I don’t have an audience here, what matters is that I like the form and format and that it feels right for my expression. It allows me to inject value into it, so I guess it’s good product then; even if no-one is buying. Good ol’ capitalism. I don’t know if writing discipline will lead to music discipline, that’s certainly not one of the aspirations I maintain - if it’s a side-effect, it’s welcome. Nevertheless, there’s a charm in writing publicly and being able to come back, re-read my thoughts and reflect on what comes out when I plug directly into what’s going on and let some of the previous week spill out, delineated in text and a few images - these tiny snapshots of what life is like for me. I feel like it’s valuable, insightful even if just for me, for what my life is becoming, the Art that is shaping it along with the events I’m experiencing - am subject to. That’s ominous, as it should be. It should be for us all. We are subject to Art.

[quarantingz]

attempting to write again...

sunday, 7 june at 10 am

The truth is I haven’t posted in God knows how long because with every attempt I’ve made to write, it would just get cut short by this nagging need for every sentence to be grammatically perfect and equally profound. For it to be coherent and concise. But that’s not how my mind works at all. What initially was supposed to be a safe and healthy space (and way) for Alyssa and I to express ourselves had turned into something more regulated, for me at least. I had slept with my social editor (credits to Welby Ings for coining this term) which extended beyond a one night stand and now I need to break up with him. So please bear with me as I now proceed to do exactly that, by trying to write after many previous failed attempts. Only this time with less judgment and resistance.

I guess another truth worth mentioning as to why I haven’t returned from my writing hiatus, if we want to call it that, was because I was wrestling with a lot of thoughts and ideas. Both internal and external, ever since coming out of lockdown and back into society. Almost like an ex-convict freed from jail. Only I didn’t see iso as anything closely resembling imprisonment but rather a time for rest and retreat. It’s funny because the book I spent almost all of quarantine in the company of (I consider books as my friends at this point) was about house arrest too. I learned a lot from that book. I’ll quote a handful of lines that stood out to me throughout this blogpost.

Right now I’m sitting here reflecting again on what lockdown entailed for me. I know I’m not alone in saying that it was actually a really positive experience. Although difficult in the beginning, I allowed myself to relax for once. Yes I still felt on edge, anxious and frantic at times but most of my mornings were sacred and something to look back fondly on.

I’m going to be honest again and say that I’m finding it hard to continue writing right now. Before creating this Note entry, everything was coming so clearly and naturally to me but now that I’m trying to articulate my thoughts, I can’t seem to get past this huge boulder blocking my way. And it’s really fucking annoying, to say the least. But I’ll keep trying.

Let me use some of the stuff I’ve been writing in my journal as prompts… In it I wrote a few days ago that one of my biggest fears, if not my worst one, is to lose (connection with) myself. Now I’ve put those two words in brackets because at its core, I think I’m generally just scared of losing myself. Which has a lot of other things attached to it. I’m scared of losing for even a moment what I’ve recently perceived as this heightened self-awareness I’ve somehow gained during lockdown. I’m scared of the thought of not progressing in my personal, career and spiritual growth. Of plateauing in even one of these departments.  

When level 2 started and I was able to be in the presence of another being in close proximity again, I kind of felt weird. I missed solitude which I forget was always something I craved as an introvert wherever I can squeeze it in each day. Given that I had more moments of solitude than I’ve ever had in my whole life in the two months we were all forced to stay inside our homes, I got too comfortable with this new way of living. I woke up, checked my sleep quality, meditated, walked the dogs, made coffee, read Scriptures, did deep work for at least two hours (which was made possible by putting my phone on airplane mode), had proper sit-down lunches with my family, read for leisure and ran regularly. In retrospect, it was the best retreat I could’ve asked for. To top it all off, there was no real pressure coming from my manager on the project I was working on. All in all, it was a great time and I can’t express enough how grateful I am to have had that privilege. To actually experience work-life balance in its rawest form.

Hence why I think it was so fitting that I stumbled upon the novel A Gentleman in Moscow which centred around an excellent example of a man who lives an intentional and purposely unrushed life while under house arrest. Someone who genuinely enjoys life’s simple pleasures. “When all was said and done,” he argues, “the endeavours that most modern men saw as urgent . . . probably could have waited, while those they deemed frivolous (such as cups of tea and friendly chats) had deserved their immediate attention.”

But after a fulfilling day of experiencing the latter with Alyssa and Cullen, I got home and was suddenly hit by this familiar wave of guilt for not “working on something” at the moment. Although this growth mindset has served me well all my life, it has also impeded my ability to tune into the Now. In saying that, I feel like quarantine primed me for what's next. And I do feel like something new is coming. Not just for me but for all of us. Cullen felt and pointed it out too. While there have been a lot of challenging events that happened through the course of the year so far, the optimist in me can’t help but feel like something good can still come out of all of this. Of course there are also a lot of other layers to this feeling. Anxiety, dread, boldness, excitement, intimidation, glee, hope, determination, faith, fear, love, doubt. And it doesn’t just end there. It’s perpetual. Cyclical. Contradictory. Which is part of the human condition and brings me to this line in the aforementioned book:

“By their very nature, human beings are so capricious, so complex, so delightfully contradictory, that they deserve not only our consideration, but our reconsideration—and our unwavering determination to withhold our opinion until we have engaged with them in every possible setting at every possible hour.”

There’s a lot to learn and more importantly relearn. About humanity and society at large. The past and how we want to move forward and change for the better. Which is going to take a hell of a lot of work that doesn’t occur overnight. In the context of the Black Lives Matter movement, I’ve been seeing a lot of inspiring statements about showing up however we can and how being an ally to the oppressed can manifest in various ways. And if we think about it there is no point in fighting when the very goal is to support, respect and love each other. So I guess what I’m trying to do is echo Alyssa’s words on checking within ourselves first before we take action or impose anything on anyone else. To withhold judgment aimed towards another being since at the end of the day we’re all just One Body aren’t we? (Thanks to Alyssa and Cullz for bringing up this term yesterday) 

I feel like I could say so much more but I’m no expert in social studies or anything for that matter so I’ve refrained from publicly speaking up. Alas, admitting ignorance is often the first and important step to gaining knowledge. Conversely, listening closely before speaking is integral to understanding. Two truths that I’m currently living by and trying to improve on. 

with tender love and respect,

- p

[kanrakixystix]

Sink or Swim -- Corqi

Hey it’s me. I’m alive. I’m still writing FFXV but I’m super slow at it nowadays. 

But hey! I finally have permission to post this publicly! So here we go! This was my entry for the @ffxvrarepairs charity zine I was a part of earlier this fall. I had a ton of fun writing it, too! 

Title: Sink or Swim Pairing: Cor/Loqi (FFXV) Rated: T Summary: Loqi is forced to take time off before the harrowing events that will soon befall the Citadel, so he takes the opportunity to spend time with his overseas boyfriend before the Empire completely shatters his world. What is a shame, though, is that Loqi may be in over his head in more ways than one.  Word count: 2,943

-

Time off wasn’t always afforded to high-ranking military officers, especially not when they were in the midst of war. There was planning to be done, maneuvers to practice, adjustments to be done to his mechs, but that would all wait for a later date. As he was told by the high commander, he was starting to look tired from overwork, and he was to take a mandatory leave, effective at the end of the week. Loqi could have argued, but the weight of this war and his efforts to ensure Niflhiem’s victory were beginning to wear on him. No measure was too great to pull his own in this war. He had has family’s name to consider, after all.

 There was the matter of deciding how to spend his impromptu vacation, however. He could simply go home and spend his days enjoying his mother’s cooking – something else that he didn’t get to indulge in nearly as much as he would like to because of this war. Staying there, though, meant that he would have to hear his father ramble about his days serving the Empire before his accident rendered him incapable of his duties as an officer. Sure, he loved a good war story now and then, but Loqi’s father had a penchant for repeating the same ones that he had heard since he was a child. He could only listen to how he assisted Chief Besithia take down the Astral Shiva and how great a victory it was so many times. Then there was the constant grilling of tactics and plans that he always wanted to discuss…

 Yes, his mother’s cooking would have to wait for some other time. Instead, he had a much more pleasant idea.

-

 Without cracking an eye open, Loqi’s hand fumbled along the other side of the bed, and a pout pulled at his lips when he felt the sheets had already cooled. Of course The Immortal would be up at the crack of dawn on vacation. Groaning, he rolled over in the bed, which was significantly less comfortable now that he knew there wasn’t the weight of the other man beside him. Peeking from underneath the sheet, he was met with the glow of morning reflecting off of Galdin’s crystal waves. He lie quietly for a time, watching the water ebb and flow with the tide. To Loqi, it was magical as much as it was scientific, how gravity created the flow of currents and tides, but it was marvelous all the same.  

 The slow creak of the door to their room reached his ears, followed by the smell of coffee, then the dip of the bed beside him. A strong, large hand brushed the hair from his face and trailed down his cheek. Loqi couldn’t help but lean into it. Curse his touch-starved self.

 “Is that for me?” he asked into Cor’s palm, skipping the morning pleasantries altogether.

 “Nope,” Cor smirked and tipped the mug of coffee towards him before taking a long sip from the plain white mug. Asshole. “Yours is on the table if you want it.”

 Loqi huffed, indignant as he sank further into the pillows and narrowed his eyes at him. He did this on purpose, and Loqi supposed he should give him more credit than he normally did. Cor’s ears were deaf to begging, even in the more – ahem – intimate of situations, so pleading with him to just hand him the damn mug was useless. However, if he got up an got it himself, Loqi would have to crawl over him to get to the coffee, which would not only leave himself wide open for the Marshal’s viewing pleasure, but it would force him out of bed, and that was the last thing he wanted to be. He was rather enjoying the waves crashing on the shore and staring at them from afar.

 “Let’s get moving,” Cor drawled as he stood, stretching his arms over his head. “The beach is a lot nicer up close.” Yawning, Loqi curled his legs under him and sat up, allowing the sheets to pool around his waist to expose pale, soft skin. There were some small scars on his arms and chest. Such was the price to pay as a war mechanic, but it offered Cor a view that would become commonplace over the duration of their getaway. As Loqi rubbed the sleep from his eyes, Cor grabbed the coffee from the table and handed it to him. Of course, Loqi wouldn’t give him the satisfaction of a proper ‘thank you,’ but he figured a gracious smile around the rim of the mug would suffice.

 -

 The beach was more or less foreign to Loqi. The only shorelines in Niflhiem were frozen over and caked with snow and ice. Topless? Forget it. If you wanted to get close to any water, you needed six layers of clothes and spiked boots just to traverse the shore. Loqi recalled a particular time he had gone on a research expedition with his father to the Chorovas Rift, and they had gotten so lost that they ended up on the shore of the Sathersea. He shivered just thinking about the chill that had settled in his young bones and nearly froze him to death.

 Galdin Quey was different.

 Donned in plaid short and an oversized tank top, Loqi shielded his eyes from the late morning sun as he stepped from the hotel room. Already, there was quite a crowd, though he knew most of them were only there to get their hands on the cuisine. True, it wasn’t as good as the food at Maagho in Altissia, but it came damn near close. Still, there were the few that were there the peace and quiet Galdin had to offer.

 As he fell into step beside Cor, Loqi brushed his knuckles along the back of his hand. The gesture was simple enough, but between them, it spoke volumes. Oh, he knew the dangers of being seen in public with the enemy. Not a day went by that he didn’t think of the consequences of having fallen for a military man for the opposing side of the war. Quite often, he would remind himself that at any moment they could be facing one another in the heat of battle, and they would have to pretend that taking the other’s life would mean nothing to them. It was a hard pill to swallow, but just as subtly as he had grazed their hands together, Cor entwined their fingers – another silent gesture, but it made Loqi’s heart skip a beat, even if he wouldn’t admit that he squeezed his hand just a little to keep him close.

 He would be thankful for the potential sunburn on his cheeks that covered the blush.

 Off a little ways, people played in the water, disturbing the natural peace, but also enveloping themselves in its natural benefits. Not that Loqi believed any of them were taking a dip in the sea for health reasons, but the fact remained that there was an abundance of swimming, splashing, and his all-time favorite, screaming. Nothing drove him insane faster than the sound of a child shrieking for no apparent reason other than to hear themselves, except for Cor and his love of WATCHING them. Loqi had hoped beyond hope that they would simply stroll by them and not pay them any mind, but no, that had been too much to ask for. They idled at the end of the pier, beneath a large umbrella that casted as much shade as Loqi was with his eyes.

 “Look at them,” Cor said after a long moment of staring out at a group of children near the shoreline.

 “I see them.” Brushing his hair from his bangs, Loqi rolled his eyes and leaned on the railing in front of them. “They’re children. Loud children. Can we move on?”

 “If the Empire continues their research and plans to control the Crown City, they might not ever get to smile like they are now, again.”

 A long, irritated groan escaped Loqi’s lips.

 “I thought we agreed upon hanging up our political difference for the duration of our stay,” he chided, then turned his head to look at the older man. Cor looked distant, as though he were here, but his thoughts – maybe his memories – weren’t. Loqi admitted that he knew only a minimal amount of Cor’s past despite his curiosity. He’d ask, and Cor would always give him the same answers. “And bore you to death with the details?” “Don’t you have anything better to do than listen to me ramble?” or simply, “Not tonight.” His gaze flicked between Cor and the children, and Loqi wondered if they were seeing the same thing. He was willing to bet not.

 “Hey.” Standing upright, Loqi turned to face him fully. “We’re on vacation,” he teased quietly, and he gently swung their joined hands to and fro. “So…lighten up a little.” Loqi shifted from one leg to the other, suddenly uncomfortable with this weird vulnerability that only happened when he was alone with the Lucian.

 Slowly, Cor shifted his gaze to him, and it was then that Loqi realized how grave of a mistake that was.

 “Come on,” he muttered, taking advantage of the fact that their hands were still locked together to drag Loqi off of the pier and into the sand.

 “What are you – ? Unhand me, damn it!” Loqi demanded. Even as Loqi struggled and tried to pull him back, Cor persisted. The closer they got to the water, the more Loqi panicked, and the more he fussed. He wasn’t afraid of open water, really. If anything, he was curious what was under there. Sure, he had a particular knack for machines, but marine biology was a fascinating science. Of course, he couldn’t speak from experience. That’s just what he had read in books and essays. No, water didn’t scare him.

 As the water splashed his feet, he screeched.

 “Cor, stop!” Then, and only then, did Cor turn to look at him, as did everyone else who heard the rather unmanly yelp. Shamefaced, Loqi turned his head away. Maybe this vacation was stupid. He didn’t know what he had hoped to gain from it, or what he expected, but the more heat continued to rise in his cheeks, the more it didn’t matter.

 “What’s wrong?” Cor’s asked, but he couldn’t hear him. The steadfast thump of his heart racing in his chest and blood rushing through his veins and pounded in his ears. Finally, Loqi jerked his hand hard enough for Cor to let go – or did Cor let him go on purpose? Either way, he was free of him, but he couldn’t move. His legs felt like lead, and the longer he stood still in the soft sand, the further he sank.

 “Loqi?” Cor tried again and took a careful step towards him. He wasn’t the only one. Suddenly there were others, asking him, asking Cor, if everything was all right. Overwhelmed, Loqi forced himself to move – away from the questions and prying eyes, away from Cor. Everything was happening so rapidly, and he just wanted the space to process it. Cor let him leave, though not without keeping a watchful eye, he knew. That was okay.

 He just needed to breathe.

-

 Eventually, the sun began to sink into the sea. That was when Cor came for him. The crowds bearing rowdy children and nosy teenagers had slowly dwindled, leaving only the couples and lonely dwellers – hunters, fishermen, and the like. Most of them occupied the restaurant, but not them.

 Loqi let the water rush past his feet as he stood, mesmerized by the sunset. Yet another pleasantry that was only afforded to him when he set foot in foreign territory. The colors were warm, comforting. He felt like he could stare forever and get lost in the depth of its beauty.

 “You can get closer, you know,” Cor suggested softly from behind, and Loqi tipped his head. He was still a little angry, though mostly at himself for overreacting. It was just a little bit of water, after all.

 “Chasing sunsets now, Marshal?” he teased, and Cor chuckled. Loqi allowed himself to be enveloped in strong arms.

 “I need something to do when I’m not chasing you,” Cor joked back, and Loqi smirked. They were silent for a moment, taking in the atmosphere, when Cor continued. “I’m sorry for what happened earlier. I shouldn’t have dragged you out like that.”

 Shaking his head, Loqi sighed.

 “No, I should have been upfront about this from the start,” he confessed, chuckling dryly. “Truth is, I don’t know how to swim.” Loqi paused, waited for the condescending snort, laugh, something. When it didn’t come, he turned around. As he did, Cor dropped his arms from around him.

 “Now what are you doing? You’re seriously not going to try and drag me into the water again, are you? Because I swear to –“

 Loqi’s rant came to an abrupt halt as he watched Cor shed off his t-shirt, which had him flushing for a whole new reason, but he still had no sunburn to blame it on. He bit his bottom lip and inhaled sharply. He wanted to touch. Oh, did he want to touch. Slowly, he lifted his arm, fingers twitching as he reached for Cor…only for him to step just out of reach. Now pouting, Loqi watched as he stepped past him and into the water, turning to face him.

 “You want it? Come and get it.” Cor taunted, a playful glint shining in his damnably gorgeous eyes. Huffing, Loqi crossed his arms.

 “No way! I just told you I can’t swim!” He hissed indignantly, and Cor chuckled.

 “Despite what you or others might think, I won’t let you drown, Shorty.”

 If the tips of his ears weren’t already red from drinking in the sight of Cor’s half naked body, the low-blow insult definitely set them ablaze. Without giving it another thought, Loqi tore his tank top over his head, fuming as he tossed it into the sand beside Cor’s. As Cor held out his arms – which only seemed to mock him further – Loqi stomped through the water.

 “You know what? This is all your fault in the first place!” He yelled, pushing the water aside with each stride. “Just once, I wanted to come out here on peaceful terms. I wanted to get away from war and politics and not have to follow through with orders that destroy your home! But, no!” His palms slammed onto the surface of the water as he continued his advance, but Cor remained just out of reach.

 “You had to talk about how the war affects the children and then get all distant. And then I can’t even help you or relate to you because you won’t tell me what’s going on in that stupid head of yours and instead you just take off into the water without asking me if I know how to swim!” He took another step, but the ground beneath him dropped off. Before he could stop himself, he sank, and the water’s surface rested just below his chin. Quick hands stopped him from going any further, though, and Cor lifted him easily. Gasping, Loqi hastily wrapped himself around Cor, arms and legs clinging to him for dear life, and all the while, Cor roared with laughter.

 “What kind of boyfriend are you?!” Loqi squealed, and it only made Cor laugh harder.

 “The kind that won’t let you drown, as promised,” he responded smoothly. Loqi would let it slide, for now, but it didn’t change the fact that he was still seething.

 “Look,” Cor motioned out to the open water where the sun was starting to disappear into the horizon. Again, Loqi was lost in the colors. How could something so simple bring such an immense amount of peace? He adjusted, and he gave a soft, content sigh as he felt the pads of Cor’s thumbs trace small circles in his back.

 “I was one of those children, once,” Cor explained softly. Carefree, never giving war a second thought, until it took away my family. My friends, everyone I ever cared about, gone. I was alone.”

 Loqi wanted to fluster. He wanted to boast about the Empire, to tell him that they should feel worthy to have died by the hands of the glorious Niflheim. Instead, he frowned. Politics be damned, his lover was being open, for once, and he was going to be here for him. Silently, he tipped his head and kissed him. It was chaste, different from many of their past kisses that were usually rushed and left a taste just sweet enough for him to want more. This kiss was long, slow, and Loqi hoped beyond hope the it said everything that he couldn’t.

 As they parted, Cor smiled, and held him just a little tighter.

 “I’ve never told anyone that,” he confessed. “At least no one important.” As Loqi let his words sink in, he found himself running his hands through his hair, amused at how the silver hairs that were creeping in glittered in the dusk light.

 “That makes us even, then,” Loqi declared, offering him an understanding smile.

 “Even,” the marshal repeated, and leaned in, kissing Loqi again. The war was far from over, but Loqi knew without a doubt that one way or another, Cor Leonis was going to be the death of him. One day, he would make his peace with that. Today, he was going to enjoy the rest of his vacation.

[thehabilableheart]

An open letter to my ex.

03|10|2019 // I genuinely don't think I've ever closed any doors or burned any bridges with anyone.. family, friends, or exes.. who have done me wrong. Tonight, I did, by choice, burn a very toxic bridge.. and I didn't even allow myself to stand and watch the flames burn out, or the wind carry away the ashes. I turned, held up my chin, and walked away. I've never allowed myself to kill relationships out of fear I may be losing something potentially important... But I learned that the only importance a burned or burning bridge holds, is a lesson. Allowing it to fester can cause so much angst… Thank you for being my lesson, sweetheart.  I won't ever allow you or your toxic "love" into my life again. Not yours or anyone else’s. I will always think of what’s best for me and my end goal.

An open letter to my ex who isn’t just an ex, but the one I considered my best friend, too. Usually, I wouldn’t write out the things running through my head about you publicly. I’d send them directly to you. But what good does that do? None. Further, the point of these posts is for people to see me, raw and open. They want to see everything I’m going through. This time, this entry will be a little different than my norm in multiple ways. A more…. Snarky type text, if you will. A bit of a “fuck you” of sorts to a someone I thought would always be my someone. He’s never going to read it though. He doesn’t care enough.

See sweetheart, I love your bravery. No matter what situation you catch yourself in, you always maneuver swiftly and come out of it. Even the ones that could easily ruin you. I admire your strength to keep pushing. No matter what it is in your way. You have an extreme, dark, in depth, intellectual mind. I love the way your brain works. I’ve always been a little envious of your smarts. We both know I lack a bit in that region.. You fully took advantage of that. My lack of logic, some would say. Maybe a lack of common sense. It’s funny. You’re so determined to be someone.. But you’re too caught up in having multiple someones around you, that you’ve become multiple someones, too! You put in so much work everywhere you go, in all that you do, all without breaking face. Even if the majority of the work you’re doing is put into your acting. You’re really good at that. Acting, I mean. You’re so handsome. SO handsome. When you’re focused but also excited about the work you’ve put into new adult (I’m talking guns here!) toys, or those dumb new video games, you’re such a fun energy. OH. Let’s not forget your strong focus on telling stories straight, though. That one is SUPER important. Kind of admirable as well. You make everything you do in life seem so… easy. Just like I did, right? Made things easy? Or was that all 4 of us? (Are there more than 4 over the last 15 years? Hm.) Not much affects you. If it does, well.. we’ve talked about how great of an actor you are. You’re great at pretending.. at being something else. You’re usually day, but I preferred when you were night. Usually you’d get drunk and control fuck me (Can’t say I don’t miss that..Haha. Cuz I do). When was our last time? January 4th was the last night I remember. Then I got completely wasted a week later, almost broke your tv, and woke up without my pants on, with no recollection of how I got to your bed..

You have an authenticity problem.. you have “fraud” written all over your face. You really could just be honest. With me, and her, the second her, and the one between me and the second. Maybe then we all could have trusted you with more than just a decent (sometimes half ass) fuck. You were a good enough distraction. For a while. I’ll give you that. But theres always better. You could have been worth more than just being temporary medicine, though. Sadly, I’ve come to realize that’s really all you were. But you aren’t potent enough. I don’t crave you. I’m not having withdrawals the way I did from A (the one you’re scared I’ll choose over you! [at this point, he’s a MUCH better option]…) when he left me broken before an 8 month deployment. I don’t miss you. I don’t have the urge to wait 8 months for you to come back to me. I’m pretty sure tonight I made the possibility of that extremely non-existent, anyway, am I right? Ha! I wouldn’t come back to me after finding out everything you’re going to find out when you wake up today. 

All of “us” was just a way to ease your tensions, your stresses from all the work you put into pretending you’re someone you’re not, right? It’s been a nice distraction I’m sure. Or maybe, it was your way of focusing on something other than the fact that you’re having to hide and clean your own dirty fucking laundry in plain site, right? So none of us will notice it? You abuse the things that distract from your pain. We’re YOUR medicine. YOU’RE the addicted one. Not us. All of us are capable of walking away. It’s not just us, either. Even your “friends”. Is that too harsh? A little bit painful? Do you even FEEL pain? Maybe you’re like me in the sense that you enjoy being hurt. You enjoy that overwhelming rush because at least you’re feeling something, right?… Silly idea, I think. You’re just extremely fucked in the head. You’ve made me feel fucked in the head too. I’m sure you have your own life experiences to blame. But you don’t get to fuck with other peoples lives because your life is a living nightmare. 

I saw it in your eyes… when you told me we were done because you decided you wanted to be alone and get yourself together, yet now I’m sure you’re fucking every girl in town again (your instagram numbers have gone up again - I already checked out all the sluts)… I saw that you were happy I was leaving. I saw the relief. Even in that last hug getting me and my pup into my car (that you used for months because your second had yours), that was broken down on the street in front of your house for weeks, I saw the excitement. I saw that you were genuinely relieved to be free again. That you were free, truthfully for the first time. Because in 15 years, you’ve never been free. But that didn’t stop you from doing whatever you wanted to. Let’s face it - we’re both the same in the sense that we always have a back up, “so to speak”. (You love that phrase - it still fucking annoys me) We don’t like to be alone. If we aren’t taken by someone, if we aren’t in a solid relationship… we’re sleeping with someone to fill that void.. Not even a void. We both just need that distraction. I’m sure too, that the moment I left.. the moment I drove down that drive…smiles crossed all three of your single, drunk, pathetic faces, “the single brothers are back!”  was shouted, and the shots kept pouring, right? The music got loud again. The feeling of not having a single care in the world returned. Did the cocaine too? Or are we not back there yet? Maybe we’ll wait for summer! Everyone close to us knows how much you enjoy a bit of snow on a bright, sunny day.

You’re a father, you know? To a little girl. One day she’ll be a woman. One day your daughter is going to be her mother. Your second. The middle between the second and me. And me. Have you thought of that? Have you taken a good long look at yourself and evaluated the way you’ve treated any of us? Have you asked “would I be happy if my daughter was with someone like me? A BOY?” Any good parent would say no. Any involved, loving parent would say “FUCK no. Not now, not ever.” But you’re not an involved parent. You’re hardly a loving parent. Visiting twice a year, literally saying you don’t even want to go back home, but you do for her, then you sleep in while she plays with the iPad.. rarely calling her, and when you do, only briefly talking and barely listening to what she has to say.. You can’t deny it. I’ve been in the room with you while you played with your guns and told her you were going to bed around 9:30, just to hang up and turn around to play video games until 2AM. But you’re so full of the lie that is you pretending you’re stronger than you are. You’re so full of the lie that is you pretending you’ve got yourself all pieced together. Pretending you have a plan. Pretending you’re the most amazing human being, man, and father out there. But really. Take a look at yourself. Sit down, evaluate, then ask yourself, “Am I the person I want my daughter to marry?” If you can honestly look at yourself and say yes, I hope she’s smarter than you.

You know that’s why I left them, right? The last two that you listened to and watched me cry over because, you know, you were my best friend? My only “REAL” friend. My 3AM phone calls. The only one who would pick up. The only one who would listen when I didn’t know what to do. And for what? Why’d you do that to me? So you could play with me like a pawn on a game board?! PSH. Fuck you. But anyway, I’m sorry, I’ve gotten a little bit selfishly side tracked. That’s all besides the point of this paragraph. Let me get back to it. The two previous boys I was with. You know who I’m talking about! The one you’re scared I’ll run back to, instead of you, when he’s free again, and the one you convinced me was right to leave? Leaving them was a choice I knew was best to make because I knew I never wanted my daughter to watch me be miserable in my relationships, and I didn’t want her to think it was alright to end up with boys like them. And I most definitely don’t ever want my son raised by a BOY like ALL THREE of you. Your daughter, she deserves a man. He may not be biological. But she has a man in her life. A genuinely good father figure. How sad it isn’t you. Then again, what do I know? My children’s step mother has been a better mother than me here the last two years. At least I’m thankful for her. I let her know that too. I thank her for loving my children as if they are her own. I thank her for being patient, kind, and respectful. I give her credit where it’s due. But again, I’m getting side tracked.

If I remember correctly, she was an accident, right? You didn’t even know for sure if she was yours or not? OH OH! OH! And please, don’t worry yourself at all! You know how social I am. I “don’t know a stranger”. Her mother? I adore her. Such a sweet, respectful, kind, strong, smart fucking woman. (Hopefully the littles come out like her!) But I was under the impression that she was so horrible, sweetheart. But it’s a fucking trend. Her, your second, and the girl between me and #2. All “terrible” women. So what does that say about me? What is your “the truth about my last”? I’ve already spoken to 2 of the 3. It’s easy for all of us to sort out what’s real and what’s fake. I’ll be sure your first gets word on her place in your mind. Or at least her place in the words that come out of your mouth behind her back, since everyone knows you don’t say what you think 1, and 2, you don’t ever tell the truth. I’m finally seeing why men don’t want us to meet their exes. They don’t want us to find out all the fucked up shit they do.

It’s sad that you’re so insecure with the person you are (we know, you’ll never admit it) that you have to make everyone around you look awful. Then when people meet (talk to) them… they’re the exact opposite of everything you’ve said.. Everything you say they’ve done.. YOU DONE DID IT. Not them. You’re making yourself look so bad, sweetheart. Your daughters step-father - the one you’ve undeservingly spoken so low about, while being a low piece of shit your damn self - is loving and raising YOUR child. He’s being a father. Sending child support, and once or twice a month calls, isn’t being a father. I obviously don’t know the guy personally, but I’d recommend thanking him for standing in. I assume very strongly, since your daughter is happy, and according to you - misses her mom, step-dad and sister while she’s with you and says she wants to go back.. I’d say he’s doing great job showing her what a man is supposed to be… all while you’re slummin’ it in your frat fuck house, drinking, and fucking your way into some made up world of what you think reality fucking is.

I pray our girls, and their half sisters, grow to know the difference between a boy and a man. I hope yours shows you a soft heart and gives you the benefit of the doubt, and encourages you to continue to grow, but takes caution not to get too close, or trusting of you. I hope all of our girls know better than to fully open up to a boy.. so they don’t get treated like a disposable item and end up hurt. Our girls are smart, though. Very smart for their current ages. I know when they look at you or a boy just like you, 13 years from now when they’re old enough to start dating…. They’ll lose hope in you just like the 4 of us women (4 that I know of, anyway) have. I truly pray that the constant men in their lives show them what a real man looks like, and teach them to avoid scum… like you, and A & J. Remember how you hated being categorized with people like that in my life? Don’t act like them, you won’t get compared to them.

I genuinely don't think I've ever closed any doors or burned any bridges with anyone.. family, friends, or exes.. who have done me wrong. Tonight, I did, by choice, burn a very toxic bridge.. and I didn't even allow myself to stand and watch the flames burn out, or the wind carry away the ashes. I turned, held up my chin, and walked away. No looking back. No pain. No tears. I burned our bridge for a reason. This is a fresh, new beginning for me. Thank you for telling me I needed to move home. Best idea you’ve ever had. Best thing I’ve ever followed through with. 

Please don’t ever interrupt my life again.

I don’t believe in rebuilding my past anymore. Our foundation is complete garbage now. I’m building my own foundation for ME and MY kids. I hope one day you learn to move forward, and not look back. I hope you stop using your past as an excuse for your actions and for your failures. I whole heartedly, truly hope that one day, you grow up to be a really great, happy man. I hope you have no regrets and begin to progress in everything you do. Good luck, Buddha. I’m sure you’ll need all the luck anyone can give you. You got what you wanted, what you asked for. You’re all alone now.

Oh, and you’re welcome. I helped you weed out the trash. 

[jjkfire]

You’ve Got Me (Wrapped Around Prequel)

Reader x Tae // College!AU // 10k words

Summary: One frat party, one game and a subsequent unplanned meeting later, comes a thousand feelings you did not ask for.

Genre: Fluff, Smut 

A/N: This is a prequel (kind of) to Wrapped Around and is purely Tae based! (even if Jimin is mentioned a few times here and there) so if you’re a pure team Jimin pls don’t read and get upset ok tq! (: Sorry this took like 10 years but !!! had to get this out so I can work on the finale to wrapped around hehe.

“Listen here…” You pause, waiting for the man before you to tell you his name.

“Jimin,” He replies.

“Right, Jimin,” You smile. “I just need to talk to Hoseok. I’m not even going to drink.”

“That’s what they all say,” He scoffs and you let out an annoyed groan because damn it you really weren’t interested in drinking tonight, especially not when you have a 9am lab to attend tomorrow… which was exactly why you were here in the first place.

“If you just want to talk to him, then call him.”

“You think I haven’t tried that??” You grumble while attempting to side step him but he’s quick to stand in your way, his hand held out in front of you.

“5 dollars.”

“I just want to talk to Hoseok for like 1 minute so, hell no, I’m not paying you 5 bucks.”

“Then you’re not stepping inside.”

“Are you even a part of this frat?” You grumble, annoyed.

“Yes…” He murmurs and just by that, you know that he isn’t but you can’t really find it in you to give a shit right now.

“Fuck, you know what? Take it,” You exhale, reaching into your pocket to give him the 5 dollars, pushing past him the moment his grimy hands take it from you.

The smell of beer and sweat fills your nose the instant you take a step into the house and if it were any other night, you wouldn’t be the slightest bit bothered but considering the fact that you are both stone cold sober and infuriated, the foul smell only adds on to your anger.

Within seconds of scanning the living area, you spot your one and only satan spawn of a lab partner, Jung Hoseok and where else would he be other than standing by the beer pong table. Okay, it’s not like you hate him, he’s truly a great person, nice and fun to hang out with but good god, he had to be the worst lab partner on the entire earth. This guy just never came prepared, sometimes missing his lab goggles, always missing his pre-lab report which by the way is the only reason he’s ever early to lab because he’ll just copy it off from you. The both of you are almost always the last pair to leave because he never understands what he’s doing which is probably due to the fact that he’s usually hungover. As you work on the post lab report, you wonder why of all people you could’ve been paired up with, you were paired up with him.

As much as you ‘hate’ him though, he’s the reason you have parties to attend on the weekends, the reason you met your best friend Solji and if it weren’t for the fact that he was the nicest, kindest boy you’ve ever met, you would’ve told on him to your TA, ages ago. You’ve carried his ass through the first two months of college now but tomorrow’s lab is dubbed the hardest lab of the semester and you want to make sure his ass isn’t going to be half dead tomorrow.

“Hoseok, you piece of shit. I told you no drinking tonight,” You groan, grabbing the red solo cup out of his hand.

“Y/N! You said you weren’t going to come,” He smiles. “I’m glad you’re here. Let’s get you a drink!”

“No drinks, asshole! You heard what our TA said,” You grumble. “It’s not called the lab from hell for nothing.”

“Just one drink.”

“Fuck no!” You exhale, pulling your hand out of his hold. “Did you at least read the procedure for tomorrow?”

“No…”

“Hoseok, please,” You beg. “Just once, just this one time. Please, please read it.”

“I—”

“Hoseok, come on dude, let’s play! I finally got Hyeri here to agree!” You hear a boy say from the other end of the beer pong table and before Hoseok can take a single step, you’re standing in his way.

“No, Hoseok. If you’re even thinking of playing, I’m going to request for a partner change.”

The smile on his face immediately fades and he stands rooted in his spot.

“I can’t play Tae, not tonight,” He shouts out and you smile because wow, you didn’t know it’d be that easy to get him to listen. “But, my friend here is down to play if you are.”

Wait, what?

“Uhh, no I’m not,” You laugh. “I said I’m not drinking tonight.”

“And you won’t be, if you play it right.”

“It’s beer pong Hoseok,” You scoff. “You’re going to have to drink at some point.”

“No, no. This is fear pong,” He grins, an almost evil aura radiating from his smile.

“The fuck’s that?”

“Well, there’s 6 cups and there’s 3 dare cups and 3 drink cups each. For the dare cups, you can either choose to do them or drink the cup instead as a punishment. So as long as you do all the dares, you don’t have to drink anything because Jimin here’s going to be your designated drinker for the three drink cups—“

“Wait, why am I being dragged into this?” Jimin questions but Hoseok ignores him, shooing him away with a wave of a hand.

“—but if you skip a dare…”

“Yeah, no, it’s gonna be a hard pass for me,” You shake your head.

“I’ll actually do my pre-lab this time and work on the post-lab with you if you play.”

What’s that? A miracle? Sure sounded like one.

“You promise?”

“Yes.”

You take a second to ponder the offer, weighing your choices heavily.

“And you get money if you win. Half of whatever Jimin collected from the front.”

That’s it. That’s what seals the deal because fuck that’s the guy who made you pay the damn 5 dollars and you’ll be damned if you leave here without getting it back.

“Alright, we’re on.”

The boy standing across you seems to be a crowd favourite because everyone’s cheering him on. Taehyung, you think is his name and as you watch the coin flip in the air, you have a feeling deep in the pit of your stomach that this is a bad idea.

Perhaps it’s your fault for agreeing to play this game, for not asking what the dares were going to be like but really what could you have expected from a frat house? You lose the coin toss and Taehyung gets the first throw which lands right smack in the cup at the top of the pyramid. Honestly, you’re not too surprised… the boys here would probably list down professional beer pong player on their resume if they could.

You grab the cue card from beneath the cup and you glare at Hoseok. This bitch. He knew these were the kind of dares that are written on these cards and he didn’t tell you.

“Read it out loud,” Taehyung says and you let out a heavy sigh.

“Let your opponent spank you twice.”

The smile on Taehyung’s face tells you he’s more than excited to and although the idea of being publicly spanked in front of a room of strangers is not really something you want to try out on a Thursday night, you’ve got a lab report on the line here. Do it for the GPA, do it for the GPA, is all you can say to yourself.

From the back of the room, you see something akin to a paddle being passed forward and then a riding crop and for a second your heart stops beating.

“W-wha—”

“What fun is it if it’s just my hand?” Taehyung smirks.

“No way, wait! No this is… no.”

“If you’re not up to it, then drink,” Hoseok grins and you glare at him because you’re this close to knocking him out with a punch.

“Fuck, fine,” You relent, agreeing to the dare. “Make it quick,” You exhale because really what was 5 seconds of embarrassment to you if you’d actually get help on the lab report this time.

Though Taehyung exudes an aura that screams fuckboy, you’re thoroughly surprised when he still stops to ask if you’re really okay with it and when you say you are, he of course asks if he could touch your ass to which you allow with a shrug of your shoulders because he was already going to spank you anyway. Honestly, what could be worse than this?

You can literally feel Taehyung buzzing with excitement behind you as you place your hands on the table, bending forward, your behind on full display for him and honestly speaking, you fully regret not walking away when that Jimin guy asked you to pay him $5 for entry. Was Hoseok really going to be that much help anyway? Is your question but all of that fades when you feel Taehyung’s hand on your ass.

“Gotta warm it up first, don’t I?” He simpers, his hand calmly stroking the curve of your ass and at that, an involuntary shiver runs up your spine.

“You ready babe?”

He doesn’t even let you answer his question as his hand comes down hard onto your flesh and you try your hardest to keep your expression blank, lips pursed, not wanting anyone to know that maybe, just maybe, you were enjoying this.

“Are we feeling the paddle or the riding crop?” He questions and though neither looked particularly enticing to you, you choose the riding crop.

You turn back to see Taehyung wielding the paddle instead and he sends you a little wink as he lines up his next hit. Of course he picks the opposite of what you had went for, you sigh. Perhaps you should be feeling fear, watching him hold a wooden paddle that looked like it could knock someone out but truth be told, you feel excitement bubbling within you.

You shut your eyes, bracing yourself for impact but it never comes and just when you turn back to ask what was taking him so long, you feel a hard smack, a gasp leaving your lips as you register what had just happened. Taehyung tries not to laugh but your shocked expression only makes it harder and soon enough you start laughing too.

You remove your hands from the table, taking the time to smooth your palm over your bottom that was still tingling.

“I went a little too hard, didn’t I?”

“Maybe just a little,” You laugh.

“I’m uhh Taehyung by the way,” He smiles sheepishly. “Thought it’d only be appropriate to introduce myself after our spank session.”

“It’s the best way to meet someone, isn’t it?” You grin. “I’m Y/N.”

“Okay, less talking, more fear pong!” Hoseok shouts before dragging you away back to your end of the table.

You hadn’t even made it back yet but you could already hear the ball landing into another one of the cups, the crowd chanting his name and it only sounds like it’s going to be an awfully long night for you.

“Strip your opponent down to his underwear using only your teeth,” You mumble, reading the dare written on the card and okay, you think maybe one drink for the sake of your dignity would be alright. After all, what’s a cup of beer?

“Thinking of drinking?” Taehyung calls out.

You look down into the contents of the drink only to find it isn’t the familiar fizzy yellow liquid but instead a dark red concoction.

“What’s in this?”

“Gin, Vodka, Tequila—”

“So everything?”

“Basically.”

You shake your head at that knowing full well that Hoseok had a hand in making whatever this hell jungle juice is.

You hold the cup in your hand and the cue card in your other, unsure of what to do.

Do it! Do it! You hear the crowd chant but you don’t know which one they mean.

“I’ll do the dare,” You sigh, settling the cup off to the side and Taehyung giddily skips to the middle, having no qualms about being stripped down to his briefs.

“At least buy me dinner first before trying to get me naked,” Taehyung laughs as you instruct him to lift up his hands.

“Shut up,” You grumble but there’s a light laugh at the end of your warning.

You assume this is hilarious to everyone else who was watching the two of you awkwardly spin around the room, trying to get Taehyung’s t-shirt off without the use of your hands and though you try not to laugh, you find the whole situation so odd that there’s no other way to cope than to laugh. After the third try, you finally get his shirt off and at this point, you’re already exhausted.

“You’re not giving up, are you?” Hoseok asks, his phone in your face and of course, of course he’s recording everything.

You only shove a middle finger in his direction, pushing him away.

Awkwardly, you sink to your knees, your mouth inches away from where the button of his jeans was. At this moment in time, you decide that you absolutely hate fear pong.

“Nervous?” Taehyung smirks, looking down at you. “Or are you thinking about something else?” He lifts his eyebrows, a devious smile on his lips.

“Don’t flatter yourself,” You sigh.

With that, you get to work, trying your hardest to unbutton his pants with only your teeth however the hoots from around the room only make you feel like shrinking away. But, the faster you get this done, the faster you’ll be out of this house and warm under your sheets and that thought alone gives you enough strength to drown out the noises that the crowd is making.

To your surprise, you unbutton his jeans with ease on the second try, leaving Taehyung speechless momentarily, only momentarily though because he always seemed to have a comment for everything.

“Had a lot of practice, have you?”

“Maybe,” You shrug, before moving to unzip him and you stare up at him as you do so, sending him a wink just as you reach the end because hey, you might as well have fun while you were at it, right? Taehyung swears he could feel his blood rush to exactly one place he didn’t want it to at this very moment and he curses under his breath, wishing more than anything that it was just you and him that was in this room. You begin to tug his pants down towards the floor with your teeth and Taehyung thinks of anything gross or unappealing to quell his almost boner.

Calmly, you saunter your way back to your end of the table, waiting for Taehyung to get back to his side and get the show on the road.

“Having a little problem over there, Tae?” Hoseok question with a lift of his eyebrows and you can hear the people around the room tease him, Taehyung’s cheeks now beginning to turn bright red. You should feel bad, you really should but hey he had his share of embarrassing you too.

Maybe it was a mistake to laugh at him and tease him because he lands his next shot with ease and your mind goes blank as you stare at the cue card in your hand.

“Make out with your opponent for 20 seconds.”

There are cheers around the room, the game finally getting interesting and you glance down at the cup in front of you. Would you still be standing after one drink? Was it a risk you were willing to take?

“Oh come on,” Tae leers. “You’ve already got me almost fully naked.”

“Fine, fine,” You mumble, meeting him once again by the middle of the table. You hope to god he misses his next shot because the dares only seem to get worse and worse.

Hoseok can already see the gears turning in your mind and he knows what you’re going to do, stand there like a statue and only allow Tae small pecks but no, he’s having none of that.

“It’s going to have to be a full make-out session,” Hoseok announces. “We see any of that lame shit and the both of you have to down one of the cups and try again.”

“Well then,” Taehyung grins. “How about we don’t try at all so we can have a round two?”

“In your dreams,” You scoff. “Unless... you’re trying to hide the fact that you’re a bad kisser.”

“Babe, I’m the best kisser in this room,” He smirks before letting his hands cup your cheeks, his lips already on yours before you can think of a witty comment.

You don’t want to admit it but heck, Taehyung is one hell of a kisser. His lips are soft and plushy and boy does he know the right balance between give and take because he leans in closer deepening the kiss and then he’s pulling back slightly, forcing you to move forward, to rest closer against him. You can feel him smirk against your lips before his tongue swipes at them begging for you to part them and as much as your mind tells you not to, you do anyway. You’re already in this deep, you sigh. Might as well give the crowd a show, no? Your fingers tug at his hair as his tongue just begins to—

“Time’s up!” Hoseok shouts and you pull away instantly, still in quite a daze but you shake it off, walking back to your side of the table. Taehyung seems to be even more of a daze than you, his pupils blown wide with lust, his hair a complete mess, courtesy of you and as he steps up to take his shot, you silently pray that he misses it.

There’s a light clink! as the ball hits the edge of a cup, bouncing off the table and you let out a scream of delight, punching a fist in the air.

“Guess I was that good of a kisser huh?” You laugh, looking at Taehyung who was running his hand through his hair in disappointment.

Taehyung weirdly has no witty reply to your comment, only passing you the cup that held the rest of the ping-pong balls.

You stand there, lining up your shot, to which cup you’re not sure but you’re hoping it lands in at least one of them.

The crowd cheers, the ball landing in one of the 6 cups and when Taehyung lifts the cup to see the cue card say DRINK!, in all capital letters, he doesn’t hesitate to down the drink, his face scrunching up in disgust as the alcohol burns his throat.

The next cup you land, is another drink cup and honestly, you’re glad because this means if you don’t make the shot after this, you’re thinking he’s going to have a hard time landing a shot in the other three remaining cups you have just by the way he puts a hand on the table to stop himself from swaying. You wonder how he managed to the 3 dare cups when he was the one making the shots. You sure would’ve loved to see Jimin having to drink for you.

The liquid in the cup sloshes from side to side as you make yet another shot and Taehyung lifts the cup, finding that the cue card finally says DARE! He’s not sure if he should be happy or—

Happy, oh heck yeah he’s happy because—

“Let your opponent lick whipped cream off of you,” Taehyung reads out and he already has a smirk on. “I don’t mind that,” He smiles.

“What?”

“So there’s chest, tummy or thighs. Take your pick.”

“Hold on. This isn’t fair… it’s like a dare for me too!”

“Don’t question fear pong. If you say no, then you have to drink my drink for me.”

“Fine,” You grunt. “I’ll do tummy.”

“Aww, are you sure you’re not more of a thigh girl?”

You roll your eyes at him, not even bothering to reply to his question.

Hoseok in your opinion is a little too excited about the whole situation, spreading more than enough whipped cream over Taehyung’s middle, making sure it trailed all the way down to the waistband of his boxers, even threatening to go down further. With a sigh, you bend down to lick it all off and you imagine this would be a lot less awkward if there weren’t about 50 people gathered around you, all watching intently.

“You missed a spot,” He points to the area just above his boxers, the spot you had purposely avoided.

With a huff, you quickly lick off the remainder and Taehyung has to hold his breath, trying hard not to picture you moving down further.

“Happy?”

“Very,” He smirks before returning to his side of the table, his steps unsteady as the alcohol has clearly hit him already.

You want nothing more than for this game to end quickly so the moment he stands behind the cups, you steady your hand for another throw, the crowd cheering as the ball lands in yet another one of the red cups.

“Let your opponent wax your armpit hair off,” He reads and by the way his voice grows small, you can already tell you’re going to enjoy this one. Maybe, fear pong wasn’t that bad after all.

“Aren’t you a little too excited for this?” He asks as you warm up the wax strip between your hands.

“Maybe,” You shrug. “Don’t worry, it’s only going to hurt… a lot,” You smile wickedly and he gulps, his face crumpling in fear.

There’s murmurings around the room as you stand before the already shirtless Taehyung, his hand lifted above his head and you tear the strip apart, placing it neatly over his underarm. You don’t even bother to ask him if he was ready before you pull the strip downward, ripping all of his hair clean from his armpit. There’s a loud scream, one Taehyung tries to muffle with his other hand but it’s no use. Everyone in the room bursts into laughter, many phones already out to record the whole ordeal. You wave the second wax strip in front of him and he begs you for mercy. You look to Hoseok and he gives you a shake of the head, which meant sorry, no mercy and you almost laugh at the whimper that escapes Taehyung’s throat when you smooth the wax strip on his other under arm.

Taehyung returns to his spot with an obvious frown, pressing a few touches to his sticky underarms.

“Should’ve drank,” He grumbles and in the time he is able to get that sentence out, he hears the ball hit the side of the cup and he’s filled with hope, but there’s a splash sound that accompanies it right after. Damn it. With a sigh, he picks up the cup, unsure if he enjoyed seeing the word DARE! anymore but as he reads the cue card, he thinks yeah, he does like seeing the four lettered word.

“Give your opponent a lap dance for a minute,” He smirks. “I mean I’m already in my underwear so I might as well,” He shrugs.

You’re blushing wildly as you are forced to sit in a chair in the middle of the room. Hoseok, ever the excited boy puts on Ginuwine’s Pony on the speakers. In your mind, you have Channing Tatum’s Magic Mike routine playing and you freeze because if Taehyung is going to do anything similar, you’re not sure if you’re going to be able to leave this chair, still breathing.

Taehyung stands a few steps away from you, prowling over to you before he stops in front of the chair, dropping down to grind the floor, maintaining eye contact with you as he did so, his bottom lip between his teeth and the crowd gathered around screams, cheering him on. You have your lips pursed, eyes trained on him, something Hoseok had said was a requirement but you think it’s hardly a challenge to keep your eyes on him, especially when he moved like that.

Taehyung stands up, rolling his body sensuously to the music as he steps closer towards you, his legs now on either side of the chair as he hovers above you, his tongue poking out to run over his lips. You swallow nervously, unable to hide the shy smile on your face, your hands placed by your side, forming tight fists as you watch him grind and thrust against you, his moves in sync with the beat. He smirks down at you, grabbing one of your hands, forcing your fist open before he places your hand on his chest, trailing it salaciously up and down, winking at you as he did so. You can’t help but laugh at the situation you’re in, it’s the only way you can cope with the embarrassment and Taehyung takes the way you ease up as a good sign. He places your hands on his hips as he grinds down on your lap, his hands cupping your heated cheeks. He wants nothing more than to taste your lips again, especially now that you’re all shy and giggly, as if mere minutes ago you hadn’t teased him after dragging his zipper down with your teeth. He wants to grind on you until you beg for more, silence your needy whines with kisses as he slips his hand down past the band of your pants to find you drip—

“That’s a minute! Time’s up!”

You’re still laughing as you slide the chair back, getting up to make your way back to the table. Taehyung take his spot on the other side, feeling rather light headed but he’s pretty sure it didn’t have to do with the copious amounts of alcohol he has consumed tonight.

Cheers ring around the room as you manage to land the ball in the final cup and Taehyung finds the cup being shoved in his hand as the room chants for him to down the drink, which he does with no qualms. It’s his first loss at fear pong or even beer pong for that matter ever since the beginning of the semester. Hoseok has his head in his hands, unable to believe that you had been able to make the shot. He had thought full well that like always, Taehyung would demolish his opponent but here he was watching as one of the frat members takes a polaroid picture of you, your face making it onto the frat’s acclaimed wall of fame of which contained a dozen or so pictures of Taehyung, the former reigning champion of fear pong.

“You better come prepared or I’m going to wring your neck,” You warn, waving the huge wad of cash Hoseok had just given you. He nods, reassuring you that he’s going to be the best lab partner you’ve ever seen and with that, you’re out the door, counting each dollar all the way home.

“You’re taking the loss pretty hard,” Hoseok laughs, patting Taehyung on the back to bring him out of his daze. “Thanks to you, I actually have to know what I’m doing in lab tomorrow.”

Taehyung only lets out a light laugh, nodding before he makes his way to the kitchen to grab himself a glass of water. He sits on the counter swinging his legs as he twists the cup in hand. To be honest, he wasn’t feeling down about losing, au contraire, he doesn’t feel the slightest bit of regret playing that match against you. It’s the fact that you remind him of her, remind him of Mina that has his mind running infinite loops. He thought he had gotten rid of her and all feelings tied to her but if how he spends his weekends chasing skirts was any indication, he’d say he was merely trying to fill the massive void he felt in his chest.

It’s fine, he reasons. He doubts he’ll see you again because that’s just how college is. You could go all 4 years without meeting the same person you had seen in your first few months on campus.

College.

It’s everything Taehyung had expected with the frat parties and binge drinking and yet it’s also everything he hadn’t expected.

If you think high school is hard, just wait until you get to college.

Taehyung had heard that very line being repeated to him close to a hundred times while he was in school and yet he thinks no matter how many times he has heard it wouldn’t have prepared him for just how hard it would be. See, everyone always describes the academic rigour, the unreasonable professors and the struggles of balancing one’s social and academic life, but no one talks about how going to college could make you feel like you were wrong about yourself your whole life.

Taehyung for the most part didn’t struggle in high school. In fact, he cruised through it while doing the bare minimum. He was smart but lazy and abhorrently proud of the fact that he could get the grades while putting in very little work. The fact that he scored high nineties baffled everyone because even with the fact that he always half-assed everything, he always made sure he was right where he wanted to be, grades-wise. He always did just enough.

Enough.

It would come to be a word Taehyung hates when he gets to college because no matter how hard he tried, he was never good enough which was an entirely foreign concept to him.

They tell you that you have to hit the ground running when you get to college because freshmen year, seeing as it is most probably the easiest year, is where you build your GPA up and he followed that advice to the tee. He stayed on top of his homework, never missed a quiz, went to every lecture, all of which was more than he ever did in high school and yet after the first wave of midterms, he found himself just barely hitting the average mark. He works harder the next time around, putting in twice maybe even three times the amount of work his peers put in and again he finds himself at the class average. Perhaps to some, hitting that average mark is enough but for someone who was the best without even trying, he felt his self-esteem corrode with every exam.

Taehyung had never felt so lost his entire life because it was like everyone around him had it figured out, had their career paths planned, their summer internships thought out but here he was, barely scraping through. He lacked ambition, is what his teachers back home would say about him when he was still in high school and he didn’t think that was much of a problem until he got to college and realized it seemed like everyone knew what they were doing, everyone except him.

Despite the boxy smile Taehyung puts on for everyone, he was miserable at best. He attends the parties Hoseok and Jimin invite him out to just so he could forget the fact that he felt like he wasn’t quite cut out for college. He’s tried once or twice to voice out how he was feeling but the boys only return with, ‘You’re fine, some of us are barely passing here’ which he understands is the truth but… he can’t help but feel like his intelligence was what had defined him in high school and now here in college, he wasn’t smart, in fact he wasn’t even average apparently. He just felt that his intelligence was part of his identity and if he wasn’t smart then who was he really?

It’s the ever incessant thoughts swimming in his head that forces him to take walks in the middle of the night to the end of campus where the land stretches out into the lake like a peninsula. He walks to the end in complete darkness, not even bothering to shine a light ahead of him because by now he’s memorized the route. It’s dark and eerily quiet but Taehyung enjoys the silence, feels like it’s a breath of fresh air.

When he reaches the clearing at the tip, he sees the soft city lights glow in the distance across the lake. He takes a seat by the edge of the cement path, his feet swinging below him as he enjoys the sound of the water lapping against the rocks beneath him. The skies are clear this time, thankfully and he looks up to admire the twinkling stars. It is at this exact spot at 12 am almost every other day that Taehyung finds himself here. Sometimes, he sits in silence and other times, after a particularly hard day, he sits there and bawls his eyes out until he’s run out of tears. It’s his form of therapy, letting out his pent upped emotions all at once before he returns to his room to put on a mask and start the day over. It’s the only time he feels he’s ever truly alone, sitting here with tears streaming down his face and usually he is but tonight, he feels a soft tap on his shoulder and then a soft pack of tissues being waved in front of his face. A flash of recognition runs across his features as he peers up to see you offering him a meek smile.

“Well, well. What is the former reining fear pong champion doing out here when it’s prime party time on a Friday night?”

“I could ask you the same thing, number one party girl,” Taehyung snickers, calling you by Hoseok’s nickname for you as he accepts the tissue, wiping away the last of his tears.

“Well uhh my friends are supposed to be having a bonfire somewhere but I got lost,” You laugh. “Snacks?” You ask handing him a packet of open chips.

“Bonfire? That’s by the park… like 10 minutes back. You took the wrong turning.”

“Ah, so that’s what they were trying to say…” You mumble to yourself, recalling how your friends tried telling you through slurred words that you were meant to take a different path but it was hard to decipher their drunken murmuring when you’re trying to navigate the dark forest with your hands full with snacks and serviettes and only your phone’s torch to light the way... until of course your phone died on you. Between the shivers that ran up your spine every time you heard the crunching of leaves in the far off distance and the fact that you were almost certain you had just felt something touch you, you decided to keep walking forward, hopeful that the path would’ve led you to something, and it lead you to something alright.

You let out a sigh before taking a seat next to Taehyung, trying to hide the fact that his crying almost had you believing that you were in the middle of a horror movie. It was only when you spotted his name on the back of his shirt, an old high school jersey probably, that you let out a sigh of relief.

“Oh well,” You shrug, placing down the rest of your snacks next to you. “This place has a nice view of town,” You point towards the lights in the distance. “And the stars look so much brighter here,” You murmur as you munch on the chips. “Of course… unless you want to uhh be left alone, I can just—”

“No, no, it’s fine… You can stay,” He smiles. “Because if you leave then you’ll take the chips with you, which means…”

“Nice to know you prefer chips over my company,” You laugh, grabbing a handful from the packet and Taehyung laughs in return, reassuring you that it was just a joke.

“So, is this your secret spot or something?”

“Something like that,” He murmurs. “Just a place I go to get away from it all.”

You nod at that, pressing your palms flat across the cool cement surface, leaning back so you could look at the stars. Sometimes you wonder why you don’t take the time to appreciate a clear night like this, that you’re so busy worrying about a dozen things that wouldn’t matter in a few days’ time when you could be having a moment like this, content and at peace as you admire the simple things. It’s in the presence of a vast clear night sky that you realize how large the Universe is, that in some way, you’re almost insignificant… not in a bad way but more of in a way that you don’t understand why your mind is always stuck on one track, why you don’t allow yourself to make mistakes, why you don’t stop to enjoy life for all that it is. It’s not something you don’t voice out often because maybe people will tell you you’re crazy when you say you want to throw caution to the wind and just let life take you anywhere.

“When you look at the stars, do you… do you ever wonder what our purpose is? Like why we try so hard when in reality, you and I and everyone for that matter are just tiny specks of dust floating in the Universe… as in that in the grand scheme of things, everything that we stress ourselves over, doesn’t really matter.”

Taehyung looks over at you with his eyebrows furrowed and his mouth half opened, as if he was at a loss for words and you throw your head back laughing.

“Don’t worry, that was just me you know… thinking out loud. You don’t really have to have an answer for it.”

Taehyung doesn’t have an answer to your question because in fact, that was the same question he had in his mind when he looked out to the stars. It’s almost like a paradox because star-gazing made him feel calm and yet at the end, anxious too. It reminded him of just how small he was, how he feels he’s never going to navigate his way through the murky waters of life.

“When I look at the stars, I feel lost,” He murmurs.

“You say that like it’s a bad thing,” You scoff.

“Isn’t it?”

“Not necessarily… I feel like being lost gives you the chance to wander around, to try new things while everyone else, like me, is stuck in some mechanical, rigid schedule,” You sigh. “There’s a perk in being lost and that’s being free.”

“But that’s the thing,” He sighs. “I get that I am free, free to roam, to wander but it’s like everyone else is moving forward and I’m stuck in limbo, just floating endlessly.”

“I guess the grass is always greener on the other side isn’t it?” You laugh, smiling at him. If anything, you wanted that freedom, you wanted to enjoy being lost but you’re set on a path, one your parents had inherently picked for you. “You know, sometimes I think we’re all just so stuck on thinking about our future that we forget to enjoy the present.”

“Do you think when we’re both 70 and all wrinkly, we’d be laughing about the things we’re worrying about now?”

“Probably,” You smile. “But is that going to stop either of us from worrying about it?”

“Probably not,” You both say in unison, before breaking out in laughter as the two of you shake your heads at each other.

There isn’t a way to put into words the atmosphere between the both of you but it was like an acknowledgement of each other’s suffering and in some odd way, it was comforting to know you weren’t alone in your struggle and neither was he in his. It’s almost like both you and him were lost in your own separate ways, him on where he was going and you on why you were going the way you were going but in any case, both of you were equally just as lost. Perhaps that was the beauty in it all, that two lost souls had found solace in each other.

Taehyung doesn’t know why he didn’t ask for your number on that night, it’s usually the first thing he does whenever he meets a girl he likes but it’s almost as if he had forgotten everything when he was with you. He forgot his practiced pick-up lines, his sleazy smirk because well, he didn’t need them. That night was just you and him discussing existentialism, purpose and just what the hell the two of you were doing in college anyway. The conversation bore no definite answers but it felt good to just talk about it for once, for him to not have to pretend like he had his shit together.

It turns out, he doesn’t really need your number though because he sees you strolling into the frat house the very next Friday evening, sauntering across the room to stand next to him

“No star-gazing while sobbing tonight?” You ask teasingly and Taehyung scowls.

“And what about you? Not going to give out life advice that you can’t seem to follow yourself tonight?”

“Touché,” You laugh. “I mean I was thinking of having more of a like drink my problems away and pretend they don’t exist kind of night.”

“Funny, me too,” Taehyung smiles, leading you towards the punch bowl that held the jungle juice that Hoseok had a hand in concocting… which meant it had at least probably 70% alcohol… which would lead to 100% regret.

By the time you and Taehyung find yourselves in one of the rooms in the frat that wasn’t already occupied, it was clear that neither of you were sober. You smash your lips against his in a rush, the entire make-out session a hot, giant mess. It’s not long before your clothes are lost somewhere on the floor and he is hurriedly ridding himself of his own shirt too.

You don’t attempt to keep the volume at a minimum and neither does he as he thrusts deep into you, complete euphoria taking over you as you feel the knot at the bottom of your stomach tightening. All you hear is your pulse in your ear and the occasional whispers as Taehyung brings you to your high. The moans slip out of your mouth against your own will and your thighs tremble, the tension you feel near the pit of your abdomen threatening to snap. There’s a thrust or two, the obscene sound of skin slapping against skin as his pelvis meets your ass and that’s when you reach your peak, your walls squeezing around his member as you let out a long moan. He picks up speed, his pace relentless as he chases his high and it doesn’t take long before you feel his length twitching inside of you, his drawn out growls dying off as he comes to a stop.

“Fuck, babe, you’re amazing.” Is the only thing you clearly remember him saying from the night.

That one night leads to another, and another, and another because somehow it’s like the both of you find each other at whatever party it was, almost as if you gravitated towards each other like magnets. Taehyung doesn’t say anything about the situation, afraid that you’d high tail it and leave him if he were to mention it but one fateful day, at a party when it’s way too early into the night, you utter out a preposition that has his head spinning.

“You and me, friends with benefits… How about it?”

It doesn’t even take a second for him to nod his head and say yes. With that, you drag him upstairs to an empty room and the whole time Taehyung spends undressing you, caressing you, fucking you, he can’t help but think it’s nothing but a dream. A fucking good dream.

“No strings attached, okay?” Is the main takeaway for the night and in that moment, Taehyung nods at the sentence agreeing, as if it had been obvious, that it didn’t have to be said but little did he know that the very same sentence would only cause him to feel pain, pain, pain in the months to come.

Though Taehyung rather enjoyed the benefits part of the relationship, he also enjoyed the friends part. He always looked forward to the almost 2 hour lunches you’d have with him because you had nothing else to do as you waited for your next class or the casual coffee dates the two of you would have after a tiring week or his personal favourite, when you would come over to stream a movie or two and you would sit on his lap even if there was space on the rest of the couch. Of course, you never really came over just to watch a movie but he rather liked it when you would let his hands rest in your lap, or when you let him lace his fingers between yours and place soft kisses on your shoulder and neck.

More than that though is how much he’s learnt about you and you about him in a span of just over a month or two. It’s during the coffee shop hangouts wherein both of you are supposed to study, keyword supposed or the unreasonably long lunches you two have is when he learns about your family, your childhood, the ins and outs of your life and you the same with him. It’s when the two of you are lying next to each other slightly sweaty and naked under the sheets that you both find it easy to talk about your deepest fears, your hopes and dreams. You were his confidant, his happy pill and everything in between. Of course he’s always had Hoseok and Jimin and he knows he can tell them everything but he doesn’t… he hesitates with them because he’s known them for so long and they know his family so personally that there’s just some things he feels is better kept private. With you, it’s different. It’s like everything flows out of him without him even knowing and he knows he’s in a pickle when winter break comes around and he spends every single day, thinking about you. You had been clear from the start, no strings attached, no feelings involved. You slipped the sentiment here and there every so often and he’s well aware of it but he can’t seem to quell the growing feelings he has for you. If you didn’t know… it wouldn’t hurt you right? It would be a secret between him and himself.

When the second semester began, he was more than happy to see you and you, him. As usual, the two of you continued with the odd arrangement of being friends with benefits but with a touch of more than just sex. It was almost as if the two of you were a couple in private, but neither wanted to admit it, well it was just you who didn’t want to and Taehyung was just afraid to say anything. He didn’t mind the fact that there wasn’t a label on it because as long as he got to spend time with you, hold you in his arms, all was good. Taehyung in your opinion was the kindest soul you had ever met and simply being around him lifted your spirits. He remembered everything and you mean absolutely everything. That embarrassing story you told him one time while you were sleepy and out of it? About how you got stuck in a toilet in the middle of an exam back in middle school? Remembers it. The fact that you had pointed at a big bouquet of roses during a movie scene and talked about how nice it would be to get one someday? Remembers it. Any detail whether you said it in passing or with full confidence, he remembers. Your favourite colour, what your parents do, your favourite pair of underwear, he remembers. He doesn’t do it to impress you, doesn’t give you your favourite cookie every so often to gain brownie points in your books. He does it simply because that’s just the person he is and the fact that he does it makes you feel so wanted, so appreciated like there was someone who thought all these lame facts about you was worth remembering. Sometimes you’re surprised by just what he remembers, one incident in particular sticks out for you.

It had been the busiest time for you in the semester, right in the middle of consecutive due dates when you get a call from your mother, her excited voice crackling through the speaker of your phone as she tells you that she received a bouquet for her birthday under your name except you hadn’t sent one. It takes a second or two for it to register that Taehyung had done it for you, remembered that you had told him you wanted to do something nice for your mother for her birthday and this had been weeks ago. He had known that you’d be too busy to remember to eat let alone send a gift to your mother. You simply didn’t deserve a friend like him.

The first quarter of the semester came and went and everything had been just like the previous semester. Then, he noticed you beginning to put some distance between you and him. The lunches grew shorter, the weekly coffee dates no longer happened and sometimes you wouldn’t spend nights at his place anymore. Still, Taehyung didn’t say anything because well, what was he to say? The two of you were only, in official terms, friends with benefits.

At parties, usually you would be around Taehyung and Hoseok but now he finds you shimmying your way across the room to talk to others, not that anything was wrong with that but then he’ll turn and find you grinding on some guy. Listen, there was nothing wrong with that either because you were free to do whatever you wanted but minutes later, he’ll find you completely missing. He thought maybe you’d gone home without him but then he’ll see you over an hour later making your way down the stairs, the man behind you with his hair in a mess, his shirt untucked and it’s then that he knows that something’s wrong… with him and not you.

You were free to sleep with whoever you wanted and him with whomever he wanted but the problem is he didn’t want anyone but you. He could literally feel jealousy bubble within him as he saw you jump from one guy to the next because he wanted to know what they had that he didn’t. It’s not like that, you had told him when he managed to find the courage to ask you when the two of you were lying in his bed, his chest still heaving after pulling out from you mere minutes ago. You never tell him the reason why you slept with all those other men, and you didn’t really have to tell him, he understands that but he couldn’t help but feel as if there was an underlying reason as to why you did.

Taehyung knows you avoid any talk about emotion like the plague, which frankly he hates. That’s not saying though that you don’t open up to him, you do but those moments are few and far in between. There have been a handful of times where you sit in complete silence next to him and he knows that you’re struggling internally, that there’s something on your mind. It could be 2pm on a Saturday when you come over to watch a movie and it’s like you’re on a different planet or when you’re in his bed at 11pm on a Wednesday, letting out little sighs as you mulled things over in your head and he would simply say his classic line; “Let’s go to our place.”

You’re not sure when his place became ‘our’ place but you’re glad anyway. The walk there is quiet and you never really say anything but when you get to the end of the cement path, sometimes you say whatever it is that’s on your mind and sometimes you don’t say anything and all you do is cry. Either way, you finally get to rid yourself of the burden sitting on your chest and that’s all Taehyung wants. Between the two of you, it’s obvious that Taehyung is more of a talker. He’s vocal about what he feels is bringing him down that day, or whatever has been on in his mind (basically everything except his feelings for you) and you’re an amazing listener, probably the only person he’s ever felt comfortable enough to divulge his worries to and sometimes he feels horrible for laying it all on you without getting to hear anything from your side so, to see you be emotional in front of him, to be able to comfort you, he feels glad that he too can be a rock for you.

Speaking to you about romantic emotions though, especially ones between you and him always lead him nowhere. You slip in things like calling him a perfect boyfriend but then clam up when he says anything remotely intimate or romantic. You lead him round and round in circles as if to say come closer, but not too close which he can do except you never say it with words, never make things clear and he ends up having to play guess and check all by himself. It’s tiring to say the least but he hasn’t quite figured out a better approach. Perhaps he should give up altogether is what he decides.

“Uhh, I think we have to stop this thing that we have…”

It’s like he had dropped a damn bomb right onto you ever so casually and your mind is spinning so hard that you struggle to hear the rest of his explanation.

“It’s just… Jessica and I are getting kinda serious so we have to stop.”

Taehyung is almost waiting for you to fight back, to say something about how he thinks you feel for him but all you say is,

“Okay.”

If Taehyung was being honest, he wouldn’t say he really had feelings for her. He liked her sure, thought she was hot and her personality was well, alright but he didn’t like her, like her… at least not in the way he liked you. But, she was different from you, said whatever was on her mind, was clear about what she wanted and maybe that’s what Taehyung needed because he was completely burnt out from always trying to decipher what your true feelings were. It was a breath of fresh air to have a girl that just said what she wanted.

He funneled all his attention to Jessica because clearly, you were fine without him, always having some other guy next to you or at least he thinks so. He hasn’t seen you at a party for a while but that’s mainly because his face is buried between Jessica’s legs in one of the rooms of the frat house. He’s not really sure what he’s doing, stringing Jessica along like that but he can’t help himself, always needing the reassurance that he was loved, that he was enough. It’s stupid because he knows that he is and maybe it’s all goddamn Mina’s fault for messing him up so bad.

Mina which he had grown up with in the same dainty little town had been the first girl he’s ever loved and yes sure, love is a strong word but he really did think that he loved her. She was sweet, funny and whenever he saw her, it was like one of those classic movie moments where there’s light shining behind her and everything’s moving in slow motion. Mina was pretty and she knew it. She was smart, got her looks to work in her favour and Tae doesn’t blame her for he has done the same. He was so blinded by love that he saw her as an angel and he wasn’t the only one, many did too. There’d always be murmurings of her being manipulative, by boys and girls alike but they were just jealous, he reasoned.

See, Taehyung was the type to give a person everything when he liked someone and if she had asked him to give her the world, he’d try to do so until the day he dies. He showered her with gifts, got his dad to pull some strings so she could get that internship right after high school, begged a teacher to write that recommendation letter for her despite the fact she never paid attention in class and that’s all he did, give, give and give. He never asked for anything in return because he didn’t want anything, because he was in love.

“Listen, Tae… You’re sweet and everything but you’re just not my type,” Mina huffs.

“W-what?”

“We’re uhh… over.”

“Then why were we… why did you…”

Why were we together for as long as we were? Why did you tell me all those sweet lies?

“Babe, I like Jimin. I thought you knew that.”

“Oh.”

So there it was, the reason as to why she had pulled him along like an abandoned puppy. She had been just using him so she could get closer to his best friend, Jimin and along the way, picked up a few treats for herself simply because she knew Taehyung had all the teachers in this school in the palm of his hands and she knew his father could get her that summer internship she wanted.

He didn’t know what else to say and all he had taken away from the conversation was that he just wasn’t enough. He doesn’t blame Jimin, neither does he blame Mina. He blames himself.

When college begins, he knew he’d never let what Mina did to him happen again so his strategy was to hump and dump, to do it before the girl could. He never stopped to know the girl better, was clear about how it was going to be just a one night stand and it worked, for the most part… temporarily but he still felt empty on some days. But he knows at least that for now, he doesn’t really remember the feelings he has for Mina, neither does he remember how what she said to him made him feel or at least that’s what he liked to believe.

He was doing great, amazing and then you came along and destroyed all of that.

You reminded him of Mina, from the way you were sweet and snarky at the same time, to the way your hair fell and the way you laughed. You weren’t a carbon copy of her and maybe he was just seeing what he wanted to see, maybe he was grasping at straws to draw similarities but you stirred something in him akin to the feeling Mina was able to get out of him before she broke his heart of course.

After he gets to know you though, he realizes you’re nothing like Mina and yet he feels himself falling back into the same patterns, feels himself slipping into a dark hole of feelings except this time, he can’t express them.

He’s an idiot, a bona fide moron is all he can say about himself when he sees how he’s neglected you for a girl he wasn’t even sure he cared about, for Jessica. He wants to sock himself in the face when he gets that call from Solji, her telling him just how bad you’ve sunken. The screaming match between you and him in front of the library still plays in the back of his mind sometimes and he knows he handled it all wrongly but he didn’t know how else to tell you that whatever your coping mechanism was, wasn’t doing you any good. It hurt him to see you so broken because he felt that way too. You think of him as someone who wasn’t as academically talented, someone who didn’t give a damn about his studies but you were wrong, oh so wrong. He could see the way you were pushing yourself way past your mental limit to achieve the grades you wanted and he saw himself in you, he knew it would only lead you nowhere but down. It would’ve been great if he had been able to say all of that in the moment but when the girl he cares about so much is standing in front of him, on the verge of a mental breakdown, everything in his brain just goes haywire. He just didn’t want to see you hurting anymore because those who are hurt themselves never want to see others in the same position that they are in.

The day you call him out for an apology coffee date is when his heart soars and just seeing you speak to him like you used to make his heart go soft. When you offer to begin again, this time as just friends, he’s smiling as if it’s been the only thing he’d ever wanted to hear from you. He knew he’d have to get things together, to break things off with Jessica so he could start over with you and start it right this time.

Except, your version of begin again seems to be very different from his because over the summer it’s like you had disappeared. There were no replies to his call or texts, no updates on your social media, no nothing. When the new academic year begins, he finds you’re no longer living in the same dorm you used to and Solji herself is too busy with her academics to tell him where you are, she not even having the time to meet up with you since the semester has started.

It’s midway through the month when he hears from Solji that you’ve been hanging out with Jimin and his heart almost drops out of his ass. Not again, he frowns. He didn’t want a repeat of high school. Why Jimin? Why did you have to pick him? He’d take on any other guy, any time, any place but he’s lost once to Jimin and he thinks it’s probable he’d lose again. But, this time, he doesn’t want to and he knows he’s got a lot more going on for him than Jimin did. Taehyung knew you like he knew the back of his hand and he’ll be damned if he lets you slip away from him. This year was his second chance and he was going to play smart, give you your distance but made sure he was in your orbit just in case you felt the need to come running back and it didn’t take long for you to do just that.

He’ll admit he didn’t think Jimin would be able to get that far with you, that he’d be able to break down your walls and perhaps, Taehyung has miscalculated his chances but he’ll wait, wait until he could prove to you that he deserved a chance too.

A/N: hello! surprise! (not really!) but uhh I know some events have been reiterated and y’all probably tired of hearing about it but it’s important! for the finale! If you’re reading this fic without having read wrapped around first... some parts probably seem kinda sketch and doesn’t make sense but uhh if you read on, you’ll understand! 

Wrapped Around, Part 1

[shirlleycoyle]

Why Remote Access Software Is Almost Too Useful

A version of this post originally appeared on Tedium, a twice-weekly newsletter that hunts for the end of the long tail.

It’s not every day that I get to tell a story about a type of technology that was recently in the news for macabre reasons, but then again, it’s not often that water supplies get hacked using screen sharing technology, which is something that literally happened in Oldsmar, Florida recently, when a panel that controls city’s the water treatment system was modified to increase the amount of sodium hydroxide.

It was caught quickly—but still, scary stuff.

At the center of the debate is a tool that is perhaps at the peak of its cultural importance, but that naturally comes with inherent security concerns: The remote viewer application, which is incredibly useful when, y’know, people are remote, as is quite common right now. But it comes with complications, as seen in a certain community’s water treatment system.

And as you might guess, the evolution of remote desktop access technology goes back pretty far. How far back? Well, at first, you didn’t need a GUI.

“One conclusion that we may all have to come to is that connection with the network may force us toward a more standard way of handling terminals and their character streams in our monitors and terminal control hardware.”

— A passage from an early Request for Comments document, dating to 1971, that proposes the creation of an official protocol for Telnet, a key networking technology for accessing remote machines through a command-line interface. While not exactly the same as the modern-day remote viewers with graphical interfaces, many of the same strategies still apply today, with a primary difference being that modern remote viewers tend to be more platform-independent, allowing users to connect between different types of operating systems with a single tool.

No Windows, no problem: Remote access software dates back to the DOS days

Remote access has been a theme of computer software for decades—all the way back from the early days when people would access mainframe networks on dumb terminals. But the idea of connecting to a computer as if it’s in the room and having full access to it still feels a bit like magic to some users, despite the fact that we’ve been doing it for decades.

A key tool in the history of remote access software is Carbon Copy, an offering that allowed users to access remote computers from a distance and control them as if they were in the room. First offered in the mid-1980s, the software, initially produced by Meridian Technologies, used a trick to stay resident in memory in DOS, allowing remote users to call in and manage a computer over the phone line.

This was an impressive trick for its time, and a somewhat obscure one—a 1986 PC Magazine profile called the product category “new enough to qualify as a secret for most PC users.”

An ad for Carbon Copy Plus that promoted the fact you could work with two computers with just a single copy of the software. Get ready to mail some floppies. Image: Google Books

Carbon Copy, which received a glowing, in-depth profile in InfoWorld the next year, was seen as an early leader in the market, with other tools such as Norton’s pcANYWHERE first emerging around the same period. In these early days before the internet was commonplace, these platforms worked over standard modems, and required people to call into the remote machine.

Ironically for a product called Carbon Copy, the tool had problems with piracy. At one point in its history, Meridian Technologies had a bounty program in which it called on software users to turn in their colleagues for using unauthorized copies of Carbon Copy, a name that literally evokes cloning things.

“We are really going as far as we can to support the product, and all we’re asking in return is that people play fair with us,” the firm’s Charles Jones told PC Magazine. “Unfortunately, the world being what it is, I fully expect we will be paying several people $2,500.”

The promise of having remote access to more powerful computers was extremely tantalizing, especially so when a GUI was attached. In a 1988 article in InfoWorld, the Mac-based remote access tool Timbuktu, which worked over local networks and modems alike, was sold to users as a way to use more powerful computers on more modest hardware. (No color, though; them’s the breaks.)

“For about the price of an SE, you can use a Mac II chassis,” said Reese Jones of the company Farallon, which had acquired Timbuktu maker WOS Data Systems at the time.

 Of course, this technology evolved over time and didn’t stay still; soon, tools like pcANYWHERE made the leap from DOS to Windows, and remote access tools increasingly became platform-independent, making machines easier to manage outside of the office.

The result is that remote access is a key part of the utility toolset for IT teams far and wide. But is it by no means a perfect tool.

The macOS-based app Screens.

Five common types of remote-access software you’ll likely run into today

Chrome Remote Desktop. Much of Google’s sales pitch in the modern day comes down to, “if you have a web browser, you can access this.” And this translates really well to Chrome Remote Desktop, which has been around for a decade and is perhaps the easiest way to remotely access computers on the market.

GoToMyPC. Around since 1998, the tool found great success around the turn of the 21st century because of its focus on ease of use, and found use among remote workers decades before it became the cool thing to do.

Apple Screen Sharing. While Apple has long offered a robust Remote Desktop application, it is generally overkill for normal users; for the rest of us, MacOS’ built-in Screen Sharing tool more than does the job, while Screens offers a decent third-party alternative.

Remote Desktop Services. Microsoft also offers an internal screens sharing tool in the form of Remote Desktop Services, which has a lineage that dates all the way back to Windows NT Server 4.0 a quarter century ago.

TeamViewer. This is the one that got the folks in Florida into trouble. A widely used tool for sharing screens that is typically used by IT teams for technical support and remote management, it has gained popularity in recent years for its flexibility and ease of use.

1998

The year that the RFB (remote framebuffer) protocol was first publicly released. The technology, developed at England’s Olivetti Research Laboratory in the ’90s, came to life thanks to interesting roots—it was first used as an interface that allowed a peripheral to connect to an ATM operating system. This unusually specific use case eventually evolved into something with an unusually broad use case: the basis for VNC (virtual network computing), perhaps the most broadly used open standard for remote viewers to this day. The research lab, at one point acquired by AT&T, was later the basis for its own company, RealVNC, in 2002.

The problem with remote access is that it is way too easy to misuse

You probably didn’t expect this story offering the basics of Remote Desktop technology to take a detour into a popular politician’s teenage years, but that’s the timeline we live in.

And in that timeline, a couple of years ago, onetime presidential candidate Beto O’Rourke made an announcement that he was once a hacker. Kind of.

See, he was once a member of the Cult of the Dead Cow (cDc, but not like the CDC), a decades-old group known for its work in the hacking scene, though in that role O’Rourke did more creative writing than actual hacking. (I promise, that’s not a slight; cDc was a DIY media group just as much as it was a hacking collective.)

It should be noted that many cDc members not named Beto O’Rourke also went on to respectable careers—lead member Mudge, birth name Peiter Zatko, once worked at DARPA and is now the head of security for Twitter.

Before Beto gave it a fresh shot of mainstream attention, the group was best known for creating one of the best-remembered hacking tools of the past 30 years—Back Orifice, a remote access tool that represented a “backdoor” tool that gave users full access to a Windows user’s computer. (The name, as you may have deduced, is a dirty joke that references Microsoft.) The tool, first announced at the DEFCON event in 1998, came to life as a way to encourage Microsoft to take security more seriously.

And when Microsoft failed to take it seriously enough, they released an upgraded version that was even more sophisticated. What made the tools dangerous was not simply that they could exploit computers; what made them dangerous was that it lowered the barrier of entry for hacking to those who didn’t know what they were doing.

The strange thing is, though, when broken down, Back Orifice is not that dissimilar to more modern remote administration tools, which also offer in-depth access to end-user machines.

The difference is the context, as well as the approach to security. Today’s remote access (usually, water treatment facilities notwithstanding) is highly secure, and allows administrators to manage highly sophisticated systems remotely. Many of our machines can be managed just like the Trojan-hacked Windows 98 machines of yore. The difference is that, rather than relying on the cloak-and-dagger approach, they do it through secure means.

Tools such as TeamViewer are incredibly common in the information technology space as a result. But they come with challenges, especially as security modernizes.

A good example of this is actually Symantec’s pcAnywhere, which found its security turned into a joke about nine years ago, when its source code had been stolen and released on The Pirate Bay after the hacker failed to extort money out of the company. The pcAnywhere software, which dated to the mid-1980s, was soon taken off the market entirely.

Remote access is something that can be easily exploited in the wrong hands, especially with poor security protocols.

“Many businesses use remote desktop to facilitate network access for remote employees over the Internet. But by granting such access, these businesses have made it much more likely they’ll be targeted and hacked,” says Matt Ahrens, the head of the security team at the cyber insurance firm Coalition, in a 2018 post for DarkReading.

Of course, given this risk, much remote software works on strengthening the moat so the access is in limited hands. Which is why the incident at the water treatment plant in Florida is basically the perfect example of what not to do with remote desktop access.

TeamViewer with the default password? Ending use of a high-access tool without actually removing it? Absolutely not the way you’d want to manage remote software that handles something as sensitive as a community’s water supply. Which is, of course, how it was set up.

768%

The increase in attacks over RDP-based clients in the past year, according to the security firm ESET. The problem, says the company, is that, because people are more remote now than they were a year ago, that cyberattackers are taking advantage of that fact to wreak havoc. So, if you’re not using VNC for anything, you may want to turn it off.

Remote access software is an incredibly useful thing in the right hands—I personally use it to manage access to my server as needed—but the wrong hands make it a potentially dangerous proposition.

It’s just like, if I were in a coffee shop, it would be a bad idea to leave my laptop open for a couple of hours while I go to the movies.

But unlike going to a coffee shop and going to the movies, remote access is something very desirable right now because of the way it expands reach.

It’s unfortunate that many people were introduced to its potential in a really dark, really bizarre way, because when broken down, a tool that allows people to manage mission-critical systems from the safety of their home is something we should be encouraging right now.

(The problem is, when those mission-critical systems are being managed, they need individual logins and tight security measures.)

In the years to come, there will most assuredly be books and oral histories written about what happened in Florida, the sheer folly of leaving remote access open with so little focus on security. But it should not be a knock on remote access, which was a super-novel concept back in the mid-’80s and is still pretty awesome today as it has improved along with GUIs and network access.

Really, it’s a knock on the fact that, all these years later, we suck at security when we should be good at it. The cDc warned us.

Why Remote Access Software Is Almost Too Useful syndicated from https://triviaqaweb.wordpress.com/feed/

[dwdelaney-blog]

Birding Brothers of the Bronx A Bird Show Spots a Rival, and Bird-Watchers of Color Are Angry

A chance sighting of a hungry peregrine falcon gave a homeless teen a lifelong passion; now Jason Ward and his brother Jeffrey star in “Birds of North America,” on topic.com.

By Anna RussellMarch 25, 2019

When Jason Ward was fourteen, he spotted a peregrine falcon devouring a pigeon on the windowsill of the South Bronx homeless shelter where his family was living. “I was literally witnessing a nature documentary unfold,” he recalled, adding, “That was definitely my spark bird.” Ward, now thirty-two, has five siblings, but only he and his younger brother Jeffrey are birders. (Jeffrey’s spark bird was a barn owl, which he saw in Central Park.) “These peregrines are really powerful fliers,” Jason said. “They have the ability to just change their immediate surroundings. Growing up in the Bronx, that was something that I admired, and wanted to be able to do myself.”

Last week, Jason, who has lived in Atlanta for more than a decade, was back in the Bronx for a birding trip with Jeffrey. A documentary series, “Birds of North America,” starring Jason, with occasional appearances by Jeffrey, had just premièred on topic.com. The brothers met in the Orchard Beach parking lot, in Pelham Bay Park, at the end of the 6 train. Jason wore a puffy jacket, hiking boots, and an Osprey backpack full of gear; Jeffrey had on a red Adidas cap, spotless white Nikes, and a sweatshirt that read “Thebronx.”

In “Birds of North America,” Jason and Jeffrey, who are black, spend time with groups, such as the Feminist Bird Club, whose members don’t resemble that most common varietal of birder: the mature white male. “That’s the vast majority of the makeup, but I don’t think it will be going forward,” Jason said. “Birding is going to become more colorful.” Like most serious birders, they track their findings on the app eBird. They also compete on Twitter to see who can spot the most species in a year. Last year, Jason won, two hundred and seventy-nine to two hundred and thirty-nine. This year, after a trip to the Bahamas, Jeffrey, who still lives in the Bronx and works for New York City Audubon (and a juice place downtown), was ahead by twenty birds.

“I look at twenty birds as a nice, comfortable lead,” Jason said.

“Was twenty a comfortable lead last year?” Jeffrey asked.

“Migration is about to start,” Jason added, kindly.

“Red tail,” Jeffrey said, noting a passing red-tailed hawk.

“Red tail,” Jason said.

They set off toward the beach. On the boardwalk, past a shuttered snack bar and a fenced-in pen with an ominous N.Y.C. Parks Department sign that read “lost children,” Jeffrey set up a scope on a tripod. Jason peered through his binoculars. “What’s that raft out there? Cormorants?” They were surf scoters. “Scoters?” he said. “Man.”

An airplane passed overhead. Jason turned. “What was that? Finch?”

“House sparrow,” Jeffrey said, deflated. “This is why I hate the house sparrow.”

Jason said that a recent post on the Birdist about underappreciated birds had named crows, starlings, and pigeons. “Pigeons are amazing fliers,” Jeffrey said. “I’ve seen a video of pigeons doing backflips in flight. They’re tough.”

“They’re like the Impala of the sky,” Jason said.

The birding community has welcomed the brothers, although there have been odd moments of tension. “Like when they meet us in the park and they walk right past me to try to find the leader. I’m, like, ‘Hey, I’m Jason!’ ” In Crotona Park, at the edge of a pond, Jeffrey was once questioned by the police.

Near an inlet, they logged mute swans (“killers”), buffleheads, red-breasted mergansers, and more surf scoters, whose heads resemble a clown in full makeup. At the end of the boardwalk, they spotted an osprey gliding on an air current. “First of the year!” Jeffrey said. “That’s a hundred and twenty-eight.”

“Damn it,” Jason said.

They decided to look for a horned owl that Jeffrey had seen in a tree hollow the previous year, up a muddy path. Jeffrey stepped carefully over a log, wary of dirtying his sneakers. At the tree, he stopped and listened: “Nothing.”

Near the parking lot, they passed a man letting his dog chase a flock of geese. “That’s just obnoxious,” Jason said. Cats are another menace. (Jonathan Franzen, an avid birder, has summarized the community’s position as “cats must die.”) “To allow cats to roam freely is completely irresponsible,” Jason said.

In the car, Jason took out his phone and logged his stats. Twenty-six species, including ring-billed gulls, common loons, and a long-tailed duck. (“Late, but not unexpected,” he wrote.) On Instagram, he scrolled until he landed on a chart of fourteen types of sparrows. “Ha!” he said, and showed it to Jeffrey, who laughed. The image of the house sparrow had been scribbled over in red letters: “Trash,” it read. ♦

This article appears in the print edition of the April 1, 2019, issue, with the headline “Spark Birds.”

Two nature series with black hosts debuted online recently. The makers of one say their rivals are playing into racial stereotypes.

Jason Ward, host of “Birds of North America,” birding in Atlanta recently.

Credit

Melissa Golden for The New York Times

Image

Jason Ward, host of “Birds of North America,” birding in Atlanta recently.

Credit

Credit

Melissa Golden for The New York Times

By Cara Buckley

June 28, 2019

For Jason Ward, an animal lover who grew up in homeless shelters in the South Bronx, hosting the bird-watching web series “Birds of North America” is beyond a dream job.

Ward, 32, has birded in Prospect Park with the comedian Wyatt Cenac, near Brooklyn Bridge with the Feminist Bird Club, and in Cape May, N.J., with his mentor, J. Drew Lanham, a wildlife biologist and fellow birder of color. Birders of color are pretty rare, which is why the program exists: to show that they do, too.

So Ward and his producers were shocked earlier this week when Rolling Stone unveiled a new bird-watching web series that shared uncanny similarities with Ward’s show.

Called “Birding With Charles,” it also featured a black host, Charles Holmes, taking a guest bird-watching — in the first episode it’s rapper Valee, who visits Central Park with Holmes. Accompanied by a tinkling piano overture and a British narrator, the host commits a series of bird-watching no-nos: he harasses a bird by chasing it, he disses a mourning dove and a robin as “basic” — “us top-tier bird-watchers don’t even care about ’em,” he says — and stands by silently as Valee lights up a blunt.

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For Ward and Anna Holmes, the editorial director of Topic.com, which produces “Birds of North America,” it seemed that Rolling Stone was making fun of their show. “It felt like it was a co-option of our series, and on top of that was mocking the very idea of what we are trying to do,” Holmes (who is unrelated to the “Birding With Charles” host) said in an interview. She and scientists and birders of color took to Twitter to criticize Rolling Stone for, as one bird-watcher tweeted, “damaging the work that we black birders and biologists have done to bring our people into these spaces.”

But Rolling Stone says it’s all a coincidence.

A spokesman for the magazine, Jeffrey W. Schneider, said “Birding With Charles” was not based in any way on “Birds of North America” but instead on the 1991 television series “Fishing With John,” in which the hip downtown actor and musician John Lurie went fishing with his equally hip friends, among them Tom Waits and Jim Jarmusch. Indeed Lurie responded to the controversy with a tweet of his own: “I believe if anyone should be upset then that would be me — but they are going to have me on a future episode — shaking my fist and yelling — You dirty crooks!”

“In @RollingStone’s latest series, in which the magazine basically rips off the @topicstories series ‘Birds of North America.’”

John Lurie

✔

@lurie_john

I believe if anyone should be upset then that would be me - but they are going to have me on a future episode - shaking my fist and yelling  - You dirty crooks!

30

7:37 PM - Jun 25, 2019

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Schneider said the Rolling Stone editorial team, which considers the show a celebrity interview program, settled on birding because “anyone could do it” and its offices are close to Central Park. The staff members had not seen “Birds of North of America” when they developed the show, he added.

He provided a screenshot of a producer’s handwritten calendar entry indicating, he said, that they were kicking around an idea for a “Fishing With John”-esque show on March 14. The first episode of “Birds of North America” was posted on March 17, though a teaser trailer went up March 8. More “Birding With Charles” episodes are planned.

While “Birding With Charles” has the tongue-in-cheek feel of a Portlandia sketch, Schneider would not address the criticism from birders of color that the show was promoting stereotypes, saying only that Ward’s show “is really cool and it is not something we would ever try to parody or ridicule.”

Told of Rolling Stone’s response, Anna Holmes said one of the basic steps in developing a series is seeing what comparable products are on the market. “Jason Ward put himself out there, publicly and prominently,” she wrote in an email on Thursday. “One would have had to work very, very hard to avoid clocking his show doing that kind of scan.”

“Birds of North America” was shaped by serendipity, a meeting of the minds and Ward’s lifelong fascination with wildlife.

Ward grew up poor in the South Bronx, he said. As an animal lover whose family could not afford cable and channels like National Geographic, he hit the library, getting lost in books about animals because they transported him to the places animals lived. One day in his early teens, he saw a peregrine falcon attacking a pigeon outside his window. Ward was enraptured, and his fascination with birds began. He started birding after moving to Atlanta; soon he was leading nature walks and tweeting (as it were) about hard-to-identify birds.

Image

Ward showing broken robin eggs to children on a bird walk.

Credit

Melissa Golden for The New York Times

Image

A peregrine falcon pin on Ward’s binocular strap.

Credit

Melissa Golden for The New York Times

Holmes, meanwhile, had been wanting to develop a series that highlighted people of color interacting with the natural world, in part because of her roots. She is African-American and the daughter of a ranger with the National Park Service.

“It’s very important to me, and has been my whole life, to underscore that people who engage with natural world — campers, hikers, birders — are not just white people who wear Patagonia,” Holmes said.

She had Ward shoot a pilot. On camera, he was great: slightly awkward but authentic. “In this really crazy world we live in now, where everyone looks at their phones and is distracted,” Holmes said, “he is celebrating the idea of stopping and being quiet and looking around you, because that’s how you bird.”

The show did not have a big following — the teaser trailer drew 31,000 YouTube views, others episodes a tenth of that — but it did get some traction. The New Yorker ran a “Talk of the Town” item; other articles followed, and Ward forged more connections with people of color working in STEM fields — science, technology, engineering and math.

“There are black people in the STEM community working very hard to dispel the whole myth that black people aren’t wildlife savvy and that we don’t enjoy being outdoors,” said Ward, who also works as an outreach coordinator with the National Audubon Society.

If “Birding With Charles” is not meant to be serious, Ward said Rolling Stone should make that much clearer.

“I cannot get behind anything that paints people of color in a less-than-flattering light,” he said, “or attempts to poke fun at something that has brought so many people innumerable amounts of joy.”

[cgpaints]

Monthly Review, June 2017

Hi everyone!

I have been (and still am) a little hesitant to post an monthly review thing this month because to be perfectly honest there just is not much to show as much as actual work is concerned. Most of my freelance work is under NDA and there was not too much time left for personal work and/or studies because as I mentioned last month me and my girlfriend finally moved into our new appartment and have been insanely busy setting everything up.

During the move something happend though, that I wanted to talk about. In a way my thoughts tend to spiral down quickly into the „aaah whats the point -realm“ when it comes to writing these long texts. I was debating myself if I should actually do this privately or if I should write it down and share it publicly but as the thought of sharing it has been spinning around in my head for three days now I figured that I might as well just write it down and try to get it out of my head that way. Maybe this resonates with someone, and maybe someone might even feel motivated to share his/her own views on and experience with this.

The thing I want to talk about is my experience of self worth and how it relates to my work, my attitude towards my work that is in turn resulting from that, maybe even my view on painting and drawing in the widest sense (as it relates to me personaly) and at last about how this might have started to change a little bit during the last few days in particular AND how aaaaaall that relates to the picture at the top of this post.

BUT first things first.

As I already mentioned we moved into a new appartment. It‘s large, it‘s cool, it‘s expensive and thus scary as fuck for a struggling freelancer like me, but that shall not really be the point here, maybe next month once the situation has settled in a little bit.

What‘s important here is that in this new appartment I do have an entire room just for myself, a REAL grown up person‘s office basically. Up until now all I had was a tiny tiny room that I could barely fit a desk in and for the past six months when my girlfriend and I moved around a little bit from Airbnb to Aribnb while she was tryting to get a fulltime office job I did not even have that. A simple desk had to to do during that time.

So now I have this biiig room with more than enough room to have all my drawing and painting supply out at the same time, ready to go whenever I want and it is great!

A few days ago after we got all our stuff into the new place I was sitting in my chair looking aorund the office trying to figure out what to hang on my walls, I just needed something up there, the room was too empty to feel comfortable.

I sat there thinking about all the awesome art from all the different artists I admire that I would like to decorate my walls with but the issue was that I don‘t own any prints not to mention originals here and just printing something out seemed kind of lame.

Being a little bummed out about that I proceeded to go through all my stuff when I found all my marker and watercolor drawings I did last year during „maysketchaday“. I looked through them and I noticed „ hey these are kind of fun!“. Moreover I noticed that they immediately sparked the desire to just grab my markers and get to painting again. I remembered the fun I had trying out a new medium last year and this just got me going. Weirdly enough I did not have this feeling for YEARS. Even during the time I painted these, sure it was kind of enjoyable but it all had this „o well, it‘s a drawing I guess“ feeling to it.

And then something hit me, and this is the thing I want to talk about here.

While feeling kind of excited about getting to drawing right away after rediscovering these tiny things actually feeling good about them I immediately remembered that I used to beat the SHIT out of me „emotionally“ after each one of these, sucking the joy out of the process I have just felt minutes before. I would be bummed out that the drawing did not come out the way I wanted, that I was not improving( which wasn‘t even true) and that I am not even close to anything „all the other artists“ are capable of. I took the drawings, put them in a drawer and would be happy to not have to look at them again.

Remembering all this I kept thinking about it and quickly noticed that I am doing this all the time, I beat myself down after each and every drawing and painting I do. I do this subconciously afer every single drawing I finish. I do this based on the work others do and even based on the response I get from it on social media, stupid shit like that. I am  not talking about a healthy mentality that made me realizy my shortcomings and motivated me to do better next time, I am talking about being resentful and downright hateful towards my own work and to be frank to myself as a person.

Thoughts like „ I‘ve been doing this for years now, I should be better“, „others have started drawing later than me and have surpassed me by miles, why am I still so bad at this?“ „is talent actually relevant afteral, or am I simply not intelligent enough to see the flaws and to be able to improve on them?“ were my daily routine. To a degree they still are, I just started conciously noticing this days ago.

I realized what I have been doing this for a period of years and it almost seems comical to me now that I was actually wondering why I was getting kind of depressive and resentful towards my work and myself even. All I do all day is trying to improve my skills with all that I have and after each time I decide to punish myself for that. What is supposed to happen if one keeps that up for years and even turns it into a subconcious routine?

Obviously you stop at least liking what you are doing, hell you might even get scared to do it, which is definitely what I experienced.

It feels a little weird to write this down in a rather short way (although for a simple blog entry this sure looks enormous) because this way of thinking has becomce such a huge part of me.

Measured on the time I spent doing if for the last 10 years I think it is obvious that drawing and painting has been the most important aspect of my life. During that time it has acutally become a part of me. I as a human am defined a lot through it. There just is not much left of me when one takes the drawing and painting aspect away from me, it is not just what I do for work. It‘s another topic to decide if this fact alone is actually good or bad, what I am trying to say is that this thing „painting“ has a lot of power over me. My personal well being as a human is highly dependant on the way I handle my relationship towards painting. If this relationship is compromised by constant self hate and punishment it‘s only obvious that all this bleeds into the rest of my personality. I feel like as a result of all this I have been kind of desolving into this unhealthy spiral of self doubt and resentment towards myself.

Its also another story to go into of when I think all of this has started, all I know for now is that this is something that HAPPENED, it has not been that way from the beginning. At some point something switched and drawing which was this huge and exciting unbeatable but beautiful and POSITIVE mountain of a thing became this dreadful chaotic monster that one can not get a handle on no matter what.

I can‘t really tell why all this dawned on me as soon as I held these drawings of dead people in my hands but it sure did. I also tend to be rather scepticals towards these moments of „revelation“ but I felt this so strongly and clearly at that moment and I still do that I decied to act on it and to ultimately write about it.

I decided to take all of them and hang them on my wall and to just have them there as a reminder that this is actually what I do and that no matter how these turned out these were the best things I could do at that time and that I don‘t have to be ashamed for or angry about them but that I am actually allowed to like them for what they are.

Now are they the best drawings ever? Hell no, they aren‘t even „professional quality“ (whatever that means) and I am not trying to trick myself into thinking that they are. But they are a part of me in some way, I painted them, I gave it my all when I painted them and this is a good thing. They have a right to be pinned on that wall. They remind me where I was a year ago, they show me where I should improve on, they motivate me to do better and they make me want to get to painting as soon as I enter the room. What‘s bad about that?

The impulse to just lock them up in a drawer and hating myself for having created it is so utterly destructive and stupid, sitting here right now writing this makes me realize that even more.

As a matter of fact I came up with a plan out of all of this.

There is still a ton of free space on my walls, I am going to use it. Whenever I paint or draw something that I think turned out okay, or god forbid even „good“ I will pin it on the wall. One day sooner or later the wall will be filled with no room left, that‘s when I will start swapping out drawings one at the time. The new „best“ drawing will replace the current „worst“ one on the wall. I think I will also divide the wall into sections I want to improve upon like „watercolors“ „oilpaintings“ „anatomy“ „design“ and so on. I want this to feel exciting again and I want to actually see my progress rather than just feeling like sinking into a swamp of „o well I hope I am going to end up somewhere sometime“

There it is, I think I poured my heart out, I don‘t really know what to say anymore.

So what‘s the point of this text in addition of just allowing me to sort out my thoughs on that topic?

I think that if you belong to the kind of artists (or people in general) who tend to go down the path of self loathing for trying to do something thats arguably hard to do, no matter if conciously or unconciously you might want to start looking at what you are doing selfhate wise and try to figure out a strategy for yourself to get out of that. As I already said I have been thinking about this for the past week or so so nothing I say is really worthy of being called „founded advice“ or anything like that but there are very personal lessons that I think I am learning right now which feel right and more importantly feel like a good means of proceeding into the future with a healthy mindset to improve and enjoy whatever this all is.

Don‘t be ashamed for what you are doing and incourage yourself like you would incourage a person you care about. Not being the best at something should feel interesting and exciting, it does not mean that you suck as a person. You are your own benchmark, do your best, try to improve on your weaknesses and be thankful for your wins and losses on that path.

Don‘t be an asshole towards yourself!

Talk to you next month!

Talk to you next month!

[garancefranke-ruta]

Resistance Report: Activists holding town halls with a cardboard cutout and empty suits - Gabby Giffords tells GOP to 'have some courage'

Former Arizona Rep. Gabby Giffords speaks at a campaign event for Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton, Monday, Nov. 7, 2016.(AP Photo/Elise Amendola)

FLAT MARCO. “His face was posted on popsicle sticks, printed on a life-sized cutout and hidden in Where’s Waldo? styled puzzles. His name was printed on T-shirts and written on posters. But Sen. Marco Rubio was thousands of miles away from Wednesday night’s ‘constituent town hall’ meeting held in his honor,” reports the Tampa Bay Times. “So instead, an empty, metal folding chair bore the brunt of grievances shared by more than 500 of his constituents gathered at the National Association of Letter Carriers Branch 599 building on Cypress Street.”

Holding town halls with Flat Marco, a cardboard cut-out, is just the latest in a series of creative measures progressive activists have taken to shame reluctant members into holding town halls and draw media attention to their concerns.

Protesters hold mock town hall meeting in Tampa with cardboard Marco Rubio https://t.co/zHnka6tSqQ via @TB_Times

— Anastasia Dawson (@adawsonwrites) February 23, 2017

In Miami, members of the local “Indivisible” group held a town hall Thursday with an empty suit designed to represent Rubio. Reports the Miami Herald: “The mayors of South Miami and Pinecrest hoisted a dark suit on a hanger into the air between them, and the crowd of nearly 300 people jeered and laughed. Someone threw a wad of cash on the table, nearly hitting the paper name tag identifying the invisible man as Senator Marco Rubio. Philip Stoddard, of South Miami, stuffed the bills in a suit pocket and held a water bottle near the lapels. A man from the overflow crowd outside shouted from the open doors: ‘It’s an empty chair. We deserve better than an empty chair.'”

Rubio’s office had said the senator wasn’t holding town halls because he was traveling in Europe, but he quietly returned on Wednesday night and was confronted by an activist Thursday morning who tracked him to a private event at Jackson Memorial Hospital. “Senator, I thought you were in Europe?” the protester asked, according to video provided to the Miami New-Times. “I saw all these ‘Missing Child’ posters all over town. … I’m glad you’re OK, but are you going to host a town hall? There’s a constituent town hall today.” Rubio kept walking. Protesters also confronted Rubio at Florida International University Thursday.

AN EMPTY SUIT? Rubio wasn’t the only senator to get the empty suit treatment. “Sen. Pat Toomey wasn’t at an event Tuesday night set up by protest groups and billed as a town hall, so they stood an empty suit at the front of an Allentown church as a target,” reports the Morning Call, a newspaper based in Allentown, Pa. “For two months, people have picketed Toomey’s offices across the state, demanding he speak to his constituents and explain how he would stand up to some of President Donald Trump’s actions. Toomey, who publicly endorsed Trump after voting for him about 6:30 p.m. Election Day, campaigned as an independent check on whomever won the White House.” Toomey’s staff told the paper that they’ve been meeting with the protestors to hear their concerns.

HOMEWARD BOUND. Seven members of Congress who have chosen not to hold town hall meetings are seeing activists holding vigils and “search parties” outside their homes in California, the Los Angeles Times reports. They did not always get the addresses right.

Activists came to hold a candlelight vigil outside @SteveKnight25's house. One problem: neighbors say the Knights moved a few months ago. pic.twitter.com/czB0JXNGnm

— Javier Panzar (@jpanzar) February 24, 2017

SHY DEMOCRATS. It’s not just the GOP: Even some Democratic members of Congress are avoiding holding town halls. “From Montana to West Virginia, the nation’s most vulnerable Senate Democrats are avoiding town hall meetings as their Republican counterparts get pummeled by an energized electorate frustrated with President Donald Trump’s early agenda,” reports the Associated Press. “Some Democrats prefer to connect with constituents over the telephone or social media. Others are meeting voters in controlled environments with limited opportunities to ask questions. But few of the 10 Democratic senators facing re-election next year in states carried by Trump have scheduled in-person town hall meetings during this week’s congressional recess.”

‘HAVE SOME COURAGE’. Former Democratic Rep. Gabby Giffords, who was shot in the head during a constituent meeting in Tucson, Ariz., in 2011, urged members of Congress to have the courage to meet with the people they represent after Texas Republican Rep. Louie Gohmert cited fears of violence as a reason to avoid town halls. “At this time there are groups from the more violent strains of the leftist ideology, some even being paid, who are preying on public town halls to wreak havoc and threaten public safety,” Gohmert said Thursday.

Giffords issued a blistering statement in reply via Americans for Responsible Solutions, the gun violence prevention group she co-founded:

“I was shot on a Saturday morning. By Monday morning my offices were open to the public. Ron Barber – at my side that Saturday, who was shot multiple times, then elected to Congress in my stead – held town halls. It’s what the people deserve in a representative.

“In the past year, campaigning for gun safety, I have held over 50 public events.

“Many of the members of Congress who are refusing to hold town halls and listen to their constituents concerns are the very same politicians that have opposed commonsense gun violence prevention policies and have allowed the Washington gun lobby to threaten the safety of law enforcement and everyday citizens in our schools, businesses, places of worship, airports, and movie theaters.

“To the politicians who have abandoned their civic obligations, I say this: Have some courage. Face your constituents. Hold town halls.”

One person who’s not afraid of town halls? Republican Rep. Justin Amash of Michigan. Sure, the libertarian-leaning lawmaker got yelled at plenty during his town hall on Thursday. But he took questions, and he’s out there telling Republicans to buck up and deal with the people they represent.

They are our fellow Americans with legitimate concerns. We need to stop acting so fragile. I'm proud to defend liberty and the Constitution. https://t.co/2CcD02mXzl

— Justin Amash (@justinamash) February 22, 2017

He’s even having some fun with it.

Too late. Follow me on Twitter to learn about upcoming opportunities to yell at me. https://t.co/WURkB7EQRp

— Justin Amash (@justinamash) February 24, 2017

ABOUT THAT WALL. Texas Republicans are not as into building Donald Trump’s border wall as the president is, the Wall Street Journal reports: “President Donald Trump’s vision of a sea-to-sea wall on the U.S.-Mexico border is running into an unexpected obstacle: opposition from Republicans in Texas, where most of the unfenced land is located. Many Texas Republicans say a better approach mixes additional fencing and more personnel, as well as better technology to monitor the state’s southern boundary, which is marked by the winding Rio Grande River and in vast stretches by formidable natural barriers. ‘Our border is very different in different places,’ said Sen. John Cornyn of Texas, the No. 2 Senate Republican, on a trip to the border this week. He pointed to fencing in San Diego as effective in separating urban areas. ‘But as you know, many places in Texas are virtually inaccessible.'”

Meanwhile in California, faith leaders are creating a new underground railroad of sorts to hide undocumented immigrants from immigration authorities. CNN reports on the start of “a network formed by Los Angeles religious leaders across faiths in the wake of Donald Trump’s election. The intent is to shelter hundreds, possibly thousands of undocumented people in safe houses across Southern California. The goal is to offer another sanctuary beyond religious buildings or schools, ones that require federal authorities to obtain warrants before entering the homes.” Private homes are protected by the Fourth Amendment and generally require authorities to obtain warrants for entry.

If you want to understand more about what the U.S.-Mexico border is actually like physically, this beautiful photo essay published in the Atlantic featuring images from two Agence France-Presse photographers, gives a sense of some of the variable terrain.

And this Atlantic video from last year continues to raise questions about what sort of life we are creating for Americans who live near the border, as there is already a no-man’s land of sort between the existing border fence and the Rio Grande — along with a residual population of U.S. citizens who live in it.

TRANS ADVOCATES REACT TO TRUMP ROLL-BACK. For the past two days trans rights advocates have been turning out to protest the Trump administration’s decision to roll back the Obama-era protection for trans students to use the bathroom of their choice at school. On Thursday night, they rallied outside the historic Stonewall Inn, where the gay rights revolution began in with a six-day street uprising in 1969.

"This is what trans looks like." Mateo w/ @MaketheRoadNY joins demonstration to #protecttranskids! #Stonewall pic.twitter.com/qPwbUcHm3e

— Daniel Altschuler (@altochulo) February 23, 2017

It was never about bathrooms. #stonewall #transrights h/t @david_films_nyc pic.twitter.com/NEhRHoPJsN

— NYCLU (@NYCLU) February 23, 2017

The Trans Lifeline nonprofit was deluged with donations after a tweet from singer Katy Perry urged people to back the group.

And Caitlyn Jenner, a Republican, spoke out against Donald Trump:

Well @realDonaldTrump, from one Republican to another, this is a disaster. You made a promise to protect the LGBTQ community. Call me. pic.twitter.com/XwYe0LNUOq

— Caitlyn Jenner (@Caitlyn_Jenner) February 24, 2017

[rueur]

Morning Pages #8 (12.01.2017)

Thursday 12th Jan - 7:43 a.m.

Usually I write a little over three pages, my last sentence or so spilling onto a fourth page. But yesterday, I wrote exactly three, I think because I was so close to not reaching three at all. Hopefully, today will be different. Less stop and start, and more just natural flowing work. That’s what I’m supposed to be aiming for anyway, this is supposed to be stream-of-consciousness, not a diary. I’ve been writing this like a diary and sometimes I feel like I’ve lost the point, but honestly it’s also supposed to be about what’s going through your head and what’s been going through my head recently has been my friends, and my family, my boyfriend, what I’ve been doing to keep myself occupied whilst I’ve been living in this cat-house all by myself. I’m house-sitting right now, living with two old cats and a very old goldfish.

On Saturday, Dan and I were supposed to go to the Laundry Bar but he’s been busy and let me know he couldn’t make it yesterday afternoon after I asked him. But, last night at around half past eleven, I was briefly on the phone to Ikaros and he asked if I wanted to do something with him on Saturday. I said I had plans to go to the Laundry Bar and invited him along, and surprisingly he said yes. He’s usually not one for clubbing, and although technically this isn’t clubbing, the reason I believe he’s not one for clubbing is because of the crowds of sweaty, young people, the throbbing music, and the increased availability of drugs and drug-takers. The Laundry Bar will most likely possess all these club qualities, but hopefully they’ll be playing really fantastic throbbing music and there will be adequate dancing space AND with my boyfriend there, hopefully I won’t end up making out with a twenty-eight year-old and then regretting it immensely and spending the next week trying to find out how I can get out of seeing him again without hurting his feelings.

So those are my Saturday plans, not today’s plans, and today is the day that I have woken up to live out, so I should talk about today. Today, Marcus is coming over here and we are going to be working on my script ‘Rock Pool’ to finetune it together - writer and director - and hopefully turn it into a filmable piece of work. This script has been in development for around one year now, but I only really got it up and running during that last six months of 2016, when I was taking a screenwriting subject for my degree (I’m a creative writing major). The story is very close to my own experiences, so I’m eager to see my message out there. Marcus is also a very old, very close friend of mine and I trust him eternally with anything that I give him. I’m honestly very excited for today. The apartment is a mess, however, so I’ll need to do some vacuuming before he comes over, which I’m a little hesitant about. The last time I used the vacuum, one cat vomited and the other pissed itself and it ended up creating a much larger mess than the one I had cleaned up. That, and the vacuum is apparently full and Emily instructed me on how to empty it over the phone and it all seemed both incredibly complicated and equally messy. She said I would most definitely get dust on me and then apologised for that in advance. But I need to be a good host and I don’t want Marcus thinking I like living in a pigsty, even though this pigsty must be credited to the boys rather than me. Not so much Fish, but Bruno and Romy. What slobs.

Plans to see Lauren and Jacob are also in the mix for Ikaros and I. Wait, I’m sorry. I just heard one of the cats mewling, probably Bruno. I try to wake up early to write these pages before feeding them a little after eight, but I think they’re hungry. And I don’t know how much I’ll be procrastinating today, like I did yesterday. I think I should just feed them now and come back to finishing this morning’s morning pages? I really didn’t want to stop and start today though. I don’t want to make a habit of it. My hands are hurting. I’m lying on my stomach in bed, writing this out on my laptop. I’ve been using one document on Google Drive every morning, filling it up with that morning’s entry and then the next morning, I erase the last morning to start afresh. Thus, the only record I have of my morning pages is on this blog. Which I hope falls into the hands of nobody that I know and most definitely, nobody that I’ve mentioned by name in these pages. I probably should’ve changed the names or something...

Let’s just say I have! Let’s just say I’ve changed my name too. You’re all strangers, you wouldn’t know anyway. I’m absolutely breaking the rules with publicly posting these morning pages, I know. I’m not even concerned with how many notes I get honestly, this is purely a storage solution. I have a shoddy laptop with no space, I’ve filled my Google Drive up uni/work stuff. I don’t even have Microsoft Word, so there’s not even a chance of me storing word documents on a USB or anything. This blog just made the most sense to me; and it was pre-existing too! I started this blog in Year 12, 2014, right before my exams. It was intended back then to be a diary of sorts too, a place where I could vent, let off some steam using the written word. It’s nearly 8:13 a.m.: a train is going to leave from South Morang station carrying maybe thirty or forty people. Just a thought. By the time it reaches Reservoir, that number will be upwards of one hundred, maybe one hundred and fifty. By half past, peak hour will most likely begin to dwindle away and the passengers taking trains leaving the end of the line by 9 are going to feel much less like sardines in a tin. I am kind of missing the early morning commute to make uni lectures. Grumpy and groggy, sometimes sweaty from my bike, working myself to death with a very minimal breakfast trying to make a one-hour class where nothing happens for the sake of being able to call myself a trained writer in a year’s time; that’s all I’ve ever wanted (as a Year 12 student, not just of my life generally). I’m really hungry right now.

I might just go and feed the cats now. It’s nearly twenty past eight and if I’m hungry, I can only imagine how their little bodies must be feeling. They usually snack on their meals though. If I walk outside right now and proceed to feeding them, only to find that their bowls are still rather full, I will be somewhat annoyed and consider it a foreboding omen in regards to my later plans to vacuum. Goodness, please please please do not force me to have to deal with any more cat vomit for the next ten or so days. Please! I refuse to wash that massive, shedding rug again!

The cats had eaten a fair amount of their food during the night, and had used all three litter boxes with great liberty. I cleaned them all up, filled up the gaps with whichever ones needed their gaps filled up, washed the dishes, fed Bruno his wet and dry food, and filled up Romy’s bowl. I replaced Bruno’s glass, and the small bowl of water on the balcony. Now all I have to do for the day, is give Bruno his thyroid cream (which I will do immediately upon finishing these pages), take the rubbish and recycling out. Empty out the vacuum. Vac. Then hopefully, I’ll have time to have a shower and then eat some breakfast. If all goes well. Oh, and I need to go and get some dirt from the front yard to properly repot the plant whose original pot broke on my watch. I mean, I was in the shower so not totally on my watch. But I was here and I am being paid to be here and I am being paid to be responsible. And I failed in this one tiny aspect. I really hope that that pot was of little to no value. Okay, I just gave Bruno his thyroid cream.

I wanted to do a little bit of creative writing in these morning pages from now on. I tried it yesterday and really enjoyed it, and I think it’ll help me more than just writing for the sake of writing everyday. If I get myself thinking creatively everyday, that would be more productive for me, I feel. With this last half-page, I think I’ll just...see where my mind takes me? I’m looking at the tiles in the bathroom.

In tiles arranged with zero pattern, of randomly alternating pink, white, blue and browns, there exists a cityscape. The browns stick out like mud-brick houses in bustling suburbia and the blue, like habitat corridors, are plentiful. Pinks are sparse, or fly under our radars, their delicate hue lost in this speckled sea. They’re probably parking spaces. The whites scream potential, little modes of change within which the city is allowed to alter its face with startling subtlety. The citizens only notice any change decades after that change has happened, because their stress-free lives, the very cause of their happiness, has a side-effect of making these people prone to falling static. It’s not that they can’t change, but that they simply have no need to. In a place where their surroundings change and the people do not, it’s becoming increasingly possible for select citizens to just wake up one morning and realise all these minute changes at once. Such a sudden realisation after a lifetime of blindness certainly drives these people to the brink of insanity because to them, their reality has simply just drastically changed over the course of one night. In order to combat this worsening condition of the people, the local councils have joined forces to create a new elected office whose sole purpose is to investigate these sudden bouts of realisation and paranoia. Very few government employees are yet to fall ill, and so they aren’t at all close to discovering the root of the issue. The most susceptible tend to be small business owners and their employees, postmen, tax consultants, real-estate agents, grocers, and beekeepers and their bees (cases of paranoia in Anthophila have also been on the rise). Least susceptible are classroom teachers, who in their line of work, are pre-accustomed to great change with the comings and goings of their pupils.

[airoasis]

Struggle for black and Latino mortgage applicants suggests modern-day redlining

New Post has been published on https://hititem.kr/struggle-for-black-and-latino-mortgage-applicants-suggests-modern-day-redlining/

Struggle for black and Latino mortgage applicants suggests modern-day redlining

JUDY WOODRUFF: it’s been 10 years considering the fact that the fiscal recession, and credit has slowly lower back for most american citizens. Through 2016, the number of traditional mortgages had risen 95 percent due to the fact the housing bust. And yet some americans are still being left in the back of. The gap between white and black homeownership is wider now than it was once in 1960. Tonight, the first of a two-phase series, outcome of a yearlong investigation from divulge, a application produced by the center for Investigative Reporting. As reveal’s Aaron Glantz experiences, black and Latino homebuyers in some cities seem to have a harder time getting a house personal loan. AARON GLANTZ: Brooklyn native Rachelle Faroul moved to Philadelphia in 2015 hoping to buy a dwelling here. RACHELLE FAROUL, Philadelphia Resident: I was once like, i am going to try this factor. I’ve acquired numerous gumption. AARON GLANTZ: She made a just right earnings as a computer programmer and had sufficient for a down fee. Her potential lender, Philadelphia personal loan Advisors, was once encouraging at first. But the lender involved her sales might be unstable, seeing that she was once a contractor. So, Faroul instructed her mother co-sign. RACHELLE FAROUL: when you consider that she is a retired schoolteacher. Peculiarly, she labored in New York city for 35 years.Her pension is quality. AARON GLANTZ: but Faroul used to be advised that wasn’t adequate to offset her mother’s pupil loan debt from a Ph.D. RACHELLE FAROUL: I received shot down left and correct. AARON GLANTZ: Lenders seem for applicants with debt repayments roughly 36 percentage or much less of their sales. So, Faroul bought a brand new job with the tuition of Pennsylvania with a salary allowing her to come up with the money for the two-story row house she discovered a brief walk from the college. RACHELLE FAROUL: I desired this quite badly. AARON GLANTZ: however that still wasn’t sufficient. When she utilized for a mortgage once more, this time with Santander bank, additionally they rejected her. Her credit score had plunged 50 facets seeing that of a single delinquent electrical invoice. She paid the invoice as quickly as Santander flagged it, but the bank still stated no. Faroul started to suspect this needed to do together with her race.RACHELLE FAROUL: you realize, black humans on this country ought to be twice as just right to get half as so much. And i could not even get half of, you realize? They would not supply me something. AARON GLANTZ: Turning Faroul down on account that of her race would be unlawful. It is been illegal for 50 years. LYNDON JOHNSON, Former President of the U.S.: reasonable housing for all on this nation is now part of the American tradition. AARON GLANTZ: The 1968 fair Housing Act used to be a response to redlining, a racist lending follow where the federal govt colored minority neighborhoods crimson on maps, labeling them hazardous to lend in. In 1977, President Carter went extra with the neighborhood REINVESTMENT ACT, requiring banks to lend to certified debtors in low-revenue communities in cities the place they had branches.However these laws have no longer solved the crisis. After the 2008 recession, banks tightened their lending requirements. Ten years later, while lending has return for many american citizens, disclose’s analysis shows what appears like contemporary-day redlining is showing up throughout the nation. EMMANUEL MARTINEZ, reveal: we’ve got areas like Washington, D.C., areas like Tulsa, Oklahoma, Santa Fe, New Mexico. These are the locations where they are extra likely to be denied considering that of who they’re. AARON GLANTZ: nearly 50 years after the reasonable Housing Act, reveal knowledge journalist Emmanuel Martinez determined some gigantic racial disparities. EMMANUEL MARTINEZ: We looked at practically 31 million loan files, just about every mortgage utility filed with the federal government in 2015 and 2016. In sixty one metros throughout the country, applicants of colour are more likely to be denied a conventional mortgage. AARON GLANTZ: Banks don’t share credit rankings. They say that is proprietary. But by way of utilising other information the government requires be disclosed, disclose discovered statistically giant variations by race. EMMANUEL MARTINEZ: My evaluation entails nine one-of-a-kind factors. Among them are the applicant’s earnings, the dimensions of the loan, and detailed understanding in regards to the local that they are looking to purchase in. Here, we have the possibility of denial.So, black applicants in Philadelphia are almost 3 times as more likely to be denied a traditional personal loan. AARON GLANTZ: expose found this pattern in dozens of cities. Philadelphia was one of the vital greatest. That implies that a black applicant and a white one with equivalent fiscal profiles will seemingly have very one of a kind results. This wasn’t authentic for just for one bank, however for the lending industry as a entire.The personal loan Bankers association would not go on digital camera for this story, but in a statement, it stated that the information available below the home personal loan Disclosure Act shouldn’t be sufficient to make a resolution involving fair lending. And the American Bankers organization mentioned that without entry to debtors’ credit history, the information are not able to paint a entire photo. EMMANUEL MARTINEZ: sadly, credit score and an applicant’s total debt-to-income ratio aren’t a part of this publicly on hand knowledge set, but it’s these equal fiscal associations which have lobbied from retaining it faraway from researchers, from lecturers, from journalists like me, who wish to gain knowledge of these disparities. SEN. TIM SCOTT (R), South Carolina: I feel that we’re at an advantage having more knowledge released in mixture on credit scoring and those persons who get loans to make certain that there’s no discrimination. AARON GLANTZ: Republican Senator Tim Scott of South Carolina says releasing that data would make the enterprise more obvious. However it wouldn’t solve one more main issue. He says credit scores penalize persons of colour. He’s offered a invoice to repair that. SEN. TIM SCOTT: So what we’re looking to do is bring to mild all those individuals who are paying those costs on time, and yet it’s now not displaying up on their credit rankings.Your electric invoice, unless you are doing something bad, would not exhibit up. Your cell mobile, unless you do something unhealthy, does not show up. Folks of color are regularly the folks who will probably be disproportionately impacted. AARON GLANTZ: In just about each city in the usa, African-americans and Latinos have been denied house loans at larger rates than whites. We could now not statistically prove a relationship between race and denial in many, but, in 61, together with Philadelphia, our analysis determined race played a role. Neighborhoods with only a few loans had the highest proportion of black and Latino residents. ANGELA MCIVER, reasonable Housing organization of Southeastern Pennsylvania: You see, there are stunning properties up here, and people work very tough to preserve their properties. AARON GLANTZ: Angela McIver heads the fair Housing organization Of Southeastern Pennsylvania.In the era of redlining, the government shaded this regional, Germantown, blue and green, marking it as a fascinating field to lend in. Over the many years, the demographics shifted from white to black. And, today, banks deny extra loans right here than they approve. You see beautiful stone facades. You see garden patios, all of the trappings of core-class life. And the banks are simply MIA. ANGELA MCIVER: it is like a tumbler ceiling. It is like, good enough, we can allow you to head this a ways, but then you hit the highest of the ceiling, you’re now not going to move any additional.And that’s upsetting to me. AARON GLANTZ: After Rachelle Faroul commenced to wonder if race factored in her loan denial, she determined to use a new approach. RACHELLE FAROUL: so as to be a be considered a excellent applicant, I needed to have a white person or any person who’s white-adjoining vouch for me. AARON GLANTZ: This time, she requested her girlfriend, Hanako Franz, who’s half of-white and half of-japanese, to use with her. Franz was working phase-time at a grocery store. One of her most latest biweekly paychecks used to be $162. And, at the time, your fiscal concern was once unstable. HANAKO FRANZ, female friend of Rachelle Faroul: Oh, sure, it was once terrible. RACHELLE FAROUL: It was once so bad. HANAKO FRANZ: It was terrible. I was once borrowing cash from my sister.Rachelle paid my well being insurance at one point since I did not have enough cash to pay it. AARON GLANTZ: however, for Santander financial institution, the ultimate lender Faroul tried, none of that gave the impression to topic. Franz had a just right credit score score. And as soon as she came on board, it all went easily, despite the fact that Franz couldn’t furnish proof of a stable work historical past. HANAKO FRANZ: They had been like, we’d like two years. And i was identical to, I are not able to provide that to you. And so they were like, all correct, we will be able to move ahead.RACHELLE FAROUL: yes. AARON GLANTZ: We reached out to the 2 areas that Faroul approached for loans. Santander says that, even as they sympathize with Faroul, her loan application used to be managed really. Philadelphia mortgage Advisors declined to comment specially on Faroul’s mortgage utility. Each corporations say they’re committed to reasonable lending and adhering to present legal guidelines. The Treasury division’s comptroller of the forex is charged with ensuring important national banks follow the community Reinvestment Act. Tom Curry held that job for 5 years beneath President Obama and conducted greater than 1,600 group lending reports on banks. Practically every one, 99 percent, obtained a satisfactory or incredible score. How can everyone be getting this satisfactory score? THOMAS CURRY, Former Comptroller of the forex: I feel you must look at each man or woman bank and their person report to look how good they may be serving their communities.AARON GLANTZ: but Curry wouldn’t discuss any man or woman banks or their records with us. Since stepping down as comptroller, he is been working at a regulation organization advising some of the equal banks he regulated. He says he still desires make certain banks are lending responsibly. THOMAS CURRY: you may have an obligation to lend in low- to average- sales communities, however you need to do it in a secure and sound method. AARON GLANTZ: mobile, Alabama; Ocala, Florida; Greenville, North Carolina, all of those cities where our statistical analysis suggests the intent you could be denied for a mortgage is the colour of your skin. THOMAS CURRY: I suppose that the outcome out of your reports are not acceptable from the standpoint of what we would like as a nation and to make certain that everyone shares in monetary prosperity. AARON GLANTZ: We additionally shared expose’s analysis with Senator Scott.SEN. TIM SCOTT: good, we surely have made quite a lot of growth over the last 50 years. The question is, is there more development to be made? The answer is sure. Some of the methods you make growth is watching at the present groundwork on which growth has been made. And if it desires to be up-to-date, we update it. AARON GLANTZ: Faroul and Franz closed on their residence a couple of weeks after Franz signed on. Final winter, they both started moving into their new home. But with the good news, there is a reminder of the boundaries Faroul confronted. RACHELLE FAROUL: i have a tough time telling individuals that we bought a condominium, due to the fact their response is at all times, congratulations. This is not a consider-excellent story. HANAKO FRANZ: And the entire point about this is that there’s hidden privilege and hidden discrimination, you understand, that still exists and makes folks’s lives harder every day. AARON GLANTZ: Faroul says her largest fear is that, years from now, she is going to appear around and be the one black person left on the block.For "PBS NewsHour," that is Aaron Glantz in Philadelphia. JUDY WOODRUFF: day after today, our series with disclose continues with a document on how the gentrification of neighborhoods is making it tricky for some longtime residents to take out dwelling fairness loans. .

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Struggle for black and Latino mortgage applicants suggests modern-day redlining

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Struggle for black and Latino mortgage applicants suggests modern-day redlining

JUDY WOODRUFF: it’s been 10 years considering the fact that the fiscal recession, and credit has slowly lower back for most american citizens. Through 2016, the number of traditional mortgages had risen 95 percent due to the fact the housing bust. And yet some americans are still being left in the back of. The gap between white and black homeownership is wider now than it was once in 1960. Tonight, the first of a two-phase series, outcome of a yearlong investigation from divulge, a application produced by the center for Investigative Reporting. As reveal’s Aaron Glantz experiences, black and Latino homebuyers in some cities seem to have a harder time getting a house personal loan. AARON GLANTZ: Brooklyn native Rachelle Faroul moved to Philadelphia in 2015 hoping to buy a dwelling here. RACHELLE FAROUL, Philadelphia Resident: I was once like, i am going to try this factor. I’ve acquired numerous gumption. AARON GLANTZ: She made a just right earnings as a computer programmer and had sufficient for a down fee. Her potential lender, Philadelphia personal loan Advisors, was once encouraging at first. But the lender involved her sales might be unstable, seeing that she was once a contractor. So, Faroul instructed her mother co-sign. RACHELLE FAROUL: when you consider that she is a retired schoolteacher. Peculiarly, she labored in New York city for 35 years.Her pension is quality. AARON GLANTZ: but Faroul used to be advised that wasn’t adequate to offset her mother’s pupil loan debt from a Ph.D. RACHELLE FAROUL: I received shot down left and correct. AARON GLANTZ: Lenders seem for applicants with debt repayments roughly 36 percentage or much less of their sales. So, Faroul bought a brand new job with the tuition of Pennsylvania with a salary allowing her to come up with the money for the two-story row house she discovered a brief walk from the college. RACHELLE FAROUL: I desired this quite badly. AARON GLANTZ: however that still wasn’t sufficient. When she utilized for a mortgage once more, this time with Santander bank, additionally they rejected her. Her credit score had plunged 50 facets seeing that of a single delinquent electrical invoice. She paid the invoice as quickly as Santander flagged it, but the bank still stated no. Faroul started to suspect this needed to do together with her race.RACHELLE FAROUL: you realize, black humans on this country ought to be twice as just right to get half as so much. And i could not even get half of, you realize? They would not supply me something. AARON GLANTZ: Turning Faroul down on account that of her race would be unlawful. It is been illegal for 50 years. LYNDON JOHNSON, Former President of the U.S.: reasonable housing for all on this nation is now part of the American tradition. AARON GLANTZ: The 1968 fair Housing Act used to be a response to redlining, a racist lending follow where the federal govt colored minority neighborhoods crimson on maps, labeling them hazardous to lend in. In 1977, President Carter went extra with the neighborhood REINVESTMENT ACT, requiring banks to lend to certified debtors in low-revenue communities in cities the place they had branches.However these laws have no longer solved the crisis. After the 2008 recession, banks tightened their lending requirements. Ten years later, while lending has return for many american citizens, disclose’s analysis shows what appears like contemporary-day redlining is showing up throughout the nation. EMMANUEL MARTINEZ, reveal: we’ve got areas like Washington, D.C., areas like Tulsa, Oklahoma, Santa Fe, New Mexico. These are the locations where they are extra likely to be denied considering that of who they’re. AARON GLANTZ: nearly 50 years after the reasonable Housing Act, reveal knowledge journalist Emmanuel Martinez determined some gigantic racial disparities. EMMANUEL MARTINEZ: We looked at practically 31 million loan files, just about every mortgage utility filed with the federal government in 2015 and 2016. In sixty one metros throughout the country, applicants of colour are more likely to be denied a conventional mortgage. AARON GLANTZ: Banks don’t share credit rankings. They say that is proprietary. But by way of utilising other information the government requires be disclosed, disclose discovered statistically giant variations by race. EMMANUEL MARTINEZ: My evaluation entails nine one-of-a-kind factors. Among them are the applicant’s earnings, the dimensions of the loan, and detailed understanding in regards to the local that they are looking to purchase in. Here, we have the possibility of denial.So, black applicants in Philadelphia are almost 3 times as more likely to be denied a traditional personal loan. AARON GLANTZ: expose found this pattern in dozens of cities. Philadelphia was one of the vital greatest. That implies that a black applicant and a white one with equivalent fiscal profiles will seemingly have very one of a kind results. This wasn’t authentic for just for one bank, however for the lending industry as a entire.The personal loan Bankers association would not go on digital camera for this story, but in a statement, it stated that the information available below the home personal loan Disclosure Act shouldn’t be sufficient to make a resolution involving fair lending. And the American Bankers organization mentioned that without entry to debtors’ credit history, the information are not able to paint a entire photo. EMMANUEL MARTINEZ: sadly, credit score and an applicant’s total debt-to-income ratio aren’t a part of this publicly on hand knowledge set, but it’s these equal fiscal associations which have lobbied from retaining it faraway from researchers, from lecturers, from journalists like me, who wish to gain knowledge of these disparities. SEN. TIM SCOTT (R), South Carolina: I feel that we’re at an advantage having more knowledge released in mixture on credit scoring and those persons who get loans to make certain that there’s no discrimination. AARON GLANTZ: Republican Senator Tim Scott of South Carolina says releasing that data would make the enterprise more obvious. However it wouldn’t solve one more main issue. He says credit scores penalize persons of colour. He’s offered a invoice to repair that. SEN. TIM SCOTT: So what we’re looking to do is bring to mild all those individuals who are paying those costs on time, and yet it’s now not displaying up on their credit rankings.Your electric invoice, unless you are doing something bad, would not exhibit up. Your cell mobile, unless you do something unhealthy, does not show up. Folks of color are regularly the folks who will probably be disproportionately impacted. AARON GLANTZ: In just about each city in the usa, African-americans and Latinos have been denied house loans at larger rates than whites. We could now not statistically prove a relationship between race and denial in many, but, in 61, together with Philadelphia, our analysis determined race played a role. Neighborhoods with only a few loans had the highest proportion of black and Latino residents. ANGELA MCIVER, reasonable Housing organization of Southeastern Pennsylvania: You see, there are stunning properties up here, and people work very tough to preserve their properties. AARON GLANTZ: Angela McIver heads the fair Housing organization Of Southeastern Pennsylvania.In the era of redlining, the government shaded this regional, Germantown, blue and green, marking it as a fascinating field to lend in. Over the many years, the demographics shifted from white to black. And, today, banks deny extra loans right here than they approve. You see beautiful stone facades. You see garden patios, all of the trappings of core-class life. And the banks are simply MIA. ANGELA MCIVER: it is like a tumbler ceiling. It is like, good enough, we can allow you to head this a ways, but then you hit the highest of the ceiling, you’re now not going to move any additional.And that’s upsetting to me. AARON GLANTZ: After Rachelle Faroul commenced to wonder if race factored in her loan denial, she determined to use a new approach. RACHELLE FAROUL: so as to be a be considered a excellent applicant, I needed to have a white person or any person who’s white-adjoining vouch for me. AARON GLANTZ: This time, she requested her girlfriend, Hanako Franz, who’s half of-white and half of-japanese, to use with her. Franz was working phase-time at a grocery store. One of her most latest biweekly paychecks used to be $162. And, at the time, your fiscal concern was once unstable. HANAKO FRANZ, female friend of Rachelle Faroul: Oh, sure, it was once terrible. RACHELLE FAROUL: It was once so bad. HANAKO FRANZ: It was terrible. I was once borrowing cash from my sister.Rachelle paid my well being insurance at one point since I did not have enough cash to pay it. AARON GLANTZ: however, for Santander financial institution, the ultimate lender Faroul tried, none of that gave the impression to topic. Franz had a just right credit score score. And as soon as she came on board, it all went easily, despite the fact that Franz couldn’t furnish proof of a stable work historical past. HANAKO FRANZ: They had been like, we’d like two years. And i was identical to, I are not able to provide that to you. And so they were like, all correct, we will be able to move ahead.RACHELLE FAROUL: yes. AARON GLANTZ: We reached out to the 2 areas that Faroul approached for loans. Santander says that, even as they sympathize with Faroul, her loan application used to be managed really. Philadelphia mortgage Advisors declined to comment specially on Faroul’s mortgage utility. Each corporations say they’re committed to reasonable lending and adhering to present legal guidelines. The Treasury division’s comptroller of the forex is charged with ensuring important national banks follow the community Reinvestment Act. Tom Curry held that job for 5 years beneath President Obama and conducted greater than 1,600 group lending reports on banks. Practically every one, 99 percent, obtained a satisfactory or incredible score. How can everyone be getting this satisfactory score? THOMAS CURRY, Former Comptroller of the forex: I feel you must look at each man or woman bank and their person report to look how good they may be serving their communities.AARON GLANTZ: but Curry wouldn’t discuss any man or woman banks or their records with us. Since stepping down as comptroller, he is been working at a regulation organization advising some of the equal banks he regulated. He says he still desires make certain banks are lending responsibly. THOMAS CURRY: you may have an obligation to lend in low- to average- sales communities, however you need to do it in a secure and sound method. AARON GLANTZ: mobile, Alabama; Ocala, Florida; Greenville, North Carolina, all of those cities where our statistical analysis suggests the intent you could be denied for a mortgage is the colour of your skin. THOMAS CURRY: I suppose that the outcome out of your reports are not acceptable from the standpoint of what we would like as a nation and to make certain that everyone shares in monetary prosperity. AARON GLANTZ: We additionally shared expose’s analysis with Senator Scott.SEN. TIM SCOTT: good, we surely have made quite a lot of growth over the last 50 years. The question is, is there more development to be made? The answer is sure. Some of the methods you make growth is watching at the present groundwork on which growth has been made. And if it desires to be up-to-date, we update it. AARON GLANTZ: Faroul and Franz closed on their residence a couple of weeks after Franz signed on. Final winter, they both started moving into their new home. But with the good news, there is a reminder of the boundaries Faroul confronted. RACHELLE FAROUL: i have a tough time telling individuals that we bought a condominium, due to the fact their response is at all times, congratulations. This is not a consider-excellent story. HANAKO FRANZ: And the entire point about this is that there’s hidden privilege and hidden discrimination, you understand, that still exists and makes folks’s lives harder every day. AARON GLANTZ: Faroul says her largest fear is that, years from now, she is going to appear around and be the one black person left on the block.For "PBS NewsHour," that is Aaron Glantz in Philadelphia. JUDY WOODRUFF: day after today, our series with disclose continues with a document on how the gentrification of neighborhoods is making it tricky for some longtime residents to take out dwelling fairness loans. .