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feralnumberfive · 4 years ago

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The Rewatch Academy: Episode 3 of Season 1

“Extra Ordinary”

I am in no way a good analyst so my little analysis and speculations probably sound a bit goofy or pretty wild and probably mean nothing at all. Everything I put into this post about each episode is purely what I noticed or thought, whether it's funny or serious. I will be making jokes, so please just leave it at that (in no way am I trying to make fun of an actor and or character!) I am also in no way saying I noticed this stuff first. This is just what I noticed while rewatching these episodes

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1x01 | 1x02 | 1x03 | 1x04 |

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☂ First off I’d like to say that this is one of my favorite episodes of this season. It’s just soooo good

☂ The second comic book in the window features the Televator from the actual comics, so that has to be canon in the show! Also at the time that that second comic came out, Five had already left since we don’t see him on the cover

☂ It’d be cool if they actually printed Vanya’s book for fans to read

☂ Well Diego isn’t wrong when he called Hazel and Cha Cha animals because of their masks

☂ Honestly I feel Vanya’s struggle with chair placement. I’ve fortunately had the luck of playing in all three clarinet chair placements, but 1st chair is challenging. I personally found each placement very fun to play, especially 3rd, and I hope Vanya does too! (why am I talking like she’s real)

☂ Hazel talks about people living ordinary lives, but didn’t he live like that too at one point? How does The Commission recruit people? If they get ordinary people, do they wipe their memories of their previous lives?

☂ “Let’s see’em get out from behind their desks, get their hands dirty for once.” Well Hazel, Five does indeed do this even though he only had a desk job for a day. Still, he got to experience both worlds

☂ My mind is blanking on this, but how did Five get that cut on his arm? Was it from a bullet wound at Gimbel’s?

☂ Five must have a high pain tolerance to stitch his own wound but his bandaid probably wouldn’t stick due to the wet blood he slapped it over. Five sweetie you need a cotton pad and gauze for that one

☂ Wait, you’re telling me that The Umbrella Academy boys’ top uniform consists of a tank top, a white dress shirt, a tie, a sweater vest, and then the blazer? Someone asked Reginald what he wanted for the uniforms and he just said “Yes.”

☂ Five: *puts hands in pockets only to immediately take them out*

☂ Aidan almost sounds like he has an accent when he says “I'm done funding your drug habit.”

☂ Five’s so soft talking to his wife

☂ No Leonard, your bread and butter is being a creep

☂ Also, he thinks wood carving is embarrassing? If someone came up to me and showed me something they carved out of wood I would be so jealous cause it’s such a neat form of art

☂ Leonard saying that he carved wood, and in that case wooden figures, when he was a kid is a slight foreshadow of all of his tampering with his Umbrella Academy figures. He can make wooden figures but he’s also destroyed a handful of the Hargreeves figures

☂ “Never really did like The Beatles.” Well sir you’ve made me dislike you even more

☂ Vanya asking Allison if her siblings wanted her at the family meeting bugs me a bit. I absolutely get that she was literally left out of anything and everything that had to do with her siblings when she was younger, but Allison just asked her to come back home for a family meeting. Allison wouldn't have walked around looking for Vanya only to tell her that they were having a family meeting and that she wasn’t actually invited. Allison is including her in on a family meeting but Vanya is just in a bit of disbelief that she’s being included

☂ Ah yes, the only PTSD flashback for Five we see in the show! He looks so scared when he snaps out of it. I believe it was somehow triggered by the kids (I could be wrong) but do you think Five sometimes panics when he looks at himself in the mirror now since his body is the same age it was when he got stuck? Also it’s very subtle but when Luther opens the door, Five slightly jerks/flinches back. I wish we would see more of this in the show since it’s one of his major traumas

☂ “Does it matter? It’s Klaus.” Ouch! Well Five I hope you know that your siblings are somewhat thinking the same thing since they believe that you’ve lost your mind and are practically an old man crying “Apocalypse!”

☂ Five does an ever so slight huff and smirk when Luther tells him that the meeting at the Academy is important. He finds it a little funny but so frustrating in his mind that Luther doesn’t know what’s truly important

☂ Also I love that Aidan has to turn to the side so that he can keep it together after Klaus talks about his chocolate pudding waxing. Either that or he’s portraying Five as being frustrated and in disbelief. Also this is the first time I’ve noticed that he says “Ay, ay ay...”

☂ “We’re all you have. And you know it.” Oh Luther, you’re failing to see that that’s why he’s acting like this right now. He’s all frantic and crazed about trying to stop the apocalypse so that he can protect and save all that he has

☂ Five certainly is mad at Luther during his mini lecture. He’s clenching his jaw tightly and when he first speaks he hisses out the words through gritted teeth. He even called Luther by his number. He’s very impatient at this point and doesn’t care for Luther’s act of attempting to be a leader

☂ This is their first, and certainly not last, time watching Klaus go by in front of them doing something he shouldn’t be doing

☂ “You haven’t been home in a long time, Vanya.” Sir you were also just on the moon for four years. Yeah Vanya was away for a long time but Grace easily could have changed too during the four years you were gone

☂ How sweet, even though Five hasn’t really been home they want to include him in on the family vote :]

☂ I’ve noticed that in S1 that David really mumbles his lines. A lot

☂ I wish we got more flashbacks of the younger Umbrellas

☂ Diego my beloved mama’s boy ♥️

☂ It’s confusing as to which country TUA takes place in, but it’s really not supposed to be a specific one. It’s portrayed as being in North America, but you can see behind Cha Cha when she gets out of the car at the Academy the flag of the RAF, which Canada would have at a monument since it’s a Commonwealth country. At the same time though Delores came from Gimbels, which was a department store chain across the U.S

☂ The light above Five’s portrait is slightly crooked, which probably means no one has really been paying attention to it

☂ It makes me nervous that Klaus wipes bubbles onto his face. It looks like he got some in his eyes

☂ Ugh I love the whole scene of Hazel and Cha Cha walking around the Academy with “We’re Through” playing

☂ Diego: *has knives but instead chooses to punch and hit Hazel to try to make him let go of Allison”

☂ A rope-a-dope is a boxing tactic of pretending to be trapped against the ropes, goading an opponent to throw tiring ineffective punches. Diego sweetie Hazel wasn’t even trying to get you off of him all he was doing was choking Allison. The only person who got tired was probably you

☂ What’s the point in Diego yelling “Luther, go!” if he’s already going 💀

☂ Luther was there immediately when Hazel attacked Vanya. That means that Luther heard Vanya and was going to go get her to safety

☂ I will never stop signing my praise for the entirety of the “Sinnerman” fight scene(s). It gives me chills every single time. Easily one of the best scenes in all of the show

☂ Klaus must really have his music blasting if he can’t hear the gun shots right next to him

☂ I’ve always wondered if Allison actually registered in her mind that “The boy” is Five when Cha Cha says that’s who they’re looking for. Either she does realize that’s Five, is simply just angry that those two are looking for a boy, or registers in her mind that it’s Five through his superhero codename even though Cha Cha’s not referring to him in that way

☂ Diego is full on just standing in the background watching Allison get beat up by Cha Cha 🕴

☂ I love Diego’s little hand flap when he gets hit in the hand fighting Cha Cha

☂ Okay so I make everything about Five, but the whole Cha Cha fight scene with Allison and then Diego kind of scares me. Cha Cha and Hazel are both amazing assassins (they’re both probably right below Five) and neither Allison nor Diego could stop her by themselves. Could you imagine Five fighting one of his siblings? Especially with his spatial jumps? We already got a glimpse of his true combat skills when he fights Lila in S2. What a scary little old man

☂ “Vanya, get out of here!” Again, wanting to make sure that Vanya is safe and gets away. He even tried to go look for her

☂ Something I don’t really get about the Hazel and Luther fight is why doesn’t Luther just overpower him? Luther has super strength and on top of that he has giant muscles due to the gorilla DNA. Shouldn’t he be able to beat Hazel to a pulp? Maybe we have to consider that Hazel might have been altered by The Commission to be stronger and more durable, but they haven’t mentioned that in the show

☂ “Ah, you gotta cut down on that fast food, soldier.” What are you talking about Diego he literally just got off the moon two days ago aflksjfdk

☂ So Luther was too injured to jump out of the way of the chandelier but was able to push it up off of himself? 🤔

☂ I personally think that Luther’s body design adaptation for the show is really cool and that they gave him the perfect amount of bulk without making him look ridiculous

☂ This has been pointed out before, but cross-stitch foreshadowing, baby

☂ Again, Diego my beloved mama’s boy ♥️

☂ Well at least Diego thought about Vanya dying before thinking about his siblings dying because of her. The latter is ironic!

☂ The clock above Luther’s mirror reads approximately 1:30 am. Hazel and Cha Cha didn’t want to wait until morning

☂ I wonder how different it would be if Five was present at the Academy when Hazel and Cha Cha attacked. He probably would have surrendered himself to them, but it's fun to entertain the idea that he would go apeshit if he knew that they were harming his family in order to find him

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Feel free to comment or reblog with things you have noticed too!

#tra #the rewatch academy #tua #the umbrella academy #umbrella academy #luther hargreeves #diego hargreeves #allison hargreeves #klaus hargreeves #number five #five hargreeves #vanya hargreeves #hazel and cha cha

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kookie-doughs · 4 years ago

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Y/N L/N AND THE HALFBLOODS

Percy Jackson X Reader

-Y/N L/N met Percy Jackson and everything was now ruined.

CHAPTER 13: I Have Trust Issues But Okay

We spent two days on the Amtrak train, heading west through hills, over rivers, past amber waves of grain. We weren't attacked once, but I didn't relax. I felt that we were traveling around in a display case, being watched from above and maybe from below, that something was waiting for the right opportunity. We tried to keep a low profile because Percy and I's name and picture were splattered over the front pages of several East Coast newspapers. It seemed like when they saw me with Percy they realized me and my family are gone. The Trenton Register-News showed a photo taken by a tourist as we got off the Greyhound bus. Percy had a wild look in my eyes. His sword was a metallic blur in his hands. It might've been a baseball bat or a lacrosse stick. I was holding his hand with my knife on the other hand. The picture's caption read: Twelve-year-old Percy Jackson, wanted for questioning in the Long Island disappearance of his mother two weeks ago, is shown here fleeing from the bus where he accosted several elderly female passengers. The bus exploded on an east New Jersey roadside shortly after Jackson fled the scene. Based on eyewitness accounts, police believe the boy may be traveling with three teenage accomplices. It has been found out one of which is Y/N L/N, a twelve-year-old girl who went missing with her family during a trip. Percy Jackson's stepfather, Gabe Ugliano, has offered a cash reward for information leading to his capture.

"Don't worry," Annabeth told Percy. "Mortal police could never find us." But she didn't sound so sure. The rest of the day we spent alternately pacing the length of the train (because I had a really hard time sitting still) or looking out the windows. Calm Once, I spotted a family of centaurs galloping across a wheat field, bows at the ready, as they hunted lunch. The little boy centaur, who was the size of a second-grader on a pony, caught my eye and waved. I looked around the passenger car, the adult riders all had their faces buried in laptop computers or magazines, Percy and I saw an amazed look. Another time, toward evening, Percy said he saw something huge moving through the woods. He swore it was a lion, except that lions don't live wild in America, and it was the size of a Hummer, then it leaped through the trees and was gone. I told him he might have been seeing things and Annabeth agreed. Our reward money for returning Gladiola the poodle had only been enough to purchase tickets as far as Denver. We couldn't get berths in the sleeper car, so we dozed in our seats. My neck got stiff. I sat between Percy and Annabeth. Grover kept snoring and bleating and waking Percy up. Once, he shuffled around and his fake foot fell off. Annabeth and I had to stick it back on before any of the other passengers noticed. "So," Annabeth asked me, once we'd gotten Grover's sneaker readjusted. "Who wants Percy's help?" "What do you mean?" "You heard it too didn't you? When he was asleep just now, he mumbled, 'I won't help you.' Has he told you what he's dreaming about?" "Gossiping about me?" Percy yawned. "Pretty much everyone is. So I think we'll join." I said. "Annabeth wants to know about your dream. I could tell he was reluctant to say anything. It was the second time he'd dreamed about it. Then he finally told her. Annabeth was quiet for a long time. "If you think it's Hades, that doesn't sound like Hades. He always appears on a black throne, and he never laughs." She pointed out. "He offered my mother in trade. Who else could do that?" We could. If you bring us together we could trade. "What?" Percy and Annabeth looked at me in worry. "Something on my face? Is there something close?" "Y/N, you did it again." Percy said. "Did what?" "You... Talked. Differently. Like weirdly." "Your definition of weird doesn't describe me. I did nothing wrong. I haven't even given an in put on your topic. Which we should get back on." I don't know why I had no idea what they meant by me talking weirdly, but I felt like I should stay away from that topic. "I guess ... if he meant, 'Help me rise from the Underworld.' If he wants war with the Olympians. But why ask you to bring him the master bolt if he already has it?" She explained looking at me as if I was the one that needed convincing. I shook my head, wishing I knew the answer. I thought about what Grover had told me, that the Furies on the bus seemed to have been looking for something. Where is it? Where? Maybe Grover sensed my emotions. He snorted in his sleep, muttered something about vegetables, and turned his head. Percy readjusted Grover's cap so it covered his horns. "Percy, you can't barter with Hades. You know that, right? He's deceitful, heartless, and greedy. I don't care if his Kindly Ones weren't as aggressive this time-" "This time?" I asked. "You mean you've run into them before?" Her hand crept up to her necklace. She fingered a glazed white bead painted with the image of a pine tree, one of her clay end-of-summer tokens. "Let's just say I've got no love for the Lord of the Dead. You can't be tempted to make a deal for your mom." "What would you do if it was your dad?" "That's easy," she said. "I'd leave him to rot." "You're not serious?" Annabeth's gray eyes fixed on me. She wore the same expression she'd worn in the woods at camp, the moment she drew her sword against the hellhound. "My dad's resented me since the day I was born," she said. "He never wanted a baby. When he got me, he asked Athena to take me back and raise me on Olympus because he was too busy with his work. She wasn't happy about that. She told him heroes had to be raised by their mortal parent." "But how ... I mean, I guess you weren't born in a hospital...." "I appeared on my father's doorstep, in a golden cradle, carried down from Olympus by Zephyr the West Wind. You'd think my dad would remember that as a miracle, right? Like, maybe he'd take some digital photos or something. But he always talked about my arrival as if it were the most inconvenient thing that had ever happened to him. When I was five he got married and totally forgot about Athena. He got a 'regular' mortal wife, and had two 'regular' mortal kids, and tried to pretend I didn't exist." I stared out the train window. The lights of a sleeping town were drifting by. I wanted to make Annabeth feel better. I don't know but the only way I could think of was a hug. So I wrapped and arm around her shoulders. She stiffened unsure of what I'd done. "My parents, they loved me all the same. The closet I got to talking about Gods was when they thought me. Not a single hint was dropped about me being a halfblood. I mean if you count my grandma Hestia. Which I think is just named after the goddess. I mean yeah, you had a not so wonderful life... But at least you're who you are now." I smiled at her. Eying Percy I gave him a nod towards Annabeth telling him to comfort her since he'd started it anyway. "My mom married a really awful guy," he told her. "Grover said she did it to protect me, to hide me in the scent of a human family. Maybe that's what your dad was thinking." Annabeth kept worrying at her necklace. She was pinching the gold college ring that hung with the beads. It occurred to me that the ring must be her father's. I wondered why she wore it if she hated him so much. "He doesn't care about me," she said. "His wife-my stepmom-treated me like a freak. She wouldn't let me play with her children. My dad went along with her. Whenever something dangerous happened-you know, something with monsters-they would both look at me resentfully, like, 'How dare you put our family at risk.' Finally, I took the hint. I wasn't wanted. I ran away." "How old were you?" "Same age as when I started camp. Seven." "But ... you couldn't have gotten all the way to Half-Blood Hill by yourself." "Not alone, no. Athena watched over me, guided me toward help. I made a couple of unexpected friends who took care of me, for a short time, anyway." I wanted to ask what happened, but Annabeth seemed lost in sad memories. Luke had already told me some of these part where he went here with Annabeth and Thalia. So I gazed out the train windows as the dark fields of Ohio raced by. Toward the end of our second day on the train, June 13, eight days before the summer solstice, we passed through some golden hills and over the Mississippi River into St. Louis. Annabeth craned her neck to see the Gateway Arch, which looked to me like a huge shopping bag handle stuck on the city. "I want to do that," she sighed. "What?" I asked. "Build something like that. You ever see the Parthenon, Y/N?" "Only in pictures." "Someday, I'm going to see it in person. I'm going to build the greatest monument to the gods, ever. Something that'll last a thousand years." Percy laughed. "You? An architect?" Her cheeks flushed. "Yes, an architect. Athena expects her children to create things, not just tear them down, like a certain god of earthquakes I could mention." "Percy! I think she'll be incredible." I pinched his arm. We watched the churning brown water of the Mississippi below. I took Percy's hand in fear that the water would just grab me and drag me down. "Sorry," Annabeth said. "That was mean." I nudged Percy to apologize as well, "I didn't mean to make fun of you. I'm sorry." "Can't you two work together a little?" I pleaded. "I mean, didn't Athena and Poseidon ever cooperate?" Annabeth had to think about it. "I guess ... the chariot," she said tentatively. "My mom invented it, but Poseidon created horses out of the crests of waves. So they had to work together to make it complete." "Then you two can cooperate, too. Right?" We rode into the city, Annabeth watching as the Arch disappeared behind a hotel. "I suppose," she said at last. We pulled into the Amtrak station downtown. The intercom told us we'd have a three-hour layover before departing for Denver. Grover stretched. Before he was even fully awake, he said, "Food." "Come on, goat boy," Annabeth said. "Sightseeing." "Sightseeing?" "The Gateway Arch," she said. "This may be my only chance to ride to the top. Are you coming or not?" Grover, Percy and I exchanged looks. I wanted to say no, but seeing the stars in Annabeth's as she watched, she was too adorable to say no to. Grover shrugged. "As long as there's a snack bar without monsters." The Arch was about a mile from the train station. Late in the day the lines to get in weren't that long. We threaded our way through the underground museum, looking at covered wagons and other junk from the 1800s. It wasn't all that thrilling, but Annabeth kept telling us interesting facts about how the Arch was built, and Grover kept passing me jelly beans, so I was okay. I kept looking around, though, at the other people in line. "You smell anything?" Percy murmured to Grover. He took his nose out of the jelly-bean bag long enough to sniff. "Underground," he said distastefully. "Underground air always smells like monsters. Probably doesn't mean anything." I took a peek at my knife and saw there was a very weak glow, or maybe a sunlight reflection. Somewhere in between. "Guys," I said. "You know the gods' symbols of power?" Annabeth had been in the middle of reading about the construction equipment used to build the Arch, but she looked over. "Yeah?" "Well, Hade-" Grover cleared his throat. "We're in a public place.... You mean, our friend downstairs?" "Um, right," I said. "Our friend way downstairs. Doesn't he have a hat like Annabeth's?" "You mean the Helm of Darkness," Annabeth said. "Yeah, that's his symbol of power. I saw it next to his seat during the winter solstice council meeting." "He was there?" Percy asked. She nodded. "It's the only time he's allowed to visit Olympus-the darkest day of the year. But his helm is a lot more powerful than my invisibility hat, if what I've heard is true...." "It allows him to become darkness," Grover confirmed. "He can melt into shadow or pass through walls. He can't be touched, or seen, or heard. And he can radiate fear so intense it can drive you insane or stop your heart. Why do you think all rational creatures fear the dark?" "But then ... how do we know he's not here right now, watching us?" I asked. Annabeth and Grover exchanged looks. "We don't," Grover said. "Thanks, that makes me feel a lot better," Percy said. "Got any blue jelly beans left?" Someone else could be watching. Hades isn't the only one to blend in the shadow young vessel. But worry not, all in the darkness, shall be your ally. So Hades will also be my ally? As air and water refuse, land and all there is shall be your ally. Can't I be allies with all? Hades, Zeus, Poseidon. Everyone. The three of them looked at me in surprise. "Don't say their name!" Grover whispered loudly. "Whose name? I haven't said a name!" I could talk through you young vessel. Is this the first time this happened? How can you forget about our conversation? Talk through me? Who are you? I am one of which that'll make sure you become one with yourself. "Y/N!!" Percy yelled. "What? Geez, you're too loud." "We've been calling your name for three minutes." Annabeth said. "Are you... Okay?" "Yeah why wouldn't I be?" When the tiny elevator car came. We got shoehorned into the car with this big fat lady and her dog, a Chihuahua with a rhinestone collar. I figured maybe the dog was a seeing-eye Chihuahua, because none of the guards said a word about it. We started going up, inside the Arch. I'd never been in an elevator that went in a curve, and my stomach wasn't too happy about it. "No parents?" the fat lady asked us. She had beady eyes; pointy, coffee-stained teeth; a floppy denim hat, and a denim dress that bulged so much, she looked like a blue-jean blimp. "They're below," Annabeth told her. "Scared of heights." "Oh, the poor darlings." The Chihuahua growled. The woman said, "Now, now, sonny. Behave." The dog had beady eyes like its owner, intelligent and vicious. I said, "Sonny. Is that his name?" "No," the lady told me. She smiled, as if that cleared everything up. At the top of the Arch, the observation deck reminded me of a tin can with carpeting. Rows of tiny windows looked out over the city on one side and the river on the other. The view was okay, but if there's anything I like less than a confined space, it's a confined space six hundred feet in the air. I was ready to go pretty quick. I could see Percy was too. So I took his hand and gave him a reassuring squeeze to calm him down despite my breakdown. Annabeth kept talking about structural supports, and how she would've made the windows bigger, and designed a see-through floor. She probably could've stayed up there for hours, but the park ranger announced that the observation deck would be closing in a few minutes. I steered Annabeth while Percy with Grover, toward the exit, loaded them into the elevator, and we were about to get in myself when I realized there were already two other tourists inside. No room for me. The park ranger said, "Next car, sir." "We'll get out," Annabeth said. "We'll wait with you two." But that was going to mess everybody up and take even more time, so I said, "Naw, it's okay. We'll see you guys at the bottom. I'll keep an eye on him." Grover and Annabeth both looked nervous, but they let the elevator door slide shut. Their car disappeared down the ramp. Now the only people left on the observation deck were me, a little boy with his parents, the park ranger, and the fat lady with her Chihuahua. Percy and I smiled uneasily at the fat lady. She smiled back, her forked tongue flickering between her teeth. Wait a minute. Forked tongue? Before I could decide if I'd really seen that, her Chihuahua jumped down and started yapping at Percy. "Now, now, sonny," the lady said. "Does this look like a good time? We have all these nice people here." "Doggie!" said the little boy. "Look, a doggie!" His parents pulled him back. The Chihuahua bared his teeth at me, foam dripping from his black lips. "Well, son," the fat lady sighed. "If you insist." Ice started forming in my stomach. "Urn, did you just call that Chihuahua your son?" "Chimera, dear," the fat lady corrected. "Not a Chihuahua. It's an easy mistake to make." She rolled up her denim sleeves, revealing that the skin of her arms was scaly and green. When she smiled, I saw that her teeth were fangs. The pupils of her eyes were sideways slits, like a reptile's. The Chihuahua barked louder, and with each bark, it grew. First to the size of a Doberman, then to a lion. The bark became a roar. The little boy screamed. His parents pulled him back toward the exit, straight into the park ranger, who stood, paralyzed, gaping at the monster. The Chimera was now so tall its back rubbed against the roof. It had the head of a lion with a blood-caked mane, the body and hooves of a giant goat, and a serpent for a tail, a ten-foot-long diamondback growing right out of its shaggy behind. The rhinestone dog collar still hung around its neck, and the plate-sized dog tag was now easy to read: CHIMERA-RABID, FIRE-BREATHING, POISONOUS-IF FOUND, PLEASE CALL TARTARUS-EXT. 954. I immediately pulled out my knife. And waited for the moment to jump in front of Percy who was ten feet away from the Chimera's bloody maw, and I knew that as soon as I moved, the creature would lunge. The snake lady made a hissing noise that might've been laughter. "Be honored, Percy Jackson and Y/N L/N. Lord Zeus rarely allows me to test a hero with one of my brood. For I am the Mother of Monsters, the terrible Echidna!" Percy and I stared at each other for a second stared at her. All he could think to say was: "Isn't that a kind of anteater?" She howled, her reptilian face turning brown and green with rage. "I hate it when people say that! I hate Australia! Naming that ridiculous animal after me. For that, Percy Jackson, my son shall destroy you!" The Chimera charged, its lion teeth gnashing. I managed to take Percy's arm to pull him aside and dodge the bite. We ended up next to the family and the park ranger, who were all screaming now, trying to pry open the emergency exit doors. I couldn't let them get hurt. I positioned myself able to parry any oncoming attack. Percy uncapped his sword, ran to the other side of the deck, and yelled, "Hey, Chihuahua!" The Chimera turned faster than I would've thought possible. Before he could swing my sword, it opened its mouth, emitting a stench like the world's largest barbecue pit, and shot a column of flame straight at him. Percy dove through the explosion. The carpet burst into flames; the heat was so intense, I could feel it where I stand and it was like I was in a sauna. Where Percy had been standing a moment before was a ragged hole in the side of the Arch, with melted metal steaming around the edges. Great, I thought. We just blowtorched a national monument. As the Chimera turned, Percy slashed at its neck. That was a fatal mistake. The blade sparked harmlessly off the dog collar. I saw the serpent tail lifted it whipped around and with all I could I ran and raised my knife to block it. Percy tried to jab Riptide into the Chimera's mouth, but the serpent tail wrapped around his ankles and pulled him off balance, and my blade flew out of my hand, spinning out of the hole in the Arch and down toward the Mississippi River. I pulled a weaponless Percy behind me and raised my small one. We backed into the hole in the wall. The Chimera advanced, growling, smoke curling from its lips. The snake lady, Echidna, cackled. "They don't make heroes like they used to, eh, son?" The monster growled. It seemed in no hurry to finish us off now that we were beaten. I glanced at the park ranger and the family. The little boy was hiding behind his father's legs. I had to protect these people. I couldn't just ... die. I was facing a massive, fire-breathing monster and its mother. And I was scared. There was no place else to go, so I stepped to the edge of the hole. Trust our hero. Jump with him. He had sworn to save us. Far, far below, the river glittered. Percy and I shared a reluctant and fearful look. If we died, would the monsters go away? Would they leave the humans alone? "If you are the son of Poseidon," Echidna hissed, "you would not fear water. Jump, Percy Jackson. Show me that water will not harm you. Jump and retrieve your sword. Prove your bloodline. Maybe your small friend could survive with you." We both knew the water hated me. But I trusted Percy. I'd jump if he told me. The Chimera's mouth glowed red, heating up for another blast. "Either you have no faith," Echidna told me. "You do not trust the gods. I cannot blame you, little cowards. Better you die now. The gods are faithless." Percy took my hand and backed up, he looked down at the water. Percy looked at me and smiled. I knew what he wanted. Holding his hand tighter, I got closer to him. "Die, faithless one," Echidna rasped, and the Chimera sent a column of flame toward our faces. "Father, please," I heard Percy say. "Don't hurt her. Help us." We turned and jumped. Our clothes on fire, we plummeted toward the river.

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tiesandtea · 4 years ago

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Mr. Lazy – fanzine interview with Alan Fisher, December 2004

intrepid suede globetrotters elina and sirje conducted this interview with alan fisher, the man about whom songs like "lazy", "high rising", "beautiful loser" and, according to the man himself, "the most of the others as well" have been written. (editor's note: not to suggest that alcohol played any part in this q&a session, but it did take place in alan's local. oh, and in other locations in the uk, plus morocco & finland, in both oral & written forms. anyway, surely worth all the so-called trouble.) no animals, be they cats or terrapins, were harmed during this interview, but a considerable amount of wine bottles did get destroyed.

how long have you known brett? where did you grow up?

i have known brett since i was 16/17 – near on 20 years now. i grew up in sussex, near haywards heath.

how does it feel that so many of brett’s lyrics are about you? (did you ever get the feeling that brett was just kind of observing you or waiting around for you to do something flamboyant so that he could write about it?)

it’s very flattering to know that some lyrics are about me. however i was never aware of brett observing me purposely to get lyrics or ideas for songs. it’s funny because there are so many songs that are very personal to me, and you think some part of the song is about you, and they are not. over the years many friends who have been in close contact with brett and the music think that songs are about them, because of various lyrical content. i think brett has ability to take elements from friends’ lives or chapters and create a story blended together, a fusion of characters in one song. i remember when i heard “the big time” and the last line – “now we’re in the big time and you’re in the way” i was extremely put out, i took it very personally. i thought it referred to me, but luckily it didn’t. however i’m pleased to say that my favourite song has to be “lazy”. the original version i think went like this – “here they come with their make up on as lovely as the birds come and see them” which i think is very beautiful. which changed to “here they come gone 7 am bla bla bla”, which was about being up all night, then putting on make up so as to hide the effects of being on a bender, and going down to off-license to buy cornflakes and bottles of red wine.

what was the best experience traveling with suede? (what happened in las vegas?)

difficult question, as i’ve had many amazing experiences on tour with suede. two very contrasting escapades were one journey in japan, and one on the west coast of america. brett and myself had the fortunate experience of visiting a buddhist temple in japan called the “moss gardens”. we visited a temple that was so beautiful and peaceful, and the entire gardens were immersed in moss with beautiful ponds and waterfalls. we sat in the temple and wrote a mantra admist buddhist chanting, which i believe influenced the song “introducing the band”. the other experience was a trip to la, san francisco and las vegas. i seem to remember i hadn’t been to bed for a few days, and when i was there i didn’t sleep much for various reasons. we stayed at a friend’s house in beverly hills called michiko, a house of pure opulence, with plenty of alcohol and other fineries. i seem to remember that towards the end (in vegas) brett wouldn’t let me sleep – just more alcohol. and i think that when i went to bed brett checked to make sure i was alive.

what will/do you miss the most about suede?

the thing i miss the most about suede is being around when a great song is created. i’d come home and brett would say “i’ve got it.”, some missing song on the album and consequently we would stay up night after night listening to the same song over and over – the poor neighbours.

at what part of his career was brett at his happiest?

when he was writing happy songs. actually i don’t think brett ever made happy songs. only joking! i don’t know when brett was actually the happiest. i think maybe when the band first started and the first album came out, that’s when he realised his dreams were coming true.

has brett being famous ever bothered you?

brett being famous has never bothered me; in fact it’s been quite a relief; it’s taken the limelight away from me.

fame can and has certainly changed many people who obtain it. how do you think it's affected brett over the years? has it affected your friendship?

i don’t think fame has changed brett’s fundamental characteristics, obviously it has shaped his life aspects like walking down the street, or having a drink in pub. i think living with me for so long has definitely fucked him up.

is there a lot of divergence between brett's public persona and the man underneath it all?

not really. he’s the same complex, passionate and artistic character at home and on stage, i don’t know about the bedroom though!!

how were the new band members really welcomed?

some dreadful, unmentionable initiation ceremonies.

was brett & bernard getting back together a surprise for you? how do you like the new material? how about brett’s solo material?

not really; they had a magic chemistry together that never really fulfilled its potential. and the new stuff is absolutely great! wait and see!!

what's all this about brett meditating? it was mentioned in the love & poison book.

i haven’t actually read love & poison, which is extremely lame of me, eventually i will. however, i think brett has some interest in meditating, maybe from visiting japan’s buddhist temples and being influenced by their way of living, zen and all that.

is brett good at pub quizzes?

brett, i could imagine, is very good at pub quizzes if he entered them. they have a quiz at our local pub, i think brett and mat osman entered once, and came a very admirable second place, which is no mean feat, because it’s a very professional affair in that establishment.

have there been times when brett did something you wish he hadn't? musical decisions or anything.

i can’t think of anything that resembles a mistake or regret in terms of musical direction. over the years, artists are faced with monumental decisions to make in terms of artistic development; single releases; band commitment and general themes for the forthcoming albums. however, i think brett has the ability to listen to other people’s opinions as well as his own, to come up with the best viable decision. considering the turbulent times of drug taking and various band members coming and going, i don’t think he’s done too badly.

how posh is brett?

how posh is brett – what a strange question – in fact the hardest one i’ve ever been asked! – not at all. crikey, well for somebody that came from a council house and bought second hand records/clothes. he now drinks tea at 4 o’clock in proper bone china tea cups – doesn’t get any posher than that. oh! and he has a butler called jessica rabbit.

does he watch sports on tv?

well it has to be football, brett hates posh sports like cricket & rugby (un)like me. he is very obsessive over the england football team, ipswich and manchester united (because that’s my team, and i always cry when they lose).

what's brett's best quality?

brett’s best quality is having good taste in friends and good taste in music, i.e., suede.

and his worst?

i can’t think of his worst qualities, but i remember the worst thing living with him, he would always become too comfortable on the sofa which would mean i would have to rewind the suede demos and go out and get another bottle of wine from the off-license.

we're sorry this is all about suede/brett... when we start an alan fanzine we’ll interview you about yourself... ok?

ok.

tell us a secret

my favourite colour is black.

how much do suede lie in the interviews? (if you read them)

i’m too busy to read suede interviews, i’ve got my own press cuttings to examine.

what do you think brett would have become without suede?

i’m sure it would have only been with some musical compaction. however, our living arrangements would have resembled something out of “the servant”.

what about you? how much has suede affected you?

suede were the most important thing in my life. as my girlfriend just put it a moment ago whilst i was writing this, it’s like going out with three people: her, me and suede. as i tell her, it could have been worse: i could have been friends with ronan keating.

do you love us? what do you think of suede fans in general? a lovely bunch on whole, or have you had some harrowing experiences with obsessed loonies?

well, i’m a suede fan myself, so i would have to say they are great. obsessed loonies? i am one; i have been stalking brett for 20 years, but he doesn’t realise.

there are lots of mentions of yours and brett's drug use in l&p. is this an accurate characterization of the state of affairs or did it get glammed up a bit for press?

it’s all a myth, i once smoked a joint with brett, it was really far out man! oh, and i snorted some glue at a dinner party once, it was so chic.

tell us something about suede that we don't know.

they are a figment of your imagination!!

tell us something about brett that we don't know.

i know something extremely juicy, real top gossip. but you’re going to have to wait to see whether he meets my blackmail demands.

if you were an animal, what kind of animal would he be? what kind of animal would brett be?

brett refers to me as an electrocuted rabbit, something similar to the mad hatter in alice in wonderland. i think brett would be a very feline cat.

speaking of cats, they tend to go missing, don’t they?

we had a cat called meisk – when brett was on tour it went missing. when i found it on the street, i thought it had a cold because it had a funny meow – it turned out to be the wrong cat. i remember brett was extremely pissed off. we had another cat called sphinx that was an incredibly lively character, it had a long run up – then produced its claws and wham!!

have you ever been arrested?

yes! on several occasions, on suspicion of being sinister and bad influence on society.

dave thompson’s yet-to-be-published suede-book, an armchair guide to suede, includes this:

"‘young men’ developed out of lyrics written for a joke band, the bruisers, that anderson, his flatmate alan and a hairdresser friend named gary hatched one evening;"

can you tell us anything more about this?

after one crazy night early in the morning we had this inspiration to form a band based on idea of national front skinheads with the title song “british bulldog”. brett and gary were both very amusing and inventive with songs like “santa ain’t a wanker” etc.

besides that, have you ever been musically inclined or in a band yourself?

after hearing brett playing an instrument called the melodica, something like a mouth organ with a pipe attached to it, waking me every morning, it put me off music for life.

what other music are you into besides suede?

sigue sigue sputnik and mozart.

have you and brett ever had a fist fight? have you ever fought over who does the shopping or cleans the toilet or whose dirty plates are in the sink?

we have never had a fist fight in 20 years. however, we once had a duel at sunrise over who was the vainest.

that’s it then. say something nice. or mean. whatever you like. thanks!

stop asking me questions about brett, and more about myself!

Source: Pornographic & Tragic, the official Suede fanzine, issue 2 (December 2004).

#suede #this is actually a great & fun read

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alwaysdowntohidewithyou · 5 years ago

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Florence Welch Interview

Transcript of Florence Welch’s interview with John Seabrook for the New Yorker Festival.

October 11th, 2019.

New York, NY.

Edited for clarity.

John Seabrook: I’m going to properly introduce you because I think a woman this accomplished needs a proper introduction. For those of you who read the New Yorker this week, let me assure you that I wrote this myself, no machine helping me. In ten years as a band, Florence and the Machine have released four chart topping, award winning studio albums. Lungs, 2009, Ceremonials, 2011, How Big, How Blue, How Beautiful, 2015, and High as Hope last year. These many-layered works weave together a range of different styles, from the bands punky first single “Kiss With a Fist,” to the rich choral and percussive tapestries of songs like “Shake It Out,” to Neo-Soul such as “Where Is the Love” (sic), and to the startlingly honest lyrics of “Hunger.” Heartbreak and loneliness rarely feel as delightful and inviting as in a Florence Welch song. The music performs the very rare trick of remaining true to its indie roots while at the same time, sounding expansive and monumental. While British listeners sometimes look to Kate Bush as a musical antecedent, here in New York, we are maybe more inclined to think of Patti Smith, in her path-finding career as a poet who found a way to address the big issues of literature, death, love loneliness, and beauty in the idiom popular song. And we are especially inclined to think of you as following Patti tonight because you are literally sitting in the seat that Patti was warming only an hour ago.

The band has also released two live albums that established themselves as major festival headliners, with a sound big enough to fill the green fields of Glastonbury and deserts of Coachella—where the artist broke her foot performing in 2015. With lyrics intimate enough to touch each individual heart in the crowd of 100,000, Florence lent her extraordinary vocal talents to Calvin Harris’ “Sweet Nothing,” and her eye for clothes and visual imagery to the band’s 29 music videos. She has also recorded several outstanding covers including “Stand By Me,” “Tiny Dancer,” and Buddy Holly’s “Not Fade Away.” And finally, and most relevant to the discussion tonight, Florence is the author of this book, “Useless Magic,” which is a 2018 collection of her lyrics, poems, journal entries, and sketches, which will serve as our primary text for this evening. Here ends the introduction.

Florence Welch: (Laughs) Thank you so much for having me. Oh, British people find it really hard to hear the things that they’ve done.

J: I know, you’re so modest. It’s hard to hear all that.

F: Everyone’s cheering and I’m like, “Oh no.” This is my nightmare.

J: Let’s take a deep breath and not talk about your accomplishments any more.

F: Okay, good. That’s done, that’s done. (Laughs)

J: Let’s talk about—you’re on a bit of a hiatus at the present from touring. Can we start there? Talk about how that happened, where that came from.

F: Yeah, of course. Well, I definitely wanted to do the New Yorker, because I love the New Yorker so much. So, this was the last thing that I said yes to. I’m very glad I did, you guys are very loud! Yeah, the last—well, I’ve been touring, oh my gosh, I’ve been touring since I was twenty-one? And it is kind of a cycle of two years of—actually we did not stop touring between Lungs and Ceremonials, because we booked a U2 tour somewhere in the middle when we were supposed to be making the next record, and they were like, “You’ve got to do this. This is pretty big.” Like, oh. Okay. And you know, that was a big thing that helped get us going in America. But I was trying to make Ceremonials as well, so yeah, Lungs and Ceremonials was just sort of one—ugh, I don’t know how long that was. Like five years of touring?

And then I had a break. And it was also kind of a breakdown (laughs). Which is what happens when you don’t stop touring for five years. But actually, I don’t know. I don’t think that was because of the touring, I think it was then when the touring stopped, all the structures that I’d been using...with touring you’re kind of very taken care of, so you can be quite a high functioning fuck-up, which is what I was. Very high functioning, but so self-destructive and with such a lack of any will to take care of myself. People take care of you on tour. Like, if you show up and do the show, people get you dressed, and you ripped all your clothes, and they’ll carry you to a plane. The thing is that I never messed up any shows, which was weird. Like I would mess up hotel rooms, and my whole life, and my relationships, and blah blah blah. But never the shows, so, I don’t know what that was about (laughs).

Then I went back on tour for How Big, How Blue, How Beautiful, after my break slash breakdown, and that was the first tour that I’d done sober and...yeah, it was amazing. The whole process of that record and kind of how heartbroken I was not just over a relationship, but also the breakdown of my relationship with partying and how those things that I thought defined me didn’t work anymore.

And this person really didn’t want to go out with me. Which now, in hindsight, I really don’t blame them for because I don’t know if you want to date someone who shows up at your house with a bottle of vodka shouting, “Why will you not go out with me?” And they’re like, “Because of this. All of this.” And I’m like, “I don’t understand!” Now I kind of really respect them for that. Like, “Oh wow, ‘cause like you had a sense of self, and you had self-respect, I get it!” But yeah, How Big, How Blue, How Beautiful, was a huge healing process, and when I came to the end of it, I did this thing where I dove straight into making High as Hope. I think I’m a person who works in extremes, so again, I didn’t stop working for...I just didn’t stop. I don’t know how to relax. I think that’s probably clear, so I started making High as Hope immediately and that meant that the next tour came around really fast. Although I would say that these shows that I’ve just done have been my favorite I’ve ever done, I loved them.

J: Where were they?

F: Well, all over the world. They were in loads of different places. But it was again, like a year and a half of travel and I’m not a natural traveler. Like I’m not—

J: You don’t like flying I think? F: Oh my god, I’m so scared of flying. It’s the worst! I had hypnotism on it and it wore off (laughs). Nobody told me that hypnotism wears off! Or I just think my anxiety is so powerful that it destroyed the hypnotism. It like, defeated it. I remember reading that the lead singer of The Liars is also really afraid of flying. I think it could be a lead singer thing as well, ‘cause you think that you are the center of the universe and if something really dramatic and catastrophic is going to happen, it should happen to you. So I think there’s a level of ego involved with the fear of flying that I’m hoping in time, I will dismantle.

I find travel in itself, and being away—especially without kind of the crutch of, you know, partying—I get lonely and it’s hard. Although I love the shows and performing, it’s such a big part of me, I...after this tour, I was just worn out by the travel. I was like, I just need to not get on planes for awhile, and I really need to just stay in one place, and try and be like, a human, because although performing runs in my veins, touring is so monotonous, and it starts to feel like you’re losing your mind—and I don’t have much left to lose. So I need it.

J: And there really isn’t any better way to do it probably, right?

F: I keep wondering. I was like, to my manager, “I’m thirty-three, I can’t sleep on a bus anymore!” She’s like, “This is how it is.” You know, I keep trying to think of ways to make it more holistic, but we’ve tried everything and there’s just no getting around the travel because people want to see you, and I’m so lucky to have the fan base in so many places that I do, and I appreciate people and I want to see them. But it means you’re going to have to sleep on a moving vehicle. Which is fucking weird (laughs). When you’re not passed out drunk it’s weird.

J: It’s not like, you curl up in your bunk and the bus takes off and you wake up in the next place the next morning?

F: I don’t know, my brain is so juttery anyway, like sleeping on something that is juttery is a nightmare for me. When I’m trying to sleep on a bus, I’m already someone who tends to get really stuck in their head, and my head is a place that rattles around, so to be in the actual physical representation of that every night, is like a nightmare. I’ve always had a hard time sleeping since I was a kid, and I’m a really light sleeper, always kind of dreaming. I don’t know if I ever get that deep, so yeah. Some things are easier when you can just pass out drunk.

J: Right. We’ll get to that part. Let’s jump back to the beginning of your career. We’re talking about a decade here, so it’s really not a great deal of time but you hit the ground running. I thought we would sort of go through your life by talking about a few songs and your professional life. We’re gonna start with “Dog Days Are Over,” which isn’t the first single I think from the album. I think—

F: “Kiss With a Fist,” yeah.

J: In a way, this is the second single, but perhaps ultimately the bigger hit from the album. I’m not sure, but I feel like this is a song where you first discovered your sound? Or at least for me, I feel like this is where I first heard your sound. Maybe for a lot of us. So I wondered if you could talk about how this song happened, and the lyrics are up here. We can talk about a few of those too. But talk a little, generally, about where this song came from, and how it fit into what work you’d been doing at the time.

F: Ehm, what was I doing? I think I was still at art college, and I—or maybe I’d dropped out?

J: You were at Camberwell College of the Arts, for one year.

F: I wasn’t a very committed art student. I made a lot of installations. I already loved patterns and fabrics and fake flowers and I’d make these big installations, and then kind of sleep in them, and pretend it was an art piece—I was just really hungover. Like, “It’s art! It’s definitely art. Don’t touch it!” I was making flyers for the first Florence and the Machine shows using the photocopier. So I’m sorry for the use of supplies and then not handing anything in.

I’d met Isa of “Isa Machine” fame. She is amazing and we kind of grew up together. She used to babysit my cousin, and then we kind of lost touch. So in South London, for awhile there was a big art collective that squatted the buildings that I lived really near, so when I was a teenager I used to break into all the squat parties, and they would bring all these christmas trees, and everyone would be wearing like, bin bags and crazy outfits, and I was like, “Oh I found them! I found my people!” I was at one of those parties and Isa was there. She was the DJ. She called herself “Laydee Isa,” but it had like seven E’s and seven Z’s. She was like “Oh, I used to babysit your cousin!” And I was like, “Heeey!” I was kind of out of it, I think. She said she had a studio, and that I should come down and make a song.

At the time, there were so many boys in bands. It was around that time of The Libertines, and The White Stripes, and The Strokes—it was a very band oriented time. So I had been writing some songs but because everything was on guitar, and I didn’t know how to play guitar, I just assumed that I would be a singer in someone else’s band, or I’d be a front-woman. I think there was a kind of internalized self-doubt as well. I know I’m not a trained musician. I didn’t have the attention span to sit and learn the piano, or the focus. I was good at singing. I think my attention span doesn’t work...I was like, “I’m already good at this thing.” I could never focus enough to properly learn, which I really regret, actually. I really regret that. So I didn’t have the sort of—I didn’t have the idea that I could make my own band basically. I thought I would be a front-person for someone else’s, but then I started writing songs, and there were so many guitarists about, and that’s how I wrote “Kiss With a Fist.”

They were kind of little gothic fairytales. There’s so much guilt and drama involved—I don’t know what I was. It was kind of like, I think I was already trying to process...I just think from an early age, I felt so much shame, and I don’t really know why. I don’t know where that came from. I think those songs were a way of trying to process what I felt was wrong about me, and through these metaphors—like, this idea that you’d done something terrible, but a bird has seen you do it. So you get the bird, and kill the bird and you eat it so that it can’t tell anybody what you did. I don’t know what the fuck I was doing. But then, you go to sleep, and you’re like, “It’s fine, I got the guy, I’m good.” But when you wake up, you try to speak, and all that comes out of your mouth is the bird singing what you did, and that’s the only thing you can say—which is so dark for a nineteen year old. I think I was just snogging people I wasn’t supposed to or something. But even before, I always felt sort of sensitive as a kid, and I don’t know. I felt like other people had a ticket to kind of get through life that I didn’t know. And how did you get that thing? And everyone seems to have a map, and I don’t. I think these songs were a way of trying to express through these little metaphors how it felt. I was already really obsessed with death in the way that you are as a teenager, and kind of imagining my own funeral all the time. I put these songs with guitars, ‘cause that’s what was around, so that would be like “Birdsong,” in which I wrote with Dev Hynes of Blood Orange. ‘Cause there were so many musicians about—like Kid Harpoon was around, Dev was playing with the Test Icicles at the time, and you could kind of play with anyone. Me and Dev were just sitting in the top room of a pub, and we kind of came up with that song just before we did a show together. That’s kind of how I would make the songs with whoever was around. Isa was sort of the first person who gave me the instrument, who was like, “Why don’t you just try and do something on this?” We called it the “shit keyboard,” it cost like 100 pounds, it was a Yamaha. It burned in a fire!

J: Before or after you used it?

F: After! It burned in a fire. She was the first person who—I think as well because she was another young woman, I think, as a female songwriter...I don’t know if this comes from, like—I had to kind of unlearn deference. I had to really stop deferring. That’s something that’s quite hard, especially when most of the people I was writing with were male. I was instinctively deferring because I was a young woman. I think with Isa, we were kind of the same age, and we kind of bossed each other around! There wasn’t any sort of power imbalance or anything. So she handed me this keyboard and she’s like, “Just do what you want.” The first song that I actually wrote, which you can tell because it’s just an ascending scale, was “Between Two Lungs,” and that was kind of the first thing that sort of felt like it really came truly from me. I was so excited by that, then that the next song we wrote was “Dog Days.” That was like, the first two. They’re not the most complicated chords, but because I never fucking played anything, I thought they were amazing! I was just like, “I’m making this sound? Can you hear this?” Like yeah, it’s fucking piano. It makes that sound for everybody. But because I was the one getting to put them in order and stuff, I just thought like, “This sounds incredible.” She only had like a little...it was in Crystal Palace, which is in South London, we didn’t really have any equipment. We stole drums from someone. The sound of the drums—which I now realize is the same beat as “People Have the Power” (Claps hands to “Dog Days'' percussive rhythm). Which is what we were doing in Patti’s show. We used pens and stuff, and it was kind of, the feeling of that song just came from a lot of enthusiasm, but not really any skill or equipment. So, that’s how it came about.

J: Can I ask you a little bit about the words in the song? “Happiness hit her like a train on a track,” and then later, “happiness hits her like a bullet in the back.” Is it happiness that’s chasing her here? Because it sounds like a celebratory song. Like, the dog days are over and now we’re gonna have some fun! But then it seems like happiness is the thing that’s after her.

F: Well it kind of always was in my mind because I would have such extreme feelings of joy but then I would end up staying out for like three days, so the happiness would always come back down to just terror and panic. I also think that my joy and excitement switch is very close to my panic switch, and I sometimes I don’t know which one is going to go. I think somehow I also equated—I was very mistrustful of happiness, and I think already by the time I was writing the song, I was a very messy person. Not like, untidy, but kind of messy emotionally. I think I’d already done quite a lot of damage to myself and others by that time. We start young in England. By the time I wrote this song, I think I was already, like...yeah, happiness hit her, like a bullet in the back, struck from a great height, by someone who should’ve known better than that. It was sort of like, I didn’t deserve this. You should know better, and I also knew I wanted to be a singer and a performer, and there is this sense that you’ve been struck from a great height, but you are the fucking wrong person (laughs).

J: Huh… okay (laughs). Let’s go from there into writing songs versus writing poetry, because the book is mainly songs, but actually there are poems in the back, and the preface has this interesting line, which I will read. “The act of singing gives the most mundane words and phrases reverence and glory, you can make a shrine out of anything.” I was just wondering, are there certain poems that don’t become songs, and why? Is there something that makes it a song, and something that makes it a poem?

F: I think the first things that I ever started writing when I was a kid was poetry. I mean it wasn’t good, but when I was seven or eight, I was writing poetry. Then I think when I started to think about actually writing my own poetry—like High as Hope is actually an album formed out of poems to begin with. It was a friend of mine called Robert Montgomery who was...he’s a poet, but also a visual artist, and he takes his poems and he turns them into big art pieces with neon lights, and he had said to me, “I think you’re a poet, and I think you should try and write some poetry.” So with that encouragement, I was like, “Okay, okay. I’ll try.” The first thing that I wrote, that wasn’t consciously in mind as a song, but it was a poem, was just a list of things that I thought I couldn’t put into a song.

J: That’s in here! That’s very interesting.

F: Yeah, it’s about getting kicked out of Topshop for drinking Rosé in the changing rooms. I was like, “I don’t know. It doesn’t sing well. So I guess it’s going here.”

J: But you also said in this poem that is not a song, “I’m not sure I can put these things into a song, these muddy trinkets, not beautiful enough. Too bloody and ragged. I always felt the songs should transcend the swamp.” F: Yeah, I think there was a way that I could use metaphor and my imagination to kind of beautify the things that had happened to me, or that I’d done, and in a way kind of own them. Like, when I talk about giving things reverence, I never wanted to actually have the songs written down because I thought that if you saw how sometimes ordinary some of the words are—like the word “kitchen sink” is in “Dog Days,” but when you’re singing something you’re turning it into a hymn almost. You’re giving it a spiritual quality, so I was worried that if the songs were written down, they would maybe lose that. So when I was writing, and I know it’s a song, I feel as if there’s a character or something that’s coming through me that’s bigger than me, and has very big ideas. It’s quite clear on things, kind of understands the bigger questions and I just have to let it happen. So when I was writing poetry, it was a different voice, and it felt like it was almost an even more personal voice because these things were just going to stay on the page. They weren’t going to be viewed with the grandeur of song. They were just going to live there, and who is that person? The drunk Topshop person?

J: You even talked about that—“This new voice, this me voice, is it conversational? Confessional?” Actually there is a poem (New York Poem (for Polly)) I put up here. This is one of the poems from the book. It’s a beautiful poem and it also has your parents and New York in it. So I thought it would give us a jumping off point for your parents. Your mother and father both appear in several of your songs, and have been part of your life. Your mother is a renaissance scholar...

F: Yeah, she is. She’s very smart.

J: And what’s her focus? What’s her specialty?

F: Her focus is the renaissance, above all else. I think even in our childhood her focus was definitely the renaissance (laughs). She’s written four or five books on renaissance studies. It’s funny, she’s always having...she’s always horrified by my exquisitiveness (sic), and how much I love clothes, and bags. But I’m like, “You write books on renaissance shopping, and when we go to museums, I have to stop you from touching things. You love stuff too! Just stuff in the past.” So she’s very interested in what people wore, and textiles, and how people shopped, so she’s read a lot of books about that. And I love shopping too, mom!

J: Didn’t she say to you, when you said you could remember every single outfit you wore, “What a horrible waste of a brain?”

F: (Laughs). I was like, “Oh, you know how I remember things mom? I remember things by what outfit I wore.” She went, “Oh what a waste of your brain.” I was dyslexic as a kid, and she’s worked so hard to get into the upper echelons of academia, and she just keeps getting more and more titles that I can’t even remember now.

J: She’s a provost.

F: Oh, she’s a provost! She’s a provost, yeah, but it just keeps going up. So I don’t know—

J: Dean?

F: No, she’s been that, yup. But I think it’s higher now.

J: So what’s next, chancellor?

F: I think that’s next! But she’s such an impressive person; she would tell me that when I was a baby she was trying to finish papers, or finish books, and she would rest me on a photocopier—it seems like me and my mum both love photocopiers. She just kept working, but I think...none of her children went into academia, and she’s a huge advocate for higher education. That was something that...I was really dyslexic when I was in school, and I couldn’t spell and I struggled at school. I mean, I still don’t think I can do my times tables. Numbers is like a foreign language to me. She’s very staunch; she’s so within herself. She’s incredibly strong, she’s been through so much. I always felt like I was unacademic, emotional, and creative, and sometimes she would look at me as if she had given birth to an octopus. Like, “What is this thing?” I always really looked up to her though, for her drive and her work ethic, and how much she...we’re both very hard workers, I think. I definitely got that from her. And obviously her love of the renaissance has affected me (laughs).

J: And your father comes from, well a journalism family, right? His father was the editor of The Spectator?

F: He was the editor of The Telegraph. I think maybe and The Spectator. I think maybe both, yeah.

J: Okay. And he was a frustrated writer? Or a wishy was-writer, became an advertising guy?

F: Yeah, I think my father is incredibly charming and charismatic and he should have been a performer, really. He is a sort of poet as well, and he was always so imaginative, and would tell me stories when I was a kid that he would then...he was like, “I’m writing a book now!” He moved to Russia when I was fourteen to write a Russian crime novel that my mother tries to pin all my therapy on. Like, I think there’s other stuff. Like not just Dad moving to Russia to write a spy novel, I think there’s other things at play.

J: Did that in fact have a big effect on you?

F: I don’t think it was just that (laughs). I think she’s deflecting slightly. He’s a really creative person and actually he was much more encouraging of me going into the arts. My mother was so desperate for me to go to university. She just didn’t see music. She saw music as a dangerous career, it wasn’t a “forever” career, she was worried I was going to get hurt. She was like, “Get a degree, get some stability, and then do your music thing.” She would, every time I got paid, be like, “It’s not forever money. Put that away.”

But my father, he was always—I mean they’re divorced, so they were like two sides of, you know—they had very different opinions about lots of things. So they didn’t work together. He’s a true bohemian at heart, and he tour-managed us for our whole tour that we did with MGMT around Europe, and England. He did it in his camper-van! MGMT offered us this tour, and it was the first tour we’d ever got. It was a huge break for us actually. We didn’t have any money, and we couldn’t afford a tour bus, so my dad took his sundance camper-van, and we drove all the way around Europe! I mean, MGMT are out there, but I think they thought we were really crazy. So we would just show up there, pots and pans clanking, like, “We’re here!” The first show we did—I mean, I did the show as an early, pre-Lungs era shows where I’d be wearing one of Rob’s t-shirts, drunk and screaming and that was the show. It was excellent (laughs). Then I fell off some speaker stacks. We all had to share a dressing room, as well. That was really cute. Then MGMT came off stage after that show, and they all came off stage, and they’re all like, “Oh my god. The ghost Andy Worhol was in the fucking audience.” Then my dad walked in.

J: Oh, that was your dad? F: It was my dad! Because he had this grey hair, and he kind of dressed as an Andy Worhol, and was right up front. I was like, “Yeah, this is my father, who is managing us.” Then I moved from the tour bus, and then I brought my girlfriend on tour with me. I was like, “Yeah, just come with us!” We got banned from MGMT’s tour bus for being a bad influence (laughs). Which, if you know MGMT, that’s a big achievement.

J: Yeah, that’s a big achievement. Congratulations! Well that gets me into the next subject, which is drinking. Which we both have in common.

F: (Laughs) J: So after the success of Lungs, you were thrown into the world of success and fashion. In particular, you became a darling of fashion. You did the costume ball—anyway, when you read your interviews from that time, you bragfully...in interviews you’re falling apart! You’re drinking at your hotel—you set your hotel room at the Bowery hotel on fire? But the bar bill was more than the hotel damage cost!

F: Yeah, it is (laughs).

J: Anyway, I guess it’s not surprising that with this life came drinking, but it got to a point where it was not manageable.

F: Yeah, I remember waking up and I mean, when you wake up and there’s a huge flame mark on the side of your room, but you’ve been asleep in that room, and you’ve got to figure out where it came from, you’re like, “Was there a fire? And I slept through it? Dope.” Like that is really...I called my publicist at the time, and was like, “Something’s happened!” He was like, “Oh my god, yes, ‘cause there’s a huge bill on my credit card.” I was like, “I think it was the fire.” That was the bar tab. The fire was cheaper than the bar tab.

It was hard. I’ve grown up in South London, and that whole scene is like punk on a pirate ship, it’s sort of pirate folk, and everyone fends for themselves, and the whole gig is like an extended drinking game where you just have to play in the middle. And the game carries on. It was just like an interlude. That is the scene that I grew up in, and I was kind of insecure, I think, about singing pop music.

J: In your family? F: Just in general, and I kind of thought as a way to subvert that, I would just party the hardest. I think as it was a very kind of male dominated scene—like the indie scene that I came up in—it was also a way to kind of outdo everyone. I was very proud of the fact that I could drink as much—and more—than all of the guys. I was the only woman on the first NME tour, and we were opening and they were fucking terrified of me. I think I came into the second show with a black eye, dressed as a bat, jumping off things. I think that’s kind of what I understood, that that was rock and roll, and if you couldn’t go the hardest, you were letting rock and roll down. You were letting these legendary people down.

I was someone who struggled with hangovers, just because I could go...I had insane endurance, but also people would come up to me who I thought were the craziest drinkers and drug-takers I’d ever met, and be like, “Woah. You go harder than anyone I’ve ever met!” I was like, “Oh my god.” But I’ve always had a lot of energy, but I think really why I would stay out for so long is my...you know that sense of shame I spoke about in the beginning? That was there before any of the drinking and the drugs. I already had that. Then to escape that, you know, it would give me an escape from that, but the things I did, or the things I would say, or the way I would treat people just confirmed the way that I felt as a kid. It was just like, you are bad. There is something wrong with you, and then I would carry on trying to escape it in that way, but it would just keep getting worse.

My psyche is pretty fragile; I’m not actually someone who should have a lot of stimulants. They gave me a vitamin shot today, and I’m like, “I’m fucked. I’m high on vitamins! I’m going to have to go to hospital for vitamin overdose!” That’s from a b12 shot. So I don’t know what I thought I was doing when I was partying. Some people are tough, I’m kind of a fragile person. I have a fragile sense of self. The hangovers that I had didn’t seem normal, they were like, “I’m dying. I can’t think, I can’t breathe, like I feel like my skin is—” Maybe it’s ‘cause I drank more than everyone else? I don’t know, but it’s a particular quality that was telling me this does not work for me, but I kept doing it, again and again, and it was always the same feeling. You’ve been doing that in whatever way since you were fourteen, and by the time you get to 27, it’s just—ugh. I didn’t want to feel that way anymore, and it was so repetitive. At some point, the fun bit had gone. As much as I tried to get it back, I just couldn’t. When the fun goes, I’m sorry to tell you if any of you are umming and ahhing, it does not come back. The first year that I stopped, I felt like I’d really lost a really big part of who I was, and how I understood myself. I also felt like I was letting down rock and roll history ‘cause I couldn’t cope. I had to kind of rebuild from scratch a little bit. The thing is that now, I don’t know, it’s almost like the idea of rock and roll that we had...we’ve seen it so many times, it doesn’t end well. I don’t want to be part of that story. J: The 27 year old story.

F: Yeah, I was 27 when I stopped and my mum, literally the speech she gave at my party, where I’d arrived already out of my mind drunk; like I was on the table and she was trying to make a speech. She was like, “Please, just keep her alive. Please.” I laughed about it at the time, but if I think about it now it makes me feel so sad for my mum and how scared she must have been. I feel like at that point there’s...this poem is kind of about that, because I felt like there was a split, there is the person who carried on partying, and didn’t come back. So there’s this ghost version of me. Then there was the person who got to carry on living, and doing the things that I’ve done. It really feels much more rock and roll than anything I ever did when I was drinking. I was doing shows, and connecting with people, and that to me—especially with everything going on in the world—to be conscious and to be present and to really feel what’s going on, even though it’s painful, it feels much more like a truly reborn spirit of rock and roll. It feels like that’s what it should be about right now.

J: The last album was sober, and this song is a remarkable song. It’s maybe not specifically about drinking, but it’s confessional nature I think is what’s a part of whatever transformation you went through. So could you have written [Hunger] as a drinking person? Or do you feel something changed in your songwriting?

F: Oh my god, no. I could have never, ever. I don’t think I could have written this song. I couldn’t have even written this for How Big, How Blue, How Beautiful. In the recording of How Big, How Blue, How Beautiful, I was sober but a lot of the songs weren’t sober because I’d written them when I was drinking, so it was like trying to pull things that were just a big mess. Like, “Okay.” I was in a terrible state. In your first year of your sobriety you’re just insane. So I definitely couldn’t have written it then, but sort of four years down the line, what started to happen was I decided to see underneath—’cause when you’re out there drinking there’s so much surface chaos. You literally can’t see beyond what you did last night as you’re trying to clean that up, and make sure nobody finds out what happened, and who saw? And was there a camera phone? You’re just living in this constant...you can’t ever get any further than the drama that just happened yesterday. So after some time, and some time getting to re-know myself, I started looking at the stuff that was underneath that, that was at the core of it. That’s when I felt able to write this song. I think also I just wasn’t so ashamed of myself at the time. When you’re drinking like I was, you carry around so much shame, and so much of that has lifted that I felt able to say and be honest about things that I just never, ever would have.

When I was really in disordered eating, I would make pacts to myself every night that I will never tell anyone. That was the thing. You can carry on what you’re doing, but you can never tell. Living with that kind of—

J: You kept that promise, because I think when your sister saw this song, she read the first lines, and said she never knew.

F: No, she didn’t. Like, my mum didn’t know. My sister was like, “You better tell mom. You’re putting this out as a big pop song.” I was terrified. I was so scared. I luckily had really good people around. I had my manager, Hannah Giannoulis; she heard this song, and she… I was doing it as a thought experiment. I was never going to release it. I was like, “This is an experiment. This is not for public consumption.” And she heard it, and was like, “This is a really important song.” I was really scared. I was so scared of anger. I’m really bad with anger anyway, but I think it’s because I have so many years of internalized anger against myself for what I was doing, or the way I was behaving that to say it, I expected anger. I expected people to be furious with me for putting something like this out there in a song. I tried to put it off, I pushed back the whole touring schedule. Actually when it was released, people were so kind. I don’t think I gave people enough credit. It was so liberating and it changed me as a performer actually, because once you’ve said your most shameful thing, it’s almost like you’ve got nothing left to lose. So the performances just became so much more open and free, and also when the people who listen to your music accept you at your worst, it is the most beautiful thing. I felt so connected with people on this tour. I’m so grateful to everyone.

#florence welch #florence + the machine #fatm #edited for clarity aka removing florence's adorable rambling that she always does while she collects her thoughts #i love this interview so so much but the quality is pretty poor and therefore pretty inaccessible to non-fluent engl speakers and hoh people #so i put my typing skills to work #if there are any other interviews you'd like transcribed let me know!#this is how i'm putting off writing oof oof oof #also really cant tell if she's saying mom or mum? it sounds like when shes referring to her she says mum #but then if shes speaking to her its mom

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duhragonball · 5 years ago

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On Twitter, there’s a new movement that started up on... Thursday, I guess, with the hashtag #SpeakingOut, where women were encouraged to call out instances of sexual abuse. I’m not sure if it started with the pro wrestling community or not, because earlier in the week I saw some stuff about comic book pros like Warren Ellis and Cameron Stewart, but maybe that was a precursor. All I know is that right now, I’ve been seeing all sorts of names being dropped in the pro wrestling business, each of them accused of being sexual predators, or covering up for the crimes of others. Some of the names I don’t recognize, because they’re independent wrestlers from promotions I’m not familiar with, but I’ve seen some names I do know, and that’s pretty tough to take. I’m going to discuss this here.

Predictably, I’ve seen some backlash to #SpeakingOut, which reminds me of the same bullshit talking points used by the #IStandWithVic crowd last year. In case you didn’t know, Vic Mignogna was a voice actor who worked for Funimation and provided the dub performances for Broly in DBZ, and Eward Elric in Fullmetal Alchemist. I think those were his two most famous roles. Over the decades, Vic garnered a reputation for being a sex pest, kissing and inappropriately touching women and teenage girls at conventions, and harassing his colleagues. I assume the release of the “Dragon Ball Super: Broly” movie in the U.S. in 2019 precipitated a newfound interest in those allegations, and fans started objecting to his bookings at 2019 conventions. By mid-year, Vic was fired from Funimation and RoosterTeeth, and he responded to this by starting an ill-advised defamation lawsuit.

Vic’s defenders are, to put it mildly, idiots. There were professional lawyers on Twitter who explained, very clearly, why this lawsuit was a bad idea. The main reason being that it was done in Texas, which has a lot of laws designed to make it harder to sue people for defamation. I think Vic’s goal was to find some way to punish his accusers for making him look bad and getting him fired. Winning the lawsuit, was a way for him and his supporters to feel like they “cleared his name”, except that was never how it worked. If he had been arrested and tried for sex pest crimes, the burden of proof would be on his accusers to show that he really did bad things. But he was suing people for slander, so that means the burden of proof was on him to show that they really were saying things that were demonstrably false and damaging to his reputation. The main problem with that is everyone had been talking about his sex pestery for years, so it doesn’t make sense to single a few people out in 2019 and blame them for reinforcing something everyone already believed. But the ISWV crowd kept insisting that this distinction didn’t matter, and that it was wrong to ostracize or turn against Vic without “proof”. I see the same demands for “proof” being tossed around for all these wrestling personalities.

I think there’s a couple of things going on with this. One is simple denial. If you’re a fan of someone and you find out they did something terrible, you really don’t want to believe it. I was never that into a lot of these guys, but I know I felt pretty low when I first heard about Vic’s shenanigans, because I liked his work. And I’m feeling that way about Warren Ellis now. Not a huge fan, but I liked some of his stuff, and now I feel a little guilty by association for ever liking that stuff in the first place. It would be nice, I suppose, to just pretend that I hadn’t heard those accusations, or that they weren’t real. Then I could just go back to the way things were before, without all the uncomfortableness. I just can’t do that, but it seems like a lot of people can and will. It’s not about “proof”, it’s about putting up some sort of barrier that will excuse them from confronting an unpleasant truth.

I think this is why you see people going out of their way to defend Christopher Columbus and Confederate monuments. They want to believe that there was something noble about that stuff, because the alternative is to admit that a lot of the things they learned in school aren’t true, and a lot of the “heritage” they cling to is built on white supremacy and slavery. I don’t think anyone really cares about a Robert E. Lee statue, but I’ve seen people go out of their way to try to say Lee opposed slavery, like he’s one of the good Confederates, so he should get a pass. Except he did own slaves, and even if he hadn’t, he still fought to defend a nation founded on slavery as a guiding principle. Tearing down a statue of Lee is a tacit admission that Lee never deserved a statue in the first place, and everyone who admired him was wrong, and maybe the admiration was rooted in racism all along. That’s a bitter pill for people to swallow, and a lot of them just refuse to swallow it. So they deny and deflect, and do anything they can to make this about something else.

The other side of it is just plain hatred. I don’t know if Vic’s defenders were all misogynists to begin with, but it seems like they all got there, one way or another. The train of thought always seemed to be “He didn’t do these things, but even if he did there’s nothing wrong with it.” From what I saw, it really seemed like Vic’s backers were all fired up about defending a man’s right to creep on women in any way he sees fit. “What, so kissing is illegal now?” No, jackass, but when you’re fifty-fucking-five and you kiss a seventeen-year-old girl who only wanted to take a picture with you, it’s pretty damn messed up. When you use your celebrity status to try to mack on young fans, that’s messed up. When you’re an established wrestler and you try to take advantage of up-and-coming wrestlers, that’s messed up. And some of that behavior is totally illegal, but the sad reality is that most of these creeps will never get prosecuted for any of it. That’s why the calls for “proof” are so hollow, because everyone knows it’ll never end up in a courtroom. At best, some of these guys will get fired, and guess what? “Innocent until proven guilty” doesn’t apply to employers. I lost a job once because my “teamwork” wasn’t good enough, and that was the closest thing to an explanation I got. Don’t bullshit me about “proof”.

I guess I should tie this train of thought in with Black Lives Matter while I’m at it. I find it absurd that the police in this country are so out of touch that when there’s a nationwide protest against police brutality, their immediate response is... more brutality. This, more than anything I’ve seen, is the reason to defund the police. They appear to only have the one mode of conduct, and they don’t even know how to do things a different way. If the situation is this bad, we may as well scrap the police as they are and start over. If the cops wanted to fix this situation, all they have to do is treat people with respect and hold themselves accountable, but they can’t let go of their hatred for five fucking minutes and figure that out. This is why you hear about those guys who make up stories about restaurants spitting in their food. They’re paranoid that everyone’s out to get them because they know they deserve to face some consequences, so they’re constantly on guard for this sort of thing. It’s sick.

Somehow, people who support these guys end up supporting the very behavior they were supposed to be denying. Maybe this is why Columbus is such a sticking point. I never gave a shit about Columbus. One of my high school yearbooks had a Columbus theme because it just happened to come out on the 500th anniversary of his first voyage to North America, but I never understood what that had to do with my high school. I think there’s people that want to give him tons of credit, basically thank him for everything that’s happened in the Western Hemisphere since 1500, not in spite of his atrocities, but to retroactively justify them. What I mean is, if you can convince society that Columbus was a great man, and that his achievements outweigh his wrongdoing, then you can also convince society that the wrongdoings aren’t actually that bad. “The price of progress,” they can say. It’s like the idea that Robert E. Lee is admired solely for his “brilliant” military mind. His side lost the fucking war, so I never understood how he gets all this credit for being a great general. The point is that if you can convince people that he was a noble man in spite of the slavery thing, then you can open the door to the idea that the Confederacy as a whole wasn’t That Bad, and that only opens the door to the idea that slavery wasn’t That Bad, and so on.

Same deal with Roman Polansky and Woody Allen. It amazes me that people will still try to defend those fucks, but it probably has a lot to do with all the other sex pests in Hollywood, who hope that everyone will stick up for them when they get exposed. So you have this little chesnut about how “Yeah, they did bad things, but they sure made some good movies.” The implication is that you have to accept a few sex crimes if you want good art. And no, that’s not true, and even if it were true, it wouldn’t be worth it.

I don’t know where things will end up with J.K. Rowling. I’d like to think that one of these days, she’ll wake up and apologize for all this TERF rhetoric she’s been spouting. That would probably be the best-case scenario. More likely, she’ll cause an entire generation of Harry Potter fans to wrestle with their loyalty to her books. There’s no job to fire her from, no laws to punish her, no government agency to step in. She’s got no financial stake in repairing this PR damage. There’s going to be an audience of bigots that will still kiss up to her no matter what she says, so her ego will be well-insulated. Maybe a hundred years from now, people will be talking about tossing her statue in a river, as society admits that we don’t need to accept transphobia in exchange for YA literature.

I don’t know, I think I went all over the place with this one, but I had a lot to get off my chest. I think the overall lesson from this year is that we can’t put these people on pedestals. Some of them are just hell-bent on letting us down, and it’s just a matter of time before their misdeeds are brought to light. I see these dopes with Thin Blue Line flags and “I stand with [X]” hashtags and I’m like “Who are you supporting here? What is it you’re standing for, exactly? Why should they be worthy of your loyalty?” And I think the answer is less about loyalty to a person or group, and more about sticking it to someone else. Women, minorities, whoever. They just want to stand by someone to spite someone else. And that’s awful.

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reading-writing-revolution · 5 years ago

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Heather Cox Richardson:

August 10, 2020 (Monday)

The most striking news of the day was not that Trump has suggested he wants his image on Mt. Rushmore but rather that such an outrageous statement has garnered so little attention. That says something about his presidency.

This weekend, the New York Times ran a story by Jonathan Martin and Maggie Haberman laying out Trump’s apparent interest in adding his face to those carved on Mt. Rushmore. He’d like to be up there next to Presidents George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, Abraham Lincoln, and Theodore Roosevelt. After Trump told the governor of South Dakota, Kristi Noem, that he hoped to have his likeness there next to his predecessors, an aide reached out to the governor’s office to learn about the process of adding an additional face. When Trump visited the monument last month, Noem greeted him with a four-foot replica of the monument with his faced added.

This entire concept is moot. The rock face cannot support more carving, which answers the question definitively. Even if it could, though, the sculpture is carved on a mountain that is part of land that the United States government took illegally from the Lakota people in 1877. The monument remains embroiled in the legal dispute over this land grab. The chance that anyone would now attempt to add a new carving to it is pretty close to zero.

Not to be deterred, on Sunday night Trump tweeted a picture of himself positioned in such a way that his face was superimposed on the structure, beside Lincoln. Yet the story that the president wanted his likeness added to Mt. Rushmore had no sticking power.

A similar fate met Trump’s statement that last week’s devastating explosion in Beirut, caused when an estimated 2,750 tons of ammonium nitrate blew up, was a “terrible attack.” “I've met with some of our great generals and they just seem to feel that it was not a -- some kind of manufacturing explosion type of event. This was a -- seems to be according to them, they would know better than I would, but they seem to think it was an attack. It was a bomb of some kind.” U.S. Defense Department officials said there was no indication that the explosion was an attack. The statement came and went.

This afternoon, at his press conference, Trump told reporters that “the Obama campaign spied on our campaign, and they've been caught, all right?.... It's probably treason. It's a horrible thing they did.... They used the intelligence agencies of our country to spy on my campaign, and they have been caught." This is a statement Trump has been making since June 22, and it is an astonishing lie. And like Trump’s other outlandish statements recently, people didn’t pay a great deal of attention to it.

During his first three years in office, Trump could command headlines with outrageous statements. They often distracted us from larger stories. But that power has waned from overuse, and now outlandish stories—Trump’s face on Mt. Rushmore, a deadly attack in Beirut, Obama committing treason—barely make a ripple.

That we are no longer shocked by his outrageous comments weakens Trump’s ability to control the narrative. It also badly weakens the office of the presidency. Increasingly, he seems to be sidelined from any real decision making, which makes it hard to run for reelection with the argument that he will accomplish anything in a second term.

The White House dropped Trump’s three executive memorandums and one executive order on Friday evening, clearly expecting to set up a situation in which Democrats challenged their legality and Republicans argued that Democrats were keeping ordinary Americans from getting coronavirus relief payments. Trump’s people came out swinging as soon as Trump signed the actions, suggesting that Democrats would oppose them and it would be their fault Americans were suffering from the economic crash.

While even some Republicans opposed Trump’s redirection of congressionally-appropriated money—Senator Ben Sasse of Nebraska called the actions “unconstitutional slop”-- Democratic leaders took a different approach. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi agreed that the executive announcements were “absurdly unconstitutional,” but she and Senate Minority Leader Charles Schumer challenged them not on legal grounds, but on their effectiveness.

On “Fox News Sunday,” Pelosi said they were “illusions,” and listed, point by point, their weaknesses. The relief memo relies on state money that states don’t have; the payroll tax cut only defers the tax until next year, meaning employers will be reluctant to implement it since they will have to claw it all back after the election. Schumer told ABC’s “This Week” that Trump’s executive actions were “a big show, but they don’t do anything.” They both called for Republicans to return to the table for negotiations.

This threw Trump back on his heels and he is trying to spin the exchange as a victory. “The Democrats have called,” Trump said on Sunday night. “They’d like to get together. And we say if it’s not a waste of time, we’ll do it…. They’re much more inclined to make a deal now than they would’ve been two days ago.” This morning, he tweeted: “So now Schumer and Pelosi want to meet to make a deal. Amazing how it all works, isn’t it. Where have they been for the last 4 weeks when they were “hardliners”, and only wanted BAILOUT MONEY for Democrat run states and cities that are failing badly? They know my phone number!”

Pelosi and Trump haven’t spoken since October 16, when she walked out of a meeting where he railed at her and called her a “third-rate politician.” She told reporters he had a “meltdown.”

Meanwhile, the country’s governors today issued a statement outlining their concerns about Trump’s executive actions. Five days ago, the National Governors Association, a nonpartisan organization of the 55 states, territories, and commonwealths, unanimously elected New York Governor Andrew Cuomo, a Democrat, as their chair. Arkansas Governor Asa Hutchinson, a Republican, is the NGA vice chair. Their statement calls out “the significant administrative burdens and costs this latest action would place on the states.”

“The best way forward is for the Congress and the Administration to get back to the negotiating table and come up with a workable solution, which should provide meaningful additional relief for American families. NGA has requested $500 billion in unrestricted state aid and NGA continues to urge Congress and the White House to reach a quick resolution to provide immediate assistance to unemployed Americans. This resolution should avoid new administrative and fiscal burdens on states. It is essential that our federal partners work together to find common ground to help restore our nation’s health and protect our economy.”

Today Trump has floated yet another outrageous idea: the notion that he will make his speech accepting the Republican nomination for his reelection either at the White House or at “The Great Battlefield of Gettysburg, Pennsylvania,” which is a national park. Both locations run into both ethical problems and optical problems, since both are federal property and iconic sites.

Federal law prohibits federal employees from promoting political positions at work. The law does not cover the president, but it does cover all the other federal employees who would need to be present to make such an event possible.

Either choice also has optical problems for Trump. The White House is the people’s house, and giving a partisan speech there will not play well. And Gettysburg? It will invite comparisons the president might not like.

It was during the dedication of the Gettysburg National Cemetery, where the dead of the 1863 battle were laid to rest, that Lincoln rededicated America to “the proposition that all men are created equal.” He reminded his listeners that the men who had died there to save the Union had given “the last full measure of devotion” to their country. And he charged Americans to “here highly resolve that these dead shall not have died in vain -- that this nation, under God, shall have a new birth of freedom -- and that government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth.”

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lovelyharrystories · 5 years ago

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Falling is the easy part (single!mom) - Chapter four

masterlist

_____

“You ready to go?” He asked as he saw you walking out of your house with a bag in your hands.

“I think I am.” You said and handed your bag to him, so he could put it in the trunk.

“Then get comfortable because this will be a three-hour drive.” He said and started the engine and drove off. He still couldn’t believe you had agreed to go with him to London. It would only be for two days since you can’t miss work but he had really thought he screwed up by asking you to come.

“I am really excited to go to London.” You said, and Harry couldn’t help the smile on his face as he saw the excitement on yours. You were like a little kid going to Disney.

“Well they are giving pretty good weather for this time of the year, so we get to walk around a bit and explore.” He said.

“I went to the library yesterday and got a travel guide that says all the things you need to see.” You said, looking in your purse for said book.

When you finally found the book in the massive handbag you took with you, Harry could see you had already putted post-it’s on the pages with the monuments you want to see.

Harry laughed at that and you looked at him with a confused look. “What are you laughing about?” You asked.

“Nothing.” Harry said but you both knew he was lying because he was still snickering.

“Tell me!” You said and slept the book on his arm.

“First of all, aw!” Harry said, and he could see you roll your eyes at his dramatics. “And secondly, you are such a teacher.” He said, and you looked even more confused.

“Why would you say that?” You said, and you tried your best to sound offended, but Harry could see right through it.

“You know what I mean. You have this whole tripped planned out already in your head. Like you would go on a field trip with your class.” He said and looks over at you.

“I guess you can say that my job makes me more organised and I do not have this whole trip planned out. I am a very in this moment type of person.” You said stubbornly.

Harry laughed again, and you looked at him with a challenging yet very cute stare. “Okay I believe you.” He says after you are staring him down for like a minute.

“Let’s put on some music to cut the tension because this trip has started off with an argument already.” You said turned the volume of the radio up. Harry laughed at your comment about you already having an argument and it wasn’t long until he could hear your cute giggles joining in.

The trip had taken longer than expected since there was an accident a few miles away from London which got you to stand still for a half an hour and Harry discovered something about you he never thought he would.

“Holy shit YN, you are the worst in traffic.” Harry said once he parked in his garage.

“No, I am not.” You said and pouted like a five-year-old.

“You are, you just yelled at like ten cars since we entered London.” Harry said laughing.

“Yeah, well that’s because people in London can’t drive apparently.” You said trying to defend yourself.

“I never took you as such a short-tempered driver. I am discovering a whole new side about you.” Harry said, and it was true. You were such a calm and sweet person, it seemed like nobody could do anything bad to you, but you changed his mind after this four-hour trip.

“Shut up, you act like you just discovered I murdered someone.” You said and got out of the car.

Harry rolled his eyes and said, “You might as well could have.”

“I heard that!” He heard you yell from the back of the car where you were taking your bag out of the trunk.

“I was only joking and let me help with your bag.” Harry said and took the bag from your hands.

“I can carry my bag myself.” You said stubbornly and harry couldn’t help but be confused about your mood.

“Are you mad at me because I said that because I didn’t mean it in any bad way and half of the stuff I was saying is a joke. I hope you know that right.” Harry said looking at you and he could see the annoyed look vanishing from your face and guilt taking its place.

“No, I know, I am just a bit stressed. I am sorry.” You said, and you shook your head in an aggressive matter making Harry confused at what you were doing exactly.

“So, now that I got rid of these thoughts. How about you show me your humble place.” You said, and Harry smiled at you leading the way inside the house. Yet he couldn’t shake the feeling away that there was still something on your mind.

“And this will be your room for the weekend.” Harry said and opened the door. He had given you a tour through the whole house and your reaction was hilarious. He never thought a person could be so excited over pillows and kitchen utilities.

“This room is massive.” You said and walked inside getting on the bed.

“How many bedrooms does this house have?” You asked.

“Four and three bathrooms.”

“That’s crazy.” You said and walked inside the bathroom that is linked to your room.

“There even is a bath.” You said.

“Yeah.” Harry said laughing but really, he was quite nervous. He wasn’t nervous during the drive but since you had set foot into his house he couldn’t shake the nervous feeling away. It was like he was scared you weren’t going to like his house or that you would see his house and wouldn’t like him anymore as strange as that sounds.

“How about you get yourself settled and I will make us some dinner.” Harry said, and you nodded.

You had been upstairs for an hour now and Harry had just finished dinner. He had made a simple pasta with some chicken and pesto.

“YN, you ready to eat?” Harry yelled from downstairs.

“Coming!” He heard you yell, and Harry grabbed a bottle of wine and poured some in two glasses.

“Sorry, I lost track of time trying to reach Kelly.” You said, and you sat down at the table.

Harry couldn’t help but question why, when he putted the pot of pasta on the table.

You handed him your plate and said, “Just wanted to ask her how Finn was doing.” You said, and he could see the worry in your face.

Harry handed the plate back to you and sat himself down opposite of you.

“Is he still feeling ill?” Harry asked. He can still remember you rushing away from your coffee date, if you could call it that, and him thinking you had a boyfriend named Finn.

“No, he’s fine but I have never really left him before.” You said while you were clearly playing with your food, making it seem like you were eating but really you weren’t.

“I hope you didn’t feel pressured to come here.”

“Oh no, not at all. I do have to admit that I wasn’t going to come but Kelly convinced me into it saying it would be good for me to go out and relax.”

“So, how old is he?” Harry asked, and it seemed to be the right question to ask in that moment because your eyes sparked when you opened your mouth.

“Four years old. God, he is growing up so fast like it seems yesterday that I got home with him from the hospital all tiny and warm.” Harry could see the love for your son immediately and honestly it made his heart warm. He loves kids and is godfather of four, but he couldn’t imagine him with kids at this stage of his life. He is so young and still wants to achieve so much before he can focus on that chapter in his life.

“Must have been a great feeling, bringing your baby home.” Harry said, and he could see you finally taking a bite of your food.

“Harry, you can’t imagine how nervous I was. I was stressing so much. In the hospital I had nurses I could ask for help but the moment I left the hospital it was all me. I had to do it all by myself. I still have a bit of that fear now, the feeling that you aren’t raising them well, the feeling of not being a good parent.” You said, and Harry could see your devotion in your eyes and even though he hadn’t met Finn and doesn’t know how you are as a mother, he knows you are the best parent a child could ask for. The amount of love you talk about Finn is crazy.

Still, there was one question that he was dying to ask, and he didn’t know how you were going to react on it. “Can I ask you a question, you don’t have to answer if you don’t want to so just tell me if I am out of line here but what about Finn’s father?”

Harry couldn’t help but hold his breath while looking at you. Honestly, he is a bit scared at your reaction. He doesn’t want you to get upset or anything.

“Oh no it’s fine.” You said, and he was quite surprised at your relaxed behaviour.

“I am surprised that you don’t know already. It was quite the talk of the town.” You said, and Harry couldn’t help but feel sorry. He knew how people in Holmes Chapel could be. It is amazing to grow up in a small town with everybody knowing everybody but one of the downsides is obviously the gossip that goes around.

“Finn’s dad, Damion, was an American transfer student who came to live with his grandma for a year. When I found out that I was pregnant it really wasn’t the best for either of us, both in Uni with dreams and honestly no place for a baby. So, when I told him, he freaked out but once he calmed down, he told me he wasn’t ready to be a dad. I wasn’t ready to be a mother either, so we had decided to give the baby up for adoption. But, having a life grow inside of you for nine months, it does something to a person and I couldn’t do it. Damion told me he would be going back to America as he had planned, I wasn’t really angry at him for it. He was a great support during the whole pregnancy, but I knew from the beginning he wouldn’t be a father. So, Damion left, and I stayed behind. I didn’t really hear a lot of Damion in the first year but on Finn’s first birthday I got a text saying Happy Birthday. I got the same text for his second birthday and by the time his third birthday came around, I got a call. Damion said he was in London and asked if he could come over. I told him that he could but that by visiting and meeting Finn, he also became a part of his life. I didn’t expect from him to have shared custody, but I would want him to visit Finn sometimes and maybe even facetime from time to time. And now we are here. Finn living with me and a father that he facetimes once in a while and maybe sees twice a year in person.”

“Wow.” Was all Harry could say because honestly it was a lot to process, you had to go through so much alone and still you let Damion be a part of Finn’s life, if he were you, he would be so pissed at Damion.

“Yeah, it’s not only you who has had a crazy ride of a life these past years.” You said, and he was happy to see that you were joking again. It seems like he got to get your mind of Finn by talking about Finn.

#harry styles #harry styles fanfic #harry styles fanfiction #harry styles imagine #harry styles imagines #harry styles one shot #harry styles stories #harry styles fluff #fanfiction #fanfic #singlemomseries #falling is the easy part

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girlactionfigure · 6 years ago

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He remembered growing up when his father pointed out a tree to him, and told him that a black man was lynched from a branch of that tree. At that time, he could not understand how another human being could hate another human being, to the point of killing him. Harold Henry was born on July 23, 1918 in Ekron, Kentucky. When he was 8-years-old, his family moved to racially segregated Louisville. He was 10-years-old when his father took him to see that tree in which the black man was lynched. Harold never got to know any black folks growing up. He said, "the schools were segregated, so we didn't go to school with them." He also added that he never got to play with them "because they weren't allowed in the parks." While playing amateur baseball in a church league, Harold was noticed and would later play for the minor league Louisville Colonels, where his teammates called him "The Little Colonel". Harold eventually made it to the Big League, then enlisted in the United States Navy in 1943. While serving in the Navy, a shipmate told him that a black man was signed to his baseball team and that he might be taking his job. Rather than becoming angry, Harold supposedly told his shipmate "well, if he can beat me out, more power to him." When he finally got back to the states, he finally met his black teammate and shook his hand. He admitted it was the first time he ever shook the hand of a black man. And, when a petition was passed around in spring training by some players saying they would refuse to play with a black man, Harold refused to sign it. Then, came the moment that has become immortalized. During one game, as usual his black teammate was being heckled because he was black. His teammate seemed so alone on the field as seemingly the entire stadium was booing, jeering at him for no other reason than the color of his skin. None of his other teammates went to the black player's defense. The black player had received death threats and if he dared talk back to anyone, the hate would intensify even more. Even the other players taunted him. Harold could not not stand it any longer. He didn't care what the other players would think of him, he didn't care what the rest of the stadium would do, he didn't care how his own hometown would react to him or his family. So, on that day, on that field, in that stadium of hate, Harold did the most amazing thing. He didn't hit a major home run, he didn't perform acrobatics catching a ball, and he didn't pitch a no-hitter. What he did would be remembered for all eternity, in baseball history and American history. Harold Henry (or as his teammates called him by that time, "Pee Wee") Reese simply walked over to his teammate, Jackie Robinson, and put his arm around him, leaving his arm there for all to see, chatting with him innocently about who knows what - but, it silenced everyone in the stadium. The boos and racial slurs suddenly stopped, the crowd no longer knowing what to think, how to act. Pee Wee Reese was one of the most respected players in the league, and he just showed everyone why. One writer noted, people have a choice, they can either choose to hate, or they can choose to love their fellow man. Reese had no reason to hate Jackie Robinson. It was a grand gesture of support, friendship, and respect for his fellow man. Jackie Robinson would say that Reese was teased a lot because of his friendship with Robinson. "(Opposing players) were abusing Reese very viciously because he was playing on the team with me … They were calling him some very vile names and every one bounced off Pee Wee and hit me like a machine-gun bullet. Pee Wee kind of sensed the sort of hopeless, dead feeling in me and came over and stood beside me for a while. He didn’t say a word but he looked over at the chaps who were yelling at me and just stared. He was standing by me, I can tell you that. Slowly the jibes died down … and then there was nothing but quiet from them. It was wonderful the way this little guy did it." Robinson would add, "I will never forget it." Another major league baseball black pioneer, Joe Black, would say, "When Pee Wee reached out to Jackie, all of us in the Negro League smiled and said it was the first time that a white guy had accepted us. When I finally got up to Brooklyn, I went to Pee Wee and said, 'Black people love you. When you touched Jackie, you touched all of us.'" After the two men retired, in 1972, an elder Robinson attended a playoff game in which he would be honored. By that time, Robinson's eyesight was failing and he felt uncomfortable, alone, on that field once again. But, all of a sudden, he heard a familiar voice from across the field. Robinson immediately turned around and yelled out Reese's name. Reese was there to support his friend once again. Robinson and Reese would embrace once again. Reese, who was a quiet, humble man who never sought publicity, admitted years later that he took his son to the same tree his father took him, to show him what hate could do. In 2005, after both men had passed away, Reese's son would be present at the unveiling of a monument honoring that moment in baseball history between Pee Wee Reese and Jackie Robinson. "My father had done his own soul searching," said Mark Reese, Pee Wee's son, in the New York Times, "and he knew that some fans, teammates, and yes, some family members didn't want him to play with a black man." "But," Mark Reese added, "my father listened to his heart, and not to the chorus." In the New York Times, Marty Markowitz, the Brooklyn borough president, said, "When Pee Wee Reese threw his arm around Jackie Robinson's shoulder in this legendary gesture of support and friendship, they showed America and the world that racial discrimination is unacceptable and un-American." Reese himself in 1997 said, "Something in my gut reacted at the moment. Something about what? The unfairness of it? The injustice of it? I don't know." Reece would later say, "I was just trying to make the world a little bit better. That's what you're supposed to do with your life, isn't it?"

The Jon S. Randal Peace Page

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headfulloffantasies · 5 years ago

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Black and Blue and Red All Over

Bucky follows the kid around. It’s not stalking. It’s protecting.

Ao3

Bucky watched the kid. Spidey bounced around the city, swinging passed in his outlandish suit. On the ground, Spider-Man mania gripped New York. Everybody loved their webslinger, with a few key exceptions. A hero with that much attention needed watching. So Bucky watched. And he learned.

Spidey knew people’s names. He was seen. He interacted. Bucky watched as the kid waved to a bodega owner, swinging onto an electrical pole and stopping to chat. He knew these people.

Spider-man belonged to the people. Steve tried that, but the image of Captain America the War Hero loomed too strong to break through most people’s perceptions. Captain America existed as a character like Mickey Mouse. All folks wanted from him on the street was a photo.

The suit bugged Bucky. The skinny kid with his floppy limbs and elastic spine couldn’t hide with his fire engine red and TARDIS blue onesie. Captain Marvel might have a similar colour scheme, but no one knew of a being on the entire planet that could lay a hand on her. Her suit was a warning. Spidey’s was an invitation.

If he was smarter, Spidey would adopt Natasha and Bucky’s style: all black and kevlar. The kid didn’t have bullet proof abilities. Bucky had seen the panic through the mask from a sniper’s rooftop when a machine gun suddenly introduced itself to a simple mugging. A graze had Bucky up and ready to jump in, but the kid had it under control. He leaped over his opponent’s head, webbed the gun’s muzzle, and had both the thugs down and out before Bucky could make it to the stairs.

So, the kid was good. But that didn’t excuse his brazen mannerisms. He taunted his villains.

“Hey, Shocker, what’s wrong with your face? Did you run into a brick wall, or were you always that ugly?”

Ok, so the kid wasn’t Wordsworth when it came to insults. But Bucky saw the play. Spidey’s motor mouth kept his opponents distracted, or angry, or just plain baffled.

Why didn’t he keep his head down? Spidey called attention to himself. He didn’t hide. Bucky started to wonder if the kid liked the attention. Maybe he was a glory hound.

Bucky walked down the street when he noticed the kid starting off his day. Four o’clock, every afternoon like clockwork. Bucky glanced up at the building the kid had leaped from. A buzz of curiosity and mild paranoia tingled behind his eyes. Bucky checked no one was watching and made for the fire escape.

Wind buffeted the top of the building. New York spread out below and above, a full spectrum of humanity in the honking horns, shouts, and bass lines. Bucky checked out the rooftop. There wasn’t much to see, just a water tower and a roof access door. On the far side of the water tower Bucky found a backpack webbed to the structure.

He stood still while his options warred inside. His fingers itched to open the bag and find out exactly who lived under the Spider-Man mask. But the breach of trust was monumental. Heroes went to war for less. Iron Fist and Johnny Storm still weren’t talking.

In his deliberation Bucky didn’t hear the light footfalls behind him.

“Are you following me, Mr. Barnes?”

Bucky aborted two very catastrophic reactions to the demon child sneaking up on him. First, he stopped the gut reaction to pull out a weapon and shoot. Second, he just barely kept himself from leaping out of his skin and falling off the edge of the building.

The white eyes of the kid’s suit blinked. Bucky stared him down.

“Are you following me?” The kid repeated.

“No,” Bucky weighed his options and decided lying was the better of two evils. Heroes were suspicious creatures by nature. And Bucky was a bastard by nature.

“It’s okay if you are,” Spidey parked his butt on the edge of the building with his feet dangling into nothing. “I just want to know why.”

“I’m not following you,” Bucky decided to die on this hill. It was a nice hill and he had died for less.

“Did Miss Romanoff ask you to look out for me? Because I told her I’m fine.”

“No,” Bucky said, squinting at the kid. “You talked to Nat?”

The kid nodded. “I found her cat in a tree. She threatened to break my knee caps.”

Bucky huffed a laugh. Natasha protected her cat more than her teammates. On a whim, he sat next to the kid, though he kept his feet solidly on the rooftop, thank you very much.

The kid watched him out of the corner of his eye. “I don’t care that you’re following me, Mr. Barnes. I kind of like having the back up. But if you want something from me, you should just ask.”

The flippancy with his own privacy set Bucky’s teeth on edge. People these days freely surrendered their information in the belief that it somehow made them safer. Hydra had been right about that much. For someone like Spidey, though, information was dangerous. Bucky’s skin crawled to think what Hydra could do with the little intel that Bucky had garnered in the last week.

“What can I do for you, Mr. Barnes?”

The kid was so polite, so adorable. “Can I ask you a question?”

“Shoot.”

Bucky hid the grin bubbling up. Trust Spidey to make a joke with the Winter Soldier.

“Why do you wear red and blue?”

“Why do you wear black?”

“Stealth,” Bucky answered with a smirk. “And habit.”

Spidey nodded. He kicked his feet, staring out at the New York skyline. “Why do you think I wear red and blue?”

Bucky shrugged, “Favourite colours?”

Bucky could see the frown through the mask. “I’m being serious.”

“Okay,” Bucky surrendered. He took a second to order his thoughts. “I used to think you did it to be seen. So everyone would look up and say “There goes Spider-Man”. Now I don’t know.”

Spidey nodded. “You’re half right. I picked bright colours to be seen. By the bad guys. I want all their focus on me, not their victims.”

Noble. Bucky didn’t expect anything less after (not) following him.

“And the mask?” Bucky prodded.

“It’s complicated. I have people I’ve got to protect. And I feel… safe in the mask. No one sees my face, no one sees how scared I am.”

Bucky nodded, turning to watch the city with Spidey. The pieces slotted into place. He didn’t have to ask about the jokes, or the webs, or the weird familiarity Spider-Man cultivated with his neighbors. It all boiled down to that: I want to help. I am afraid. Bucky got that.

“Do you ever get scared, Mr. Barnes?” “All the time,” Bucky admitted.

“What do you do when you’re scared?”

Bucky sighed. “I don’t know anymore. It used to be that whatever I faced, what I had to go back to if I failed was worse. Now,” he shrugged. “Now I can’t let go of what I’ve got. I fought tooth and nail to hold on to the people I have. And I’d rather die than give them up.”

“Me too,” Spidey said quietly. He reached up, and to Bucky’s amazement, Spidey pulled off his mask.

Bucky almost had a heart attack. The kid was puny. A literal, baby faced child. Brown curls and wide eyes, and a smile like a puppy dog. Oh god, protect him. Who let this infant out into the world to get beat up by bad guys every night?

“Hi, I’m Peter,” Spidey extended a hand.

Bucky carefully took Peter’s fingers in his. “Call me Bucky.”

“Are you going to stop following me now?”

“Not a chance.”

#bucky #james bucky barnes #peter parker #spiderman #marvel #fanfiction #mcu #winter soldier

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artificialqueens · 6 years ago

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You won a seven nights stay in Paris (Brooke x Vanessa) - Evelyn Bubbles

Howdy y’all it’s me your girl Evelyn, resurfacing of course when another season starts. As always I gotta come up with some ship, so here’s my BrookexVanessa, I have no idea how to call it though. Branjielina? Probably. This is based in canon, I’m gonna use female pronouns and drag names so there’s no confusion. Enjoy! You remember Vanjie being over excited about Brooke Lynn winning the Paris vacation? Well, they went together. And things got complicated.

The problem with winning something it’s always hoping to collect the prize alone, in peace. Especially if that particular prize is really huge. After her best friend had told her he couldn’t come since it was his wedding anniversary, Brooke Lynn Hytes, 32, carefully texted the season eleven groupchat. She wanted to have fun, but also see the monuments, museums, landmarks. Come on, it was Paris after all. Paris. One of her favorite cities. She had been there in the past with her ballet company, but she hadn’t had the time to really see that beautiful place. She was hoping for someone interesting, curious, cheerful, to answer her desperate “Hey, anyone wanna go to Paris?”. Of course Silky was the first one to answer: “Mama’s too booked, sis”. Then a couple of others. A’keria was getting ready for what probably was one of her last pageants. Nina was about to host a new charity event. Plastique probably couldn’t even read. Brooke Lynn was about to turn off the phone and go to Paris all alone, when Vanessa texted her privately.

-Saw the episode? Remember that I was the one who wanted to come with u! -I remember love xx -Then it’s settled. Fully cancelling all my gigs. When is it -After my bday -Like I know when that is, girl -March 10th lol -Cool love that. We’ll get those French cookies sis -I’ll send you the details right now then :) -Can’t wait!!

And then, a profusion of kisses emojis and many many red hearts. Brooke couldn’t believe she had just accepted to go on a 8 days trip in Paris with notoriously batshit crazy Vanessa Vanjie Mateo. She was fun to have around, for sure, and she was also one of her closest friends after the competition, but they’d never travelled together. Although skeptical at first, Brooke smiled. It could’ve been fun.

////

This is gonna be a big mess, Brooke thought as soon as Vanessa started running towards her at the JFK airport, New York City. She practically jumped at her neck, showering her with affection. “So nice to see you again girl! I’ve missed your face! You look amazing, these first weeks of fame have done a body good”, she said, tapping on her arm. “Thank you Vanjie. You look fantastic as well”, commented Brooke smiling wide. She loved Vanessa dearly, but she was dragging along what seemed like an entire wardrobe packed into one giant, plus a handbag and a sparkly backpack. Brooke felt all the eyes on them as Vanessa started chatting loudly, catching the attention of a group of girls who eyed them and pointed at them giggling. They’re fans of the show, maybe, Brooke guessed, or maybe they’re just laughing at a loud obnoxious gay couple at the airport ready for their honeymoon. Except for the fact that Vanessa and her weren’t a couple, nor on their honeymoon: they were sharing a price won at a transvestism competition. The usual.

////

On the plane, everything went… not as planned. Vanessa didn’t say a word for the whole flight, pleasantly surprising Brooke who was expecting eight hours of non-stop blabbing. Instead, Vanessa fell asleep right away, AirPods in, head propped on a tiny pillow and her soft lips semi-open. Brooke couldn’t help but smile, adjusting herself on the seat and turning on her classical music playlist that she used to listen before bed. The last thing she remembered was the Carmen overture playing, and Vanessa’s sleepy face turning gently towards her. She woke up when the plane landed pretty roughly, shaking both of them in their seats. Vanessa was candidly sleeping with her head resting on Brooke’s shoulder, nuzzled into her neck. “What the fuck was that…!”, Vanessa said, suddenly nervous, that surely want the best wake up call, “A turbulence?”. “You… own… everything…!”, Brooke joked, and Vanessa punched her on the shoulder, “You’re so stupid girl! No but seriously, have we landed like… that was quick!”. “Only because you slept all the way through”. “I needed some rest okay? Making coins every night is hard as shit you know that!”. “I do Vanjielina, I do. Let’s grab our stuff and get the fuck outta here, my legs hurt”.

////

“What do y’all mean with ‘My suitcase is still in America?!”. “Yeah, so sorry Mr. Cancel… apparently your suitcase wasn’t embarked… they’ll be delivered to your hotel as soon as possible, unfortunately that won’t be possible until… let me check�� four days from now, we’re going through a strike, again, and we won’t have incoming flights for a bit”. “What will I do then? I have no clothes, no shoes, no nothing!”, Vanessa groaned in stress. “Listen, I know this situation sucks, but I’ll be more than happy to lend you my clothes. Also, don’t you have your toothbrush and stuff in your handbag and backpack? You’re gonna survive just fine. And don’t you wanna go do some shopping? We could find some really cute stuff for you to wear these days”. Vanessa looked at Brooke with puppy dog eyes. “Thank you sis… I really need some positivity right now or I’ll have a nervous breakdown”. “It’s nothing Vanjielina. Now let’s give them the b&b address and we can get the fuck outta here. We’re in Paris and I haven’t seen the city yet!”. “You’re right”, said Vanessa smiling as usual, “I’m tired of this shit. Let’s go”.

////

The bus from Orly to their b&b in the luxurious XVI arrondisement took forever, but as soon as they arrived they were blown away. The classical Parisian house, just behind the Trocadero, with its characteristical blue roof, round windows and narrow appearance was stunning in the daylight, and its white curtains masked the surely elegant interior from unwanted stares. “On here it says that the owner is a certain Mathieu Pepin…”, Brooke said consulting her receipt on her mail app. “Let’s wake up this motherfucker”. “Wait, Vanjie…”. Too late, Vanessa was already torturing the intercom: “Hello, hi? Someone there? We’re here!”. “Vanessa!”. “What? I wanna go explore!”. “Yeah, but we shouldn’t…”. “Oh my God! I can’t believe it!”. Brooke and Vanessa turnt around, only to face an overenthusiastic blonde guy with curly hair and a light beard all over his chin and jawline. “Miss Vanjie and Brooke Lynn Hytes, in my apartment…! This is a dream come true”. “Oh, hi, I’m Brock, nice to meet you, but you can obviously call me Brooke as you know us from the show”. “Of course I know you two! I’m so happy to have you here, I’d guide you inside personally but I have quite a few things to do. It’s not hard though, the last floor is all yours. Here’s your set of keys. This opens the main door, while this opens the apartment… oh, I’m Mathieu by the way… here’s your WiFi password…”. Brooke giggled, this Mathieu guy seemed kinda all over the place but he owned a flat in one of the most expensive Parisian neighborhoods, he must’ve been someone important. Or at least very rich. “So sorry I have to leave you this soon. Does any of you speak French?”. Vanessa shook her head, while Brooke said: “Kinda… the basics. The very basics. Toronto is not a French speaking area. I studied it in school but…”. “Oh, don’t worry! You’ll survive just fine with just English around here. Have a great staying! Can I be a little indiscreet?”, Mathieu said winking, “I’m so happy the rumors are true! Have fun you lovebirds!”. Then he kissed both of them on the cheeks and rushed away, chatting loudly on the phone in perfect Spanish. “The rumors? Which rumors?”. “I ain’t got no idea girl… let’s get inside this fucker”, Vanessa shrugged, grabbing Brooke’s backpack and bringing it inside. Fortunately, they managed to get inside that tiny elevator, squished and uncomfortable but still, the doors closed. “Looking at it positively, if we still had your suitcase we would’ve had to run this thing twice”, Brooked said jokingly, to cheer Vanessa up. It worked, and she smiled back. They arrived at the apartment, the only one on the last floor. “Oh wow, it’s really fucking big!”, Vanessa exclaimed stealing the keys from Brooke’s hands. “Do you say that very often Vanjie?”. Vanessa gave her the middle finger: “Shut up you whore… and carry your shit inside”. Brooke laughed, following her friend into that beautiful apartment. Light entered the open space softly, waving over the modern furniture, the wooden floor, the white curtains. “This place is stunning! C’mon drag race sponsorship! Okay I gotta explore”, said Vanjie dropping her stuff on the floor and running into the various rooms. “This bathroom is huge!”. “Oh my God look at this kitchen!”. Brooke left her suitcase as well, dropping her bag on one of the huge sofas. “Bitch… you should really come and see this”, Vanessa called her from the last room. It must’ve been the bedroom. Brooke started fantasizing on how beautiful and big their beds must’ve been. Vanessa was blankly staring at one, huge ass bed. A single king sized mattress. “Now I see why that bitch told us he was happy the rumors are true”, said Brooke. They looked at each other in the eyes. “Yeah sis”, Vanessa told her, “They think we’re banging”.

#rpdr fanfiction #vanessa vanjie mateo #brooke lynn hytes #branjie #pining #smut #evelyn bubbles #ywa7nsip #canon compliant #s11 #submission

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writingonthemoon · 5 years ago

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Old Clothes Part 2

This is Day 18 of Tuck Month because it kinda makes sense

Part 1

Word Count: 3463

Disclaimer: Mentions of blood, slightly traumatising experiences

Old clothes have a way of piling up. There are two options to get rid of them. You can donate everything and allow someone to make themselves anew with the past you’re giving them. Or you can burn, destroying any trace of crimes you’ve committed or wrongs you have yet to right. Both actions eat away at you, destroying your soul and moral compass. You know you can’t fix what you’ve done once you grab a match and you slowly start to wonder how askew your thinking is. Donations are stressful, causing you to look over your shoulder every few moments to see if anyone was suspicious of your activities and strange giveaways. My father had forgotten that last sentiment.

My childhood was a strange one at best. Everything that seemed absolutely normal was slightly off when you examined it under a magnifying glass. When I was little and got dirt on myself, I would change into an entirely new outfit, even if there was no dirt on what I was wearing. If I got sick during the day, I would have to wait until the evening until I could have anything. My bedtime consisted of news stories and my mornings had me washing the surfaces any candle was resting upon. It wasn’t an abnormal upbringing, it was just a little strange.

Due to the oddities of the way my family lived, we got the attention of our neighbours. They didn’t necessarily do much about it, they just noticed it. They noticed it more than they should have. I was sick the day they stuck their noses in too far. My stomach wasn’t upset with the idea of me not eating until later in the day, but the Michaelsons next door were outraged. The two came over with a small basket of food and handed it to me without a word. All I got as an explanation was a sympathetic look shot in my direction. At the smell of all the delicious pastries and sweet fruits, my stomach started rumbling. I knew I couldn’t eat anything from the basket because I would have to show my parents and I wasn’t supposed to take anything from the cupboards. There was only one thing the mind of a hungry four-year-old though as a viable option. I go out and get some like my parents had always done.

I put on my shoes and marched out of my house towards the market where I knew there would be so much good food that would satisfy me. But, I was four and still a little dumb on society’s rules. I walked along the street, being oh so careful to keep my dress clean, and began pulling things from stalls, not knowing I had to pay. I had always become interested in something else by then when I was with my mum, so I never learned. Until that day, of course.

My mother came home first and, just by the look of me, could tell I did something wrong. My face was a little paler than usual and I was clenching my stomach. I can assure you I never ate until the evening when I was sick after that. She helped me prepare for bed, getting me in my sleepwear and braiding my hair for the night. Then, Father arrived home in a sweeping panic. His dark hair stuck out at odd ends and he kept straightening his jacket more than he needed. A thief had gone through the marketplace with red hair and small stature. He and my mother both knew what would happen at that time.

They hurried to pack everything we owned up, but I could tell by the different ways everything was gathered that we wouldn’t be taking it all. As we left with our cart behind us, my parents brought us to a field. The two of them grabbed packs and handed me a small one before turning to the mounding cart. My father took a flint to it. The flying sparks lit up my eyes as I watched in amazement. In only a few moments, our belongings were up in flames, the heat roaring against my face and the crackling of wood echoing in the sleeping village. We left, went to a different town and started again. Our reputation was built upon arrival. The three of us were a good family with no faults to us. Everything perfect. It was a mistake to keep our names and it was a mistake to drop our clothes in the donation box. They were mistakes that were replaced with inevitabilities. The ashes on our clothes were a sign of who we once were and the ease at which we started to move through different towns was flowing like our old coats in a breeze.

Jesse and I had seen the Wonders of the World together with the wind following our trail. We had been just about everywhere and it seemed there was a new place discovered each day. It was the ultimate life of adventure laid out for us to take. We were riding the wings of life for years with no plans to stop. Eventually, you do have to land, do you not? The decades caught up to us and we grew out of the fantasy we had been in. The time we spent together faded from moments to memories. Memories to remember forever.

The Brooklyn Bridge. I hadn’t actually seen it finished, just the beginning of construction. I was going to see it when it was finally completed, but I got caught up doing anything but. It might seem strange, but I knew who else was going to be there on the day, so I wasn’t there. Now, sixteen years after it was completed, sixteen years after I was to travel there with him, sixteen years after a promised return, I finally saw the outcome.

My internal thoughts were drowning in the sounds of the people coming from every which way, namely ahead. The doorway to the sixth-largest city in the world was a lot busier than I expected it to be on a Sunday. Well, the largest borough in the second-largest city in the world since New York absorbed all those other places. But I guess I can’t assume much when I haven’t been in America for ages. It was more civilized in Europe and Asia was extremely respectful and aware of others. Here, it was crowded and everyone was pushy and living in their own world, paying no mind to anything going on about them.

As I gazed at the structure in front of me, I felt a shove from my right, knocking me to the ground further from the foot traffic I hadn’t been interrupted in the first place. I jumped to my feet quickly, telling the man off with rude words from a few decades ago that had fallen out of poor light. They were still my favourite ones to use. Once I lost sight of him in the throng, my palms starting stinging. Turns out, they were cut up from the rough ground.

“Damn,” I muttered, resolving to not wipe my hands on my dress as they were slowly turning red, “Prick.” I spat at the invisible back of the man. Even if I was immortal, it had been faltering lately. Not by much, I could still survive anything that could kill me, but every now and then I would cut myself with a knife or I’d scrape my knee climbing a monument. These instances were few and extremely far between, but they still concerned me.

“Excuse me, miss,” I held my breath and turned to see an oddly familiar face that puzzled me, “you ‘lright?” Pieces of red hair poked out from under the cap on his head and his warm brown eyes brought me back to summers with my sister, Clara. Freckles splattered his face, though I couldn’t be sure if they were there all the time or just in the August sun.

My brain rebooted as he raised his eyebrows a little, “Yes, yes, of course.” I smiled at the boy whose soft face couldn’t be older than my look, “Thank you.”

“You sure? 'cause I’m just 'bout to head out for the evening and, sad to say, I know how to deal with stuff like that.” He pointed at my injuries.

“Sad to say I do as well.” I chuckled lightly and thought for a moment, “I hate to trouble you, but I might just take up your offer, seeing as I’m just visiting the city.”

The boy smirked with a mischevious look in his eyes, “I coulda guessed that. A beauty like you woulda caught my eye a long time ago.” I giggled at his blatant flirting and he offered me an arm, “Shall we?”

“Of course.” I linked up with him and he started leading me down the streets. The new sights of the city distracted me enough that I paid no mind to many of the people around or the boys beside me. A realization suddenly came upon me and almost caused another tumble into the street, “So, what is the name of my knight in shining armour?”

“Albert DaSilva. Age 16. And what about yourself?”

“Odette… Tuck. Age 17.”

“Odette, huh? That’s my great-something-aunt’s name. She kinda disappeared a while ago. I think she was your age, Dette. I’ve heard a lotta stories from my family 'bout her, but Nona Clara told them the best,” I struggled to breathe when I heard my sister’s name, “Even though I don’t remember a lot of her, I know they were the best.” Albert turned his head a little and saw my expression, most likely one of bittersweet pain and shock, “Sorry, I’m going on 'bout myself. What about you? Got anyone in your family named Albert?” He nudged my shoulder a little with a pairing of a chuckle.

“Oh,” my mind scrambled for an answer. This boy beside me might be my family and I couldn’t tell him, “don’t worry, it was alright hearing about yourself. Uh, I have a nephew. He was just born, so I only met him once before I left.” The lie rolled off my tongue like nothing and it was sorta true compared to how old I was, “I would love to get to know him better, but I guess I’ll just have to hear more about your Nona Clara and her sister for now.”

“Ah, I don’t think you’ll really wanna.”

“No,” I objected all to quickly and I silently cursed myself, “I would. I lost communication with my sister a while ago and hearing about Clara and Odette would be nice.” I paused before I wrinkled my nose, “I don’t like saying my name in that way. Makes it feel like I’m her.” I mean, I was 90% sure I was her, but I wouldn’t tell him that. I would confuse him too much and he would probably want to burn me. Or was that what people did when I was little? Or was it before I was born? Events I didn’t even go through blend into my memories nowadays.

“You don’t have to worry about that unless youse immortal.” He laughed, bringing me out of my mind, and I forced a matching tune. “Nah, they… they lost her in some woods in New Hampshire back in 1808. So unless you was hangin’ 'round back then…” he trailed off and watched his feet as we traversed the pavement. I bit my tongue to keep myself quiet, but soon I couldn’t help it. It seemed right to tell him a version of what had happened.

“I lost my family too,” his head turned in my direction and I could feel confusion radiating off of him. Why would I be telling him this? Maybe he’ll know the real reason eventually, “just like her, but I feel it was a little different. We moved a lot when I was younger. Travelled all over the place. But, heh, it wasn’t just because we could.” I swallowed thickly before continuing on, “Whenever we moved, we had to reinvent our family. I was never sure why, but we just did. We had a ritual where we burned everything extra on our last night in whatever town we were in. All we had were our names, the clothes on our backs, and whatever money we could carry in our pockets. I could barely remember where I was from after a while.”

“Well, ta jog your memory, where are you from?”

“England. I was the last of my siblings born there. I mean, my family was here before, but some of them went back and then we came back and-” I cut my rambling short, “It gets a bit confusing sometimes.”

“Eh, it’s alright. Just wait 'til you meet some a my friends, then it all gets confusing.”

“I hardly believe they can be that confusing.”

“Well, they ain’t confusin’, jus’ chaotic.”

“Chaos is my speciality.” The two of us walked a little further, Albert sharing short stories about myself and my sister until we reached a grand old building with shouting coming from inside. A grin came to Albert’s face that made me match him. It was nice to know these boys still had real happiness in such dismal times.

“Your friends in there?” I bumped shoulders with him, bringing him out of his euphoric trance. He nodded rapidly before pulling me up the steps to the door. Al rested his hand on the knob, his brow furrowing for a moment, “Something wrong?”

“No, no, it’s just… I ain’t never brought a girl here 'cause we ain’t really allowed,” he shrugged.

“It’s not like I’m spending the night. You’re just cleaning up my hands because you’re a gentleman. And if anyone tries to mess with you, I can rough 'em up for ya.” I copied his accent and lightly punched one of my palms the way all tough people do. I regretted that when I saw the blood staining my knuckles.

“Heh, yeah, I betcha will.” With that final statement, the door swung open in front of me at Albert’s request and he led me in, a hush following my soft closing of the door. I positioned myself behind the buff redhead, which was slightly embarrassing since I was old enough to be the great grandmother of all these boys and I had fought men bigger and scarier than some scrawny munchkins.

“Look at that, Al’s finally brought home a girl.” A boy called, earning laughs from the crowd.

“No, he hasn’t,” I replied softly yet loud enough so my voice to projects around the room, “At least, not in the way you all are insinuating.” I held my hands up to show the blood off, “He’s just being chivalrous and helping me out.”

“Hey, she should meet Davey! They both use dem big fancy words!” Unclear shouting continued about this 'Davey’ person and I took the time to observe the motley crew. There was one with an eye patch, a few with various injuries, and most with dirt a permanent blemish on their complexion. Then I saw a matted flop of blond hair under a backwards cap that I recognized easily.

“Crutchie!” I yelled, waving my hand in the air to get his attention. He looked away from an older boy he was in conversation with—which made me feel a little bad ruining their flow—and spotted me, causing a smile to come to his face. He started making his way towards me after bidding his friend ado. There was a wolf whistle from one of the boys and some patted him on the back as he slipped by them. His face went a light pink and I got thrown back in time for a moment.

“Hey, Odette,” he greeted when he was closer. I was worried for his cheeks because of how much he was smiling, “what are you doin’ here?”

“I just said, dummy. Albert found me on the street and offered to help me clean up my hands.” I presented my hands to the boy so he could clearly see what I was speaking about, “It was a trivial fall, but they got cut up nicely I’d say.”

Crutchie’s eyes grew tenfold, worry covering his happy demeanour, “Are you sure you want Albert helpin’ you?” The emphasis he put on the name of my 99% sure great-grandnephew made me laugh. Clara could never clean injuries well either.

I covered my mouth with my hand, attempting to play it off like nothing, “I don’t care much. Help from any of you would be tremendous.”

“Well, then, I’ll bring ya to Buttons and grab Jack. Buttons’s the best at stitchin’ us all up. He’ll take care a ya. An’ Jack has been takin’ care of the lotta us for ages, so he’s picked up a thing or two.”

I nodded, “Fantastic.” I didn’t feel the word, though. I was stressed about my hands, more than any normal person would be. This was the worst any malfunction had been and I was becoming frightened at the prospect of time running out.

"Hey there,“ my worrying was cut short by a voice directed at me, "the name’s Jack Kelly." The boy in question was about my height and I could feel an air of authority about him. He was also the one Crutchie was speaking with earlier. His deep coffee eyes had a look in them I had seen before and could never understand the point of. Tangles were visible in the fringe of his hair that stuck out from under his hat. The hairstyle he had was too long to be respectable and his hat was crooked, causing something in me to cringe and recoil.

"Odette. I am to assume you’re the one Crutchie mentioned that can help me with my… predicament.” A sombre chuckle escaped as I looked at the scarlet flesh of my once unmarked palms, “I hope you’re as good as he expressed.”

"Gosh, Odette, you gotta let up with those big fancy words of yours. You sound like youse lying for your life.“

I skipped a breath and a heartbeat, "Takes a liar to know a liar, Mr Kelly.” I raised my brow at him in a challenge.

"Oohoohoohoohoo. Youse a good one, Dette.“ I honestly giggled at his compliment. It was a different one and one that I liked, "Now, let’s take a look at your hands.”

I was reluctant to put my hands in the care of the conman, “Should they not be cleaned first? I have a little experience with these kinds of things and I thought that was the first step.”

Jack stared at me for an uncomfortable amount of time, “You know Davey or Kath or anything?” The tilt of my head explained my confusion with the names, “Nevermind. But yeah, youse right. If Crutch went to Buttons, there should be some hot water ready so we can clean your hands. Come on.” He started walking away, making me rush so I wouldn’t lose him.

"Mr Kelly!“ I called, which made him give me a look of inquisition and exasperation. He must not like the title, "Sorry, Jack, can you just—” I reached up and straightened his cap, which made me relax a little

He chuckled, “Youse real strange, Dette.” After only a few more steps, we came upon Crutchie and a young boy with a tiny sewing kit sitting in front of him. There was something about his slouch and his thin fingers that unsettled me with familiarity.

"Hey, Odette. I sees you met Jack.“ The blond gestured to Jack with his crutch, "Anyways, this here is Buttons. He may only be thirteen or so, but he’s the best of all a us when it comes to fixin’ people up.”

The young boy—Buttons—looked up and I stumbled backwards, causing Jack to rush and catch me. I was shaking, my emotions starting to get the better of me. There was no way. It couldn’t be him, but it was the same face, same build, same everything. I started getting lost in the kind eyes I used to play with and the smile I would do anything to see. The smalls curls I would tie back peeked from under the edge of his hat. Everything was identical, maybe a year older than the last time I saw him. Except for the eyes. They were the same as Crutchies and Alberts. Jack even had that look, even if he’d gotten good at hiding it. I couldn’t help the name from slipping out, though. Just to see if I would get a reaction, “Elijah.”

#my posts are all so late now #anyways enjoy #old clothes

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disregardcanon · 5 years ago

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end of year writing meme

Total Stories Written: 27

Total Words Written: 147413 Average Words Per Story: if you do the mean, then it’s 5,459 Shortest Story: the aftermath of rebirth at 338 words Longest: Paint a New Horizon at 23,673 words

Looking back, did you write more fic than you thought you would this year, less, or about what you’d predicted?

I wrote fewer stories than I expected, but they were far longer than I expected. I wrote a lot of 11k fics.

What pairing/genre/fandom did you write most?

pairing: Sansa/Margaery (throwback to 2015 omg)

genre: I don’t feel like I had a certain genre I wrote a lot of tbh.

fandom: A Song of Ice and Fire

What pairing/genre/fandom did you write that you would never have predicted in January?

THE POKEMON GAMES! Like, oh my god. I wrote fanfiction about soul silver. I wrote fanfiction about POKEMON WHITE. what. the fuck. Like, technically the first fic i ever wrote was about pokemon but i never expected to do it again.

Did you take any writing risks this year?

I wrote 2 very long asoiaf fics about difficult subject matter. Combined, they add up to more than 40 thousand words of fic.

Do you have any fanfic or general writing goals for the new year?

Fanfiction wise, I would like to finish up some of my wips and try to improve.

In general, I would like to figure out more what I want my writing to look like moving forward and how to go about that. I’m experiencing some growing pains, so I need to reassess my style and strategy and see what I need to readjust moving forward.

From the past year of writing, what was your…

Best story of this year: Paint a New Horizon

This feels like a bit of a cop out since it’s the longest, but I am very firmly the most proud of this fic out of anything I wrote this year. I feel like the emotional bits were satisfying, the romance worked nicely, and the action kept me interested in a way that almost never does. I was able to commit to TWENTY THREE THOUSAND WORDS and put my ALL INTO IT! that is. monumental for me. I’ve written long fics in the past, but those were chaptered and frankly, not as good as this one was or as much work.

I love this verse so well that I might actually go back and write more in it later when I have time. I have the beginnings of a sequel ruminating around in my drats.

Most popular story of this year: normally I split this up into multiple categories, but by hits, kudos, OR comment threads The Times They Are a Changin’ comes out on top. The mcu fandom really went nuts over Carol and Maria, didn’t they?

Personal favorite:

Washing Machine Heart is a fic that I hold close to my heart. 1. I wrote this one when I was on a study abroad in Latin America, which is the coolest thing that I have ever done 2. it’s just. really well done. I’ve never written something quite so messy and unpleasant in a realistic way before. It’s ugly in the way that Steven Universe: Future is ugly right now. In exactly the way that “Washing Machine Heart” should imply 3. oh god was it cathartic

Most under-appreciated:

Maternal, Paternal at 71 kudos, I know I shouldn’t call this one “under-appreciated”, but it’s in a few VERY happening tags, in a very happening fandom with a VERY popular set of characters. I’d think that people would be more interested in reading “Endeavor is an asshole and eventually Dabi kills him” but like. it’s whateves I guess XD

Most fun to write:

We Could Be Heroes both semesters that I had during 2019 were. super fucking stressful. the only times that I’ve had that were productive for fic was January break, summer vacation, and December break.

Last April on my birthday, though, I rewarded myself and after I got home from hanging with some friends I just sat down at my laptop and didn’t think about literally anything. I just wrote. I took a format that I knew I liked and didn’t have to think about (talk show format with an OC I already made for a different story) and then 3 characters I was very interested in then (Melissa Shield, Monica Rambeau, and Tahani Al-Jamil) and then I just. ran with it. I wrote and wrote and wrote and it was amazing. I didn’t think about it being good or about my homework or literally anything other than this talk show lady talking to these three cool characters.

It was wonderful. 10/10 would do it again.

Story with the single sexiest moment:

Familiarity. It is literally the only thing I wrote this year with ANY sex in it, so it’s automatically the sexiest. Way to go Margaery you did it.

Most “holy crap, that’s wrong, even for you” story:

Um. Just Souring Grapes in general.

Most challenging to write:

Biggest disappointment:

Shouto Todoroki Joins the Supervillain Dads Club I hoped to finish this fic last year in January. It’s currently December and I haven’t been able to look at the thing since.

I think it’s mainly because I just lost the drive, but it’s also kind of because wips stress me the fuck out. And also I had 2 stressful semesters so that doesn’t help. Favorite character to write: my favorite characters to write this year were both Todorokis! Dabi and Fuyumi are both a joy to write, I swear

Favorite opening lines:

Serena falls down at the kitchen table feeling as cold and distant as the room does. The harsh lines and open floor plan were supposed to show a minimalism only possible with wealth, but to Serena it's always felt empty.

A Woman’s Place

Surprisingly, Theon’s life does not change much either way after Maron is taken to the Greenlands. Balon does not magically start paying attention to him, even though he’d prayed every night to the Drowned God that he would.

Pretty Little Thrall

The Twins are a grand fortress spanning the width of the Green Fork. A great stone tower stands on each side of the river, with a greater bridge running in between. The Frey stable boys have taken their horses, and Jeyne walks as close to the river as she dares as they make their way to the tower. She watches the river rush beside her in awe. She’s never seen a river run so wild before. It seems like the very waters rushing beside her want to rise up and drown her themselves.

Good Family

Favorite closing lines:

That's what she gave up fighting the Kree for, and Carol will do everything that she can to bring them back. She's stopped fighting for some things, but she'll never stop fighting for this. If the times don't change on this one, she'll make them. She'll rip that gaudy fucking glove off of that bastard's grape crush colored hand and shove it up his ass if that's what it takes to get her family back.

The Times They Are a Changin’

"Alright, then. Let’s do this together,” you say, “as a team.” You think that you really like this "being friends" thing. Maybe after you beat Red, you and Silver can go to Hoenn- or Sinnoh. Unova even. Somewhere new and exciting with new people to beat. It’s nice to have a partner who’s not a Pokemon, for once. You think that, together, you could be the best trainers that ever lived.

Maybe the best friends too.

no silver medals (when you get the gold together)

The stars spread out above you- the universe expanding outwards onwards and upwards, excelsior.

Excelsior

Other favorite lines:

What does a grape do under pressure? Grapes tend to shrivel in the sunlight. Turn to raisins, actually. She doesn’t remember what poem that was from, but she remembers reading something like that in English class once. Some poem that she didn’t understand really, and might not have gotten even if it were in Japanese. She doesn’t think that’s what she’s doing.

Does it ferment, like wine? Her father always joked about her mother aging like a fine wine, growing more beautiful every year, growing stronger. But Miné isn't gaining strength, not really. Not right now. Maybe she’s just souring, getting more and more bitter about things that she can't have. Maybe she's just souring grapes.

Souring Grapes

“The authorities confirmed that Endeavor was not even in the state during the accident, and Shouto’s doctors confirmed that the burns were consistent with boiling liquid, not an open flame.” Superman looks visibly relieved to hear that.

“But that does not mean that I trust him,” Batman says, “I would prefer to keep an eye on him.”

“Why would you want to keep an eye on him, he’s a superhero ,” Captain Marvel says, with none of The Wisdom of Solomon but all of The Innocence of a Ten Year Old, “that means that he’s a good guy, right?”

Shouto Todoroki Joins the Supervillain Dads Club

The thought stabs into his brain like a needle, like the scent of pine, like the memories he’s never wanted back. Robb was the one person who ever cared about him, and Theon betrayed him to parade around as a prince and become Ramsay Bolton’s broken little toy. He swore himself to the little boy who took him by the hand when he came to Winterfell as a scared little boy and never let go. And then Theon betrayed him.

“Theon,” the trees whisper,” Theon.” The crows in the branches take flight, cawing his name, and he feels something else take flight too. His heart, beating somewhere deep inside his chest.

“Theon,” it throbs, “Theon, Theon.”

He wants to do something, something reckless, something brave. Something that makes him redeemable.

He can’t save Robb, but he can save someone . He can save Robb’s fake sister. Theon can save Jeyne from some of her pain.

If You Believe in Me (I’ll Still Believe)

She dared a glance forward and met Margaery’s eyes- a deep, chocolate brown. They were warm and inviting and Margaery’s little curly bangs framed her face like a heart. Margaery’s head went over the back of the booth and it seemed to almost be floating against the flowery wallpaper. It looked like Margaery was lying out in a field of flowers- the Maiden gazing up at the clouds and trying to make shapes of them.

She could imagine Margaery telling her that this one is a flower, like Tyrell, and this one’s a deer, like Baratheon, and this one’s a dick, like Joffrey. She giggled nervously again and felt her cheeks flush. She’d never felt this giddy and unsteady in her whole life.

“Are you alright, Sansa?” Margaery asked cautiously. She reached across the table and laid a hand over Sansa’s own. The touch was warm and tender, and Sansa felt the blush from her toes to the tip of her head.

“I’m perfect!” Sansa nearly screeched. Margaery laughed at that, but her look was kind.

“Yes, darling,” she said with a smile that was wide and fond, “I think that you are.”

Lesbian. The word wasn’t supposed to fill her with such a warm, hopeful feeling, was it? She wiggled awkwardly in her chair, trying to get situated and stop feeling so silly and excited and vulnerable, but it didn’t fix anything. She felt Margaery’s leg brush against hers under the table. It sent a jolt through her.

Lesbian.

Sansa took a shaky breath. She thought to herself that there might be something to that.

Paint a New Horizon

#end of year writing meme #writing meme #sunkelles writes #2019 writing meme

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shayanyaan · 5 years ago

Text

Two Eleven Super

“London is very human-scale,” I am quick to pitch for one of my favorite cities in the world.

Her eyes widen and her face lights up. She nods her head vigorously and points her finger at me, in complete agreement. This is the moment in a conversation when one person articulates perfectly what the other person was thinking but couldn’t quite put into words. B and I have been explaining to each other how both of us are more comfortable living in cities where we can walk or take public transport.

“Oh gosh London, yes! Seeing a London trip on my schedule always fills me with immense warmth. Imagine being able to walk around a city slowly absorbing all that it has to offer, the sights, the sounds, the traditions.”

They say never meet your celebrity heroes because you’ll inevitably find something disappointing. I think the same applies to some of the great cities of the world. But both of us conclude hands down that London does not fall in this category.

“Actually London is not even a celebrity. London is a reliable old friend. A friend that has not lost their sense of culture and tradition. The monuments, the churches ...”

“.....and the bridges across the Thames - each one steeped in history.” We are finishing each other's sentences now. “The railway stations. The tube - a subterranean metropolis beneath a metropolis. The Mind the Gap jokes.”

“And what about the black cabs and then … and then the red double decker buses. Oh the red buses - what an icon! They say tourists take the tube but real Londoners take the bus.”

“Aha! You’re probably right. Flocks of pigeons on Trafalgar square, the shops on Oxford Street.”

“And you can’t forget the ever present murky skies, steady rain, rippled puddles, umbrella bearing pedestrians.”

“Of course you just had to mention the Great British weather!” A disapproving look is thrown. The entire body of humor surrounding the British weather is a road we agree not to go down.

---

I continue to quiz B on some of the other cities that she thought would fit the human-scale bill. New York inevitably comes up as a place she has not only travelled to but lived in. I am glad she brought up New York. Now New York is not an old friend. New York is a person you know you shouldn’t fall for, but you do anyway. There is something about the pace and the madness that sets New York apart from the rest of the US. Something about the people, coming from all corners of the world. To make a living, or even half a living. American dream and all that.

In New York you are acutely aware of the class divide that exists in society. New York is dirty. The subway is full of creaking old trains. New York has JFK and LaGuardia both of which are dismal at best and soul destroying at worst. Oh and Penn Station. Never has there been a more classic case of the mighty having fallen. A complete and utter hell hole out of some post apocalyptic world.

But somehow it all works. Barely. And that is where New York absolutely has you. As you walk around the city, you peel back the layers and beneath all the flaws and scars, you will find a genuinely captivating person. A person that knows how to push your buttons and make you forget the pandemonium, if only for a split second. Through the dollar pizzas on the street corners. Through the sheer magic of Central Park and the museums. Through the Manhattan skyline; hands down the best skyline in the world. Standing next to the Hudson, under the Brooklyn Bridge, with Lady Liberty keeping a quiet watch from a distance, you will be powerless as New York sucks you in. One glittering high rise at a time. Dreamy eyed, you cannot help but stare in wonderment. Hundreds of floors, thousands of windows. What goes on inside? And the lights! Yes so many lights. What could be a better tribute to Tesla, Faraday and the like?

“In general, the east coast of the United States is on a much more human-scale. Relatively small states with trains taking you across borders within a couple of hours at the most.”

“Going west of maybe Illinois, they started drawing great big rectangles for states.”

“And then there’s Texas. Vast open skies in an almost revolting shade of blue. Just as vast are the expanses of highway, further than the eye could see, or care to see. Wide, long and monotonous. Not a single human-scale building in sight”

“And who the hell builds highways passing through the center of a city!? Makes going to get some milk feel like a great expedition to the other side of the world.”

More chuckles.

Then a brief silence, during which I am suddenly reminded of where I am - in a lounge on the upper deck of an A380. A massive ship hurtling through the ether, pushing the speed of sound. A big TV screen near where I am standing silently glares back at me indicating that -50 degrees is but a mere 10 meters from where I am standing. Yet here we are, B and I, chatting like two friends catching up over coffee.

But of course, we are not friends. Not even acquaintances. She is on the Emirates cabin crew. And I am just a passenger.

---

Back at my seat, halfway through an episode of Chernobyl, I pause to stare out of the window. Beyond the wing, which seems to stretch out to eternity, a smudge of orange is forcing its way through the royal blue of the sky. I can hear the muffled yet reassuring boom from the four Rolls Royce engines. It is then that I realize that there is nothing about the A380 that is human-scale. There is nothing about the skies which she inhabits that is human-scale. I've travelled on the beloved Super dozens of times. Yet I continue to be amazed at the size and scale with which she operates. Devouring continents and swallowing oceans. Bringing the other side of the world just a little closer to home.

A friend of mine often describes journeys on the A380 as the closest we can get to the long sea voyages on gigantic ocean liners in the 1930s. And he is right. Two decks with so much space to stretch out. Bars, lounges, showers - no expense spared in ensuring luxury. Imagine peering out of the window from your first class cabin on the Queen Mary and seeing nothing but vast open sea. Right now I am doing exactly the same. Only from 36000 feet above the Earth, and all I can see is the vast open sky. Far below, Moscow and St Petersburg slip behind us. Scandinavia and the Atlantic Ocean lie ahead. As we burn more fuel, over North America, we will eventually settle in the exclusive airspace of flight level 410.

The Boeing 747 is a work of art. Sheer poetry. The Airbus A380 however, is a lesson in outsmarting the laws of Physics. It is an absolute whale of a plane that looks like it should never leave the surface of the Earth in the first place. But somehow it does, through the most languid and sluggish of take offs. Once up at cruising altitude though, it is steady ship all the way to your destination. The ability to punch through the sky without even the faintest of trembles is simply unmatched. I continue to stare wistfully out of the window, thinking about how much I’ll miss the A380 when she’s gone. She’s right up there with the Concorde in that nothing like this will ever be built in my lifetime.

---

Resting my head on one of the fluffiest pillows ever to have taken flight, I gaze at the roof of the cabin - tiny twinkling stars gently coaxing me to drift off into a deep sleep. And frankly, it is not hard to. The bed is completely flat and the mattress is more comfortable than the one I have at home. The blanket is ever so soft. The fake gold and wood around the windows is not something I’d furnish my home with, yet up here in the sky, it somehow adds to the coziness. From my own little cocoon, I can see neither the aisle nor other TV screens. Not a single window shade in the cabin is raised. I don’t remember the last time I fell asleep on a plane without an eye mask. All I can hear are the engines whirling away, and the hushed sound of the air beating against the fuselage - no more than a relaxing white noise.

In the moments between lying down and falling asleep, I am thinking about the countless journeys I’ve made with Emirates over the last two decades. Leaving home as often as I’ve had to, I’ve come to really treasure the sense of familiarity that an Emirates flight brings to me. I’ve never stopped to think about it before but there is a certain warmth and tenderness you feel when you have an old faithful travel companion to share your journeys with. And Emirates has been that companion for me, helping me wipe away the homesickness. Slowly at first, then all at once. The boarding music that says “Hello Tomorrow”. The inflight announcements that say “Tayaran Al Emarat”. The reassuring voice of Sir Tim Clark answering questions on the default podcast channel. The wavy curves on the cabin wallpaper. The cabin crew with their brown blazers and their red hats. When choosing an airline to fly, it is hard to look past this comfort of familiarity resulting from a bond first formed unwittingly, many years ago. And strengthened over numerous journeys from one side of the planet to the other, including this one. Before I can process any more thoughts, I slip into a happy and peaceful sleep. We are probably somewhere over the North Atlantic. But in this moment, it hardly matters.

---

Six hours have passed. B is on hand to wake me for dinner. It seems the crew has saved the best meal till the very end. Three courses this evening, starting with a chick-pea salad that doesn’t make you hate your life with its dreariness. I politely refuse the alcohol but ask for a piece of garlic bread on the side. Which is brought to me, warm, from a basket lined with cloth. The main course is served with the Jeera rice cooked in just the right amount of butter. The ratio of jeera to rice - perfect. The Rajma has the power to rival any dhaba in North India and along with it is a second curry made with melt-in-your-mouth soft paneer. Actual phulkas to go on the side, instead of pita.

And if you're going to go full North Indian with your meal, you need some achaar. Which obviously is on my tray as well. Emirates just knows how to serve Indian food. If I had any doubts about this, they are well and truly shattered when B brings the dessert. Four of the finest pieces of Rasgulla. Sometimes you have a meal so sublime that you are moved to shedding a tear or two. This AVML has been one such.

I call B over one last time to thank her for everything. She passes me a brownie, one very similar to those I’d been wolfing down earlier while talking to her in the lounge. This of course, brings the widest of smiles to my face. Not because I like brownies. But most certainly because of the fact that she had noticed. And remembered. The crew has been absolutely stellar on this flight.

---

Business class. A crew that knows how to pronounce your ridiculously long last name. A crew that has time to engage in conversations with you. Meals served on crisp white table cloths. Meals that come in courses. Flat beds to stretch your legs. Flat beds to rest your weary soul. On a grueling ultra long haul flight across 10 time zones, almost anything that seeks to make you feel more earthly is highly appreciated.

This has been Emirates Two Eleven Super - Dubai to Houston in just under seventeen hours, albeit the best seventeen hours of my life.

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