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hamburgerhelpersotherhand · 4 years ago

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Infatuation P8

Joe Goldberg x Reader x Love Quinn

Warnings: a lying bitch and a writer who hates writing warnings because they spoil what’s to come

Notes: James Elkins, a fairly well known art historian, once wrote “Love would be the state in which I hunt a hunter or fall prey to prey” (The Object Stares Back, 1996). This is a quote I reflected on a lot while writing this series, though I’d still say they dont feel connected. I had to read the book for class so y’all have to deal with my bs

I barely managed to sleep last night.

I’m so incredibly tired. My eyes are heavy and I’m having trouble keeping my focus.

Snap.

Love is in front of me, snapping her fingers. I’ll give her my attention soon, but I’m caught in a thought.

That car from last night. I wonder who it was... I think I’ve seen that specific car before. That or the lack of sleep is getting to me and I’m seeing things.

Snap.

I blink repeatedly and then set my sights straight onto Love’s face.

“We open soon. Are you alright? You’re really out of it.” Love asks.

“Yeah, I’m alright.” I smile reassuringly. ”I’ve just been having trouble sleeping.”

Love runs a finger across my forehead. It tingles. She searches my sleep deprived eyes for a moment.

“I understand.” Love smiles back, her worry still woven in there. “How about you come sleep at my place tonight?”

That sounds like a great idea. How long has it been since we slept together? Far too long.

“Sounds like a plan.” I lean forward and place a gentle kiss onto her lips. She shares the same sentiment and we reluctantly part ways a moment later.

Love is still on my mind as I pack up last week’s display. Ah, how I yearn to entangle myself with her. I’m... beginning to fantasize while noting down the amount of unsold copies of the display we have left. I feel weird. Like, a little bothered, maybe. Not because fantasizing about your girlfriend in the open while at work is inappropriate but... I mean, it’s not professional, but that’s not the point. What I’m trying to say is... you’re there. You’re on my mind too— somehow.

In my deepest thoughts, you’re there... sandwiched between us. She loves you so much, you know that? You’re good for her too— you can be good for us.

The familiar jingle I’ve heard oh so many times takes me out of my thoughts. The world around me clears up and I eagerly look around.

You’re not here. I think I’m starting to hear things.

I finally shake you from my mind and store the boxes in storage.

Love prepared a delicious meal, as no surprise to anyone. We spent most of the evening talking. Mostly about useless things, like the next colour for the bathroom. Personally, I favour a blue tone. Love seems to want something black and white.

“Zebra print?” I say.

“No! That would actually look awful!” She laughs and almost spills her drink in the process.

“Hey, watch it! I like this shirt.”

“Can I tell you something?” She asks.

“Yeah, whatever you’d like.” I answer, sitting up to listen carefully.

She points to my chest and speaks. “I really don’t like that shirt.”

“I’m hurt.” I feign sadness and she sips her drink.

“—No no, I mean-“ Love gulps before continuing with a softer tone. “-maybe you should take it off?” She raises her eyebrows and I catch on.

“Ooh. Yeah- yeah, sure.” I smile widely and she sets down her drink. Love leans in and kisses me gently, something sweet still on her lips. I can feel my brain already melting as I lean forward as well.

rrRRING.

It’s her phone. Love seems reluctant in her next kiss. I pull her in more, my hands snake themselves around her back.

rrrRRRING.

Now she completely pulls away from me, pushing me aside as she grabs for her phone.

“I’m sorry— it might be Forty.” She pleas as she accepts the incoming call. Again with Forty, huh? He’s starting to seem like more trouble than he’s worth.

“Hey, Y/N.”

I perk up at the name, but I pretend my attention is elsewhere. I pick up our empty plates. I can’t hear what you’re saying, but I see that Love is listening intently.

As I make my way to the kitchen, Love speaks.

“But why? You just came back.”

I quickly and quietly set the plates down and walk back to the living room. I stand by the archway and continue to listen. It doesn’t sound good.

“You can’t. Y/N-“ She’s desperate and I can only imagine what you’re saying on the other end.

Love takes her phone away from her ear and looks at it. “Are you kidding me?” She mumbles before tossing it onto the floor.

“What happened?” I ask, walking into the room and standing by her side.

She reluctantly answers, a pained expression crossing her face. “Y/N. She’s leaving again.”

“Did she tell you why?” I ask quickly, sounding a little too interested.

“No, she didn’t tell me why.” Love leans forward so I can’t see her face, but I can tell in her voice that she’s holding back tears.

“Love,” I sit next to her and place my hand on her back. “It’s alright.”

“No, Will. It’s not alright.” She squeezes her stomach. “I worked so hard to make her comfortable. I’m gonna sound crazy but I thought I finally had her back.” Love quickly places her hand over her mouth in a worrying motion.

“Let me get you some water, okay?” I say, noticing her trembling state. She looks like she’s either going to be sick or start crying.

“I’m going to her apartment.” Love states before attempting to get up. I latch onto her arm and pull her back down onto the sofa.

I speak quickly, grabbing her half empty drink and standing up. “I’ll go. You look like you might throw up. How many drinks have you had?”

“I don’t know... ugh, fine.” She replies meekly and I leave for the kitchen.

Y/N, I thought you were better than this. This is like breaking up over a text, it’s feral. You even hung up on her when she wanted answers. What has you so scared?

Well... You’re not allowed to run from your problems anymore.

After bringing Love a glass of water and making sure she made it to her bed, I let her know I’d take care of it.

Love told me to talk you down from this. Apparently, you sounded very frantic in the call.

I’m parked in my car, across the street from where you’re packing up. I can see it in your lit window. You’re moving quickly.

I fix my cap on my head and continue to watch as you disappear from view.

Soon, your light gets turned off. My queue. I step out of the car and wait for you to exit the building.

When I see you open the door, step out with your luggage, and turn to lock up again, I jog across the street.

“Y/N-“

“AH!” You turn around quickly, knees glued together and almost causing you to topple down the steps. “Oh, gosh. You s-scared me.” You fumble with your keys and quickly turn to lock the door.

“Sorry, uhh... what’s the luggage for?” I hum casually.

“I-I’m going on a-a trip. A s-small one.” You feign a smile and scoot passed me. You’re still a liar. A horrible one too.

“Thats not what you told Love.” I say, following behind you.

You’re not saying anything anymore, just rolling your stupid luggage. It doesn’t even have a bell on it.

You’re being childish right now.

“Why would you lie?” I say.

You spin yourself around quickly. “Why would YOU lie?”

Oh.

Oooh. I get it.

We stare into each other’s eyes for a bit. I’m not moving, but you’re shaking like a leaf. You know, and I can tell you regret saying anything.

You turn around again to continue walking at your ridiculously fast pace but— I’m not sure what came over me... I grabbed your forearm and yanked you back. You let out a squeak and throw your luggage into my knee, knocking me off balance for a moment.

I hear an engine start and quickly spot two red lights. It’s a car. A black car, to be more exact.

Fucking perfect.

You try to bolt away, but I don’t let go and instead, pull you into me. I... I don’t know why I’m not letting go. I’m making this worse.

You’re already fully sobbing, it’s actually pretty loud, and you’re trying to hit me. I grab hold of your nose and cover your mouth, pulling you closer into my chest the more you struggled and kicked the air. Your dainty hands are trying to pry my arms away, but you’re growing weak. My focus, however... is on the car.

It pulls out of its parking spot and doesn’t waste any time driving off. Who the hell is that? Fuck.

Fuck, fuck, FUCK.

The lack of oxygen is finally getting to you. You’re letting out muffled screams now, further wasting whatever energy you have left.

I rest my head into the crook of your neck and you finally begin to settle down. I’m tense, angry. I’d like to think it isn’t your fault, but I have a feeling you know who was in that car.

I’m now realizing, as you start to go limp in my hold, I’ve probably made better choices in the past.

#joe goldberg #joe goldberg x reader #love quinn x reader #love quinn #forty quinn x reader #forty quinn #you #netflix you #x reader #yandere #yandere x reader #fanfiction

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400legends · 3 years ago

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The Uncertainty Principle (Day 129)

It seems fitting, given the news about the destruction of the planet Hanadar, that I should be thinking of the famed Hanadarian physicist Poignant Pendalia (that was their name at the time of the publication of the 'Uncertainty Principle'). At this moment, at the helm of the Cosmic Peanut's space ship, Malaka, I know how fast I am going (not nearly fast enough) but not where I am.

I mean, I know generally where I am: in space; on Malaka; in the cockpit, but I don't know where I am or where I'm going except away from the Veerux Lancers that are closing on us.

The red-eyed priest who had stood between us and the Cosmic Peanut's ship said he was on a solo mission, but that is not true. His escort waited nearby.

The stars know the Cosmic Peanut tried to reason with the priest. She used the proper words of her personal charm spell - "Buddy" and "Broseph" but to no avail. He sent his drones at us, and I am ashamed to say that I healed myself before taking any action to help my group.

CP was quick to urge us all to use non-lethal means with the priest, and I will admit that she might have included the needle drones in that edict, but the deadly machine was inches from my eye, and so I set my stun baton to full power and reduced it to a blob of melted plastic and metal.

Sara, on the other hand, had listened well to the Cosmic Peanut's words. She sliced at the priest relentlessly until the last moment, when she punched him in the face with her sword hand, and he crumpled, alive but a threat no longer.

The Cosmic Peanut stepped over his body and opened her ship's bay. "Don't you want to bring him along?" I asked.

She glanced over her shoulder. "No. Gods, no. Leave-- Check his pockets. Any keycards, access badges?"

I held up a cred stik. "Just this." Without thinking, I tucked it behind my left ear. "200 credits on it."

"Eh. That's something I guess. Now hurry up. Anyone who's coming, come on!"

The Hanadarian Phadrea pushed past me with a firm grip on Splendor's arm. "Why are we leaving?" the singer asked. If she got an explanation I didn't hear it.

"Who can shoot guns? You?" The Cosmic Peanut looked at the waitress, Iota. "Pretty handy with that crowbar. How are you with heavy guns?"

"I... I don't think I've ever used--"

"Fine. How about Comms? You, Swordie (she pointed at Sara, the Saguarine) how are you with guns. Pretty good, I bet."

"My training is in the art of mind-body synthe--"

"Perfect. Find a spot anywhere but the gun sling."

She looked at me and grimaced. "Pacifist, right? Except when it comes to drones. Go to Bypass. We might need a hack or two."

"As I mentioned in my job interview, I am also a fine pilot." (This was not untrue so much as untested; I understand thoroughly what it takes to pilot a spaceship.)

"Noted. Now go sit down. You two," the Cosmic Peanut pointed at the Hanadarians standing on the gangplank. "Guns? Guns? Come on, gimme something."

"Splendor is a world renown communicator," said Phadrea.

"That is true," Splendor replied, "but what happ--"

The Cosmic Peanut slapped the bay door control. "One minute to lift off. Take a seat, then we'll talk."

As luck would have it, Splendor joined Iota in the Comms area and Phadrea was with Sara in the Hangar. So we all heard Splendor learn the news about the Veerux destroying the whole planet of Hanadar. We heard her repeat the words "blast radius" softly as Phadrea said, "Take us to the Galactic Coalition HQ. They'll have resources and news of... survivors."

"GC HQ? No fracking way," the Cosmic Peanut's voice boomed on the open comm line.

"Who is paying for this trip?" Phadrea's tone could have dropped the temperature of Raath a few degrees. Before CP could answer Iota said, "There are two ships racing toward us."

With one second of assessment I knew they were too far away to hack. I told CP as much. She said, "We're about to get much further away. Hold on!"

I heard Splendor take a deep, ragged breath. "I'll deploy countermeasures. Standing by." She sounded brave, resolute, and confident.

"The good news?" Iota's voice broke in. "The good news is that the Proxy might get her chance to hack. Those are Lancers, and they're only 18 arcs away now."

"Motherhumper," the Cosmic Peanut swore. "Proxy, up here. You're gonna fly, and I'm gonna shoot."

I stood to my full 4 foot 2 inches and paused to savor the moment. The Cosmic Peanut was giving me a moment to shine; I had to give her something in return. I accessed my onboard library database for suitably martial and inspiring words. Quite by accident I had discovered that people with my sort of magic can often inspire others to greater heights. As we passed in the narrow space between the cockpit and the gun sling, I saluted and said, “The bravest are surely those who have the clearest vision of what is before them, glory and danger alike, and yet notwithstanding, go out to meet it..... wise words from the Ixian historian Horace."

The Cosmic Peanut shook her head. "Just..... just be kind to my ship. Fly as fast and as straight as you can." A moment later on the comms she said, "Alright people, hold your butts. We're gonna dance."

Just then a new sound broke in on our comm line. A screeching cry sounded loud and long throughout Malaka.

In the ensuing silence Sara asked, "What was that?"

"Uuuuhhh, a war cry? I think?" answered Iota.

It took me two seconds to find the correct word in Galactic. "That," I said to the souls onboard, "was a Veeruxian kamikaze prayer. Brace for impact."

I heard the Cosmic Peanut mutter, "Brace for this!" as she let loose a volley of energy blasts.

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morfinwen · 7 years ago

Note

For the OC ask, #3 for Ash, #5 for Susanna, #10 for Ian, #13 for Lanzo, and #20 for Angie, please. :)

This was very fun to answer, but it got very long, very quickly, so i’m putting it under a ‘read more’.

3. Ash's greatest achievement

Ash’s great-aunt Philomena was a tall, willowy woman, bent over with age, as many wrinkles as a crumpled ball of paper, and long white hair she hadn't cut since she was in her fifties. Even with a cane, she had difficulty moving around, and since she refused to wear her glasses she was constantly squinting. She also radiated the quiet, immense power of a master wizard, especially when she wore her favorite shawl, the one that seemed to shift color as you looked at it, and faint light escaped from under it like she had trapped stars there. After his mother, she was Ash’s favorite person in the entire world.

For the last two years of high school, Ash spent a few weeks with her during the summer, to help out with some of the big house projects she couldn’t do any more. He also got the chance to help her with enchanting, and discovered he had a real knack for it -- as a nature mage, it was to be expected that he’d naturally be better at enchanting than other types of mages, but even for a nature mage he had a gift. After talking about it with his mother, grandmother, and Philomena herself, it was worked out that Ash would spend a couple years with her in an apprentice-like capacity. So as soon as he graduated high school, he had one weekend to himself, and then it was off to Aldstow, WA.

It turned out to be a lot harder than he had anticipated it being. Ash wasn’t afraid of hard work and Philomena was no slave-driver, but learning enchanting proved to be mentally draining, and there was a lot of physical labor to do around the house as well. With no end date set, he felt more keenly homesick than he had during the past summers, to the point that his nightly calls to his mother often made him cry. On top of that, enchanting was a precise art that was learned at a slow and steady pace, so it felt like he was barely making any progress at all.

Philomena, as mentioned, was no slave-driver, but she was also no hand-holder. She made it plain that if at any point Ash wanted to leave, he could. Ash considered it more than once, and might have even done it if he’d had any idea what he would do once he got home. So he stayed, working himself to exhaustion every day, reading and re-reading his great-aunt’s old, old books, memorizing the precise details of how to grind, measure, weigh, combine, etc. each ingredient, listening to his mother’s voice over the ancient telephone every night, trying and re-trying new enchantments until he got them to work. On a handful of special days, like the equinox and family birthdays, he would go home for a short visit, and at the end of it hug his grandmother, aunts, and mother good-bye again and get back on the bus to Aldstow.

At the time, his biggest achievement was probably when he made a breakthrough with his enchantment studies, when he got something big to work or when he started having more successes than failures. Looking back, though, Ash is most proud of just sticking it out, and not only ending it as Philomena’s most accomplished apprentice, but finding himself in the process.

5: Susanna’s shortcomings

Susanna is loud. You never have to wonder where she is, you only have to listen for the 100 decibels of unnecessary noise coming from somewhere, or else the sound of someone else asking her (in the subdued way of someone trying not to further agitate their shattered eardrums) if she could possibly be just a little quieter. She’s only quiet if she’s trying to sneak somewhere, or unconscious, and sometimes not even then.

Susanna is bossy. She knows exactly what everyone ought to be doing, and how they ought to be doing it. Anything she’s doing with friends is essentially a stage play, with roles described, assigned, and directed by Susanna. And she does not appreciate people going off-script.

Susanna is provocative. She has long since learned what buttons she has to press to annoy her older siblings or get them to go along with her, and has no shame in pressing them if she thinks it’s necessary. While she won’t annoy her brother or scare her sister for no reason, Susanna’s list of acceptable reasons for being obnoxious is considerably longer than most people’s, and includes things like ‘I’m bored’.

Susanna is flippant. If she doesn’t care about something, it doesn’t really matter to her if someone else does. In fact, the very idea of someone caring about something she considers a waste of time rarely occurs to her. She’s frequently sarcastic, and rolls her eyes at anything she considers dumb. She has spent more time in the principal’s office than her other two siblings put together.

This all sounds a bit harsh, so i’d like to offer some mollifying context: Susanna is an eleven-year-old orphan whose parents died when she was four -- her whole world got uprooted and relocated before she had a solid grip on articulating complete sentences, and yet most people seem to think that since she was so young it couldn’t have affected her that much. She feels overshadowed by her siblings -- her older sister can be dramatic and emotional, but is good at connecting with people and making friends; her older brother might not be the next Einstein, but he’s clearly brilliant, and when he talks, adults listen to him with more attention. She knows who she is and what she wants, but outside of meaningless ‘and what do you want to be when you grow up’ questions, no one seems interested in finding out what those things are. And if Susanna sees something that needs changing, she’s darn well going to set about trying to change it.

10: Ian’s fashion sense

You could say Ian doesn’t have a fashion sense. A snooty older female cousin and one of his ex-girlfriends have in fact said that to him, and he didn’t dispute it. What Ian does have is more of a fashion … feel?

Growing up, Ian got most of his clothes from thrift stores. His mother loved thrift stores. Not just because it helped make the money stretch to the end of the month, but because you could always find something with character: plates with frogs on them, a sweater made entirely of fake feathers, creepy dolls, ugly paintings, books with advice someone claimed they received from an angel in a dream. Every month, she and Ian would visit two or three of the nearest ones, donate everything they could, and fill a cart with as much as they could afford.

Most of the kids at Ian’s school got their clothes from department stores. Their t-shirts and shorts and backpacks had popular animated characters on them or whatever print pattern was common in the area at the time. Ian’s clothing, for better or for worse, was usually several years behind, or totally unique. Sometimes that made him a joke, sometimes it made him the envy of the popular kids, but Ian never looked like anyone else at school.

As an adult, Ian doesn’t look that unique anymore. He has to meet a general dress code, some of the music types he lives and works around take ‘looking different’ to an extreme, and for whatever reason the local thrift stores don’t seem to have the same character as the ones in his hometown did. But whenever he picks out his clothes, he goes for whichever ones remind him of shopping with his mom.

… Which means he’s usually dressed like he just time-travelled from two decades before he was born, or is wearing a tartan or gingham button-up shirt, unbuttoned, over one of those vintage label t-shirts you get at Walmart these days, and the same pair of jeans he had on last week. And maybe the week before that. Ian, do you actually own more than one pair of jeans?

13: Lanzo’s embarrassing memory from years ago

Listen. Listen, Lanzo has lived too long and seen and done too much to bother with being embarrassed anymore. In a hundred years, is anyone else going to remember? Is anyone else going to care? No. It isn’t an emotion worth bothering with.

Well, that’s what he’d say, and certainly it’s come closer to being true over time, but there are still some things that are kind of embarrassing to think about.

Lanzo was born to German nobles in the middle ages, and inherited an estate from his parents. It was large and remote, which was convenient for him when he became a vampire. Once Lanzo (back then, he went by the name he had been born with, Gottfried) had his finances in order enough that the estate could essentially run itself, he left the day-to-day management to trustworthy servants, and figured he would live in quiet indolence from then on until eternity.

That plan worked until there was a uprising among the peasants that lived on his land. After this long, Lanzo can’t really recall their specific grievances, or how justified they might have been, but by the time he realized there was a problem, the situation had become serious.

Lanzo could have crushed the uprising by himself if he had really wanted to, but the idea of exposing himself so clearly as a vampire, in a time when people still believed in those kinds of things and had all kinds of ideas on how to handle them, was not an appealing one. So instead he negotiated extensively with them, and in the end wound up leaving the estate in the hands of the peasants, taking with him most of the money and some of the valuable art. It was a story that would perplex future historians to no end.

He can laugh at it now, since he can think of probably a dozen better ways to have handled the situation, not to mention how silly the whole idea of ‘stay on my estate forever’ was in the first place. At the time, though, getting kicked out of his own house to wander Europe until he could figure out something else was really embarrassing.

20: Angie’s reaction to a mystery love letter

Angie knows people. If she’s known someone for a year or only a week, she can read them like a book. She understands them, sometimes better than they understand themselves. If she receives an anonymous love letter from someone she’s met, the chances are good that she knows who it’s from just by reading the first few lines. In some cases, she might even know they were going to send it a week before they actually wrote it. So if she really can’t identify the author, and there’s nothing in it to suggest it was sent by some total stranger who’s stalking her, she would first and foremost be surprised. Beyond that, it would really depend on what was in the letter.

I’m not sure how likely the average person is to inspire other people to send them anonymous love letters, but i think Angie would be at least a little more likely than that. She has this otherworldly quality that can be inspiring or intimidating, but definitely inclines others to see her as slightly separate from the rest of the world, in a good or bad way. If someone admired her romantically, they might not feel they were on equal enough footing to approach her directly.

Thanks for asking!

#ask #answer #OCs #ash jackson #susanna raines #ian grayson #lanzo ramsey #angie mckendrick #valiantarcher

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heartslogos · 7 years ago

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send the morning [88]

“You’re too good for this world,” Dorian murmurs, head resting close to Kaaras’, tracing the lines of his cheeks, the way his temples sweep up into his horns and the way the color of his skin changes on the way there. Kaaras continues to sleep soundly, wondrous and magnificent. Dorian is quickly running out of words to describe this man.

Wondrous, magnificent, spectacular, awesome, mesmerizing.

He could go through every single badly written poem or purple-beaten romance novel in Cassandra’s wholesome collection and there still wouldn’t be enough.

What Dorian means is - too good for me.

(But damn it all, Dorian is selfish enough to say he’ll hold onto this anyway. Regardless of what he deserves. This he can have. He can keep. This.)

“I can’t believe you don’t even realize it,” Dorian muses.

“It’s enough that we do,” Mahanon says, voice low and rough as he noses the back of Dorian’s neck, “Why are you awake?”

Dorian’s not sure, exactly. But it isn’t that early and he can hear the sounds of people moving about the castle fortress well enough. There’s still some time before he needs to be up and working again at his infinite amount of spells and theories and ideas that could possibly be used to get them closer to the end of all of this that much faster. This war is as much a race against time as it is anything else.

There are parts of Dorian that want everything to slow down, though. To slow down. Stop.

Maker, for once in his life he just wants everything to stop.

Dorian’s never felt this way before. His entire life until now he just wanted things to keep going, to wash over and past him. The sooner gone the sooner he could move on to other things, different things. Not always better things. Dorian has led a life where he’s wanted nothing to do with keeping. Just…moving.

But there’d been nothing worth keeping in Tevinter.

There had been Alexius, and then Alexius had gone…mad with grief and obsession and there had always been Felix. Clever, good, kind, and compassionate Felix. And then Felix was gone.

But there’s something worth keeping here.

Kaaras was right, Dorian has to tell Mahanon.

Dorian wants to keep this, them. This is not something that he wants to end. But it will, inevitably, because he has to go back to Tevinter, eventually.

And he knows that eventually is when Corypheus is gone.

There are things he must do, people he must face, and institutions he must challenge. Dorian came to the south with his head held high with pride for his country. Love for it. And he still does love his country and he desperately wants to prove the world wrong - they are not the Venatori, they are not the evil boogeymen of the North. There is a richness to his people, culture, there is time that they have that Ferelden and Orlais and Antiva and Nevarra and the Anderfels and the Free Marches and all of the South has in glimpses and remembered snatches. Tevinter still has it. That ancient time. It still runs through them and maybe it’s time for that to change.

Maybe that ancient self that they’ve been clinging to needs to be…put away. No, not put away. Modernized.

They can keep the good parts, because there are good parts worth being proud of. But they don’t have to cling to the terrible parts.

Dorian wants to fight for those good parts, because Tevinter shouldn’t have to exist on the border of Thedas’ minds as one terrible thing fighting back another terrible thing and the better choice between the two. They have poets and artists, they have historians and mathematicians, they have good honest people and they have stories and songs of their own.

Dorian wants to fight for those things so he can bring them here.

And so he can bring the good things worth keeping there.

Dorian finds Mahanon’s hand and gently runs his thumb along Mahanon’s knuckles, feeling Mahanon’s fingers sleepily twitch, softly curling against Dorian’s stomach as Mahanon hums, warm breath fanning against Dorian’s neck and shoulder as he tucks himself closer to Dorian’s back.

“Sleep,” Mahanon mumbles, “Before my nightmare of a sister comes in to complain about whatever it is that’s caught her attention.”

Dorian wants to bring Mahanon to Minrathous and show him the gardens. He wants to show Mahanon the untouched forests and the grand views from the college towers. He wants to give Mahanon the honey and seed cakes that Dorian liked best when he was a child.

He wants to introduce Kaaras to his former colleagues and throw open the doors to every library for Kaaras to pore over and absorb into that vast and quick mind of his. He wants to put a piece of chalk into Kaaras’ hands and point him at the nearest board and talk theory with him all day every day and then walk him to the art galleries and think in silence.

He wants to link hands with both of these quick and wonderful and powerful men and show them the place that made him him.

These are the men who made him dare to want, to hope, and he wants to show them the world he’s going to dare into this age.

“I,” Dorian says gently and for the first time, out loud, “Am going back to Tevinter, and I won’t run away this time. I’m going back to Tevinter and I will fight for this.”

Mahanon’s hand curls tighter and he presses so close against Dorian that he can feel the shiver of Mahanon’s ribs as he exhales.

“I know you will,” Mahanon says, voice quiet and small but also fiercely proud, “You are Dorian Pavus, Altus most recently of Minrathous. And I would expect no less from you.”

Dorian closes his eyes when Mahanon says that because he isn’t going to cry. Not for the way Mahanon says Dorian’s name so gently, not for the way that Mahanon says that last sentence sounding like a man who’s just signed away his life.

Because it sounds like Mahanon wants to cry, too.

Dorian could go his entire life without seeing Mahanon weep. Not for him.

“I won’t let you go,” Dorian says, voice choked. “I won’t let either of you go.”

“Don’t,” Mahanon whispers back, voice just as tight. “Don’t.”

#heartsfic #gather your party and venture forth

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dillydedalus · 4 years ago

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november reading

so with lockdown #2, my master’s thesis done & handed in etc, i just had absolutely nothing going on so this month so... lots of books. featuring Houses full of statues and birds, an AU of weimar berlin, and... the plague?

someone who will love you in all your damaged glory, raphael bob-waksberg (audio) actually listened to this last month! anyway even tho i forgot about it, i actually really liked it! it’s a collection of short stories, all about love in some way, most with a strange twist - a couple wants a small wedding but the MIL insists they have to at least sacrifice 5 goats to the stone god and have a shrieking chorus, or it’s hardly a real wedding, right? that kind of thing. i really liked these stories; they were fun, hopeful without being cheesy (mostly), and the audio production, with lots of actors reading the different stories was fun. 4/5

the driver’s seat, muriel spark man this novella is nasty, but in a good way - sharp, vicious, mean but so well executed. it’s also pretty hard to discuss without spoiling it & i do think one should go into this unspoiled. but it’s certainly a classic of the unhinged women genre, showing lise seemingly making herself as noticeable, irritating and off-putting as she can on a trip to an unnamed (probably italian) city. 3.5/5

the empress of salt and fortune, nghi vo (singing hills cycle #1) a lovely novella set in an asian-inspired fantasy empire, which shows young cleric chih and their speaking hoopoe almost brilliant learn the story of a previous empress, a northerner who rose from exile as an cast-aside wife to power and of her servant, a peasant girl called rabbit. enjoyed the setting and the way this story unfolded through objects and rabbit’s retelling, and will definitely read the sequel novella which comes out in december. 3.5/5

pine, francine toon (audio) this is a crime/thriller type book with some horror elements about a young girl whose mother has disappeared mysteriously when she was very small. she lives with her dad in the scottish highlands close to a giant forest. the beginning is pretty cool & creepy, but then like 80% of it is just the girl being sad & wanting to know what happened to her mother & the dad being an alcoholic mess. and then most of the plot happens in the last 10% & isn’t great. disappointing. 2/5

where the wild ladies are, aoko matsuda (tr. from japanese by polly barton) a collection of short stories retelling japanese folklore stories about female ghosts/monsters with a feminist twist. on the whole, i liked these stories, but also found them a lot more light in tone than i expected; i guess i thought this would be more on the wild & raw side, so i ended up finding them a bit underwhelming. might also be a problem with lacking cultural context. will say tho that tilted axis press is great & i will seek out more of their books. 2.5/5

piranesi, susanna clarke (audio) god this was so good! so delightful! the House with its many rooms full of tides and clouds and birds and statues is a wonderful, magical yet melancholy setting, the narrator is kind & gentle & earnest, full of wonder and curiosity at the House and its mysteries (the contrast between the narrator’s and the Other’s attitude to the House... yes), the slow building up to the numerous reveals are just. very well done. the writing is lovely (did i almost cry about the albatross? yes) and chiwetel ejiofor is a great audio narrator. just all around lovely & the ending hits just right. 4.5/5

doomsday book, connie willis reading this book during lockdown #2.... a galaxy brain move i wouldn’t necessarily recommend. anyway this is set in a near future where time travel is used for historical research; oxford university is sending the young historian kivrin on the first mission to the middle ages (1320, which is perfectly safe, as far as medieval years go), but things go wrong and soon modern day oxford is under quarantine (ha. how wild. can you imagine.) and kivrin notices that some things are a bit off about where she is (spoiler it’s actually 1348 and y’all know what that means right... PLAGUE TIME). lots of people on goodreads found this slow and boring and while it is pretty damn slow (and for a world with time travel way too many plot points hinge on being unable to contact people by telephone), i found it riveting and uh dread-inducing throughout, but also really warm and immersive. adored this, was devastated at the end. even almost a month later i’m still in my feelings about it. 4.5/5

too loud a solitude, bohumil hrabal (tr. from czech by michael henry heim) a novella i intellectually appreciated but didn’t really love - the narrator works as a paper compactor in a nightmarish basement full of mice (that also get crushed by the hundreds) from where he imagines rat wars in the sewers but from where he also saves hundreds of books. it’s fascinating & well-written but as soon as it gets away from the nightmare paper-crushing basement, it just loses its appeal, especially when the narrator reminisces about his relationships to women (how to simultaneously put women on a pedestal and smear shit on them!!!). 3/5

i’m thinking of ending things, iain reid literary horror/thriller type book with a really intriguing first half, as a young woman is visiting her boyfriend’s parents for the first time while thinking of ending the relationship and things increasingly feel off (the parents are weird, there’s a picture on the wall that the boyfriend claims is him as a child, but is actually her, she gets weird voicemails from her own number). great sense of vague unease, very scary. then the second half kind of blows up the whole story in a way that i should theoretically find interesting but just found kind of underwhelming and not scary, especially since the ending then feels the need to spell it all out for you. 2/5

passing, nella larsen (reread) ugh this is brilliant and i almost don’t have anything to say about it so i’ll just summarise it i guess. it’s a novella about two black women in 1920s america, who knew each other as teenagers and who run into each other in a rooftop bar, where both of them are passing as white. irene finds out that clare is passing full-time, married to a white man who does not know that she is black, and although she strongly disapproves, she can’t help but be seduced (the queer subtext is strong here) into renewing their friendship, which begins to threaten her sense of stability and control. this book is pretty much pitch-perfect, has a lot of things to say about race, loyalty, what happens when categories we live by are threatened or destabilised, and is also just tight and elegantly written and. ugh. brilliant. 5/5

ring shout, p. djèlí clark an alternative history/fantasy book where the ku klux klan gets possessed by demons from another dimension and a group of black (and other marginalised) women (some men too) who are able to see these demons have to fight them from gaining more power through a showing of birth of a nation. note: the klan is still already evil without the demons, but their evil makes it easier for the demons to possess them. very cool concept, very cool setting, but i found the main character and some of the plot progression a little boring. 3/5

amberlough, lara elena donnelly (amberlough dossier #1) this is really just the nazi takeover of weimar berlin in an alternate world (literally... the denizens of the city of amberlough are amberlinians... the two epigraphs are from le carre and cabaret...), told thru an amberlinian spy (cyril) forced to work for the nazi-equivalent (the ospies), his secret cabaret mc/smuggling kingpin boyfriend (aristide), and rough-and-tumble sally bowles (cordelia). as such, it’s extremely my shit, although i will say that donnelly makes it a bit easy on herself by making the nazi parallel so very overt; the ospies’ ideology is not particularly detailed beyond ‘real fashy’ and wanting to unite four loosely federated states. it’s just.... a bit weaksauce, and while she does include an ethnic minority for the ospies to hate, this also doesn’t feel as fundamental to their ideology as it should. also cyril sucks. but these issues may be solved in the sequels & it was a lot of fun. also.... amazing cover. 3/5

the vanishing half, brit bennett very much in conversation with larsen’s passing, this is a 2020 historical novel about passing, colorism, and identity, in which desiree and stella, very light-skinned african american twins who grow up in a black town that values lightness very much, become separated when stella chooses to pass for white and marry a white man. the book is very immersive and engaging, and stella and desiree are interesting characters, but (i felt unfortunately) much of the book is focused on their daughters, whose chance meeting might expose stella/reunite the sisters/etc etc, but who weren’t as interesting. the plot also relies on coincidences a lot which is a bit annoying. still an interesting and entertaining read. 3/5

die stadt der anderen, anthology printed version of an art project where three pairs of authors were sent on trips through berlin, which each person writing about what the other person showed them and how they experienced the city through the other. there was nothing earth-shaking in this, but reading it during lockdown was lovely. in conclusion i love berlin... would love to experience it again some time. 3/5

the fire this time, edited by jesmyn ward collection of essays on anti-black racism in america, many in response to the beginning of the black lives matter movement. i don’t have much to say about it, but it is very good and i would recommend. as is often the case with essay anthologies about serious topics i don’t really think i can rate it.

intimations, zadie smith a very short collection of essays written during early lockdown. smith is always smart and fun but i wish these had been a little more focused on politics and less on personal experience, but like, you can’t really criticise a book for not being what you wanted it to be. ‘contempt as a virus’ was very good.

superior: the return of race science, angela saini really solid, engaging and accessible discussion of race science and why... it’s bad & dangerous, both looking at race science in the past and the invention of race, and how it is returning and regaining influence (not to say that race science ever completely disappeared, but as saini explains, it moved into a more marginal space in the sciences after ww2). 3.5/5

the hive, camilo josé cela (tr. from spanish by j.m. cohen & arturo barea) spanish modern classic set in madrid during the last few years of ww2. told thru short fragmentary snippets with a huge rotating cast of characters, mostly lower and middle class, going about their days, with the theme tying them together being “the city, that tomb, that greased pole, that hive”, which is a very sexy line, but unfortunately it didn’t work for me. the tone is v dispassionate and in combination with the huge cast it just made me profoundly unengaged. it also has the weird habit of changing scene in the middle of a paragraph, which i found rather confusing. 2.5/5 slave old man, patrick chamoiseau (tr. from french by linda coverdale) absolutely amazing short novel from the creolité movement aabout an old slave, seemingly resigned to his position, suddenly escaping and being pursued by the slavemaster’s terrifying monstrous mastiff through the forests of martinique, but really also about selfhood, relearning humanity, trauma and nature. the language is at turns sparse and lush and always gorgeous and the translation from french/creole uses endnotes (we love an endnote) and a strategy of doubling to retain some of the original language, which was really cool to read. so yeah this is brilliant. 4/5

mexican gothic, silvia moreno-garcia gothic horror novel about young mexican socialite noemí visiting her recently-married cousin in her new (english) family’s isolated, creepy and dilapidated mansion after said cousin sent a disturbing and strange letter calling for help. gothic horror shenanigans involving vivid dreams, family secrets and eugenics ensue. after a slow start, i absolutely devoured the second half in one afternoon bc once it gets going it REALLY gets going. not super-scary, but a nice creepy atmosphere & reveal. also loved how it combines the clear yellow wallpaper inspo (the cousin’s letter involves people in the wallpaper) and the focus on the english family’s eugenic ideology (not a fun fact but charlotte perkins gilman was a eugenicist), and the vain & flighty but also smart & stubborn protagonist. had a lot of fun with this. 3.5/5

i’m also still reading a tale of love and darkness by amos oz which is really good but which is taking me forfuckingever.

#the books i read #long post #capital-H House is way nicer than blue text house

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pagesaplenty · 5 years ago

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10 Books to Read if You Want to Date Pete

I have had a few conversations lately surrounding dating, books, and intelligence as an intimidating roadblock. Before I get started on this fun little feature, let’s shed some clarity first. One, I am fine with my status as a single lady. It isn’t a burden, nor is this post a cry for help (matchmakers *wink*). Secondly, I do not believe our passions should so cloister us from any type of relationship that we can’t socialize with someone if they don’t have or share our passions or have any future chance of sharing them. I have friends and family I have meaningful conversations with and take joy in our relationship…and they are not readers. It can be done!

While I’m naming this feature “books to read to date me”, to me this list serves more as a window into who I am and how books have (and do) impact me as a person. Perhaps none of these appeal to you, but maybe you want to know or connect more with me? These titles, while huge favorites, each carry a story of their own and a story that can spark meaningful relationships. By no means do I expect someone to change who they are and suddenly read books that are not their cup of tea or try reading at all. I have learned, the hard way, you should never read a book to impress someone. Chances are they won’t be paying attention anyways (hello bookstore boy I read ‘On the Road’ for and wanted nothing to do with the Beat Generation, save beating my brains out, after I finished).

In no particular order…

Wives and Daughters by Elizabeth Gaskell – When I was a teenager in the homeschool world, it was a difficult world to gain footing in. It felt a little like the people obsessed with being Purebloods in Harry Potter. I had not been homeschooled my whole life and had left public education; we were in between. Classics were not my forte. They intimidated me, bored me, and even made me feel stupid. Then at a gathering with more down to earth homeschoolers, a girl a few years older than me mentioned reading Elizabeth Gaskell and how much she liked her writing (better than Austen). I think it was the way she talked about books that made it seem possible for me to try reading this classic author, even if she was a contemporary of Dickens. The next trip to Barnes and Noble I was shocked to discover the monstrous size of this book. Queue intimidation all over again. However, I managed to muster my determination and read the book. It was a magical moment to read a classic and not feel bored or overwhelmed by lack of understanding for language and time.

Reasons to Stay Alive by Matt Haig – A few years ago TWLOHA’s Suicide Prevention Week Theme was based around this book. I was familiar with Matt’s work, but had never read any of it. It was the first time I have ever read a book and felt understood surrounding my own mental health. This is a book I want more of my friends and family to read. I wish more people with loved ones coping with mental health would read this. In my opinion it is a source of hope to see, on the page, so clearly the things I live with and I believe more people need to understand in order to be sources of hope, understanding, and strength for each other. Matt’s honesty, while heavy at times, is very refreshing and clarity amid the chaos that can be my thought process.

Saga by Brian K. Vaughan and Fiona Staples – My siblings have been graphic novel readers for many years. In all those years I know they tried on numerous occasions to convince me to read them too. In my fear of not reading a “real book” and reading something “childish” I deprived myself of many years’ worth of fun and engaging reading in the world of comics. Saga was the first graphic novel I read, and it ignited my imagination and joy for the medium. I love fantasy and sci-fi. I love art. I love reading. I love Saga. Saga is all of those plus it’s cheeky and filled with humor. I haven’t finished the series yet because I read them slowly… I don’t want the series to be over too soon! Don’t let outside influences fool you…reading comics is reading.

I Capture the Castle by Dodie Smith – I was tricked into reading this! When I was a teenager I didn’t read very widely or diversely. I read fantasy and more fantasy. Then the occasional school assigned book that landed me more in the historical fiction genre as a secondary comfort zone. One summertime visit to my Gran’s in Ohio and a stop at our favorite local shop there, had me picking up this book. The green and yellow wallpaper design drew me in, but even more so was the shout out on the cover from J.K. Rowling. (By the way, I rarely read what books are about because I think summaries are written in such a spoiling fashion. I count on good covers, I know terrible, and Freddy to help me find out if I’ll like something.) Well a J.K. Rowling quote on the cover and the word ‘Castle’ in the title definitely sets this story up to be a fantastical one! Not so much, but nonetheless I persisted and fell in love. Dodie Smith writes a strong voice for a coming of age story. I love her word usage and the book is filled with quotable wisdoms. The quirkiness of Cassandra’s family is something to warm your heart to and find kindred spirits on many levels. I once had a friend compare me to Cassandra after I gifted him with the book and I thought I would squeal of said honor.

C.S. Lewis Biography – This biography stands out for me for a number of reasons. I don’t typical like or read Christian Fiction of Non-Fiction. When I was a Sophomore my Mum’s curriculum for literature was a biography and a book by the author. This specific biography really impacted the way I perceived my own faith at the time. Reading about Lewis’ turning points and his fascination with heaven were very grounding for my teenage years. The fear of the unknown has always been a trigger for me, but to read how at peace he was with heaven will be something I never forget. Also as someone raised in a faith based home, I believe it is important to read testimonies/backgrounds that are not similar (and ‘perfect’ at first sight) to your own. Diversity of all types is imperative for growth.

The Historian by Elizabeth Kostova – This is another book that made me feel like I was a grown-up and had arrived because I picked it up when I was younger, and it wasn’t my normal reading. My friend had brought it back from a trip and I was instantly intrigued by the cover. This book is dense. I know that turns some people off, so much so the audiobook is abridged to cut out ‘unnecessary’ elements (which personally annoys the hell out of me). As you can see from my own writing, I love detail. I enjoy immersive stories and elements that you know were researched to the gills all for the delight of a story, a fictional one at that. I cannot say too much without spoiling this story, but I can say it is a more mature ‘National Treasure’ paired with folklore/history of ‘Dracula’.

A Long Fatal Love Chase by Louisa May Alcott – It may surprise many who know me to see this Alcott book on my list instead of ‘Little Women’. Alcott is my favorite author. Almost 60% of one my bookcases in dedicated to books by and about her. While I love ‘Little Women’ and all the memories it holds for me, I know ultimately it was not what Alcott wanted to write. Years ago the copy of ‘A Long Fatal Love Chase’ that Freddy and I came across looked more like a mix between a thriller and sizzling mass market romance. Freddy read it first and we still to this day talk about how we didn’t believe it could possibly be by Alcott. While the story itself isn’t earth shattering, for me it is the idea behind it. The idea that Louisa still found a way to write what she wanted to write. This book still found a way to survive in the shadow of ‘Little Women’ all these years later. It is a story I enjoyed and Louisa’s influence continues to be in my life. That I may write, write what I NEED to write, and for it to endure in one form or another.

Stay with Me by Ayọ̀bámi Adébáyọ̀ -

"I was armed with millions of smiles. Apologetic smiles, pity-me smiles, I-look-unto-God smiles---name all the fake smiles needed to get through an afternoon with a group of people who claim to want the best for you while poking at your open sore with a stick---and I had them ready."

From it’s ‘simple’ orange cover to quotes like the above, this story’s subtlety and ability to shock grasped at my heart and held on. The story could have go on and on and I would not have shied away from reading it. While heavy with thought (and subject matter) and intention, Ayọ̀bámi writes so masterfully. I’m writing this right now and thinking I need to read it again. I am so struck by her writing. I also am indebted to her because after finishing I wanted more and it sent me on a path to find more Nigerian writers, whom I love too.

Gift from the Sea by Anne Morrow Lindbergh – When my grandmother was dying, we read this book out loud together. We would discuss and talk about her life after each chapter. We would talk about the shape of the shell we were living in right at that moment. I did not love everything about this book because many instances Anne spoke from a level of privilege I have never experienced and that can leave a taste not so pleasant. However, for the memories it has for me and its ability to have so much to ponder, I find this book a very valuable one. The way she writes about nature feels like my childhood and how my Mum taught us to look at the world around us.

Letters to a Young Poet by Rainer Maria Rilke – I probably talk about this book too much. For such a little book it certainly houses much wisdom. I recently read the letters on my Instagram and was struck anew by things I hadn’t been the first time. I know because this is the first book I have ever allowed myself to write in (aside from my Bible). There were parts that brought me to tears anew that I hadn’t underlined previously. I imagine Rilke calmly sitting in a corner as he observes the world and embraces his failures and struggles as growth. This book of letters holds something different for each reader and therein lies its value.

#to be read #books to read #book list #readers #date me list #reading #impact #books

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mirrorfae · 8 years ago

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Aries’ Log

Sunday, First Day. Sunrise.

The Windsinger and the Arcanist have begun battle.

A sea monster of Arcane has risen from the depths of Starwind Bay, apparently, and has broken up a peace treaty between two trading envoys. I’m not sure if that’s what’s actually going on, but the cause doesn’t matter. The air rings above us with the sound of arcane and wind clashing. All the other clans in the Strand that we know have begun to send dragons to assist the effort, and Leo - our clan leader - thinks we should do the same.

I think this week will be a great time to practice documenting. Arcane will win; we’ll take back Starwind Bay, I’m sure of it! And this is the first time our clan has participated in something this huge, something the whole flight is in on. This will change the way our clan works!

10 AM, First Day

Dragons have begun to leave the clan.

A lot of them went to run with the Mirror pack for a bit before leaving - they wanted to gain experience to better help Spacedad in battle. The lair feels odd now. It’s empty, with not so many wings and voices churning around.

Father - Sagittarius - laughed about it and told me he’s glad he won’t have to trap so many insects for all the clan’s Faes. I suppose it would be difficult being the sole hunter of the clan while the Mirror pack is away.

But enough of that - Leo called a meeting earlier, telling everyone to work hard for the Arcanist. We might be a small clan, but we can be powerful! Zodiac and the pack have gone out to look for dragons they can train and send on their way to the Arcanist’s forces. I’ll stay here, I think - I like my pens and ink, and I don’t know what I could do in battle. Besides, I’m the historian of this clan. They have no other writers.

Noon, First Day

All but one of my children have left.

I didn’t even know Requiem was going until he and Cetus were gone; Zodiac came to tell me. And then Stanza came, and told me that she wanted to study her magic under the Arcanist himself, but at least she gave me a chance to say goodbye.

It’s bittersweet. I know my children will be serving honorably, and will be remembered forever in my books, but right now, I’d much rather have them beside me.

Enough of that, though. I don’t think I’ve ever seen Leo awake this late into the day. She’s still her usual self, fluttering around and helping everyone as we rush to assist in the battle. Even the hatchlings are pitching in, with looking around the Strand to try and find those stones that augment a dragon’s worth in battle. The air in the clan is full of excitement!

5 PM, First Day

Zodiac and Leo are arguing.

My den is too high up, and they’re keeping their voices too low, for me to hear what they’re saying - not that I’d ever try to eavesdrop on an argument between mates. I can get the gist, though. Zodiac thinks Leo is overworking herself. Leo is trying to convince him that she’s just doing what’s best for the clan. I don’t think I’ve ever seen either of them this stressed. Leo’s usually casual and forgetful, with her fans held in any position but this stiff anger. And Zodiac’s tail is lashing, and his claws are out…. From my studies of Mirror body language so I can better write it, it seems he’s preparing for a fight. So, he’s angry too?

They’re outside the wards of the clan, and night is falling, and they don’t show any signs of coming back inside before full dark. They’ve been going at it for nearly an hour now.

I hope they aren’t divided. Most dragons depend on Leo, and Leo depends on Zodiac. If Zodiac is gone, then Leo will fall, and right now we need a strong leader.

Oh; someone else just stepped out from behind a tree! It’s Cinder - that fire-touched dragon. She’s trying to calm them down. She’s a Skydancer, so I hope it works.

Sapphire, her Fae best friend, is perched on her shoulder. Come to think of it, I don’t think I’ve ever seen Cinder without Sapphire close by, or vice versa. I wonder what’s going on with those two. If they’re mates, I’m going to have to ask Mom to tell them what happens with secret relationships - she and Dad had me in one, and it was hell for me as a hatchling.

Okay, Leo and Zodiac look like they’ve calmed down. Leo’s perched on Zodiac’s head and murmuring something to him. Cinder seems satisfied, too. I think it’s over.

Monday, Second Day. Just after sunrise.

Leo called another meeting at sunrise.

She says that Zodiac and the Mirror pack will be off in Plague territory for the rest of the week. There’s apparently a spot called the Mire where they can quickly and easily train any dragons that want to go help the Arcanist, and that a lot of other clans will be doing the same thing. I think Zodiac called it ‘blitzing’, though he left before I could get a clarification.

Whatever the case, Leo seems more depressed now. Her fans aren’t held as high as she zooms around the clan to help dragons, and she’s definitely stressed - it’s obvious, she’s even started getting a bit snappish. That’s quite unusual for her. I hope nothing bad comes of it. Perhaps it wasn’t the best choice for Zodiac himself to leave right now.

Second Day, Noon

More dragons have left. Even Frost, Sapphire’s best friend besides Cinder, is gone - and I still don’t see that dragon showing any emotion. She’s practically like ice! I swear her fans are frozen into position.

Speaking of Cinder and Sapphire, their other friend is gone now. Breeze, the wind coatl, couldn’t deal with all the dragons leaving - she says she’s going to go visit another clan until this week is over. I like Breeze, but I don’t like Dahlia, Breeze’s best friend. Dahlia seems sweet, but there’s something… odd about her, and it only intensifies when Breeze isn’t around.

Dahlia seems to know everything that goes on in this clan, now that I think about it. Sure, she seems sweet, and she’s apparently one of the Gladekeeper’s own favored, but I’d bet anything that I could easily reimagine her as a villain. I’m scared to do it just in case I accidentally tap into the writing ley and make it true. I hope Breeze gets back sooner than planned - I prefer her here, balancing Dahlia out.

But it’s okay, whatever. Aquarius just came back from the trading post and she says Arcane is on top!

Second Day, 5 PM

Something’s very wrong - I can feel it.

Apodis and Virgo, the two most sensitive Skydancers, have retreated into their dens. Orion just came by to ask if I felt any tension in the clan, and well, I do.

Our own exaltation efforts have been going well, but it’s like something has changed in the air. Having no Mirrors around is really… odd. It’s like we’re vulnerable, and I don’t mean to attacks from the outside. Our wards protect us well enough from that. By the Isles, even if some dragon managed to see through the enchantments and find our clan, Elesis and Raven would die defending us before anything happened - and a Blazing Heart and Veteran Commander are nothing to be trifled with.

No, that’s not why we’re vulnerable. Having so few dragons in the clan proper is just weird. Most of the dens are empty now. There’s usually a hum of magic and discussion in the air, but right now there’s nothing, just silence undercut by the murmur of the creative ley line that I can tap into to bring my words to life. I’m about ready to scream from the quiet.

Oh - Leo is calling a full clan meeting. Her fans look droopy. Is something wrong? Does it have something to do with all this tension?

Second Day, 5.30 PM

My claws are shaking as I write this.

Leo has stepped down.

She gave up her position as clan leader.

Nobody really thought of her as our leader, but she was, I realize that now. And guess who took her place?

Cinder.

Cinder, with Sapphire on her shoulder and Dahlia in the shadows behind her, stood up at the base of Leo’s normal announcement tree and told us that she’d be our new leader, and that she wanted to have our support. She says Leo will still be around, just she’ll be the head of researching new magics and arcane studies. Cinder will be running the clan from now on.

I know Leo’s been stressed the past two days, but is that really enough to make her do this? Did Cinder do something to make her step down? I don’t know much about Cinder; she’s relatively young, and I’ve been busy researching Aquarius and Orion’s past.

I didn’t see this coming at all. Cinder says we’ll be continuing our exaltation efforts, and that if we have any concerns, we’re to bring them to her or Sapphire. Sapphire said nothing throughout the entire address; she just stared at us all from her perch on Cinder’s headdress. She’s so intense and cold that she’s almost scary. I heard she’s Orion’s grandchild - honestly, I wouldn’t be surprised. But Orion is at least friendly. And Dahlia didn’t come out of the shadows the entire time. It was actually really creepy how she just watched everyone.

This whole thing scares me. Leo’s always been in charge of this clan. She was the original founder, with Zodiac, for crying out loud! Why now is she apparently unfit to lead?

I think I’m going to go talk to Pictoris and my mate Lyrae for a bit. Perhaps if we discuss how this relates to themes in our fields - art for Pictoris, music for Lyrae - we can all calm down and have a rational conversation. Right now, I don’t think I could unstick my fans from their position of fear if I tried.

Tuesday, Third Day. Sunrise.

Today dawned bright and cold. Usually, it’d be a talkative, cheerful morning, but I haven’t heard anything but the chirping of birds and the crackle of distant battle today.

Reports from the Mirror clan came in last night. They’re helping around thirty dragons train every hour and sending them on their way. Their speed hasn’t slowed even though half of their own number is gone, which is impressive. We have Zodiac to thank for that. According to Cassiopeia, he’s taken over more than half of the work, with Viole taking up the slack when he tires.

I wonder what would have happened if Zodiac had been here last night. He’s so protective over Leo. I don’t think he’d have let Cinder take over without a fight.

At this point, I almost wish he were here. Cinder is meeting with Orion and Dahlia right now. I’m really uneasy about that. Orion, we all know, used to be an assassin - hell, he was sent to murder Aquarius when we first met him! And Dahlia… with her shadowy ways and the way she seems to know everything, her and Orion is a dangerous combination.

Hopefully nothing will happen. Hopefully.

Third Day, 11 AM

Orion and Aquarius have gone off to talk together, and Isa - Orion’s mate - is worried about him. He seemed stressed after he got out of Cinder’s den, she says. She’s curled in the corner of my den right now, trying not to let her runes explode from the worry she’s feeling.

I feel bad that I can’t do anything more to calm her, but only Orion’s proven able to do that. And since he’s off with Aquarius….

You know, this might be a good time to try and find out more about their past. When they flew past my den on their way into the Strand, they seemed to be referencing events and places I’ve never heard of. “The Priestess,” Aquarius said - maybe that’s a Light thing?

I’m going to go shadow them. I’ll see what happens.

Third Day, 4 PM

I just got back from shadowing them. Flying through the upper branches of the Starwood Strand is hard, dammit, but what they said worries me.

They kept referencing this “Priestess”, though Orion called her something else. Elvira, I think it was. Whoever it is, they kept talking about her with disgust, and comparing Cinder to her.

Orion said that Cinder wanted to see if he’d be willing to ply his skills for her once in a while. Apparently she didn’t say so in as many words, but that was the gist. And he echoed my thoughts on Dahlia. He thinks the sweetness is just an act, and that there’s much more to her than it seems. She showed some of that during their meeting - reflexes that have no place in a sweet, tiny Nocturne, displayed when Orion tried to leave.

Aquarius is no less concerned. She kept dipping her claws into her bag to bring out that pink ball of glass that she always carries. Orion asked her why she didn’t just use it - for what, I wonder? - and then Aquarius glared at him and shoved it back down.

They also mentioned something else. Mass exalts, and forced exaltation. Why would anyone want to force a dragon to be exalted? Exaltation is the highest honor a dragon can receive, after all - researching at the side of the Arcanist himself for eternity! Even as I stay behind and worry about my clan, I feel guilty about not rushing to join the battle, though I know there’s not much I could do.

Forced exaltation, though. Orion scoffed at it. Aquarius challenged him, saying that she’d love to be wrong, but that Orion should look at Pavo, the one who tends the clan’s dimensional garden, for an example. She thinks he and Dahlia are too close for Cinder’s comfort. If something happens to him, she says, Orion will owe her a few sticks of Sacridite.

Betting over a dragon’s existence. They seem oddly callous about this entire thing, now that I think of it. Worrying about mass exalts and forced exaltation; I wonder what kind of clan they came from, and what sort of leader this Priestess Elvira was?

When Orion and Aquarius were turning back to the clan, though, Orion stared straight up at me. His fans were tilted in amusement. I think he knew I was there, though I don’t know why they’d let me tag along and listen. Just to be sure, I swung around and collected some more beetles to crush into ink on my way back, so I had an excuse as to why I was out.

There’s no time to worry now. Sapphire and Kizzy are taking inventory of our food supplies. With Dad’s hunting skills, we should be good for the week, even with the Mirrors gone.

Third Day, Midnight.

Something’s up.

I was reading just now - found a new book called Venom, it’s lovely - when I heard low murmurs from the clan clearing below. I peeked out the mouth of my den, and it seems like Cinder is talking to Dad and Pavo. I don’t know why.

Didn’t Orion say something about Cinder wanting to get rid of Pavo? Exaltation is the highest honor a dragon can receive. Would Cinder twist that?

They just finished talking and Pavo and Dad are going out. I want to believe they’re just getting more food - Pavo for plants, Dad for insects - but something tells me that’s not it.

Dad isn’t wearing his fillet. Leo gave it to him when he first entered the clan - it’s basically his signature item.

I’m scared.

Wednesday, Fourth Day, 7 AM

Pavo and Dad have both left for the Arcanist.

They didn’t even say goodbye - Pavo to Dahlia, Dad to Mom. They just left in the middle of the night. Cinder called a meeting earlier when everyone was awake, to deliver the news and to say that we flipped Wind again in the middle of the night. Right now, we’re the strongest Flight in Sornieth.

Normally, I’d love that, but now, it scares me. Dad wouldn’t have left without at least telling Mom. And Dahlia was nowhere to be seen, but I thought I felt the threads of her story ebbing from Pavo’s garden. Will it become her garden now?

Cinder…. She seemed triumphant, almost. Victorious. I think that’s what a slowly lashing tail and head held high means for Skydancers, though I’m going to go ask Virgo later to make sure I’m right. And I can’t even look to Sapphire for a mirror of Cinder’s emotions, because she’s as stiff as ever.

Something odd happened when Cinder was talking. She paused for breath, and I could see it as her gaze shifted to Sapphire on her shoulder. Sapphire’s fans flicked once, and then Cinder nodded and jumped down from the roots of the speaker’s tree.

Sapphire never seemed very threatening to me, but I’ll have to keep a closer eye on her. I think there’s more to that dragon than seems. In a weird way, Cinder might just be the most honest out of that trio.

Fourth Day, Noon

Mom is distraught about Dad leaving.

I just spent the whole morning in the hoard with her, helping organize all the things we have left. Cinder’s had us sell a lot of things to fund the conquest, it seems.

Mom wouldn’t stop moving the whole time I was there. She wouldn’t talk about Dad, either. Every time I tried to bring up the subject, her fans went flat back, so I just ended up dropping it.

She’s wearing his old fillet. It looks strange on her, the jewel too big for her forehead, but she keeps wearing it.

I don’t think she’ll get over this anytime soon. It makes me really mad at Cinder. What could be the purpose of asking Dad to exalt himself? Pavo, I can understand, with Orion’s reasoning about him being too close to Dahlia. But Dad? What did Dad ever do to her?

I hate how I’m writing about forced exaltation. I hate this conquest push. And I hate that Wind is on top again.

I’m going to go try and talk to Mom some more.

Fourth Day, 5 PM

Mom’s still being OCD and nervous. But when I was helping her, I realized something.

Dad was the primary hunter of our clan. Without him, only the Mirror pack will be bringing in food, and the Mirror pack are also the only ones who could reasonably challenge Cinder.

Does she mean to keep them busy providing food so they don’t have time to stick around and challenge her? This doesn’t seem like something Cinder would come up with, though. Perhaps it’s Sapphire’s idea - she’s asked for books on politics and strategy from my collection before. If it is Sapphire’s idea, I have to wonder how much control she really has over Cinder’s actions.

Fourth Day, Sunset

Viole just came back to the clan with news. Zodiac and Pisces are still hard at work in the Mire training dragons who want to go to the Arcanist. When they’re blitzing, they don’t record all the identification details of the dragons they train, but Viole thinks they’ve trained hundreds so far. I hope it’s worth it.

Thursday, Fifth Day. Sunrise.

Cinder just posted the new clan divisions.

The Mirror pack will remain as it is, though severely weakened since so many have gone to serve the Arcanist. What used to be the clan proper is going to stay in the same place, but we’ll be divided into “administrators” and “researchers”.

I’m in the researcher category, with my writing. So I’ll still be technically under Leo, thank the eleven. Orion somehow fell into the administrative ranks - I don’t know why, but it worries me, especially with the meeting among him, Dahlia, and Cinder.

At least nobody was left out. Mom was given the choice of studying her light runes under Leo or continuing to manage the hoard, and she’s chosen the latter. I hope she doesn’t hole herself up down there.

Pictoris wants to chat - she’s worried. Cinder told us that Aquarius will be taking the surplus of what the clan creates in order to sell it. It’s not a bad idea, but it’s a decision that should be made by us, not by a leader.

I’m going to go fly with Pictoris now.

Fifth Day, Noon

Pictoris and I met Raven and Elesis while we were outside the clan. They’re both concerned about what’s happening. They’re not really in either part of the clan, so they don’t have a fear of Cinder, but Elesis trained Cinder to use her fire magic. She says she hopes Cinder doesn’t start abusing her powers.

Raven seemed unsurprised, which I found really sad. He says that’s just the way of ambition and the fate of the ambitious. I wonder what experiences he’s had with ambition in the past, to be so fatalistic about it?

Heh, fate-alistic. I’m going to have to remember that pun for later. Wind is still on top of dom.

Fifth Day, Sunset

An ink blotch mars the page. Aries’ writing begins again below it.

Ach, I spilled my ink bottle on this paper. I have a good reason, though - my claws are shaking again as I write this.

Just as I sat down to document what happened this afternoon, Dahlia poked her head into my den and asked if she could return a book. And then she asked what I was working on.

I’ve said before - that dragon knows everything. It was weird that she didn’t know my newest project, but then again, I’ve not really told anyone. So I told her I was working on documenting the events of this week.

And then Dahlia told me that Sapphire would like to see it when I’m done.

That’s when I spilled my ink.

Sapphire, not Cinder. Especially with my recent observations about Sapphire, that seems weird. More importantly, I’ve written down every little suspicion I’ve had about out new leaders in this manuscript. If they don’t like what I’ve written, I have no doubt that I could be serving the Arcanist next.

A noble calling, yes. But it’s not my calling - not now, not yet!

I’m going to rewrite this. I’ll write it to be censored, take out all the suspicions and only write the good. Perhaps if I tap into the creative ley and let the words flow through my quill, it’ll even come true, and all my suspicions will be invalid.

Friday, Sixth Day. Noon.

I’ve nearly finished the other manuscript. I’m only returning to this one to note down that Aquarius and Orion flew out for another chat earlier this morning. They just returned, and there’s some strange laughter around Aquarius - I can’t tell where it’s coming from. Maybe that wisp of mist that’s always floating about her wings?

Orion doesn’t look happy. But he just dipped into his and Isa’s den, probably to calm his mate, so I’ll return to my rewrite.

Sixth Day, Sunset

The rewrite is done. I’m going to ask Pictoris to embellish the sides with art before I submit it to Cinder, and of course, there’s still a day left of this week-long battle. But I don’t think there’ll be much left to tell.

Cinder has taken complete control of the clan, with Sapphire on her shoulder. Dahlia has taken up residency in Pavo’s old garden, and it looks like she still knows everything that goes on in and around this clan, so I’ll have to be careful with this manuscript just in case she finds out about it.

Breeze came back today, too. She just came out of Dahlia’s den - it sounds like she’s going to be the new ambassador of the clan. I thought Castar had that job, but apparently she’s only going to focus on her ley line research now.

The clan has completely changed. I don’t think I like it.

Zodiac should be coming back tomorrow - last he knew, Leo was still the stressed leader. I wonder what he’ll think?

Saturday, Seventh Day. 9 AM.

Sunrise brought the Mirrors back to the lair.

I was woken up by a furious snarl. I scrambled to the edge of my den and looked out - lit by the rising sun and the light from the shimmering trees, Cinder was backed up to the base of the speaker’s tree, the light glimmering off her white scales and being swallowed by her black runes. Zodiac was in the process of leaping at her with his claws outstretched until Scorpio and Pisces moved to restrain him.

He snarled at her - sounding furious, demanding to know how she dared call herself the clan leader in Leo’s place, wondering what she’d done with his mate. Cinder seemed to be trying to calm him down, but Sapphire wasn’t helping her case - perched on a branch, icy mist flowing around her claws, just waiting for Zodiac to make a wrong move. I don’t know if Zodiac saw that, but Pisces and I certainly did.

Pisces is just as skilled as Zodiac. I thought for sure she’d try and kill Sapphire. But then Leo came out of her den.

Zodiac looked relieved, honestly - gaze darting over to her and back to Cinder, not trusting Cinder but wanting to check over his mate. Leo alighted on his head.

I’m really too high up to hear any conversations that aren’t loud enough for the Arcanist himself to hear. Perhaps I should spin another den lower down on this tree. But from the looks of it, Leo was explaining what had happened and the new structure of the clan. Cinder let her speak without interruption - smart dragon, I’ve never seen anyone but Leo be able to calm Zodiac.

Eventually, Zodiac growled an order, and Scorpio and Pisces stepped away from him. Zodiac whipped around, gently bit on one of Leo’s piercings to take her with him, and escaped into the Strand.

They haven’t come back yet. I hope they’re okay, but while I’m brave enough to follow Orion and Aquarius, I don’t dare follow Zodiac and Leo.

Seventh Day, Noon

They’re back.

Zodiac came in with Leo perched on his head again. He looked calm, but I saw his tailtip twitch when he saw Cinder still.

It seems I was right about Cinder’s motivations for asking Dad to journey to the Arcanist. They had a talk under my tree, just within earshot, and Cinder told Zodiac that his pack will need to spend more time being focused on hunting. Zodiac tried to say that his pack is depleted after the battle, and they all need to rest and regain their numbers, but Cinder wouldn’t have any of it. “The clan still needs feeding”, apparently.

Well, most dragons in this clan can hunt for their own food, and Pavo’s garden - which Dahlia now inhabits - is supposed to grow most of our plants anyways. Cinder’s excuses seemed like just that - excuses. And Zodiac didn’t seem happy about it either. I swear he was just about to rip out Cinder’s throat by the end.

If he did, I don’t know what I’d feel.

Seventh Day, Sunset

The battle is over, and Wind has won. The bay is now called Windstar Bay.

Whatever. I’m still going to call it Starwind, though maybe not when I’m writing.

More importantly, the rewritten manuscript has been handed off to Pictoris for decoration. Willow is already starting on creating a case for it, and then we’ll give it to Cinder. An example of all our work, if you will.

I don’t know what I’m going to do with this copy. I heard that down in the Southern Icefields, there’s a Fae who’s creating a giant library where all books are accepted and safe.

I think I’ll travel down there and take this manuscript in secret. I’ll leave it with her to defend - Cinder hates snow and ice, and even if Dahlia finds out about this and Sapphire makes the trip, a Fae can easily repel another Fae, right?

Hopefully the information contained here will prevent another clan from the same fate.

If you’re reading this because you’re curious, then there you have it - now you know the true story behind the leadership change of Starflame Clan. Sure, it runs smoothly, but at what cost?

And if you’re reading this because you think your clan might be going through the same change, or because your clan already has and you want to find a way to reverse it, I’m not sure I can help you. Prop up your leader even if they’re not the best - even if they’re forgetful like Leo, or hot-tempered like Zodiac - because if another one comes along, even if they lead the clan well, you don’t always know at what cost the new prosperity will come.

My name is Aries, and I come from Starflame Clan. My clan and I will survive, but sometimes late at night, I wish we hadn’t.

#flight rising #flight rising lore #lore

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theteej · 8 years ago

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7. Knowing Little and Learning Much

I had no idea growing up that I’d end up building a career studying southern African history. Growing up as a mixed black kid in Southern California, I’d had scant direct introduction to the continent more generally and to South Africa in particular. I remember being overwhelmed by The Poisonwood Bible and Cry the Beloved Country as a high schooler, but I think it’s telling that my first two major memories were through books written by white folk about the continent. It wasn’t until my junior year of college that I decided I should take a leap and study abroad somewhere far away. I chose somewhere as far from what I thought I knew as possible—Pietermaritzburg, KwaZulu-Natal, South Africa. That’s how I found myself anxiously looking out over the dry stretches of scraggly fields with trepidation one July afternoon in 2004 as a twenty-year old undergraduate readying himself for a semester far away from home. That semester changed my life in ways I’m still beginning to understand, twelve years later. Moving to South Africa put so many things in sharp relief; I was unaware of how much of the world that I saw as ‘normal’ was instead based on everyday cultural conventions that didn’t follow me beyond America’s borders. I first heard isiZulu. I began to think about how a country ten years out of apartheid could reconcile its brutal past in its quotidian present. I began to think about how to be a historian for the first time. I made friends from a variety of groups—from astonishingly talented singers, to brilliant actors, to snarky writers, and beyond. I began to learn how little I knew, and how much I wanted to learn. When I stepped onto my college campus again in January, I cried for so many reasons. I cried for missing this new place and who I’d become in a semester. I cried because I’d begun to get the tiniest inkling of how little I knew. I cried because I’d fallen in love with a place and I wanted to spend my life getting back there.

I didn’t make it back to South Africa for another five years; in the interim I’d graduate with bachelors and masters degrees, taught high school, and moved to rural Illinois to start a PhD. I was twenty-five and desperately eager to go back and learn. I had so much to learn. I spent three months in 2009 back in Mzansi, and began my time back in Pietermaritzburg, but the place couldn’t be more different. I was part of an intensive isiZulu language program, and while I spent part of my time back at the University of KwaZulu-Natal where I’d studied abroad, this time my classes were all in isiZulu. I lived first in a residence hall, then in an urban township (iMbali), and then later in a rural community miles away (Manqongqo). This time made me keenly aware of the ways in which history and my own positions had prepared me to hear and perceive so much of the world around me on wildly uneven terms. The majority of the residence of KwaZulu-Natal spoke isiZulu as a first language, but I had really understood none of it in 2004. Much like in Southern California, the predominant language and cultural formations happened all around the white, colonial hegemons of English. It was as if a radio had been playing at a frequency beyond me, at full volume, and I suddenly became aware, ONCE AGAIN, of how little I knew. Of how wrong I was. Of how much I had to learn.

I returned two years later for a full academic year to do the archival research for my PhD. I was twenty-seven, more tired, more wary, more cynical, and yet my positions changed again. I was now in South Africa for the closest thing to business. This time I lived in Durban, the larger city by the sea, located nearly fifty miles (80km) away from the smaller capital of the Pietermaritzburg, and I tried to learn how to be an academic for reals. I struggled to think of my own positionality as a North American academic with so many thoughts and quick analyses and schemas, I wracked my brain trying to think of the ways in which language and culture and colonialism linked my existence and those of the people I encountered every day, I made friends who shaped my life profoundly. To the cynical surprise of someone who spends most of his time critically assessing the myriad transformations wrought by settler colonialism, I found myself feeling at home in Durban in some ways. This feeling made me realize the complexities of travel, of building lives, of claiming identities, but also steeled me for thinking through how to live in a space shaped by centuries of inequality, and to think about how I could take all of this overwhelming knowledge home with me. I ate loads of bunny chows—brilliant, red curries stacked in fluffy white loaves of bread. I drank cup after cup of espresso in local roasteries. I pored over pages of dry government reports and sanctimonious missionary publications, sifting through the arrogance of colonial words for indigenous voices, humanity, complexities of the violent collisions that shape our daily lived reality. I fell more in love.

I returned once more in 2015, this time shocked to be a full “grown-up,” a professional academic at thirty-one, on a university funded research trip. I struggled to be back in a town I’d loved, and to make connections three years after the fact. I despaired of ever finding the right material for my book—I felt the rush of imposter syndrome as I wondered whether or not I could even turn that hard-won dissertation into a readable tome. But I had an amazing month. I saw people I loved, I made new connections, I laughed and went on adventures and tried to record it all down in journals and photographs for the next iteration that would come back, as I always did, to Mzansi.

I boarded a plane for South Africa yet again on June 12, 2016. Ten days before, my boyfriend had broken up with me over the phone. The day before a man had murdered nearly fifty people at a gay club, most of them people of color. As I stood at the gate with my boarding pass in my hand, my phone rang. It was my grandmother, who as far as we knew, was in perfect health. She had eight weeks left to live.

“I’m on my way to the store, but I wanted to call and wish you the best,” her soft voice crackled over the static of her car’s speakers. I could picture her winding around California streets on a sunny afternoon in pursuit of groceries.

“You never forget to call, do you?”

“Of course not! Be safe. Learn things. You always come back with something wonderful, don’t you?”

“I’ll try, Grandma.”

I returned to South Africa this time feeling bereft. Things were falling apart all around me. I knew my life was about to be very different without Benjamin (and had no idea that my grandmother’s denouement was awaiting). I was even more cynical about me wanting to return to a location to be inspired and challenged, and had been writing more and more about settler presumptions. It felt familiar, and I felt nervous about the whole endeavor.

I was not prepared for the realization of how absurdly fortunate I was. I returned to Durban, and immediately fell into the arms of three people I loved at the airport—Mark Daku, my constant Canadian travel companion, and Shéla McCullough and Darren van Niekerk, dear friends who were about to be married. We laughed and bantered and chattered on, my spirits lifted despite the nearly thirty hours of travel fatigue I was battling. I immediately threw myself back into being in a space I loved. I walked the streets of Glenwood and remember being handed a free coffee as I walked into the Bean Green. “No charge today,” the barista said. “You’re home.” I teared up, even as I cynically wondered where home could be, and if such a thing could be true apart from colonialism. I drank the coffee with gratitude and salt-streaked eyes.

I spent two intense weeks in archives, back among familiar pages to flip through. I stared at the Indian Ocean’s relentless fanning of the sandy shore. I got my possessions rifled through by curious tree monkeys. I thought about this being my fifth time in such a transformative place, thirty-two and feeling more than a little bit broken by life around me. This trip was about love, hope, and possibility. I found new documents that excited me. I got to see dear friends who held me as I cried and let me feel less alone or overwhelmed . I got to embrace folk whose words I’d loved on the internet and couldn’t wait to chat with in person. 2004, 2009, 2011-12, and 2015 all crashed up against 2016 for me, and I saw myself at all those other times, and realized how much I still didn’t fucking know.

I watched Shéla and Darren get married on a winter’s afternoon in KwaZulu-Natal, the warmth of family near and far mingling with the joy of people who had become part of a chosen community that stretched across continents. I laughed out loud as Danni Bowler blasted Drake at full volume as she maneuvered through the streets of Johannesburg, insisting I sing along. I danced until my legs ached with Dean Hutton, Mvelase Peppetta, and Dexter Sagar in a tiny Cape Town club. I played a card game with Lauren Beukes and her amazing daughter on a chilly evening. I insisted on a road trip for schnitzel in the Midlands with Lauren Jarvis and Liz Timbs, each of us egging each other on to belt another Beyoncé song at the top of our lungs. I sat over dinner with Charl Blignaut, Sekoetlane Phamodi and Louise Ferreira and remembered that in moments of great pain are also moments of incredible love (and scintillating wit). I affectionately called Marc Kalina dad and listened to brilliant musicians at a historic anti-apartheid jazz club in Pinetown. I woke up every day emotionally overwrought, impossibly sensitive, and deeply grateful. I drank loudly and laughed harder with Mbali and Hlanganani than I’d done in ages. I got to tour Dean’s brilliant and devastating art exhibit that got me banned from facebook for a day. I sobbed while standing on Table Mountain in the rain with Amber Abrams and reconnected with my doppelganger Damien Williams over copious glasses of gin.

I remain deeply suspicious about the ways in which one can imagine being home in a space that is already occupied by others. But I also am eternally grateful for the opportunity to return to a country where I feel embarrassingly loved, deeply cared for, included in the lives and hopes and dreams of others so very dear to me. South Africa has transformed me as a student, as a thinker, as a writer, and as a person. I keep coming back to a place that teaches me how very little I know, and makes me hunger for the chance to learn more and more. This year was painful, but it was also beautifully reassuring that connections continue, that friends endure, and that life continues to hold love and meaning.

Ngiyabonga kakhulu, abangane bami.

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This is the tenth of sixteen short essays about things that have changed for me this year. Stay tuned for the (finally) remaining few as time goes on. #Teej16

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psychotherapyconsultants · 6 years ago

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Podcast: What is Schadenfreude?

We’ve all experienced it – that feeling of smug happiness at another person’s misfortune. From someone slipping on a banana peel to a jerk receiving a dose of instant karma, there’s something satisfying about this strange emotion. Why is that? Are we living in an “Age of Schadenfreude”? Should we feel guilty about feeling it? And for crying out loud, how do we say it in English? Listen in to find out!

Subscribe to Our Show! And Remember to Review Us!

About Our Guest

Dr. Tiffany Watt Smith is a cultural historian and author of The Book of Human Emotions. In 2014, she was named a BBC New Generation Thinker, and her TED talk The History of Emotions has over 1.5 million views. She is currently a Wellcome Trust research fellow at the Centre for the History of the Emotions at Queen Mary University of London. In her previous career, she was a theater director. Her latest book, SCHADENFREUDE: The Joy of Another’s Misfortunes is available for purchase.

TOXIC RELATIONSHIPS SHOW TRANSCRIPT

Editor’s Note: Please be mindful that this transcript has been computer generated and therefore may contain inaccuracies and grammar errors. Thank you.

Narrator 1: Welcome to the Psych Central show, where each episode presents an in-depth look at issues from the field of psychology and mental health – with host Gabe Howard and co-host Vincent M. Wales.

Gabe Howard: Hello everyone and welcome to this week’s episode of the Psych Central Show podcast. My name is Gabe Howard and with me as always is Vincent M. Wales. And today we have a great guest all the way from the U.K. We’re fairly certain that this is our first guest who actually lives in… is it England? Can we say England or do we have to say U.K.? It shows you how well travelled I am.

Tiffany Watt Smith: You can say… I’m in London, you can say England or U.K.

Gabe Howard: Wonderful. I have heard of London, so I feel very good… but before we move much smurther… Ugh. Let me start that over… But before we go much smur… [Laughter from guest and co-host.]

Vincent M. Wales: Am I experiencing schadenfreude?

Gabe Howard: Oh, man… Yes! We did that on purpose, everyone, so that I could introduce Dr. Tiffany Watt Smith. She’s a senior research fellow at the Queen Mary University of London Centre for History of Emotions and she’s the author of a couple of books, one of which is the Book of Human Emotions and a new book that’s out, Schadenfreude: The Joy of Another’s Misfortune. Right out of the gate, Tiffany, welcome. Thank you so much for being here and…

Tiffany Watt Smith: Thank you for having me.

Gabe Howard: Thanks for mocking my mispronunciation of everything. I want everybody to know that I did that intentionally for illustrator purposes.

Vincent M. Wales: Uh huh. Uh huh. Great. All right, I have to ask this right up front: what exactly is the Centre for the History of Emotions?

Tiffany Watt Smith: Well, we are a group of researchers in London – there’s a few different research groups around the world who look at the history of emotions. But what we look at is how ideas about emotions have changed over time, how different some emotions come into fashion, like boredom in the 19th Century and others sort of drop away so that there are some emotions which used to exist that no longer do. But the main thing we’re really interested in is trying to understand the origins of some of the emotions that we care most about today. So a lot of us look at the histories for example of happiness and the whole wellbeing agenda and we look at the history of anxiety and shame and things like that. I mean look at all kinds of sources whether we’re looking at literature and art or philosophy and medicine to try and understand the way thinking about emotions has changed across time.

Gabe Howard: That is very cool and of course one of the things that you are looking into is the emotion where somebody gains joy when something bad happens to another personm which is referred to as – and I’m going to butcher the wordm I always do – Shroydenfrada.

Vincent M. Wales: You sure did!

Tiffany Watt Smith: Schadenfreude, yeah, again on purpose. Good mispronunciation.

Vincent M. Wales: Yes.

Tiffany Watt Smith: So schadenfreude. Yeah. Literally, “schaden” from harm or damage, and “freude” meaning joy, so “damaged joy.” And it means the glee or quiet smug self-satisfaction that we might feel when witnessing someone else’s accidental misfortune or minor mishap.

Vincent M. Wales: Yeah, we’ve all experienced that and I think a lot of us, immediately following that, experience guilt for feeling that way.

Tiffany Watt Smith: Absolutely. I mean I think that this is one of the reasons why I was so drawn to this topic. I mean not many people write about schadenfreude. Although certainly over the centuries, people have wondered about this emotion. Why do we feel it? What kind of situations do we feel it in? Is it ever morally okay to feel like this? And certainly I think what I found was that schadenfreude is a hugely interesting and often quite paradoxical feeling/emotion because, on the one hand, it seems to be rather possibly spiteful or malicious even, you know sort of enjoying seeing someone who is more successful than you not getting that promotion, enjoying seeing that effortlessly attractive friend getting dumped, you know whatever whatever that thing is. But at the same time, schadenfreude does link in to some of those things that we value most in our human societies. The thing that stands out most to me is justice. One of the reasons why we feel schadenfreude, often, is because we feel that someone’s getting a kind of deserved comeuppance. It’s only fair that they should suffer in some way. So you know someone shoves past you in the queue at the supermarket and then their credit card is declined, or they steal your parking spot and then bang the front of their car. You know, these little things that kind of give us a little jolt of pleasure in our day. I think we think, well, it’s karma. You know, they deserved it. Maybe next time they won’t be so you know… try to get one over on us and so on. So I think the schadenfreude might seem quite antisocial, but actually often when we think about it more, we can understand that is really connected to you know very cherished ideas about justice and fairness, as well.

Gabe Howard: You brought up the word karma. Is this just karma? Is it something more? And is there an English word for this or is it really just schadenfreude. I’m gonna get it right before the end of the show.

Tiffany Watt Smith: There is no English word for this particular pleasure, although over the centuries people have had a go at trying to invent one. So around the 16th Century, someone tried to introduce “epicaricacy,” but that is a real mouthful and that definitely did not catch on because about a hundred years later, you’ve got people saying oh why don’t we did we have a word for this in English?

Gabe Howard: And I can’t pronounce that word either so I’m glad that one didn’t work.

Tiffany Watt Smith: Yeah, that was a terrible ugly word. It comes from the ancient Greeks for this particular feeling. But certainly many other cultures and languages have a word for this, but you better to ask me to pronounce it, because I definitely can’t. But they are in Danish and in French, the Japanese have a saying, a really wonderful saying, that the misfortunes of others taste like honey. So this idea is around in many different languages, but in English I can only assume that over the centuries we’ve found the idea so distasteful and believe that it’s not us that feel like this but any other people, that we’ve just never quite given this a name.

Gabe Howard: It’s interesting that you said only other people feel this way when we’ve all felt this way. I personally felt this way and I consider myself to be a good person. I know that Vin has felt this way and and I will personally vouch that Vin is a good person. But it is sort of a… like you said, people feel guilt about it. What is up with that? Is it just part of our makeup? Is there a biological need to feel this way? Why… you study emotions; why do we have this?

Tiffany Watt Smith: So there’s lots of different questions there, and just to say upfront I absolutely recognize the guilt and the discomfort around it. And even after having spent a long time writing a book about it, in which I was in the situation where I have to confess my terrible schadenfreude crimes, I still feel a certain amount of awkwardness talking about it. So maybe the question about why we might feel guilty about it we can come back to, but there’s certainly lots of reasons why we might feel this emotion and yes, why we might be primed to feel like this. You know I’ve already mentioned about justice and how important it is actually that we enjoy seeing transgressors get some kind of comeuppance and it’s fairly obvious, I think, to assume that you know those pleasures are have been ingrained in us from a very early stage in our social evolution, because human society depends on justice to run smoothly. So it makes sense that we would enjoy seeing transgressors exposed or embarrassed or punished in some way. Again, I think that makes sense in forms of fairness you know when we sense that someone has perhaps got a bigger slice of the cake than we have, you know someone who’s very wealthy or seems to have all the talent or all the lark or you know… and then we see that person sort of not quite get what they want. You know, perhaps get tripped up in some way, that the enviably good looking person in your school gets a huge spot on the day of the dance, something stupid like that. It gives us a little a feeling of you know that the playing field has been leveled again. Things feel a bit fairer. Again, very important for our society to survive, but also important because you know we find ourselves as humans living in groups constantly comparing ourselves to one another, trying to make sure that we are not falling too far behind, and making sure that we can get a good share of the resources and so on. And so in these kind of small, competitive ways, which are completely normal and natural, even if they don’t always feel very pleasant, then schadenfreude does play an important part, because it’s sort of a little moment of recognition that oh yes this person that we were competing with, you know, slightly fallen behind and that makes us feel a little boost that we might be just about getting ahead. I think that kind of completely normal.

Gabe Howard: So it’s like a boost of confidence that maybe pushes us a little further and allows the gap to shorten a little you know from the “we can’t overcome” to “wait, I see a possibility.”

Tiffany Watt Smith: So the pleasure isn’t simply you know ha ha you’ve fallen flat on your face, it’s also a sense of optimism and potential for us, for our thing that we’re trying to get going. One of the areas I think this is really fascinating with actually is in relation to work, in the workplace, there’s so much schadenfreude in the workplace. Particularly, I think, in relation to those who are our superiors you know, our bosses and so on, and there’s nothing sort of more delightful really than seeing that person who wields power over you. you know. experience some minor embarrassments. because it allows us to kind of feel that you know that that sort of possibly not very nice boss. you know. when they have or experience some sort of mishap, it allows us to kind of see a little chink, little glimpse of possibility where we might sort of steal back a tiny bit of power of our own. Psychologically I think that’s very important.

Vincent M. Wales: So basically what you’re saying is that despite this sounding like a rather spiteful and awful emotion to suffer, we might actually get something positive out of it.

Tiffany Watt Smith: I think of course we do get something positive out of it because it is gives us pleasure and that is hugely important. But yes that positivity may actually sort of extend to thinking about ways in which we form more coherent and stable societies, which I think is the unexpected thing about schadenfreude. I think schadenfreude works in all kinds of other ways too. One of the things that found again and again in the research on this emotion is that it really does help bond groups together, and this isn’t unexpected. I think we’ve all seen this example with rival sports teams. You know schadenfreude is you know taking pleasure in you know the own goal of the other side. That’s one way in which a team can really bond together, it’s not just that you put the other side down, it’s also that you laugh together, you feel pleasure together, laughing together is a very bonding and important experience. Now of course that can go too far and it can have quite unpleasant effects, so we can talk about that perhaps in a bit. But we do see schaudenfreude playing this really important role in cohering groups together. Actually, there’s been some research on laughter that suggests that this may have really been a very important mechanism far far back in the evolutionary past. There was a study done at the University of Oxford by Robin Dunbar who’s an evolutionary psychologist. And he was looking all kinds of laughter, but fell on looking at… a sort of belly laughing, you know when you’re laughing so hard that it actually hurts. And it’s only humans that have this kind of laughter. And he found that people only ever laughed like that in response to slapstick. So people falling over, you know, hitting themselves on the head with buckets and so on. And he found that when people laughed like that, then shortly after they were able to withstand much greater pain than they were beforehand or if they laughed in some other way.

Gabe Howard: So The Three Stooges were saving lives. [laughter]

Tiffany Watt Smith: Well this is what he’s suggesting, he’s saying that perhaps this kind of slapstick entertainment has been part of our you know our cultural heritage for a really really long time. And when our distant ancestors were all laughing together around a fire at someone, you know, pretending to get hit on the toe with a hammer, that actually that laughter was important not just because it bonded people into those groups that were crucial for survival, but also because it allowed people to cope in very hostile and dangerous environments where there was a lot of pain. I thought it was really intriguing.

Gabe Howard: We’ll see you in about 30 seconds after these messages from our sponsor.

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Vincent M. Wales: Welcome back, everyone. We’re here with Dr. Tiffany Watt Smith discussing schadenfreude.

Gabe Howard: I think that comedians for a long time, and even myself, I’m not a comedian, but I do public speaking, and I know that if I make fun of myself, then the audience is more likely to laugh and there’s comedians that have made their whole careers about talking about how they’re bad friends bad, you know, they’re ugly or they’re fat or they’re worthless or they’re pointless or, you know, this self-deprecating humor is just very common in our society. Is that an example of schadenfreuden? Nope… still got it wrong.

Tiffany Watt Smith: I think that that is really one of the most neglected forms of schadenfreude in that when people write about schaudenfreude, they really don’t often talk about this particular phenomenon. And I think this is an example of how we use schadenfreude all the time. I mean, if you start a new job, you know you’ll go into that office or that new group of people and you will tell a self-deprecating story of some terrible disaster that happened to you on the way to work. You know, you do it not just to entertain people, but so that you are seen as less of a threat. You know, that the kind of person who is coming into a new group or is the outsider always seems like a threatening person. So those kind of stories allow people to laugh at you and laugh with you, laugh at your expense, I suppose. And that’s, you know is a way of being accepted into the group as much as it is a way of giving everyone else pleasure. And as you say, you know it’s an absolute staple of standup comedy. Standup comics know that people enjoy hearing about the suffering of other people. And standup gives them a license to enjoy it, I think.

Gabe Howard: And schadenfreude is also an example of the millionaire with the tax problem or the very tall person who bangs his head on the doorway and things like that. These are all little examples of where they have something very desirable, but that desirable thing also has a negative. So maybe it’s like every silver lining has a cloud? Or am I oversimplifying or undersimplifying?

Tiffany Watt Smith: I think one of the things that I found when I was trying to tackle writing this book was that you know this is a very complex emotion. You know there are some emotions which feel like quite simple to think about because it’s a trigger and a response. And it’s kind of one thing you know, scary bear you know your heart rate races and you and you run away. Schadenfreude isn’t quite like that kind of emotion. It’s what psychologists call the cognitive emotion. So a cognitive emotion means that it is involved with appraising and judging a situation and doing all kinds of sort of very fast mental calculations to work out whether someone really deserves it whether it’s really funny or whether in fact this person needs our help, whether they really injured themselves or whether they’ve just sort of suffered some minor embarrassment. Yes, all of these complicated things are going on when we experience schadenfreude. And we experience it in relation to a kind of vast range of different sorts of phenomena or in a vast range of different kind of situations. So sometimes it can be as simple as someone slipping on a banana skin or the Three Stooges. And sometimes it’s to do with you know that seeing someone who we think has behaved really unfairly being called out or lambasted in the media. And yeah and sometimes it is these situations where we feel, you know we almost tell ourselves that, you know there’s a highly desirable trait, you know being very tall, being very glamorous. I don’t know, being very clever or being able to speak twelve languages, you know has in fact got its downside. And this is part of a little trick we will play on ourselves and I’m sure we all do it. You know, a way of just making life’s inevitable unfairnesses that little bit more palatable. It’s not just us that experience difficulty, failure, embarrassment. You know everyone does. And I think that’s what we want to remind ourselves of that, continually.

Vincent M. Wales: I don’t think it should be any surprise to anyone that the schadenfreude is a complex emotion because most emotions are. You think about all the different forms of love that we have. The Greeks had several different names for the different types. So it stands to reason that that this would be in the same category, right?

Tiffany Watt Smith: My last book, The Book of Human Emotions, and I did a TED talk about this as well, makes exactly this argument that it doesn’t really make sense to distinguish between very simple emotions and complex or cognitive emotions because actually all emotions have this very powerful cognitive element and in fact you know even something as simple as apparently simple as fear has a hugely rich history and changes so much across different cultures that actually fear emerges as a very complicated emotion that seems to have very different kind of physical and experiential responses when we feel it. So, yeah, thanks for pulling me up on that because actually, you know I want to make the point that schadenfreude is perhaps more of an appraisal or a judgment-based emotion than some others. But as you say, you know all emotions have this richness and complexity.

Gabe Howard: Now Vince and I are based here in America and I know you live in London, so this might be somewhat of a difficult question to answer just because, you know the different cultures, but we both have the Internet. And when somebody falls down or gets hurt or something bad happens, that video or message will will go viral pretty easily, whereas when somebody does something well or something good, it doesn’t get seen as much and you know, in America we have a lot of unrest as far as you know political parties and race and even you know gender and sexuality. Are we living in the age of schadenfreude? Are we just excited when bad things happen to people that we have dubbed our enemies? And I know that’s a big big question. But it seems like we’re almost searching out for bad things to happen to people. And you know with with Facebook and the Internet it’s easier and easier to find.

Tiffany Watt Smith: Yeah, I mean this phrase “an age of schadenfreude” was again was one of the reasons why I became interested in this topic, because you know when you’re a historian of emotions, you know this kind of phrase you know we’re living in an age of blah blah blah emotion is very tantalizing, you know, what is it about this emotion that makes people feel like it really defines the spirit of their time? And you certainly get over the centuries people saying well you know how in the 18th Century you were living in an age of sympathy. The 19th Century living in an age of boredom. In the early 20th Century, we’re living in an age of anxiety. Anyway now we are living in an age of schadenfreude. I think I do absolutely recognize what you’re describing, which is that sort of apparently insatiable hunger for the spectacle of failure. You know, whether that is or particularly, I think, if that is a politician. But certainly anyone in our sort of disliked you know enemy camp, as it were, and we see that person mess up in some way, there’s a kind of celebration. And celebration seems to be more public than it ever has been. I think there’s two important things to think about. I mean one is obviously that schadenfreude has always been with us. But it is a lot more visible now than it used to be because of the Internet, because of the ways in which we can demonstrate and register our pleasure in likes and shares you know thumbs up and so on. And you know that that would never have been that would just wouldn’t have been possible in the same way, you know even 30 years ago. So in a sense schadenfreude is much more visible than it used to be. But there’s also something about the way in which the Internet works that I think possibly exacerbates our schadenfreude. As I said we’ve spent a lot of schadenfreude when we feel or perceive that someone’s misfortune or mishap is deserved in some way. Now if you spent 10 minutes wandering around your local streets, you’re probably not going to encounter many situations that outrage you. And many examples of terrible injustice being carried out. But if you spend 10 minutes wandering around the internet, you are going to see lots of injustice coming at you. Whether that’s looking at the news, whether that’s looking at even at your local Facebook group with everyone complaining about that slighting or the person who doesn’t pick up their dog poo or whatever it is. You know, so there’s all sorts of unfairnesses and outrage being prompted online. But also it’s much easier for us to register our disapproval, to tell someone off, and to enjoy the spectacle of someone being told off when they’re online than it is in our face to face interactions. Because of course you know if you see someone on the street doing something wrong, you’re unlikely to march up to that person and tell them off and you’re certainly not going to stand there and point and laugh at them if someone else tells them off, because you know you might get punched or, you know you might risk some other kind of social embarrassment. But you know when we’re online, you know we’re completely protected from that. And there’s very little risk in calling someone out and enjoying it. So I think that the Internet I think makes schadenfreude a much more visible. But it also I think creates an environment where we can really let our schadenfreude rip and that is something that I think is really important for us to be aware of. And that’s why I think this emotion is very interesting for us to think about now, and because as you say schadenfreude becomes hugely powerful when we are divided into enemy camps and, you know when we’re we’re in rivalries and these rival groups are set against each other. You know, study after study shows that schadenfreude is very powerful when we’re in groups and very powerful when we’re rivals. And so it’s a very you know it’s a powerful combination of things you know very strong divisions, for example politically as there are here in the UK at the moment certainly. And then also this platform, online platforms, that make it very easy to share and enjoy our glee at the other side’s misfortune. So that was a very long answer to that question. I mean there is another reason why I think that the age of schadenfreude might have caught our attention at moments, and it might be that we’re feeling… I think we are feeling more schadenfreude than before. And I think it’s definitely more visible. But we’re also more anxious about schadenfreude, I think, for the last hundred years there’s really no articles published with the word schadenfreude in the title. But since about the year 2000, there’ve been hundreds published. So there’s a sudden influx of interest amongst psychologists and philosophers and social scientists and so on about schadenfreude. And this real interest comes off the back of you know the surge of interest from the 1990s onwards in empathy. So schadenfreude in this context is presented as the opposite of empathy or the failure of empathy, empathy’s shadow… And so this is a sense why people got quite anxious and worried about schadenfreude. But since empathy is so desirable, what does schadenfreude tell us about ourselves? Now I personally think this opposition between schadenfreude and empathy is problematic and doesn’t quite work. But nonetheless this is one of the reasons why we’ve got so interested in schadenfreude today.

Vincent M. Wales: Well I had a question that you already answered…

Gabe Howard: That’s how good you are!

Vincent M. Wales: Yeah I was going to bring up compassion and empathy and you’ve already touched on that, so great.

Gabe Howard: We really appreciate it.

Vincent M. Wales: And we are probably about out of time, too.

Tiffany Watt Smith: Okay. Oh sorry I just rattled on.

Gabe Howard: No please don’t apologize, it’s fantastic. Thank you so much. We learned so much. I saw a Broadway musical, Avenue Q, where they had a song that had schadenfreude in it and it was you know funny, obviously they explain it for the purpose of humor, not for education. So we’re very excited to have you on this to lend to it because it’s a very popular musical here in the States so I imagine a lot of people have some little bit of information about schadenfreude but not as much as you just gave us. So we really appreciate it. How do we find you? What’s your website, book?

Tiffany Watt Smith: I have a university website so if you just Google my name that will come up. I’m on Twitter.

Gabe Howard: What’s your Twitter handle?

Tiffany Watt Smith: DoctorTiffWattSmith.

Gabe Howard: Beautiful beautiful. And of course your book, is it available on Amazon, where fine books are sold?

Tiffany Watt Smith: I’m sure it’s available anywhere where fine books are sold.

Gabe Howard: Excellent. And you have the two books, what are the name of the two books?

Tiffany Watt Smith: So there The Book of Human Emotions and this one is called Schadenfreude: The Joy of Another’s Misfortune.

Gabe Howard: Wonderful, thank you so much for being here, we really enjoyed having you.

Vincent M. Wales: Yes we did.

Tiffany Watt Smith: Thanks for having me. It’s great to talk to you.

Gabe Howard: You’re very welcome and thank you everybody else for tuning in and remember, you can get one week of free, convenient, affordable, private, online counselling anytime, anywhere by visiting betterhelp.com/PsychCentral. We’ll see everybody next week.

Narrator 1: Thank you for listening to the Psych Central Show. Please rate, review, and subscribe on iTunes or wherever you found this podcast. We encourage you to share our show on social media and with friends and family. Previous episodes can be found at PsychCentral.com/show. PsychCentral.com is the internet’s oldest and largest independent mental health website. Psych Central is overseen by Dr. John Grohol, a mental health expert and one of the pioneering leaders in online mental health. Our host, Gabe Howard, is an award-winning writer and speaker who travels nationally. You can find more information on Gabe at GabeHoward.com. Our co-host, Vincent M. Wales, is a trained suicide prevention crisis counselor and author of several award-winning speculative fiction novels. You can learn more about Vincent at VincentMWales.com. If you have feedback about the show, please email [email protected].

About The Psych Central Show Podcast Hosts

Gabe Howard is an award-winning writer and speaker who lives with bipolar and anxiety disorders. He is also one of the co-hosts of the popular show, A Bipolar, a Schizophrenic, and a Podcast. As a speaker, he travels nationally and is available to make your event stand out. To work with Gabe, please visit his website, gabehoward.com.

Vincent M. Wales is a former suicide prevention counselor who lives with persistent depressive disorder. He is also the author of several award-winning novels and creator of the costumed hero, Dynamistress. Visit his websites at www.vincentmwales.com and www.dynamistress.com.

from World of Psychology https://psychcentral.com/blog/podcast-what-is-schadenfreude/

#World of Psychology

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jerron-jrb-blog · 7 years ago

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How has media shape who you are today?

Discuss what it means to say that an identity is “socially constructed.” How do media technologies and content play a role in this construction?

To answer this question we have to understand a couple of terms. Media, and few terms from the the seven models, such as socio-cultural, Cybernetic and Phenomenological. It is really important not to say that identity and personality are the same, they may share some similarities but our personality actually come from our identity. First media is/are the modes of storage and delivery of a shared meaning. Which at its core is the exchange meaning or information, to communicate by sending and receiving information.

Socio-cultural is a when people or a groupe communicate to either to replicate, reinforce or even challenge the social order. This model questions the traditions, value and roles in a community. One could say that this is the foundation when talking about identity being socially constructed. An example of that was the civil rights movement, the beginning of the feminist movement. Chapter 1 of the Devereaux readings states “globalization, technological change and the restructuring of media ownership underscoring many of the questions that have been asked about the media as...raising new kinds of issues for all of us our roles…”. Cybernetic is another tradition of communication that media analyst look at to see what influences and restrains the flow of new information. This can construct or destruct a person's morals how they act around people, if they have access to technology to get new information. Phenomenological is very important because it is how we communicate using our senses. This doesn't mean only our five senses but how we feel on the inside also. An example of that is the sense of security, or depression, anxiety. When it comes to social construction we can use phenomenology when talking to someone who when through a traumatic experience. Now when we say an Identity is socially constructed and how media technologies and content help shape that identity we need to look at the (1) who is the viewer and audience; (2) who is producing or who is the messenger and (3) what is the context of this message.In late September during a out lecture we touched briefly about how ads use gender and sexuality when it comes to selling a product when analyzing the GAP photo. I am a black man, I have been socially constructed to fail and end up in the prison system because of I lived in low income neighborhood and am from the lower class. I also should be afraid of the law enforcement because most large black males are up to no good. To fight against this I am disgustingly happy and I am really respectful and I don’t want to be perceived as a thug or hooligan. I kept face; according to communication theorist, face or facework is what a person does in certain situations so people won’t think that person is a bad person. Everyone has face and every one gives face. An example of a person giving face in a stressful situation is James Bond. Bullets flying, high speed chases, winning at a casino card games...through all of that he has a stoic look on his face. We can look at society and how the raise young boys in masculinity. Being told “boys don’t cry” or “man up!” In a documentary the The Mask You Live In it talks about the toxicity of masculinity in society and how it is literally killing boys because boys are not taught to express their emotions because being the worst thing a man can be view as is weak. This is true for all types of communication and with that we can look at how identity is constructed by society. Sturken and Cartwright said Analyzing images and built spaces according to what we believe to be the intentions of their produces”(54) But it is important to remember that in this giant world we live in, their are a lot of sub cultures and societies/ communities that identities in those respective areas are being constructed differently.

2. How is your identity constructed through commodities? What commodities make up your commodity self? (Hint: nearly ALL media content/technologies could be considered commodities)

We have to look at the all powerful media and ask ourselves as we start to analyze and break down my identity we need to see what makes it up and look how it shaped my habits, behavior. The foundation of my identity is that I am a 23 year old, black male. Now we are going to look at what other things make up my identity I come from midwest of the United States and reside most of my time while not at school in central Wisconsin but southeast Wisconsin and come from a family of seven. My parents are married and have been for 29 years and both went to college. My parents taught me to be strong but patient, kind but firm. I would also say I am a product of the 90’s. Now looking at these few things let us look and analyze the information from above.

I am a 23 year old black male. Looking at this we can see that I am of college age but it might not have been easy. Living in America I have easy access to different technology. Also I was a product of the 1990s in america so I watch a lot of pokemon, along with Disney’s Recess, Nickelodeon, Cartoon Network, Disney Channel, Adult Swim, Black Entertainment Television(BET), MTV and the content I got while watching these program is to be yourself and have fun and enjoy life while you can. That is a huge reason I act the way I cat today. Because of the shows I watched as a kid I am who I am today. Those shows taught me that it is important to be kind to everyone even when it's an enemy. Also to don’t take life too seriously if I do am I really living so I live each day with a “I don’t give a fuck” attitude. Looking at that I’m a black male in America we can look at the news media on their content and how it shaped my identity.

When I was younger I thought that I was suppose to be loud, rude, illiterate, thuggish and end up in jail. But also look at the the same television network from above and some of the shows they had also shaped my identity. The Cosby show was about how a black family, that reminded me of my own family, looked and acted. I related with that because My mother is the real life Claire Huxtable and also that you don’t have to believe everything that came on the news.

Continuing with my identity I am from the midwest of the United States and from Wisconsin. My middle school was a pilot school to see what education would look like if every student had a laptop and some of the questions asked in my hometown were “how are they going to learn with computers?’, ‘it's just going to be a distraction.’ ‘they should stick to paper and pencil.’”. But when I asked my dad about the idea of every student he thought it was an excellent idea. He then told me when he was in high school and college he wished he would have taken those intro to keyboarding and computers seriously because his job requires that he know how to use a computer. Looking back at his experience I can proudly say that I learned a lot from doing homework online and and it honestly got me ready for high school and college. Understand how my commodity self came to be. But also we should look at the people behind it see who their audience was/is. Another commodity that has helped shaped my identity was the bible. I am a son of a pastor and that was a big part of who I was as a person but when I got to high school and started acting in plays that really changed me. Being in a theatre major for awhile. I learned a lot about how theatre (according to theatre historians) was the first type of media and how theatre really reinforced the focus or idea of the media is to inform society about itself. So Theatre and reading the bible are the two biggest influences and made me who I am today.

3.Pick one of these commodities and analyze how it is advertised. What sort of ideological/discursive framing is being employed?

Society is so vast and one does not have the funds to research and study society as a whole. But we can look at smaller groups and how they communicate with people when it comes to selling their product. I will be talking about the effects media has on a smaller scale. “Audience research puts human experience at the centre of our enquiry”(Stokes 174). In class we talked about ideology and disclosure and I want to focus on both, but for now let us look at ideology or institute.

Ideology is way society governs itself and perpetuate modes of behavior and acceptance and interaction. We are going to how companies use it to advertise. Now defined by in our Sturken and Cartwright Ch7 reading “Advertisements present an abstract world, often a fantastic one, that is not situated in present but the imagined future”(265). The institute of advertising know that most customers are smarter than they look but some if not all ads usually use art, culture jams and other forms of entertainment. Even when it comes to representation of gender and sexuality in advertisements.

The two photos above are current ads for women athletes that show how to be a top athlete. On the left you have a nike ad and in the add we can see a women running with headphones and with text saying “Ladies first, men second” now the more important text is on the bottom “Join the Men vs Women Challenge ”This is an institute that has been around since the beginning of the feminist movement, whose is better boys or girls? The discourse comes in when someone reads the nike ad and automatically think boys. One of the first things I learned about media is that the job of the media is to inform society about itself. And I feel that the media above is a great to stir conversation.

The ad on the right is about female empowerment. A female soccer player doing some footwork and the text says “I Kick balls. Deal with it”. The ideology is being challenged because of what the text is saying. It showing the women are more than housewives or a cute, quiet doll playing girls. It shows that women know how to play sports and are not going to stand to be told what they can and cannot due. and behind this is about Not if boys are better than girls but can men and female athletes be equal.

Chapter 2 of Sturken and Cartwright tells us how viewers make meaning. They say that production of meaning “involves at least three elements besides the image itself and its producer: (1) the codes and conventions that structure the image and that cannot be separated from the content of the image; (2) the viewers and how they interpret or experience the image; and (3) the contexts in which an image is exhibited and viewed.”(49).

Work Cited

Alex Ingersoll - Communication 106 Lectures

Devereux, E. (2014). Understanding the media (3rd ed.). London: Sage

Mark Tolstedt - Communication 107 Lectures.

Stokes, Jane. How to Do Media and Cultural Studies. SAGE Publications LTD,2009. Print

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salutethepig · 7 years ago

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No fidget-ing at the back; or the Huntingdon (fitchett) Pie

Why am I writing about a mere pie you may ask? OK, for any number of good reasons (foremost of which of course is: “it’s a PIE, stupid, what’s not to like?”) but really there are two main ones:

It’s a great traditional dish made with pork & apple that’s been produced in and around Huntingdon and dates back hundreds of years &

It used to be made with bacon taken from the Huntingdon Black Hog, now sadly extinct. A local pig, dear to my heart, especially as it was so similar to my beloved Berkshires.

It’s such an important specimen (the pie that is, obviously; sadly the pig isn’t with us anymore) of the history of the food in this country, that the very wonderful Slow Food UK movement have added it to their Ark of Taste programme as a prime example of one of now nearly 100 or so English products, felt to be under threat of either disappearing completely or being changed beyond recognition (i.e. read “cheapened”).

The Berkshire (along with the British Lop, Gloucester Old Spot, Tamworth and other rare pig breeds) is also in there, right next to our regional cheeses, ancient fruits, endangered sheep and traditional fish, all coming under a heading we could and should call “best of British“. Do you see a theme emerging here?

So, back to the Fidget (“fitchett” is an alternative spelling, as one suggestion for the derivation of the name is that it was originally ‘fitched’ or five-sided in shape; however, reading Stefan’s Florilegium also suggests the origin could indeed be fitchett, a slang word for ‘apple’), whilst local Cambs. food historian Alison Sloan said:

“One of the most popular theories is that it was named because the ingredients move around, or fidget, while it is cooking, but there are almost half a dozen other ideas.”

However you choose to pronounce this beauty, with pork and apples cooked inside a golden-brown short crust pie, what’s not to like about it? And along with onions and cider, that’s the basis for this deceptively simple dish.

[NOTE: some recipes also throw in potato — but that’s some horrible aberration ‘straight outta Shropshire’, so will be ignored here and henceforth by all right thinking people].

Sloan went on to say:

“We were quite late in using potatoes as our staple food in Cambridgeshire, and relied a lot on wheat and pastry. Therefore, pies were very popular – especially as there were a lot of apple orchards. Another local favourite was eel pie. People would not have eaten a lot of meat, so fish was very important. Eels would have been caught in the ditches around the Fens, along with herring.”

Back in 2007, a Grauniad journalist ¹ tried to find a Huntingdon Fidget Pie he could sample whilst on a family visit to the town; with a singular lack of success. Things haven’t improved any in the 10 years since then. Still no one is offering them in the town. Not one place.

These majestic pies — that were once produced here and all over the Midlands and described memorably as “meals on wheels for working men” ¹ — are the hyper-local equivalent of (amongst others) the bulging Cornish pasty…

…or those packed hot pies coming from Lancashire…

..but unlike these other two, you’re hard pressed to find them being made anywhere now, even (especially!) in their home-town — and that’s a crying shame.

So, to redress this balance I intend making these regularly. And with Berkshire bacon as I can’t get the pork from a genuine Huntingdon Hog. There are a number of recipes floating around the web now but this is the one I’m slowly fine-tuning. This will probably serve four (small) people. Although I’m not sure that’s the correct numbers — “your mileage may vary” — so you may want to scale up the numbers below …

The loud — and increasingly self-parodying — Gordon Ramsay’s recipe is pretty much word for word, exactly the same as mine, so I’m not linking to it. I’m not saying “disgusting, typical bullying plagiarism” here. Not exactly, but…

The Hairy Bikers (for whom I have a warm place in my heart, alongside the Two Fat Ladies & Keith Floyd), unfortunately use potato, so in this instance, their recipe in turn is sent back to the depths of Hades. Although I may try their use of a small touch of nutmeg at some point.

No, THIS one is canonical. Art least for the moment.

INGREDIENTS:

100 g (4 oz) unsalted butter, cubed

250 g (9 oz) plain strong flour

1tsp fresh thyme

1tsp brown sugar

salt and milled pepper

225 g (8 oz) back bacon, rind off, roughly chopped

1 medium onion, skinned and roughly chopped

225 g (8 oz) mixed cooking & eating apples, peeled, cored, roughly chopped

15 ml (1 tbsp) chopped fresh parsley

150 ml (1/4 pint) dry cider

1tsp corn flour

1 large egg yolk, beaten, for the glaze.

PREPARATION:

We’ll start off with the pastry: sift 225 g (8 oz) of the flour and a pinch of salt into a bowl and add the thyme. Rub the butter in gently, until the mixture looks like breadcrumbs, then add just sufficient cold water to mix to take it to a firm dough. Ball up the dough, knead lightly then cover the bowl in clingfilm and put it in the fridge for 30 minutes.

Meanwhile, cook off the bacon and onions in a little pork fat until the former starts to crisp and the latter to go translucent. Combine the two, tossing in the corn-flour. In the pan juices left finally brown off the apples and then decant all three items into a 568 ml (1 pint) pie dish. Add the parsley & brown sugar and season to taste with salt & ground pepper.

Take the remaining flour and slowly add the cider, a little at a time, until it’s a runny paste; pour this into the pie dish.

Roll out the pastry until it’s approx. the depth of a £1 coin. Cut off a thin strip long enough to go around the rim of the pie dish. Moisten the dish rim with water and place this strip onto the rim, pressing down lightly all the way round.

Roll out the pastry again until it’s a circle approx. 1/2″ wider than the dish diameter

Now moisten the strip of pastry, place the pastry circle on top and press firmly to seal. Knock up and flute the edge using a fork.

Make a diagonal cross in the centre almost to the very edge of the dish and fold the pastry back to reveal the filling. Chill it all in the fridge again for 30 minutes.

Take out and brush the pastry all over with the egg. Bake at 190ºC (375°F) gas Mark 5, for about 45 minutes or until the pastry is deep golden and the filling is cooked.

And this is the result. Well, one of them. In this version from today, I’ve used diced pork loin rather than bacon, to ring the changes and experiment. Hey, no carping criticisms eh? My town, my recipe(s), MY frickin’ pie.

It’s perfect straight from the oven along with a green vegetable — I’d suggest a purple sprouting broccoli or some curly kale or you can let it chill and then match it with a salad & a sharp pickle.

† interestingly, there’s a Fitchett mentioned in connection with the eponymous town of Huntingdon, VA. Nothing to do with pigs or pies but still, one of those nuggets of useless information (in this case about Cherrystone oysters), that you’ll thank me for one day. You’r …

Doran S. Callahan Collection, Eastern Shore Public Library Accomac, Va. 1900

References:

Fort, Matthew. “Start fidgeting”. The Guardian, 17 November 2007

No fidget-ing at the back; or the Huntingdon (fitchett) Pie was originally published on Salute The Pig

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museemagazine · 8 years ago

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Woman Crush Wednesday: Heide Hatry

Interview by Hallie Neely

What made you decide to create this project?

I have to say that, first, I didn't conceive the project as art. It began as the totally unanticipated way that I came to terms with death and with grief in my own life, and when I realized what potential it had and that I could share that, I was happy in the same way I am to share my art, but I on;y came to look at it more generally and to configure it as an art idea, and as an art idea that has taken profound dimensions, in some way radically questioning the nature of our relationship to the art-work, while returning to what might be seen as a primordial feeling for both matter, in the most basic sense, and for the image as an essentially social, while deeply emotional artifact, as a result of my own painful experience.

When my father died 25 years ago, in what seemed to me at the time to have been suicide, I was devastated, and it took me quite a long time even to be able to think about him without breaking down crying. Then, in 2008, one of my closest friends committed suicide. I couldn't believe that I hadn't been aware that he was feeling so despondent that he could do that, and not only was I inconsolable, but all of the unresolved pain of my father's death also came back to the surface. I felt paralyzed with grief.

In Germany, the ashes of a cremated person must be buried, so I had never encountered the practice of preserving, or sometimes scattering, the ashes of deceased loved ones before I came to America, and it was, by chance, only a few weeks before my friend died that I had been allowed to look into an urn that contained the ashes of a friend's deceased wife. That experience touched me deeply, and maybe because of it I had the sudden idea that I needed to make portraits out of my friend's and my father's ashes. Probably that says something about my deeper motivations as an artist, that I think that death can be conquered by art, or that it can heal the worst emotional pain, but the fact is that even as the idea came to me, in a sort of revelation, I already started to feel a calm arise within me. Over the several months it took to figure out a method of using ashes to make their portraits (as I implied, I didn't have access to their actual ashes, so I was using a substitute, as I tried to discover a technique that would work) I engaged in an almost constant dialogue with them, often out loud, and even crying or yelling. By the time I had made their portraits, not only was my grief dispelled, but I felt like they were somehow there with me, that there was a presence that goes way beyond the power of art when I was with them. It reminded me of the relics of saints in the Catholic church or the humble glow of an Icon, which is often so much more powerful than even great works of religious art because believers know that it has been blessed and that they are being protected by the saint it depicts.

Being an artist, I naturally thought that the effect was caused by the, in this case very lengthy, process of making the portraits, but when a friend, whose mother had died when he was still rather young and with whom he felt he had a totally unresolved relationship, one that was cut short before they could know each other in the way he wanted, asked if I would make a portrait for him as well - with her actual ashes - I discovered that he had the same almost preternatural experience, both of the presence of his mother, and of an indescribable calm and consolation. That's when I thought that this was a comfort that I could offer to others as well. And it turned out that I knew quite a lot of people who had ashes of loved ones that they felt were almost a burden, or were being disrespected, or shunted aside, by simply being stored in an urn or a box, and over a number of years I made portraits for some of them as gifts, always finding that their relationship to their beloved changed or was enriched in a range of interested ways just by having this renewed contact with what they knew was the physical residue of the actual person they had loved.

How do you choose the people you want to create portraits for? Do you people come to you to request these pieces?

I didn't really choose the particular subjects, except to the extent that I was speaking to friends or people I learned had suffered a loss and telling them about my experience and that of others for whom I had made portraits, but it does strike me that in a world in which many more people are being cremated than ever before, we are more often in the company of what remains of our beloved long after the immediate exigency of attending to the body or even of coping with the pain and grief that frequently renders reflection impossible and which has typically dictated that we simply adopt common social practices without examining them, has subsided. So I think that in some way my discovery happens to suit the times, even as it obviously reflects a long cultural and perhaps even primordially human tradition. In fact the great art historian Hans Belting, among others, thinks that the origins of portraiture had exactly the purpose that my project envisions - to keep the dead among us and clear our minds, in some way still in relationship to the kinship group, even exerting a force among us with their presence. For me, such a process seems clearly better than hiding the dead away in an urn or spreading them to the winds. Memory is always better than forgetting: it is the basis of everything important that is human.

More pertinently, though, a lot of people feel something like despair when the people they loved die, as if a part of them has died, too, or that they have suffered a horrible trauma. Knowing that the person is actually right there in front of you, as if seeing you as you look at him or her, has a powerful effect. The friends for whom I made a portrait all told me that they also sometimes talk to their beloved one, just as I do with my father and my friend.

Of course, a lot of the people for whom I made the first portraits are artists or people for whom art is an important thing in their lives, so for them the visual impact of the work is also very powerful, and they are used to having a deeper relationship to images than to something that is simply functional or decorative, and they also tend to hate waste, I mean to hate to incorporate objects in their lives that don’t express some sort of meaning. In addition, the people who typically want this are people who had a profound and deeply loving relationship to the departed, and they feel this as an act of reverence to them and a memorialization of their relationship and their love. They don’t ever want to forget them.

Still, it’s not something everyone would want, and plenty of people find it an uncomfortable prospect even if their relationship to the deceased was not fraught or problematic. That said, there are also people who have found it compelling in spite of their deep qualms about using the ashes of people they loved. One of the people whose husband’s portrait is included in the exhibition always tells me that while she is horrified by the project, she has also felt healed by it, and I really admire her for engaging these complex feelings. But so far, most people who see the work find it invigorating or recognize the obvious respect that animates it than find it frightening or creepy. I sense a turn in the general rejection or fear of death that has characterized our modern relationship to it. Look at all of the books that have been published about death in the last decade, an astonishing number, and groups, like reading groups, that get together to discuss aspects of death, the so-called “death cafes,” or even programs that discuss death with children in schools. And I think this is a great way to help bring that suppressed curiosity, or “socially inappropriate” but totally natural and healthy fascination into the open, and into normal life, again, after a very long and counter-productive period of repression.

Has this project made you more interested in death as an art form?

I’m not sure I know quite what you mean by “death as an art form,” although it certainly sounds evocative – De Quincy’s Murder Considered as one of the Fine Arts or Stevenson’s “The Suicide Club” spring to mind – but I have very much worked with death during the 8 years I’ve been engaged in this project, and I’ve learned a lot, for example, that we all have to die – including me. Of course I knew that before, but there is a huge difference between “knowing” and actually being aware of it. And I think this difference is what makes death such a huge taboo, especially for people in the US and other “civilized” countries. To really understand that we have a few years on this planet and that then everything will be totally over is just too painful for most of us, and since death is unavoidable, it seems to be easier, and maybe more practical, to avoid thinking about at it. Personally, I’m trying to cope with that pain, to get used to it like to a chronic condition and use it to remind myself of how beautiful life is and to want to live it to the fullest.

One of the not necessarily empty platitudes about art holds that it is all about death, even that it owes its existence to the fact of death, much as the philosopher, Jacques Derrida, could contend that “all of his writing was about death.” And the Buddha, among many others since, quasi-paradoxically opined that the meaning of life is death. In some ways, it is more difficult not to be interested in death, even without trying than it is to be free of the thought of it. Since, however, in a way that cannot easily be said of much other art, the very substance of Icons in Ash is death, and in some respect I see myself as speaking for death, or rather letting it speak on its own account, giving it a voice uncolored by the civilized history of art or thought, I am profoundly and very personally attuned to this empty and very impersonal “thing.” I think that much of the quiet force of Icons in Ash comes from the fact that we feel the void even as we know we are looking at someone we once knew and perhaps loved. Death has the human face it has been missing for such a long time.

Can you talk a bit about your process, about your workflow in creating each piece from start to finish?

I use three different techniques to make my ash portraits, all of which took a lot of trial and error to perfect – in my many experiments I generally used animal ashes from cremated pets that hadn’t been claimed by their owners. The first, and the one I’ve spent the most time both developing and practicing, is essentially a mosaic technique, which requires individually placing thousands and thousands of discrete particles onto a bed of wax to create the likeness, working from black-and-white photographs that the family or friends have chosen for the portrait. The obvious difference from the mosaics you might know, say the famous ones in Ravenna, is that my fragments are not really visible as individual “stones,” but are tiny particles, like dust or pigment that create a subtle dimensionality when they’ve been arrayed on the wax.

Because the ashes are pure bones and therefore of only one color, I also use white marble dust (as a symbol of death) and black birch coal (as a symbol of life) to get a palette ranging over different shades of grey. This is, as you might imagine, an extremely painstaking method, and I am hunched over the work sometimes for weeks, applying these microscopic fragments with the tip of a scalpel. It is like reconstructing a broken image, which is in fact where the word “mosaic” comes from – Moses piecing back together the tablets of the Ten Commandments that he had shattered in anger.

I also use a more painterly, but still methodical and highly repetitive, or meditative, technique, in which I draw many layers of very diluted ink onto either an emulsion of ashes and binder, or on a surface of pure ashes. These look almost like photographs, but have a much deeper and textured feeling because of the layering of the drawings.

And, finally, because I realized that so many people who would like to have such a portrait can’t afford an image that is so time-consuming to create, I developed a photographic technique in which I can recreate a photo on a surface of pure ashes or, again, on a surface bearing an emulsion of ashes and binder.

The portraits I have made so far are always approximately life-size, which I think supports the feeling that the person is actually there, and I recess them in a shadow box, which gives a sense of deeper dimensionality, as well as a distance that I think subtly reflects the changed state of the subjects’ existence, as well as of our relationship to them.

This is a conversation with the deceased - an homage to their legacy. These are their very ashes made into a portrait of themselves. How did it feel to start using ashes of people you didn't know to create such long-lasting pieces for their loved ones and for yourself?

I like how you put it: “a conversation with the deceased.” That’s exactly what it is, and an homage to their memory!

When I started to develop this as an art idea, I had strong and strange feelings to touch the ashes of human beings, but I suppose that uppermost among them was the feeling that this substance was something precious and that, unlike almost every other action one might take as an artist, I had to be extremely careful and specifically about the material itself.

But the far more disturbing aspect of the matter as I began offering to make portraits for others was the idea that I, as a German artist, making something out of human ashes, would involuntarily and almost inevitably conjure thoughts of the Nazi atrocities for many viewers. I was so troubled by that possibility that I had to give up the whole project for several years, not seeing how it wouldn’t cause pain or anger rather than the solace that I intended. It was only after I researched specifically what the Nazis actually did and what they intended that I could resume it, because I knew that my purpose was exactly the opposite of theirs: where they wanted to obliterate a whole people and make it as though they had never existed, to destroy them, and eliminate every trace of them, I am remembering, preserving, honoring, and making present what is lost to us. To me, this is an act of reverence.

Of course it’s still strange to work with a human being’s ashes, and sometimes I have a very hard time to continue working and need a break – that actually happens more often when I am working on somebody I knew – just because it is so intense to be aware of what I am doing. On the other hand it is a pure labor of love and I am rather trying to think about putting the bone particles back together, animating, in a way, a person who has died, than thinking that this is a dead person. There is simultaneously a frustration and an ecstasy in this practice, which I think exemplifies the frustration and the ecstasy that has always characterized art: we are desperate to make whole what can never be whole, to make sense of what never makes sense in actual life. This is where art is at once a greater truth than life, and an inevitable, if inadvertent, lie that has always excited a certain distrust among the practical and the earnest. I believe, however, that this seemingly irresolvable tension or aporia is a consequence of the denial of death to which most civilization has been so fervently devoted from time immemorial, and in Icons in Ash, by materially putting the fact of death before us in its simplicity and its specificity, we can begin to strike an understanding that neither diminishes nor overreaches its subject.

WCW QUESTIONNAIRE

Describe your creative process in one word.

Love

If you could teach a one, one-hour class on anything, what would it be?

How to follow your dreams

What is the last book you read or film you saw that inspired you?

I am usually inspired by nature or art exhibitions, but the last book that inspired me was what I am reading right now: Death: An Interdisciplinary Analyses by Warren Shibles (Language Press, Whitewater, Wisconsin, 1974)

What is the most played song in your music library?

Black Star by David Bowie, sung by Amanda Palmer and Anna Calvi

How do you take your coffee?

Lots of steamed and frothed almond milk with a few drops of espresso

Heide has a solo show at Ubu Gallery in New York until May 12, 2017!

#Woman Crush Wednesday #WCW #Heide Hatry

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magitek · 8 years ago

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no need to read under the cut unless you want major sgt prompto’s spoilers but @strifetown here’s the draft!

“Sir, please,” Brandon said, politeness diminishing by the second.

“Another moment, if you don’t mind. I’m reminiscing.” It was no small business, taking over an empire, but Ardyn rather thought he’d pulled it off beautifully. Being the force behind a figurehead was not the path he’d wanted all those ages ago, but it was a fitting one nonetheless. Who could fault him for stopping to smell the roses, now that they’d finally bloomed?

Over the millennia, Ardyn had lived almost every life imaginable. The life of a youth, a friend, a messiah. A pariah. A chronically drunk hermit (that had been an interesting century), followed by a somewhat less drunk historian (too easy, having lived through so much of the key events). He might’ve dabbled in theater at some point, before cameras made their way back into the pool of readily available technology. He’d played more parts than he could count – but each of them men of no consequence. On the fringes, never acting, always plotting. Waiting for the right time to act.

As the lifetimes wore on, Ardyn began to see the patterns of humanity. How certain brands of disruption were purely temporary, and would soon be forgotten. A life spent making fiery statements could easily mean nothing, and a man with nothing to lose could live by his own rules and face no consequences, compared to the eternal sentence he already carried. Yet history repeated itself, though in more elegant ways. A simple, subtle action repeated from a bygone age could become the catalyst of chain reactions that started wars, ended dynasties. Brought chaos – though not enough, never enough for the gods to wake up and understand where they’d failed. The debt they owed him.

And through all the chaos, Lucis still stood. Their crystal and their nuisance of a ring, forged from the power of usurpers, protected them from whatever havoc the Aldercapt line dared wreak upon them. It took a long time – too long – for an opportunity to present itself, so once it did, Ardyn latched onto it with everything he had, bending the paths of history to his will. After all, revenge was a dish best served cold, and there was nowhere colder than Niflheim.

“Chancellor, sir, the broadcast goes live in two minutes,” Brandon said, holding his clipboard in one hand and a water bottle full of something in the other. “I know you hate being rushed, but—”

“It’s quite alright – I believe I’m ready,” Ardyn said amicably, adjusting his hat one more time. He’d decided to keep the title of chancellor for the time being – he’d held most of the power under Iedolas’s rule anyway, and the title of ‘king’ was something he was reluctant to take until…certain plans had come to fruition.

Iedolas, in one of his last orders before Ardyn’s appearance, ordered the construction of a specially fortified balcony on the southwest side of the capitol building. It was a lavish structure by Gralean standards, though it would seem drab amongst Insomnian architecture. The late emperor, unfortunately, hadn’t had much use for it – the open architecture made anyone on the balcony an easy target for, say, a bullet to the head. Security had warned him the press conference would be better located on the front steps, or the throne room, or almost anywhere else, but in the unlikely event the rebels chose to take direct action, they couldn’t touch him anyway. And an attempt on his life would be an excellent excuse for Ardyn to hunt down their so-called ‘president’ and watch as their ranks dispersed.

In short – given the circumstances, it was the perfect place for Ardyn to usher in his new administration. And as he took a stand at the podium, sizable crowd waiting behind the lines of reporters, he felt the satisfaction of a man who would not be thwarted.

“Citizens of Niflheim,” he began, “it is thanks to the quick work of our ministers that the government has transitioned so quickly following the tragic death of Emperor Iedolas. I stand before you today as your continued chancellor, prepared to carry out and preserve Iedolas’s vision for this nation.”

It was a short introduction, and not very flashy, but that was the point. Best to save the flashiness for the bastards who deserved it.

The first reporter to grab his attention was, he was pleased to note, wearing a scarf that nearly matched his in pattern – though it wasn’t Ross (the biographer had requested to be in the public standing room section, in order to capture the moment as a regular citizen, and Ardyn had no reason to deny such an artful request). “Chancellor Izunia, now that the transition of power has completed, will the restrictions on domestic industries be lifted?”

I sometimes forget how little the common folk care for the things that matter. “There will be a series of new orders in the upcoming weeks outlining the expectations of domestic industries,” Ardyn said. “I would expect…certain freedoms and protocols to be altered, but other than that, the answer to your question is yes – industries will be allowed to resume production. The prosperity of our fair empire is, of course, a top priority.”

The next question was on that mistake of a magitek project, the rallying cry of that pesky ‘resistance.’ I should never have allowed Verstael to proceed with that one in the first place. Producing the units with curated daemon souls would have solved the problem, but of course he and Iedolas wanted to create a public relations nightmare first. “I have no plans at this time to resume the MTP program,” Ardyn said, the polite tones of his voice becoming more forced. “The invasion of Tenebrae and all subsequent operations have been nothing short of successful, even with the loss of MTP integration – our current production methods are optimal, so there is simply no need to make changes.”

The same reporter had a follow-up question. “Chancellor Izunia, are the current line of magitek soldiers truly optimal if MTP is still a ghost in the system? What about the recent blackout?”

She had done her research – Ardyn gave her that much. The blackout that, for a brief period before Iedolas’s death, had oh-so-conveniently rendered most MTs immobile received little more than a passing glance by the media. For good reason – there was no reasonable cause for it. ‘A freak accident,’ the head of magitek security had called it. ‘Fatal errors sometimes occur at random, and easily spread through an interconnected system.’

An interconnected system Ardyn had never supported. “If I could remove all traces of MTP from the magitek army, I would,” Ardyn said. “As it stands, that program is nothing more than a trace – a label, so to speak, that every MT carries. It has served as the bedrock for most of our intra-magitek data transfer systems, so removing it would be logistically impossible. Any further questions on the matter should be directed to the magitek security department.”

Those sorts of painfully detailed questions dominated the press conference for another hour – for the love of fedoras, dramatic press conferences for were dramatic, sweeping statements about Niflheim’s future place in the world, not factual information on policy! After what would have felt like an eternity if he hadn’t already been acquainted with it, a reporter in the front row finally asked the money question. “On the topic of carrying out the rest of Emperor Iedolas’s vision – what does that look like to you?”

At long last, the question I came here for. “It’s fairly obvious, is it not?” Ardyn asked. “Niflheim possesses the crystals of every nation in the world, save one. All that’s left to do…is to conquer the kingdom of Lucis. Which I rather think we have the means to accomplish. Don’t you all agree?”

A gust of cold wind, blast Shiva, swept through the square, and Ardyn faked shivers as it blew its way home to the ice goddess. The crowd behind the reporters began shouting chants of ‘Nippleheim,’ like they were so fond of doing whenever Shiva sent chills their way, and Ardyn debated for a moment how to deal with it before settling for a bow.

“In case the winter storm becomes more severe, I think it best we end this little gathering,” Ardyn said, unclipping the microphone from his collar. Good evening to you all, and whatever Lucian moles have burrowed near.

------------------

The George guy behind the front desk was giving him weird looks, and Prompto pushed his glasses back up for the fourth time in as many minutes, feeling self-conscious (well, more so than usual). Is there something on my face? I mean, the glasses, but…they don’t look that bad, do they!? Maybe he’s just high.

“You look uncomfortable,” Ignis said, his own glasses stupidly straight. Of course they were, Ignis wore his way more often than Prompto did.

“I am,” Prompto said. “I look stupid and we’re about to be on an actual radio show. With actual people listening.”

“Don’t be,” Ignis said. “Prompto, you’ll be fine.”

“Seconded. I dunno how Iris – uh, Briana does it,” Gladio said, looking around. “But you should be grateful we’re getting publicity. And it’s a radio show – no one’s gonna see your glasses.”

Prompto had a hard time finding the words to justify why…I know, Gladio, but I still feel weird about it just didn’t cut it. Being ushered out the door by Ignis five minutes after waking up (Noct must’ve turned off the alarm so he could rest, but he’d been fine for days) didn’t leave enough time for any part of his morning routine, and Prompto saw too many signs of the chubby boy of yesteryear in the dashboard mirror on the way here.

The guilty boyfriend in question returned from the bathroom with a lazy smirk on his face. “Man, you look cute in those glasses,” Noctis said absentmindedly, biting his lip once he realized he’d said that out loud.

Oho…that’s something new~. “I’d ask you if you’re just trying to boost my ego, but…” Prompto said, crossing his arms. “That look on your face speaks for itself.”

“…What look? I don’t have a look,” Noctis said, though he was still wincing.

“The first step in recovery is admitting you have a problem, dude,” Prompto said.

“Pfft. Recovery from what?”

“From thinking I’m cute or something,” Prompto said, pushing up his glasses again.

Noctis snickered. “You are, though.”

The unmistakable click of a phone camera drew Prompto’s attention to the other side of the room. “Another one for the shame album,” Ignis said, motioning for them to follow. “We’re up next.”

Unless he’d read Iris’s message wrong, the radio station had a weekly show where they interviewed local musicians – and while the content was usually superficial, considering recent events, it was likely they’d be asked about Nifheim’s recent transition. The timing was, admittedly, super weird for the band’s first public appearance, but they’d take what they could get. Noctis hadn’t heard the news until it reached the public airwaves, which meant…well, Prompto wasn’t sure what it meant. The marshal, the king…none of them had said anything. But they had to have known before the general public.

Wait. Hold on…is the dinner with Noct’s dad tonight?!?! Holy shit?!?!?! “Psst,” Prompto said, poking Noct just as they reached the doorway into the recording room.

“What’s up?”

“When are we having dinner with your dad?”

Noctis shrugged. “I thought it was tomorrow.”

“Are you sure?” Prompto asked. “Because I thought it was today. And. There’s kind of a difference.”

“Hmm. I’ll ask Ignis after this is over,” Noct said, and of course he wasn’t at all anxious about seeing his dad, but by the Six he knows I’m dating Noct now, doesn’t he??? This??? Is suddenly even more terrifying???

The girl giving the interviews gave off a way less creepy vibe than George the receptionist, and she gave them a concise yet fitting introduction as they took seats around the mics. “I know you boys are musicians, but the public’s buzzing about other things right now, so – if you don’t mind.”

“Not at all,” Noct said, and the others voiced their agreement shortly after.

“Great! So, folks, to review – the leaked broadcast from a few days ago contained more information than anything that’s reached Lucis so far,” the interviewer said. “In a matter of days, the old emperor died, and they’ve already got the chancellor in a leading role. And what’s more, the guy spent ages dishing out the deets on Niff policy. I’m assuming you boys have all read the full transcript, yes?”

“You betcha!” Prompto said, though it wasn’t entirely truthful. Skimming counts at least a little, right?

“They won’t get into Lucis,” Noct said, and Prompto could tell he was making an effort not to put more authority into the statement than ‘Nick Callaway’ had any right to. “It’s been centuries, and they’ve never managed it before.”

“That Izunia dude didn’t even give a timeline or anything for it,” Prompto added. “He just said ‘oh yeah, we can probably do this.’” I read that much of it, anyway. That and the MT stuff…

“Well, why would he go into details?” Gladio asked. “It’s not like that guy’s any stranger to leaks. Maybe he planned for everything he said to make it to Lucis.”

“The real question I have, Joanne,” Ignis said, who, bless him, had actually managed to ask the interviewer her name, “is not about Izunia’s foreign policy. I think none of us were truly surprised by a promised invasion – this is, after all, the last free nation on Eos.”

“Yeah. Yeah, I think we can all agree on that,” Joanne said. “What’s your – wait, we’re getting a caller. Uh, Nick?”

“Mmhmm?” Noct said.

“Hi Nick, I’m Sophie! I heard your guys’ new single and it was super cool!” The girl sounded about twelve. Kid fans were good.

“Thanks,” Noct said. “It really means a lot—”

“And I just wanted to say, you sound so much like Prince Noctis! And he has, like, a super nice voice, so I definitely mean that as a compliment!”

The girl clearly hadn’t meant it like ‘I think you’re lying about your identity,’ but Prompto cringed all the same. Well, that was bound to happen at some point. Let the conspiracy theories begin…

Noct laughed nervously, looking at Ignis for guidance. Joanne the interviewer gave him the ‘start talking’ gesture, and Noctis shrugged. “Aw…shucks,” he said, and Prompto almost burst out laughing at the words. Shucks!? “Though, I’m sure the prince is way…um, sexier than me. In every conceivable way. Definitelty.”

Gladio snorted, which in turn caused Prompto to start giggling, and it was only thanks to Ignis’s death stare that the two of them managed to calm down in a timely manner.

“Was it something I said?” Noct asked.

“Dude, you don’t just talk about how sexy the crown prince is while you’re on the radio,” Prompto said, despite still being on the radio. The rumor comes out: is Nick Callaway gay for Prince Noctis? Lol that’d be hilarious… “That’d be like me saying that the king should wear booty shorts the next time he goes out in public because he’s, like, the kingdom’s daddy.”

A moment passed. In complete silence. Joanne blinked. Ignis his face in his hands. Noctis looked absolutely scandalized. “Oh my gods, I didn’t mean that,” Prompto said.

“That caller, uh, hung up. So what were you saying about Izunia’s foreign policy, Iggy?” Joanne asked, and it was to her endless credit that she wasn’t cracking up over Prompto’s extreme social mishap. “Or was it that it wasn’t about foreign policy?”

“The latter, John,” Ignis said. If people don’t know he’s with the Citadel already, they will by the end of this interview. Stop being so formal, my Iggs. Iggy Shears. “I like to keep up with news from the empire, and many of the policies mentioned are things I’ve never heard of.”

“Yeah, what’s this Employee Discretion Act that he talked about in the middle?” Gladio asked. “Or the MTP program that one reporter kept asking about? We’ve seen a lot of types of MTs since they started cropping up, but I’ve never heard of MTP.”

“What about when the crowd started chanting Nippleheim?” Noctis said, completely off-topic.

“Haha, that was definitely a highlight,” Joanne said. “I can imagine some kids out on the edge of the crowd going ‘chancellor of bofa!’ ‘Bofa what?’”

“Bofa deez nips!”

The conversation never quite got back to Niflheim’s domestic policy, which was all good and fine – Prompto planned on rereading the parts of the transcript that talked about it later. For reasons. MTP…I hadn’t heard of it before seeing it in the news. At least, I don’t think I have. But a trace of an obsolete comms system…

-------------------------

So…the dinner wasn’t tomorrow, it was tonight – Prompto was, terrifyingly, right about something. By the time they’d gotten back to Noct’s apartment, they barely had any time to get ready for dinner.

He’d frantically done his hair and contacts after the (gods, why did I say that thing about the booty shorts, what if he heard about it already) interview, putting on the closest thing to a formal shirt he had – though, on second thought, as Ignis pulled in front of the Citadel, he was pretty sure he was wearing one of Noct’s. Captain Yikes strikes again.

Noctis led him (by the hand, which was…distracting) down several hallways to the dining room, and before Prompto had gathered the presence of mind to prepare for seeing the king not only as his son’s friend, but as his boyfriend, and also the guy who kind of suggested he show off his legs to the world, they were there.

Oh gods, it’s just the three of us. I mean, of course it’s just the three of us it’s a Caelum family dinner oh gods – calm down, Prompto. He gulped and took his seat on one of the long sides of the table, as Noctis sat opposite his father on either end of the table. Drinks had already been set out for the three of them, and Prompto took his in hand, almost disappointed it was just water.

“I’m glad you could join our family dinner, Prompto,” Regis said, his voice giving no indications whether or not he was about to turn into a googly-eyed rage monster and smite Prompto where he stood. Worst case scenario, of course. “Do try to relax – this isn’t an interrogation.”

Part of Prompto (the rational part, evidently) was relieved, but the other part didn’t believe it. “Uh…you sure? Cause, I always thought ‘meeting the parents’ was supposed to be, y’know…”

“But you’ve already met,” Noctis said. “Unless you mean…oh.” Yeah.

Regis chuckled. “I believe it would be an abuse of power if I attempted to intimidate either of you, even more so considering Prompto already seems rather anxious. Though, if you want the fatherly relationship lecture, so be it.”

Prompto gulped, expecting the worst.

“Use protection,” Regis said after a moment, prompting both Noctis and Prompto to spit out their drinks. “Honesty and communication are vital to maintaining a healthy relationship. Wash stains out sooner rather than later. Don’t microwave eggs whole – especially not in your significant other’s kitchen. On that note, there’s a fairly long list of things I hear you shouldn’t put in microwaves. I think Clarus has it.”

He went on like that for a while, the advice getting stranger and stranger, and Prompto almost thought he was off the hook about his earlier comments. “Close the blinds, and – I ask this as a father, Prompto, not as a king – do not let my son leave his apartment in booty shorts, as nice as they may look. And Noctis, if you ever see me frolicking about in those, assume it’s an imposter and stop them.”

Noctis blinked. “Uh, sure.”

“And you, Prompto?”

He nodded quickly – a little too quickly, bangs falling across his face. “Yes, sir. I mean no, sir. Whatever, sir.” #Yikes.

“Good. Noct’s safety and happiness are, of course, the most important things,” Regis said. “On that note, I think it’s safe to say Izunia’s rhetoric held more promise than suggestion, if you catch my meaning.”

“You want us to skip town,” Noctis said, clearly on the same page as his father.

Skip town… “Yes, that would be wise. It will be more difficult for your band to gain popularity without access to Insomnia, but ideally, you two, Ignis, and Gladio will leave Lucis as soon as possible,” Regis said.

Prompto gulped. Already? “Leave Lucis altogether?”

“That is the end goal. And if fortune favors you, Altissia is a mere boat ride from Galdin Quay,” Regis said. “The arts flourish nowhere more so than Altissia.”

“Okay…but Dad, what will you do?” Noctis asked. There was a pleading tone to his voice Prompto hadn’t heard before, and he felt more like an intruder than ever. He could be the little boy in the courtyard again, wide-eyed and lonely…

Regis shrugged. “That depends on what Niflheim does. The fact that Izunia is after the crystal is a given. What else he might want is…hard to say.”

Noctis took a deep breath and looked up from his plate. “Don’t…don’t die, Dad.”

His father gave a small smile, eyes unyielding. “I’ll do my very best not to, son. I promise.”

Prompto took a sip of his water, trying to take up as little space as possible.

--------------------------

“Lunafreya Nox Fleuret, to the counter. I repeat, Lunafreya Nox Fleuret, to the counter.”

Luna stood up in a hurry, earning plenty of stares from the other poor souls in Altissia’s emigration office. Would they have been more or less surprised if I’d worn Oracle white? No, what would have been the most surprising was if they all succeeded in booking passage out of Accordo.

The woman behind the counter handed her a booklet that looked remarkably like a passport, giving her a wan smile. “You’re awfully lucky this got pushed through – Oracle or not, closed borders are closed borders,” she said. “Has Accordo’s novelty worn off already, Your Highness?”

“No, of course not,” Luna said, signing the passport. “It’s simply…” Now that the government has fully transitioned, I could be summoned to Gralea any day. And I… “I wish to see Lucis, while it remains free.” While Noctis and King Regis remain free. The Six know what Ardyn has planned…never mind. Ardyn may not even know what Ardyn has planned.

“You and everyone else in this office, Lady Lunafreya,” the woman said, stamping the signed passport. “I hope you find what you’re looking for there – oh, your passport was greenlighted on the condition you take an escort. He should be at the docks, if you’re ready to leave immediately.”

An escort… The only comfort is that while this ‘escort’ could be any number of magitek monstrosities, the chancellor himself could not leave Gralea unattended under the present circumstances. So at least he wouldn’t be joining her. “Thank you,” Luna said, placing the passport in her handbag.

Luna made sure to take in the scenery of Altissia’s winding streets one last time as she walked to the docks, suitcase rolling behind her. I’ll be back one day, she thought, though…probably not for a long while.

She was pleasantly surprised to see, of all people, Ravus waiting at the docks. “It took you long enough to get here,” he said. “That boat on the end is assigned to take us to Galdin Quay, and from there, I’ll rent a car and drive you north.”

“Thank you so much, Ravus,” Luna said, “I—”

“It’s no trouble,” Ravus said, though his expression said differently. Luna could only imagine the strings he’d had to pull to get her through. I’ll make it up to you later, once we’re both in Gralea. “I’ll drop you off inside the Crown City and head back to Tenebrae. The chancellor will most likely send another escort to take you out of the city before…”

“…Before he attacks,” Luna finished, the words sour on her tongue. At least this gives me time to warn them. Things could always be worse. “You’re not staying with me?”

“I’m afraid I cannot,” Ravus said. “Just between you and I, the contest for who will be chosen to lead the invasion of Insomnia is between General Glauca and myself.”

The polite, sisterly thing to say would have been along the lines of ‘I’m rooting for you’ or ‘I pray for your success,’ but the last thing Luna wanted to see was the fall of Insomnia, regardless of who was responsible. “I pray the operation does not result in many casualties,” she settled on, giving her brother a searching look. What is it you want?

“Luna, whatever things may look like, know that I’m trying to protect you,” Ravus answered. Maybe, but you also seek glory. First Son of Tenebrae doesn’t have the same ring to it as it did in ages past. “Let us hurry – I’m sure you want as much time with the king and prince as possible.”

#i'd wait until morning and just.....talk to u......but i want to proofread/post before thursday evening #so maybe by the time i get out of bed you'll see this?#lmk when you read so i can delete the post

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