#I’m basically going to be obessing until Saturday

[theflagscene]

Can we just talk for a minute about the morning after in Tharn’s apartment during episode five while they were getting ready together and the Monk calls Tharn to speak to him, Phaya motions to Tharn to put it on speaker when he hears who it is. Tharn doesn’t question it for a second, just does it and continues listening to what he has to say only for Phaya to reply instead of Tharn, which did not surprise the Monk at all nor does Tharn react like they should be hiding that they’re cohabiting. Remembering that up until the night before, the only person who knew that Phaya would be staying with Tharn for a while was Yai (he was sent to Phaya’s place to get him some clothes and stuff). Even Chalothon wasn’t expecting to see Phaya there, and he’s a creepy green eyed stalker snake deity. But to just go on speaker phone together with the Monk (the man who basically raised Tharn) without any preamble? Like my dudes, my bros, my lil cop idiots. You’ve skipped right past the dating stage and are now 4 years into marriage.

[sophiapathic]

Sk8: The Infinity - A Take on Love

Because my six unfinished assignments can wait until I throw this into the void, scream for five hours and after my voice gets hoarse, I resort to watching the beach episode on loop until next Saturday.

This was entirely sparked by the recap episode, which really pressed the reak havoc and theorize button in my brain. I am truly losing my grip on reality. Help. I apologize in advance, creatures of Tumblr. 

Me right now:

Anyways... 

I saw people mention here and there screaming that “we need canon relationships and they will get trust issues if a romance isn’t confirmed by the end of the series”. I think that mindset is harmful to have in this case. You can’t really avoid being disappointed if you get into the series expecting it to deliver on your wishes of gay romances. So, this might be controversial, but stay with me please. The anime and manga are both confirmed to be based primarily about the characters themselves and of course the sport -skating. I was hoping to take a closer look at what the series intends to do with certain dynamics and relationships according to yours truly. I also want explain my reasoning behind it not being queerbaiting, though it being inherently queer-coded, through the current lense of the canon.

Sk8: The Infinity is unquestionably a love story.

We need to state the genres this series is in, because some of us tend to forget. It is in fact not a shounen-ai, not a yaoi, not a romance, not even a josei. Say it with me it is a series in: COMEDY and SPORTS.

(Source is the official US Sk8 website.) The spotlight is udoubtedly on skating and what it means. Another important highlight of the show is how the definition of the sport relates to the characters, and how vastly different they are from what we expect. For example, when we see Shadow first, we pigeonhole him into this vulgar indecent rock and roll persona, only to find out later that he is actually a stweetheart at a flower shop. Joe is another very good case study. When we first see him we think of him as a womanizer muscle-head, later we find out he has a heart of gold and is very emotionally intelligent. We’re also quick to judge Miya as the cold, unfeeling prodigy then we discover how lonely and normal he is on the inside. And so on and so on. 

The show continues to defy our expectations of what each character should be like. In a way it is about breaking the conventional stereotypical roles we subconsciously assign to certain looks. We see that even in anime, multifaceted characters can exist without distrupting or damaging the delicate dynamics of a traditional sports anime. We successfully established the second focal point of the series as disproving stereotypes and presenting strong, diverse and unexpected personalities.

How about the defition of skating? What does it mean in the context of Sk8: The Infinity then? Where does a love story come into the picture? Skating is repeatedly described as a ritual of love within the anime, an idea that our villian, Ad*m, is obessed with. In a sense skating is a language of love canonically.

Then skating itself is love. Throughout the series we see varied styles of skating therefore different ways of expressing love, affection. We get to experience several metaphorical ways of “being in love” through characters skating with each other. Each dynamic shows us a type of love. Healthy, disfunctional, outright abusive. 

The way Reiki teaches Langa to skate can be interpreted as a direct metaphor for someone learning to love again after losing a person close to them. Langa’s father has died and Reiki literally brings him out of his shell again. It can also be interpreted as a queer kid’s experience of a world of romance that feels similar to his previous one, that being snowboarding, yet it still being new and different. Skateboarding. When due to Reiki Langa’s potential is discovered and his hunger for more and more develops, especially next to Ad*m, Reiki’s main frustration stems from them not being well-matched or on equal footing anymore. He feels like he cannot give Langa what he needs anymore. Which would obviously go againts the literal description of a healthy romance. Two people with mutual respect who both bring equal assets to the table. He feels like he needs to catch-up to be with Langa again. The only thing he doesn’t consider is Langa’s deep appreciation of him and the fact that literally he was the one who helped Langa experince the feeling of love again.

Kojiro and Kaoru’s relationships, to me, is very much representative of two people  wanting to be in each other’s presence, but due to their different language of love, miscommunicating horribly. Them bantering and insulting each other is the only way they know what to do with the other. The only way they can ensure the other’s attention and eyes are on them. This has worked so far. They are literal opposites, but both have a very clear definition of their form of love. To Joe skating, or love itself, is about the feeling and going with the flow. Being spontaneous. Whereas for Cherry, every move needs to be calculated and executed perfectly in order to be “efficient”. Their frustration comes from both wanting different things from the other, but not communicating their need properly. Despite this, they stick together due to a magnetic pull they obviously feel towards the other. The attraction is there, the trust is there, they are even well-matched in skill as we see them neck-to-neck constantly. They could give each other what the other wants. Only if they could express themselves well... This is why Joe pushes Reiki towards reconciling with Langa. he wants them to not fall into the same trap of not stating their  needs and thoughts properly.

Now Ad*m and Langa are obviously problematic and I don’t really want to have to explain, honestly guys. I really don’t  (since I have trauma regarding this subject), but I need to go into this a little bit. This is a textbook toxic predatory relationship. Where the older, twisted, damaged person, has an obsession with a young, outstading child. He wants to lead him into “Paradise” and show his “Eve” what love is really about. (Ain’t that disgusting you guys...) His form of love is inflicting pain, so I really can’t imagine a scenario where he and his “Eve” live happily ever after and everything is fine and dandy. He needs someone who he can torture. He literally is looking for someone who can handle his way of expressing affection, his “love hug”, who has the same type of crazy eyes for adrenaline and danger. His Eve. In his distorted mind, this all makes sense and Langa is that someone he was looking for thoughout the years. The problem is, he disregards Langa’s side where the relationship becomes problematic.

Cherry and Ad*m during their younger years seems to be a very innocent infatuation on Kaoru’s end. It is a one-sided relationship where someone is in love with the idea of a person long gone. They were discovering the world of skating, or the world of love together with Ad*m taking the lead. Cherry immediately became infatuated with him, wanted to learn his love language, wanted to be at the same level he was. It probably started very innocent. At first, Ad*m being gentle, because that’s how Tadashi was with him too, then after whatever happened between those two, Ad*m, disappointed in the way of love, or skating, Tadashi showed him, returned to what his aunts taught him. Maybe after injuring Kaoru with the “love hug”, therefore eliminating him from being his potential partner, started looking for his “Eve”, gradually became more agressive in love as in skating. Kaoru was distraught and wanted the Ad*m he originally learned love from back. Holding out some hope even years after. Trained to get used to his “love hug”, to literally condition himself to be able to get close to him. Ad*m, however showed Cherry brutally that he truly cannot handle his way of love.

Ad*m and Tadashi. *sighs* As of this post, I don’t really have enough information to give you a good overview of what I see this relationship representing. As far as I can tell Ad*m was abused horribly and to ease the pain and make him forget, Tadashi showed his another way of expressing affection. Skating or love. Basically a first love gone horrible bad, scarring an already abused child and turning them into a monster. Tadashi himself reinstates this during one of the episodes. It was his fault that Ad*m turned out the way he did. Their love slowly became strongly abusive throughout the years. Tadashi is stuck in it because he feels like he deserves it. This is a metaphor for  dangers of an emotionally and physically abusive relationship, where one person feels responsible and the other is using power. Tadashi’s guilt keeps him next to his master and he even endures abuse, now he is trying to break out and show Ad*m he messed up and I think this could potentially be a good representation of how difficult that process truly is. 

As far as Reiki’s, Miya’s, Shadow’s skating goes. Their main arc relating to love is first and foremost learning to accept themselves and aprecciating their uniqe way and style of skating. Only after can they become people who can truly be accomplished in love/skating (in Miya’s case I’m obviously talking about platonic feelings). Each of them had a preconception of their persona in love/skating, which gets questioned heavily throughout the series. Miya gets defeated, Shadow’s soft side gets discovered, Reiki... well. I get sad. :c Even though he taught someone to love again, to appreciate life again, he ended up discovering how dissatisfied he truly is with himself... These three all need to learn to love every aspect of themselves to reach fulfillment and to really experience healthy human relationships.

Sk8: The Infinity is unquestionably a love story, without explicitly being a romance, meaning that it is a tale about love, both romantic, platonic and everything inbetween through a queer-coded lens, showing both dysfunctional, abusive and healthy relationships, ways to express emotions and even delves into self-love and the idea of nature versus nurture in the villian’s case.

That is why I, personally don’t scream for a canon couple. To me, the show gets its main point about affection and love across, without making any of these relationships explicitly stated. Not to mention that it does justice to both of its assigned genres. Comedy and Sports as well. Yeah sure, I wouldn’t complain, but I think these dynamics are more than satisfying to watch, and much deeper than bishounens wanting to bang each other, which is, in my opinion, inherently sexualized. If they want, yeah they can confirm, make it canon without forcing it to be a center storyline. Hell, I would even be happy about it. I would clap with all of us. BUT, as the series currently is, I really see it taking the other route because of the above. This way audiences who want a yaoi or ikemen going at it, won’t be disappointed with the series when they find doesn’t revolve around that, straight viewers will just find it flamboyant, and people who look for subtext and want to read between the lines will certainly do that with the amount of crumbs and hints the writers gave us. 

We don’t need outright, written in black and white gay representation in Sk8 to experience very real types of love. The queer theme is secondary to me, just like queerness is, in most people’s lives. Yeah sure, it is a big thing, but not the only attribute a person has. My life doesn’t revolve around my queerness. I rarely talk about it. If I was a main character this would be a side-arc. Just like Sk8 doesn’t revolve around the characters coming out. It’s just them living their lives and possibly being queer while doing so. If you look at it this way, it is almost normalizing attraction between same-sex people by just showing it as regular love. If you can, why not interpret it this way, so it can be a liberating experience instead of a disappointing one.

Please don’t attack me! I am fragile and this is only my opinion. c:  *crawls back into her hole*

[camuslittlesister]

I’m having an identity crisis. I’m sitting out the ranking for two events in a row 🥲

Tbh I’m going for the frame so I might sneak in the rank low as a result, but if I’m not trying for the ranking prize then I’m going to bed at a normal time, or trying because I pushed 2am last night thanks to pretty swords (yes, I am playing Touken Ranbu, although given my IRL Okita obession the sword voiced by nii-sama was not my starter and, at time of writing, it still isn’t one of mine). But Manjunari and the butterflies with Kenshin looking on is glorious and I kinda need that in my life even if I sweated blood and tears for the smutty Kageie and the sleepy shinobi 🤔 #firstworldproblems if ever there was one.

But yeah, random thoughts as I suffer through the wait for 2 of my top 5 SLBP men to drop. I’m currently skipping through the tanuki for the puppy, to be called Rei-chan.

I mean, am I wrong?

Basically this post will not be a complete review because I’m likely just nyooming through half of the event and re-reading Kenshin’s story on a loop for the first 5 or so days until Shingen and Hideyoshi are out.

SLBP story events be like:

LI I like: Watching paint dry? Great story!

LI I dislike: Your vassals are rebelling and there’s a lot of drama, boooo-riiiiing.

Look at that ambitious little face tho 🥺makes me so proud

It’s the 3rd day of the event (nii-sama’s sword came home in TR in the meantime) and I’ve so far skimmed through all the bits with the Hojo kid, since I disliked him ever since the time he was in Kai (or Shinano, it was a Yukimura story, of that I am sure...) a few events back (and they had Saizo to salvage the situation). So aside from almost dying laughing at the beginning with the Demon Daddy Show, and enjoying seeing the crazy-ninja-who-hates-Saizo’s face, I haven’t read anything until the ending (that CG is my next copy for my self-taught drawing course).

I have, however, read Manjunari (cue: 😱) and I have so many mixed feelings about it. It was nothing new, in fact it’s like an AU of his MS, but I both don’t like him and really want to like him.

Saturday morning, breakfast time, Utapri on Auto because I cba: Can’t Shingen hurry up and come out already

Sunday morning, oh my gosh, brace yourselves for the word vomit. *Very Ren Jinguji voice* Are you ready? 😏

Utapri ruined my life. I can never ever read those words without hearing Junichi Suwabe in my head.

I have so many questions. First of all, am I allowed multiple husbandos in one castle because Kansuke buhahhahah 😂 I want to put a ring on it because he is just too cute and funny.

Secondly, WTH? We know babe is so extra but this is a level of extra that is unreal. I mean, I have done it too, both my house bathroom and playing Mystic Messenger in a public one but the cleaning standards in the 21st century are kind of improved?! This sounds worse than a festival portaloo, and those have also improved over the years since my misspent youth having to be chaperoned at festivals because a music-obsessed minor (Side note: it surprises me too that my favourite Utapri boy is not Ranmaru given we are one and the same 🥲 I’m writing this as Spotify just started playing Memory by Sugarcult). And what makes it worse to me is that he hid away to read the Art of War. AGAIN.

Surely he knows it by heart by now? He is reading that book all.the.bloody.time.

At least he’s self-aware...

Oh, who am I kidding, with that face he can get away with murder as far as I’m concerned. Which he kinda did since I forgave the start of his route (it wasn’t literal murder in that case tho, but it was bad 👀)

*more story* Multiple levels of adorable 🥺

I for one was not surprised at his modern day job in the epilogue because that guy is painted as a workhaolic in every story. The guy couldn’t even stop the time he went on a holiday, although that wasn’t entirely his fault. Part of it was. Can we get a holiday story where he actually just lounges about reading a book or something? Pretty please.

But, of course, this story isn’t it. I do dig the tragic hero vibes tho. He’s so pretty in the rain and somehow so pretty as he is coughing up blood and nearly dying?! How did I only notice this on my 3rd replay of the story?

Also so dang satifsfying when the tiger goes full kitty omg the finaleeee. *Narrator: she died with a smile on her face and her morning coffee all over the bed*

Spoiler alert: I did not actually die, and I am back.

Fjshnfodosnsjkfnfnsna HIDEYOSHIIIIII. You naughty teasing little snakey fox. Although my favourite Hideyoshi bits were, in fact, from Toshiie’s story.

Don’t get me wrong, I love the playful banter and let me kiss you as a punishment for being adorable kind of scenarios (even tho they’ll never apply to me because I couldn’t be any more different from the average Voltage MC if I tried), but THIS was glorious.

And also I have so many thoughts about how MC seems to think he is better than he really is as a person, but also I can see the idealism and whole quest for equality are not necessarily mutually exclusive. You can be shrewd and ambitious for a goal higher than yourself. What can I say, I love him 🥺

Toshiie’s story was a bit meh but also the plot twist was nice. And now, after panicking that I couldn’t find my frame I was sure I had accepted, it’s time to press send and dive into the next event. No rest for the wicked and the SLBP event junkies, as they say...

[tealandrosegold]

September 1, 2021 Wednesday

Another morning. Instead of a donut and pumpkin, I got an everything bagel, a banana and an iced vanilla latte. Yesterday I was complaining about how I expect everything to fall into place but because I did apply and wasn’t thinking about it, I was pleasently surprised that Boys and Girls Club requested an interview. I haven’t gone there since I was a freshman in high school. It’s just funny because I wanted a job that would do with my career and it kinda just fell into place. Now, I’m nervous that they’ll do a background check and stuff it has been six years since I’ve been incarerated and I haven’t done anything to rouse up the law. I was speaking to Stephanie yesterday about grad school and how I wanted to stay in Lincoln but I wasn’t so sure about living at home for another two years because I wanted my ‘life to start’. She said I could get a region 5 which is basically the same thing as the rent subsidy I was getting with the nuns. I basically fucked up living with the nuns and they evicted me but with this, I’ll be in school and hopefully working at the Boys and Girls club. As I type this I can feel my nails feeling weird on the keys. I got them dipped and they look pretty but feel so heavy. The only downside to all of this is telling Mama and Baba but they aren’t very supportive. I’m waiting until the start of the new year when I tell them my grad school plans after graduation. Another thing I was thinking about as far as goals is just that the opprotunities given to me are immense. I think this what they call blessings. It feels like hard work getting them though. 

As I listen to my music this morning I turned into a sap by listening to White Stripes. I pretty much stopped listening to Jack White because it brings me pain. There was a tucked bench while I was walking on campus and I felt a pang. It’s something when you miss someone but realize that they probably don’t think about you in the same ways you think about them. All I know is that Loki tries but gets fustrated at their differences. It wasn’t really about love and obession as he said but the fact that we were that close and really understood each other. Even Fassy is getting tired of all the things that I give to him in regards to ____. I really try to give the others ways that they can be orginal but it argues the fact that I felt like I had a soul connection with someone. Like I said. He thought it was obession and I had a swift block on facebook. There’s just some things I can’t explain that happened and those are my pockets that comfort me now. I was actually thinking about Jaren as well. And the target sight. But Ryan always tells me he attempted to rape me and if he didn’t he meant harm. There was a time when I’d disassociate just thinking about him because of the fear I felt from the potential of being raped. I just couldn’t comphrend it six years ago. I guess the only reason for clarity these days is because I know my body. 

I tried having sex with Ryan last night but I couldn’t get myself into the zone. It’s weird because these days whenever I cum, I get feelings of shame like what I’m doing is so wrong even though I know it’s natural. I tried a new thing where I tried telling him about my day instead of just jumping into it like I was used to. It’s like a nonverbal agreement that we have sex but I can never enjoy yet. I don’t feel a soul connection with any of them including Loki. I don’t know if it’s from the EMDR I’ve been doing or if it’s just because I delatch myself so much from the act and disassociate while I’m having sex. I can’t really say it’s enjoyable. I have read that when your goal is just to have an orgasm then you aren’t really having sex. It feels robotic these days. But I did attempt last night even though I said I just wanted Deadpool instead of him. I’m trying to make things as normal as possible for them and for myself. I laugh and think to myself how it feels like split personality disorder but it really isn’t. A while ago Angelina messaged me and told me that normal is what I make it. And this is normal for me. It doesn’t harm anyone and I know it’s not harming me. If anything it makes me feel more lonely than others. But back on Jaren. I don’t hate him but I know my mom thinks that he’s some sort of soilder in terms of religion and spirtiuality. She’s on to something but all that was a past life. Just like her calling me a whore for hanging out with Mary Magdelene as she said. But I switched that for Afton when I was 11 is what I told her. And she still called me a whore for the whole summer.

I did my routine this morning and last night pretty automatically. It’s shower day today and I don’t want to elongate it so I think I’m going to take a shower after classes since my homework load isn’t alot tonight. But I’m also going to put away laundry. It just makes sense for me to do it during the week instead of leaving it all for Saturday. The state of the bathroom makes me sad and I’m trying to be better about keeping on top of my chores. I might light some incense today as well. Just things, things, things.

Namaste,

Nyameer