#Love From A Distance

[asoftepiloguemylove]

Richard Siken "Planet of Love" Crush // Sue Zhao // Patti Smith Woolgathering // Catherine Goldstein The Letting // art @/callidaeusa (insta) quote Ada Limón Roadside Attractions with the Dogs of America // Jamie Varon Does The Universe Fight For Souls To Be Together? (via @weltenwellen) // Richard Siken Love From a Distance // @teenbeachmovie3 // Cynthia Cruz "Diagnosis" The Glimmering Room // Ruta Sepetys "Emilia" Salt to the Sea // Ethel Cain Sun Bleached Files // "Who We Are" Supernatural dir. John Showalter

[heart-songs]

Finally, after a lifetime, she admitted it was the chance of seeing Tate, the hope of rounding a creek bend and watching him through the reeds, that had pulled her into the marsh every day of her life since she was seven. She knew his favorite lagoons and paths through quagmires; always following him at a safe distance. Sneaking about, stealing love. Never sharing it. You can't get hurt when you love someone from the other side of an estuary.

Delia Owens, Where the Crawdads Sing (pg. 354)

[alena-sempai-art]

Commission

Jacob and Ember

[poetry-by-mlw-long]

That Inscrutable Face by M.L.W. Long

[itwontbethesameasitwasanymore]

“Don't think about the past and don't relate to anything about it, because if it was good it would still be with you now.”

-ej

[ebatothemoon]

I was out of words. I felt miserable. The more I felt miserable, the more I urged to overflow from myself through words I fail to put in order and the tears I cried out. The distance in the void was getting further, the smoke was getting heavier. I was, and still am, out of vision.

Then, I heard this song. I listened to it. I wanted to hold on to its words, her voice. She sounds like a flower petal appeared on a sealed road. At that time, she sounded like what I could become at most: wounded yet hopeful. Humming to this in the void, hoping you to hear this. This is all I can do now. To send my love from a distance and to believe that we [all] share a love from a distance. This feels comforting right now.

[maharetr]

#actual tragedy that her one of her few good decisions as a mother was sending daeron away from king's landing to old town#the hope that one of her children ended up kind and happy...but without her... (tags from @youngbloodbuzz)

My son, Daeron. What's he like?

[6lackestl0v3]

i lost myself with you, i shouldn’t have… now its:

a cycle vs my dreams vs myself . now its revenge love? scared to allow myself being my natural self? i’ve turned so naive, closed off . my time wasted, YEARS of my life wasted for you to have given what i had before we met all for what? your needs to take advantage of my kindness, my loyalty, my love? for that disgusting lustful mindset, manipulation, evil spirit & aura … that beautiful image i made of you to disguise who/what you were/are. never can i allow myself to give up myself like that ever again.

[bloominglegumes]

tf one orion scribbles,,,, hes just a little guy,,,,,

[missyl93]

Thisssss. So much this.

“Even when I detach, I care. You can be separate from a thing and still care about it.”

— David Levithan

[giantkillerjack]

Today my therapist introduced me to a concept surrounding disability that she called "hLep".

[plain-text version of this post can be found under the cut]

Which is when you - in this case, you are a disabled person - ask someone for help ("I can't drink almond milk so can you get me some whole milk?", or "Please call Donna and ask her to pick up the car for me."), and they say yes, and then they do something that is not what you asked for but is what they think you should have asked for ("I know you said you wanted whole, but I got you skim milk because it's better for you!", "I didn't want to ruin Donna's day by asking her that, so I spent your money on an expensive towing service!") And then if you get annoyed at them for ignoring what you actually asked for - and often it has already happened repeatedly - they get angry because they "were just helping you! You should be grateful!!"

And my therapist pointed out that this is not "help", it's "hLep".

Sure, it looks like help; it kind of sounds like help too; and if it was adjusted just a little bit, it could be help. But it's not help. It's hLep.

At its best, it is patronizing and makes a person feel unvalued and un-listened-to. Always, it reinforces the false idea that disabled people can't be trusted with our own care. And at its worst, it results in disabled people losing our freedom and control over our lives, and also being unable to actually access what we need to survive.

So please, when a disabled person asks you for help on something, don't be a hLeper, be a helper! In other words: they know better than you what they need, and the best way you can honor the trust they've put in you is to believe that!

Also, I want to be very clear that the "getting angry at a disabled person's attempts to point out harmful behavior" part of this makes the whole thing WAY worse. Like it'd be one thing if my roommate bought me some passive-aggressive skim milk, but then they heard what I had to say, and they apologized and did better in the future - our relationship could bounce back from that. But it is very much another thing to have a crying shouting match with someone who is furious at you for saying something they did was ableist. Like, Christ, Jessica, remind me to never ask for your support ever again! You make me feel like if I asked you to call 911, you'd order a pizza because you know I'll feel better once I eat something!!

Edit: crediting my therapist by name with her permission - this term was coined by Nahime Aguirre Mtanous!

Edit again: I made an optional follow-up to this post after seeing the responses. Might help somebody. CW for me frankly talking about how dangerous hLep really is.

Plain-text version:

Today my therapist introduced me to a concept surrounding disability that she called "hLep".

Which is when you - in this case, you are a disabled person - ask someone for help ("I can't drink almond milk so can you get me some whole milk?", or "Please call Donna and ask her to pick up the car for me."), and they say yes, and then they do something that is not what you asked for but is what they think you should have asked for ("I know you said you wanted whole, but I got you skim milk because it's better for you!", "I didn't want to ruin Donna's day by asking her that, so I spent your money on an expensive towing service!") And then if you get annoyed at them for ignoring what you actually asked for - and often it has already happened repeatedly - they get angry because they "were just helping you! You should be grateful!!"

And my therapist pointed out that this is not "help", it's "hLep".

Sure, it looks like help; it kind of sounds like help too; and if it was adjusted just a little bit, it could be help. But it's not help. It's hLep.

At its best, it is patronizing and makes a person feel unvalued and un-listened-to. Always, it reinforces the false idea that disabled people can't be trusted with our own care. And at its worst, it results in disabled people losing our freedom and control over our lives, and also being unable to actually access what we need to survive.

So please, when a disabled person asks you for help on something, don't be a hLeper, be a helper! In other words: they know better than you what they need, and the best way you can honor the trust they've put in you is to believe that!

P.S. Also, I want to be very clear that the "getting angry at a disabled person's attempts to point out harmful behavior" part of this makes the whole thing WAY worse. Like it'd be one thing if my roommate bought me some passive-aggressive skim milk, but then they heard what I had to say, and they apologized and did better in the future - our relationship could bounce back from that. But it is very much another thing to have a crying shouting match with someone who is furious at you for saying something they did was ableist. Like, Christ, Jessica, remind me to never ask for your support ever again! You make me feel like if I asked you to call 911, you'd order a pizza because you know I'll feel better once I eat something!!

Edit: crediting my therapist by name with her permission - this term was coined by Nahime Aguirre Mtanous!

Edit again: I made an optional follow-up to this post after seeing the responses. Might help somebody. CW for me frankly talking about how dangerous hLep really is.

[summer-lightning07]

Call me selfish, but I wanted everything of yours to be mine

[notacluedo]

jean and neil 🤨💅

[tiffanyachings]

Aes Sedai + Warders in battle

[andi-o-geyser]

despite how you feel about the changes from the stream to the show, if you like or dislike them, i love how inherently hilarious the narrative path tlovm is taking regarding perc’ahlia is because a situationship would literally kill campaign percy and vex like how the internet would kill a small victorian child. they are NOT built for that

[bixels]

Taking the current topic as an excuse to ask you to tell me all the reasons you love Rarijack. Your art for the ship is so sweet and intimate I'd love to hear any in depth thoughts you have.

Breathes in.

I think what makes their dynamic really strong is that they have opposing personalities but aligned values. It's deeper than just "opposites attract." Rarity's fancy, prissy, and femme while Applejack's modest, rough, and "masculine." But both value hard work (to the point of being workaholics), their families (both have guardianship over their little sisters), running successful businesses, and eventually each other. Their relationship can be boiled down to, "Despite our differences/disagreements, I still like you because we value the same things."

We see their relationship develop so much. In the first season, they can't stop bickering about surface-level differences. By season four, they still bicker, but will mend their relationship because they can't help but do nice things for each other. In Trade Ya, they start off arguing over personality differences (Applejack likes old junk and Rarity likes useless crap). Then they pivot and start arguing that they value their relationship more than the other. In the end, they mend things by sacrificing their needs and buying each other a gift. Even if they don't understand it, they know it'd make the other happy. And that's all that really matters. It's a genuinely sweet moment that shows how arguing can be healthy and necessary for relationships to strengthen.

We even see them dropping their hang-ups about each others' personalities. In Made in Manehattan, when Rarity runs off in dramatics about someone's fashion, AJ doesn't roll her eyes or scoff, she smiles. Oftentimes, their conflicts are very common domestic conflicts romantic couples face. Applejack's Day Off is about a woman's inability to balance work and life and find time to properly spend with her partner, causing her partner to feel neglected.

By season seven, they're actively participating in each others' interests. Any problems or conflicts that arise are dealt with, and they come out the other end stronger and closer. In Honest Apple, AJ pretty much spells out why their relationship works so well: even though she doesn't understand fashion, she can recognize and appreciate how much work it takes and wants to respect that. When she realizes her mistake in the episode, AJ goes above and beyond to fix things and apologize to Rarity. They care about each other so much.

The two go out of their way, sacrificing their personal desires and beliefs and doing things they normally wouldn't, to make the other happy. That's just love.

There's Simple Ways, where AJ gets stuck in an unwanted love triangle between Rarity and her hipster crush. And her frustration and anger can be so easily interpreted as AJ finding herself in a terrible position; the girl she loves wants another man, and that man wants her.

I dunno. I've always had a preference for opposites attract ships, but Rarijack's stuck with me like a brain worm because they have the perfect chemistry. The way they show they care, or do things for each other, I've always read it as the truest representation of romance in the show.