#Rare and Beautiful Things

[thepersonalwords]

Back then they used different chemicals in the tanning process. They prevent ocean bacteria from eating away at whatever is inside. A leather bag from the early 1900's is like a time capsule.

Giselle Fox, Rare and Beautiful Things

[martyryo]

Swapshipping ☕

[movie-robotnik-positivity]

"Dark Beginnings" brings up something that was likely implied before but I never considered, which is that Shadow didn't share Maria's fascination with Earth.

Maria would often tell Shadow about Earth's beauty but he never returned the enthusiasm, he only cared about curing his sister. Besides, the ARK was all he had ever known.

So of course Shadow's disinterest towards Earth turns into hatred after the GUN incident, and his revenge is only stopped thanks to Maria's memory. Even in the present, you could argue Shadow doesn't care for Earth very much.

[group-dynamic]

Bartender: Hey, man, how's it going?

Me: Yeah, you know, it's good. Just thinking about how Gil Galad's kingship was haunted by Elrond. Like his first great failure after being crowned when he'd barely come of age was showing up too late to stop the destruction of Sirion. How he probably felt a deep personal responsibility to find Elwing's missing boys at least but couldn't even do that. Like, I know he probably got redirected by Cirdan toward all those refugees and stuff, but he probably really wanted a win, especially because he was kinda orphaned by then himself and knew how cruel fate was to the sons of greater destiny. Like all his family who'd been king before him died, like, horrifically? And then when Elrond returns all fine and he comes to Lindon and he's chosen the fate of the elves, Gil Galad's physically haunted by him again. See, but this time he chooses to be haunted by Elrond. Because I think he wants to fix what he sees as his first great failure by restoring a bright future for this kid which was robbed from him when Sirion fell--and it's probably like he wants better for him than what he got, too, because he got this kingship in exile thrust upon him when all he was doing was hanging out with Cirdan making ships or something with the other non-combatants and refugees like he and his mother who were fleeing war and violence and he was like fourth in line to the throne so he probably found out in one fell swoop that all his family's dead and oh, you're king and your destiny's out of your hands. So he's like, I'll make Elrond herald and give him all the experience and guidance on this leadership stuff I never got while also giving him better control of what kind of future he has. Then--get this--he never even marries or has kids and when his reign is coming to an end. . . Which, by the way, he probably foresaw his own death which is fucked-- because he gives Elrond his ring before the war of the last alliance, metaphorically making him his heir and also giving him the opportunity to shape his future. . .Yeah, yeah, cause Elrond wouldn't have been considered suitable to be a lord or a king or anything after he was raised by wolves the sons of Feanor. So when Gil made him herald it was like helping him gain political experience and any status he lost. So anyway, then Gil Galad dies, but in some ways he's spent a greater part of his life dedicated to the act of restoring Elrond to the path he should have been on in an alternate reality where he was raised as Earendil and Elwing's son and like correcting that first failure--but also changing Elrond's fate because Elrond has the ring, like, he literally has Gil Galad's legacy and power in his hands, something he wouldn't have had (or needed?) before. But he decides he won't be king. He'll use that power to guard the place that fulfills the legacies of both him and Gil Galad. He's rebuilt the home he lost, something Gil Galad was trying to give him, and then he makes it a place for all the orphans and the wounded and the refugees--like he even fosters a bunch of future orphan kings and like--

Bartender: Like the ending of Hamilton?

Me: *mumbling into my empty glass* Yeah, exactly like the ending of Hamilton.

[sundry-whovengerslocked]

so I had a Big Brain Moment...

had this been done? I don't think it has

there's so much more I couldn't fit. so much more. feel free to expand on this (or make it look better)

other things:

since avatar is based off of Asian culture technically zuko also helped save China

all could be seen as an lgbt allegory

mulan and zuko both fighting for their honor (why didn't I think of that sooner, it's so obvious!)

atla had the kyoshi warriors and mulan fought with a fan

atla and mulan both had a strong woman having men to do drag

all have fairly recognizable voices

all at some point had talking animals (mushu, aang's sleep deprivation hallucinations scene)

zuko and mulan both had pivotal hair cutting scenes

all of them being physically different than others in some way (po being the only panda at first and being made fun of for being fat, mulan being a woman warrior, zuko and his scar) (this along with other things fits into the lgbt allegory idea)

badass old men (iroh and bumi, oogway and shifu, the emperor)

po and mulan both meet flower symbolism (the peach tree vs the cherry blossom tree)

atla and kung-fu panda both have turtles/tortoises as wise figures

mulan and zuko both wear badass clothes

all underdogs who eventually earn the respect of pretty much everyone in their stories

zuko and po both being the comic relief at some point

zuko and po both joining an already well-established team and feeling left out at first (the gaang, the furious five)

shifu and iroh both essentially losing a son but in wildly different ways

lotus symbolism (po's birth name being little lotus, iroh's white lotus group, again the flower blooming quote for mulan)

mulan and po being bowed to by someone higher up than them (the emperor, shifu)

[carnivalcarriondiscarded]

when you mentioned in your tags that there was hardly any laughingstock i didn't believe you at first, but holy shit ur right. YOU AND @krasytoonz MADE ME INTO A LAUGHINGSTOCK BELIEVER. I WILL PAY TRIBUTE TO THESE SKRUNGLY FUCKERS SOON, MARK MY WORDS *shakes fist into the void*

no yeah Seriously though its just us out here, fighting for our lives in the fucking Trenches. in ten years someone is gonna use the word 'laughingstock' casually in conversation and im gonna have War Flashbacks

[ganondoodle]

have you ever seen a piece of work that seems to be SO your thing that you get kinda scared to actually look into it further? like when you see a part of it your heart starts to race and then you scroll quickly past it everytime it comes up again?

if you know what i mean .. what the hell is this?? i rarely see things i react to like this but it does happen and it is now? and im like .. legitimately scared of it in a weird way? is that a weird 'oh no this is embarrassing i cant admit liking this and cant be caught i need to pretend to not care' response for whatever mysterious reason? or a fear of it disappointing you if you actually started to read/watch it so you rather have the mystery of not knowing for sure????????? i literally cannot pin point what it is

[megamagimugi]

This is my submission for Day 5 of Beauty and the Beast 2024. The theme of the day is Dandelion... and I took it literally :D

This digital painting was inspired by a dream I had a while ago, that was a clear combination of the dandelion scene in Belle Reprise, those pink flying flowers in Super Mario Galaxy... and probably the other flying flowers in Super Mario Bros. Wonder, since I remember playing that game the night before.

In the dream, I was with some other people, presumably some friends conjured up by my subconscious. Maybe we were kids, though I'm not entirely sure. We were catching a ride on huge flying dandelions whose seeds were gradually blowing away as we flew on them. Just for fun. Probably had to grab another dandelion once ours had no more seeds. The scenery was like in my illustration, a sunset and grassy hills. Similar to the original scene in Disney's Beauty and the Beast, but more yellow.

So I decided to insert Belle instead of myself and the other people. Well, she did say she wanted adventure in the great wide somewhere. Maybe this was what she imagined at that moment, fantasizing about just flying away from her provincial life. Either way I'm sure she would have loved to do something like this for fun.

Here's the painting:

And maybe some detail:

Tagging @beauty-beast-week, of course. Also I'm sure my dear mutual @vulpixfairy1985 would appreciate this, since she's also participating in this event.

Speaking of, this is my first time participating in an event like this, so I hope I'm doing it right.

[lovenonymously]

Im Sol

Lovely Runner (2024)

[schmweed]

[forestmossling]

someone: what’s your favorite stranger things pairing?

me: obviously it’s steddie

someone: that’s such a BASIC FUCKING BITCH ANSWER-

me: alright, you want a real answer?? wayne munson/benny hammond. look it up.

[swordheld]

hi! your blog is one of my favourites and i absolutely adore reading your thoughts. my grandfather recently passed away and it feels like i lost myself with him. how do i continue living after this? there is this constant weight on my chest and it feels like an emptiness has made a home inside of me. how do i go on when it feels like the world crashed on my shoulders?

hello, love! this is so very sweet and kind of you, and i hope you're treating yourself gently and kindly right now - there aren't words for a loss like this. that heaviness is difficult, and hard, and painful. it's okay if things don't feel okay, right now, or even soon - i think that's something that a lot of the people i know that have gone through similar grief feel: like they should be able to get back to a relative 'normal' in a [insert far too short period of time].

but it's okay if it hurts. that's where i'd like to start. you're allowed to feel that emptiness, that world-crashed feeling that goes beyond words, beyond time. don't feel like you have to rush this to feel some sort of better. things get easier with time, i promise you this, but sometimes painful feelings are important to feel, too. cry, scream, feel your emotions. they're a part of you. grieve.

it's perhaps a little silly, but when i think about death i always think about a couple of space songs: mainly drops of jupiter by train and saturn by sleeping at last. there are perhaps others that speak to the emotions better, but these two have always hit something a little deeper for me, and are popular for a wide-reaching reason.

and while personally i don't know much about grief like this, i do know a lot about love; and i think they're a lot of the same thing.

the people we love are a part of us, and this is why it takes from us so deeply when we lose them, because it does feel like we've lost a part of ourselves in the wake of it. but it's because they were so central to our experiences of living - our lives, that the separation introduces a hollowness - a place where they used to be. a home that now goes unlived in.

an emptiness, like you said.

but just because they're not here physically, doesn't mean he's not still there, in your heart, in your life, your memory. you can hold him close in smaller ways, as well: steal a sweater, or cologne/scent for something a little more physical and long lasting for remembering. hold onto the memories you cherish, the things that made you laugh, the ease of slow mornings and gentle nights. write them all down, slide a few photographs in there, go through it and add more when you miss him. keep them all close, keep them in your heart.

you're not alone, in this. he's still there, with you, it's just - in the little things.

he's with you in the way you see and go about your daily life, in doing what he liked to do, in the ways he interacted with the world that you shared with him. the memories you recall fondly when the night is late or the moment is right and something calls it into you like a melody, an old bell, laughter you'd recognize anywhere.

but i think, perhaps most importantly above all others - talk about him. with your family, your friends, his friends, strangers; stories are how we keep the people we love alive. the connections they've made, the legacies and experiences they've left behind, and so, so many stories.

how lucky, we are - to love so much it takes a piece of us when they go. grief is the other side of the coin, but it does not mean our love goes away. it lives in you. it lives in everyone who knew him, in the smallest pieces of our lives.

the people we love never really leave us, like this: they're in how we cook and the way we fold our newspapers, our laundry, in the radio stations we tune in to and the way we decorate our walls, our photo albums. they're in the way we store our mail, organize our closets, the scribbled notes in the indexes of our books. the meals we love and the drinks we mix, the way we spend time with one another. they've been passed down for generations, for longer than history - and we are all the luckier for it.

think about what you shared with him, and do it intentionally. bring him into your life, like this, again. whether it's crosswords or poetry or sports or anything else. if one doesn't help, try another. something might click.

i hope things feel a little easier for you, as they tend to do only with time. i hope you find joy in your grief, even if it is small and hard to grasp at first. know that your hurt stems from so much love that there isn't a place to put it properly, and that it is something so meaningful and hurting poets and storytellers have been struggling to put it into words and sounds that feel like the fit right for eons, and that it is also just simply yours. sometimes things don't have to make sense. sometimes they just are - unable to be put into words or neat little sentiments, as unfair and tragic as they come.

but i promise it will not feel like this forever. your love is real. and perhaps, on where to begin on from here - i think it's less on finding where to begin and just beginning. and you've already started. you've taken the most important and crucial step: the first one. wherever you go, after that, from here? you'll figure it out. you always have, and you always do. it'll come, as things always do. love leads us, as does light - and you're never alone in your hurt. in your grief, your missing something dear to you. i think if you talk about it with others, you'll find they have ways of helping you cope as well - and they have so much love of their own to spare, too.

as an aside, here is the song (northern star by dom fera) i was listening to when i wrote this, for no other reason more than it makes me think of connections, and love, and how we hold onto the people we love and how they change us, wonderfully and intrinsically. it's a little more joyous than the others i've mentioned, and plays like a story, and it made me think of what is at the core of this, love and stories and i am here with you, and maybe it'll bring you some joy, if you'd like it. wishing you all my love and ease 💛

[treasuredplanet]

plans to see sleeping at last tonight and based on where we’re at emotionally I’m going to start openly sobbing during the first 0.5 seconds of saturn

[girlysongs]

Selena Gomez on Jimmy Kimmel Live

[lonelyzarquon]

woke up to the news that bill nighy has grown a beard. seems like an exceptional event and i have to share

assuming it's for a part 'cause he prefers to be clean-shaven and there are like 3.5 occurrences of him ever having facial hair. giggling kicking my feet etc 'cause it seems wrong (unusual) and absolutely rocks at the same time

[whatohitsonfirewelp]

Buddie may never go canon. And that’s okay.

It doesn’t change that Buck, Eddie, and Christopher are a family.

And honestly? I truly believe I might even like this more. The idea that hey, yes, a bisexual man and a straight man can continue to be best friends, co-parents, to show vulnerability with one another and still keep it platonic.

That men overall are allowed to show their emotions and be human and love each other without it inherently being sexual or romantic.

Especially when one of those characters is a Hispanic man, because men of color have so little freedom to express themselves and show their love loudly and openly for their family.

Because Evan Buckley is Eddie’s family.

And they don’t need to be a couple for that to still be true. And if you don’t think it’s possible for two grown men to love each other and still be a family without also being in love, then you need to take a good long look at yourself.

The idea that he can’t is rooted in homophobia and sexism.