#SCATTER !!!! *turns into 100 rats that all run in different directions*

[dumbandtiny]

its all fun and games until an artist that was a major part of me getting into g/t likes my shitty meme i made in two seconds

[goblinconceivable]

oh ffs, i have feels but also head exploded

So basically someone liked a story I wrote a million years ago and mostly forgotten about, and when that happens I often reread the thing.  (I can’t be the only one who does that...)  Can’t say I’ve thought about Alex/Izzie since I wrote it, couldn’t even tell you when I stopped watching the show, though I think it was before her cancer.

Anyway I infected myself with feels for them again.  And I dig the style I was using, 1+1 started a third chapter for funsies and should have stopped there.  Because I did some reading and watched some clips and it’s all too much and when that happens I meta.

Usual mishmash, structure desired but no work put into achieving it.  Classic brain dump.

Okay, fundamentals first.  I am for now ignoring how Izzie/KH left the show.  Because they had to exit her somehow and I’m sure Shonda was pissed at her, (or was leaving the door open for her return but I doubt it.)  Haven’t seen it, if I needed to I could work it into my conception of their whole arc, but since I’m more critically hung up before that point, not worrying about it.

What’s got me messed up is that RIGHT AFTER Izzie promised to not go crazy, she... went crazy.  Like, WTF was that about?  I get that GA is all about the soapy drama, that is why I stopped watching.  First couple seasons: brilliant.  Downhill from there.  But two things:

1) We never get to see these two happily together.  One hot second and bam.***  Every.  Time.  Shonda allowed it for Meredith and Derek, but in my brain other couples got it for periods of time at the least.  But these two, nope.  And know what?  THAT WOULD HAVE BEEN FASCINATING TO WATCH.  I could delve into this and might swing back around but trying to hit highlights.

2) It set them on two different storylines instead of one.  And Izzie got the short stick.  Yes I can see how it works on paper, but not on screen.  There are limits to the visual medium and limits to how much screen time they were given, which pretty much destroy the ability to nuance something this complex.  

a) Izzie’s in her own world dealing with a ghost and is basically in two relationships at once (mental note to look for parallels with Alex’s exit and Jo v Izzie.)  Except one’s a dream and the other is a reality that is still developing, yet she can’t give attention to.  She has to fight every time to be there for Alex in the real world, and we don’t really get to explore her struggle.  It often just looks like distraction and distance and him being second right after she firmly laid out that she cares about him.

b) Alex is in a relationship and is super happy and excited and wants the perfection he’s dreamed about to be real so much he’s overlooking everything that’s off.  In his own little dream world I guess, but like, the whole thing skews into this being the story of Alex while Izzie is wandering in circles somewhere over in that direction, all serving the purpose of advancing exploration and development of Alex’s character.  When did KH ask to be let out?  If it was after this point, Shonda svcks.  I mean, it is cool to watch him really blossom, but since he’s doing it under his own steam I’m left with a bad taste in my mouth.  Because he’s not really in a real relationship.  I want to see him get that, I want to see it for real.

***What IS interesting, I’ll admit, is that when they’re not together, they’re beautiful.  Which is most of the time, so they gave me that.  I’m a massive fan of the bittersweet, the star crossed, the never-quite-on-the-same-page, the nuance, the “it’s a deeper connection, a deeper love than just romance.”  Thank gosh, it is time for excited thoughts.  Because there is a strong friendship and mutual reliance and helping each other grow, pushing and giving hard truths and encouragement, and yes romance is woven through this but not the genesis and used more in terms of nudging everything along the path.

I love that Alex basically imprints on Izzie.  I love that he loves her the whole time.  But he’s willing to step back.  He may get jealous and resentful and petty and scared and mean.  But those are natural human emotions, Izzie gets them too, and they’re fundamental to his character and through those things he learns and grows.  Izzie doesn’t make him.  She entices him.  Yeah, often directs him, especially at first.  But at some point he’s growing on his own, in fits and starts, in reaction to his own emotions.

For example, when Izzie tells him she slept with George, he gets pissed, but also admits why pretty readily.  And he tells her the truth, remarkably straightforwards.  He reaches out to her a lot.  And she turns him aside a lot.  And he keeps loving.  Even if romance is off the table.  He runs after her a lot.  Sits next to her when she’s upset a lot.  Is understanding a lot.  He’s different with her, and look I’m a fangirl, it’s a trope, I swallow bait line and hook.  Which should be bait hook and line if my vague understanding of fishing is correct.  I fished once, with safety implements, and still cried even as they removed the fish and popped it back into the water.  (Okay I just reread to sort out where I’d gotten too and it’s hook line and sinker.  Statistically someone will probably read this someday, you have my full permission to laugh at me.  Anyway...)

The quintessential moment, the revved to 100, of course being when Izzie is clinging to a dead Denny.  They’re all standing around.  No one even looks surprised with jilted Alex talks to her.  In a really caring way.  And this is still fairly early on, wasn’t watching anything but their scenes but this had to be rare sight eh?  (Mebbe?)  And then he picks her up and sits down holding her and she clings and cries and like symbolism and could essay that but not going to right now because the broad relevant stroke is that Alex loves Izzie selflessly.  And this is the pinpoint core of why I can buy his ending, because he can’t NOT love Izzie.  I don’t think he even wants to stop.  Though he can set it down in his heart and let her go and doesn’t pine.  But he never stops loving her and it’s so many kinds of love imperfectly yet perfecly forged.

Forged.  But also born.  Stars uncrossed.  I have emotions without words and if I try I’ll never get out of it to move on, so moving on.

(Oh, George telling Alex to talk to Izzie because she won’t talk to him about whatever it was.  Isn’t is crazy that Izzie’s emotional squishy bestie goes to the emotionally stunted bad boy to help her because...  it’s an understanding of the two-way Izzie/Alex bond, but also this crazy trust that Alex will show up.)

I love that Izzie isn’t blind to his faults, truly doesn’t like his faults, but has eternal faith for who he is and can be.  She always saw him as someone with walls, once she stumbled on a lose stone and got a glimpse inside.  She knows.  She doesn’t always understand, but she knows.

Slight divergence from that line of thought, but its a great moment when they get together and he’s fairly transparently trying to make sure they’re in a committed relationship by dangling other women in front of her, and she’s a little ticked that he seems to be taking it rudely casually.  Probably a bit of insecurity, but I’d say more that she has a long history of not reading him from the perspective of him loving her.  Ie, 100% not recognizing that telling him about sleeping with George would hurt him.  And doesn’t get it until he comes in and he’s dropped the swagger and it’s a “I know I’m doing something wrong and I don’t know how to do it right so help me” thing.  

(Random memories of Sloan/Don from The Newsroom when she’s crying on the floor and Don comes in a sits next to her.  I wuvs them too.)

I love that she openly leans on him, when he offers support she takes it.  She doesn’t ask why, she accepts it and leans into it and is open to it because she trusts him because she knows him.  The bits where she hates him tend to fall out of romantic issues, but when that’s removed from the equation they’re in sync.  And the thing is, just as caring is fundamental to Alex’s nature, trust is fundamental to Izzie’s.  And those two things weave into each other.  Kinda like rats and the food button.  When Alex reaches out Izzie she honestly accepts it, a “reward.”  So he’s comfortable doing it again, and again.  And when she does rebuff him he’s seen rewards come out enough that he doesn’t just scatter.  And when Izzie trusts him, he rewards her with gentleness and care.  She has the rougher time of it overall, because Alex is more screwed up emotionally, and breaks her trust more often than she rebuffs him, but that’s where Alex’s constant love comes in.  But I cannot recall enough critical moments to have a cohesive proof, so I could be a little off base.

In my head Alex has always loved Izzie more than Izzie loves him, but I think my memory was unfair.  There is a real constancy to Izzie’s affection, though I don’t think she imprinted on Alex as he did on her.  She’s a different person, loves differently, has different issues.  But my longstanding impression is mostly because of Denny.  Who she truly did love, though the qualities of that love deserve exploration which I will not at this time attempt. And Denny loved her.   The whole “side loves along the way” being a trope.  Though usually “it ended in death/deathlike state” is given to the man and so THANK YOU SHONDA.  Thinking of classics like Jane Eyre and Rebecca though I think both were actually crazypants first wives.  And I do think female character’s side guys have a  habit of dying, but it tends to feel more like a plot point to shut the door on continued love, whereas Denny remains a part of Izzie’s life. 

 At any rate, despite superficial similarities, Alex doesn’t hit the trope because his crazypants relationship wasn’t ever really about the woman:  yep Alex got Rebecca, and Rebecca was crazypants, and it was a plot point to get him to the crying.  Rebecca wasn’t love. It was never love.  BUT

She DID, in every way, highlight what needed to be highlighted.  1) That he desperately wants a family.  2) that caring for someone, not just about them, is fundamental to him, (and ties neatly into him caring for Izzie all those sitting on the floor conversations.) and c) it’s not entirely healthy.  Which is ALSO why thrusting his new happy relationship with Izzie into caregiver role is insensitive and undermines the relationship because it only makes sense if we got to see them both happy in the relationship first.  And then we can see the quality of his caregiving change.  But we didn’t.  So bugger it.

I do LOVE how they let almost the whole next season play out he fallout of all that.  Something taken slowly!  We got to explore it.  Did feel a bit drawn out tbh.  But it just emphasizes the weight of it, I guess.  Especially as it was a subplot amongst 100 others.  This was their development for the season.  Which was mostly Alex.  But Izzie’s reactions revealed some things about her as well.  Majorly dancing around laying it out for a close look and I don’t know why.

Favourite moment?  Maybe Izzie putting her hand on Alex’s chest when he’s freaking out and telling him to stop, he doesn’t need to say any more.  Because he’s trying to convince her of something, and she understands.  And the trying to convince is shredding him, and she knows that.  It’s a very loving and accepting “stop.”  She’d already taken charge of the situation, for the good of the patient.  She’d already taken charge because she knew Alex couldn’t handle it, he was too deep in something to see clearly.  And she’s still in charge.  She doesn’t break down and cry for him, or try to comfort him, he’s been thrown back into childhood and PTSD might literally be at play and what he needs, and she understands, is someone he can trust, who’s calm and gentle but strong and solid, to say it’s okay.  It’s going to be okay.  You don’t have to carry this on your own.  We have it now.  Because when we’re little and in over our heads what we want and what we need is an adult to take the burden.  And still the physical contact is comforting, her tone of voice reassuring.  She creates a space where he can feel safe and heard.

Ugh, rewatching, and we’re watching him literally devolve.  Stages of grief ya’ll.  He’s using every tactic to try and get what he thinks he needs: being able to take care of Rebecca.  He’s in denial that anything is wrong.  He gets angry when Izzie grabs him, to the point of threatening to hit her (though it’s fighting words and not real threat, and Izzie totally knows that.)  He dives into bargaining.  She’ll be okay if he can take care of her.  He can do it.  He tries to convince her it’s true.

By the time he gets home it’s depression.  Not just Rebecca, but about his mom.  And Izzie approaches him differently.  In the hospital it was immediate and she was “in charge,” and needed to be in all facets, but at home, with the situation taken care of, she’s a friend.  An equal.  Which is what he needs right now.  His sticking point later is the crying, so I kinda wonder how he’d react just to having told her about taking care of his mom as a kid.  Right at the start he told that kid about his dad, (dad beating up his mom and him beating up his dad) while Izzie was within listening distance and didn’t seem fussed.  But it’s ultimately a story about him being manly and protecting his mom physically.  Which would be why it’s several seasons in before this crops up - waaay more intimate information.  Probably all lumped into one, with the crying as shorthand.  And mostly that his past is a fact, it’s his emotions he wants to keep private and deny.

He clearly did try to drown his emotions with sex.  I’m not sure it would have worked with a random girl because he’s way too close to crying to do much of anything.  And obviously doesn’t work with Izzie because sex is apparently emotional intimacy and I guess comfort for men moreso than women, but it plays out as a desperate attempt to get comfort in a safer way.  Bargaining again, I suppose.  “Have sex and will be fine tomorrow.”  But, as noted, he doesn’t get that far because it’s too heavy and he rather quickly is just sobbing.

Which is a lovely parallel to holding Izzie while she cried on him after Denny died.  Though Izzie had no qualms and no massive emotional recoil because emotions and vulnerability are normalized for females Izzie is a particularly emotional person.  And an inverse of all the times Izzie is an emotional wreck and Alex sits down besides her and offers her support and understanding.

Could also argue that Izzie just saying “I’m sorry... About Rebecca.  And your mom” - it’s an emotionally intimate moment.  Of understanding.  She’s acknowledging the two situations, and isn’t trying to do anything about them, explain or push or anything else.  Just make him feel understood and not alone and sex is the way he can respond to that.  How to process that in a way that feels manly to him?  Also notably Izzie does seem to be going with it, and it’s aborted because he starts sobbing.  And is still saying “Please” which is amazing, because he totally was never asking Izzie to just sleep with him.  He wants to make it stop - the pain, emotions, probably reliving memories.  But also... stages of grief.  He needs to feel it, so he can accept it.  He really just needs to cry, and grieve, and not be alone.

And it’s like... this is where their love story feels epic because it would look so different if they didn’t have all the levels and layers of love.  Take out the romantic/sexual aspect.  Take out the friendship.  The trust.  The family.  Take out anything and this can’t play out.

Who didn’t love moments like Alex explaining to Bernedette Peters that men sometimes need to protect their manliness in the eyes of the woman they love.  And they’ll do shit things to protect that manliness, but it’s because they care.  Which is obviously idiotic and while romantic on screen is very much not so in real life, but this is fiction so hey ho.  It’s such a wonderful foil.  Because the situation here was not that Alex took his pain elsewhere to protect Izzie’s opinion, but that Alex completely and for a long time shut Izzie out to protect his manliness, which is entirely counterproductive but the only option he could see.  He minimizes his experience as a “bad night.”  (I mean, if you remove all the adjectives, he’s not wrong.) He’s protecting his own sense of manliness to himself.  He doesn’t like feeling that vulnerable.  He let Izzie get too close.  He’s afraid.  It’s all a tangle.  And it pays off when they come back together and he’s willing to be more vulnerable, almost, and then enthusiastically, happy to be.

*But it does reference when he slept with Olivia when he failed his boards.  So yeah, he’s done it literally too.

Backing up a step to revisit season 5.  And actually they start out close.  They’re all out in the cold waiting to greet patients and Alex grabs a blanket for her.  He’s not irritated that Izzie keeps asking how he’s doing, just obviously in a bit of personal denial.  And they’re totally messing around and lighthearted and look at each other with their heads really close and it begs some questions about the interim, though I guess they just haven’t talked about it deeper than “are you okay.”  And per the Izzie/Meredith convo I guess they didn’t continue having sex (probably didn’t have sex that night either).  Though the way Izzie looks at him as he leaves, she’s totally concerned that he’s not dealing with it.

Ah yes, forgot - so they just kept his breakdown unremarked upon, the superficial checking in is situational because Rebecca is a fact.  They don’t talk about it, it’s fine.  Pretending it did not happen.  But it’s as soon as Alex thinks Izzie told Meredith about it that it goes pear shaped.  It’s funny that his issue is the crying and he’s the one that told Meredith, but thematically Izzie saying “he’s opening up to me” is sorta the same.  Also awww that even as she labels them friends, there’s this little glow inside her that they got closer.  Emotional intimacy, what’s life without it eh?

So also 100% it’s high on Alex’s mind.  That he did it, and so too that Izzie could betray him and tell others.  Their relationship is so beautifully fragile in that short interim.  It’s this little bubble where he’s okay that he was vulnerable with Izzie because she accepted it and isn’t making a big deal about it.  And he does feel super close to her.  But he can’t take anyone else seeing him in a non-manly light.  For himself, and it works in terms of Izzie too if it’s an inside/outside situation.  I’m a bit stuck and going in circles.  If Izzie tells, then Izzie isn’t taking it seriously?  Doesn’t understand him?  I don’t think he’s even angry at her, if he looks weak to others then she’ll come to see him as weak?  Halp, stuck.

Also so, I’ve seen it remarked upon that Izzie tends to forgive Alex when she maybe shouldn’t.  But part of forgiveness can come from understanding the other person.  Doesn’t have to be, especially for little stuff.  But for big stuff?

Oh, and so weird but kinda cool that right after that rather self-aware conversation with Peters, he specifically lets Izzy see him with another woman.  Were those scenes meant to be inverted?  Or is he going into this eyes wide open?  Trying to prove something?  He’s hurting her though, is it intentional?  Because cheating, by nature, is secretive, your person doesn’t know so you’re not hurting them directly, though of course when they find out it blows up.  But the intention to wound is not there, it’s an escape.  Proving that he’s really fine and back to his old self?  They are not sleeping together so this isn’t cheating.

And even after that Izzy just shrugged it off.  Popped in to tell him they maybe are getting kicked out, tries to get an apartment with him.  She’s holding on to their closeness and friendship, despite him being prickly.  And then... he smacks her or whatever they were doing which is back to flirty, and not meaningful but notably guides her out of the elevator before him.  Though her barb about STD did hit him.   Maybe he was trying to figure out how to stop being rude at her, and her continued friendliness was bufffer space until he could?  He does say hello at the end, but who was she talking to about having no one?

It does bring up an interesting insight.  It is true bout not something I thought about, that Izzie could be lonely, and actually does get as much out of their relationship as Alex ever did.  They are incredibly close.  And I think George might be married at this point, and thus no longer her “person”?

And then into the cryptic speak about them, while the father/son organ musical chair thing was happening.  He’s looking over his shoulder at her, glances up, unspoken words yadda yadda.  Follows her out into the hall when she leaves.  The freeze out is shorter than I remember, but look, they kinda always keep communicating because freeze outs do not feel right.  And I’ve moved to a blow by blow but Alex is trying to talk profession, and Izzie doublespeaks the “emotionally stunted” and he physically recoils and stutters like “yeah but no, that’s not what we’re talking about” and yet is now there and talking about them too.  “Okay, ... I”m trying to be-  I am, but this” WHAT is he trying to be/is???  Trying to not be emotionally stunted.  Is emotionally stunted (or doubling down on trying?)

This is just such a beautiful conversation.  Because Izzie IS emotional and caring but she has a mean backhand.  Pettiness, ultimatum, she can smack back as hard as anyone smacks her.  And she’s coming from a totally reasonable place, because he’s going hot and cold on her.  And you can see that it affects him, and that falls out from that same pattern where he’s trying to tell her somehing and she’s not putting in a ton of effort to figure out what he’s saying, but is focused on her own needs and thoughts.  ‘Cuz she’s hearing something like “give it up, you’re not going to get what you want out of me.”  And he’s trying to say “I’m afraid I can’t be what you need, because I svck, please don’t make me try and fail.”

And they’re convo through parallels continues, Izzie calls Alex broken and is like “okay I do it your way my caring for you is pointless and it’s all fine.”   Dad calls for son while kinda dying.  I know they claimed different thought process but didn’t Alex call for Izzie when he was shot?  And the payout from the series of exchanges: Alex is yelling at his standin to just step up and show he cares.  With a hefty does of potential regret.  It’s a 180, hoping that the kid does love his day, as well as getting emotionally invested.  His relationship with his father isn’t mentioned, not sure if it’s meant to play into this, because he has previously acknowledged that he regrets losing his father completely.

(But then 10 seconds later she’s going to go crazy and by avoiding treatment it’s kinda like trying to kill herself and just... poor taste writers, poor taste.)

Cue a moment where Izzie knows what he’s trying to say and rewards it.

Enter Izzie being a little obtuse, I know I covered this but ending my personal cannon with them getting together - Alex literally says “are we going steady.”  He’s literally saying “you tell me yes or no, and I will do that.”  Of course he’s trying to say “I don’t know if you’re serious and I want to be please clarify and reassure” but one of those literal ones should have been enough.  But then Izzie does always push him, not always intentionally, to be a little more direct, a little more vulnerable, trust her a little more.  And the result is sooooo adorable!

And brings to mind when Izzie was trying to ask him out for the first time.  And it went a tiny bit screwy and Alex flips it and asks her out.

There’s just so much awesome.  *sobs*  And there’s probably awesome in the cancer storyline too but I do not feel I can trust it and also it’s going to run full into Izzie being lame and leaving and all character development out the window?  And I DO NOT want to see her trying to come back and Alex saying No.  Because what will I see in the middle that gets them there?  They always say yes.  Eventually.  And season 16 when JC is leaving the show is a bit on the long side, even if I ignore the details of the intervening years.

Throwing everything at the wall and maybe I’ll be done with dumping or can at least refine things.  It’s the little speech I’ve only read and don’t want to hear bcause not sure how he did his line-read, but when he describes how he imagines Izzie’s life.  In how much detail, how much he wants for her, what he knows she’s capable of building.  He’s saying it to Jo and I’m uncomfortable with the idea he loves her, even if the letter to her does leak a “love you, in love with Izzie,” and I’m fine with Izzie loving Denny and don’t find it a problem Jo is still alive because I don’t see Alex going back but the thing where if he looks her in the eye he won’t return to Izzie and the kids is upsetting.  And it’s just the kids and insta-family which is enticing.  I mean, he’s not going to tell wife he’s leaving that he’s always loved his ex in a different way or anything.  But he’s also not lying.  He does mention to Meredith that he can’t go back to Seattle.  He’d stay with Jo then out of...  ?  Halp.  The best I got is he’s currently in a dream and if he goes back to his life, where he was happy, then he’ll lose the dream and it will disappear on him?

Slightly nicer is the elsewhere expressed (Meredith) idea that he’d set Izzie as unreachable.  Thus, in line with what he told Jo, he didn’t want to contact her because he didn’t want to make it worse for himself, and his happiness comparison was completely excluding himself from the possibility of being part of Izzie’s life.  It’s all happiness of them individually, not together.  But yes, he always wanted to reach out, wanted to hear her voice and he never had an excuse?  No excuse but curiousity, and that wasn’t enough to take a chance, but this was an excuse and he took it.  

And the idea that he knows the right thing is to stay in Seattle, and being with Izzie and the kids is crazy, but it’s what makes him happiest, where he belongs.  Meredith’s letter read first, so in that light, he’s overexplaining to Jo.  Also exposition.  References that conversation about his mental picture of Izzie, which I think was in the context of Jo questioning his feelings for Izzie.  It scared him because...  ?  He focuses on the kids.  It’s a little at odds with doing this for him, and a little suddenly ignoring the fact that he’s In Love with Izzie and I guess his mental image for Izzie was also his dream life and he gave it to her.  Though where he thought her kids came from is possibly an oversight.  Adoption?

Because it makes it sound like he’s torn between new and old love but the old love has is kids and wins.  It’s a free pass to perfection.  But he imagined a “whole life” for her, which is a massive investment opf time and emotional energy on someone he hasn’t seen in forever.  I mean thinking well for an ex is al well and good but this sounds a bit beyond that, where she’s not a part of his life but a part of HIS life, believing she’s okay makes everything okay.

I am also willing to take up arms and claim that “I can’t look you in the eye because I wouldt be able to walk away...” doesn’t mean walk away from Jo, but walk away from Izzie.  But that’s kinda tenuous.  It just... it sounds like if he sees Jo he won’t be able to leave her, which puts her above Izzie (and even the kids, though he can still be in their lives) and that contradicts other statements, or at least their implications .

Though fair point that there’s a metric of who you’ll give up everything for.  Izzie would for Denny.  In a sense, I hear Meredith got her back in the Seattle hospital and she declined out of respect for Alex’s feelings.  So in a way she gave up her life for Alex.  And never reached out to him but did respond when he did.  She picked up the phone.  Maybe not knowing who it was, or they all kept their own phones.  And Alex gave it all up for Izzie+kids.  I want to know he’d give it all up for Izzie alone, and the life they could have had.

Or is it that he wouldn’t be able to leave Jo because, as noted to Meredith, it’s the right thing to stay in Seattle.  And he’s become a man who does the right thing.  And sometimes the right thing isn’t what we truly want, and to get that we have to be selfish.  He one perfect thing is in Kansas.  And it’s the family.  It’s a family with Izzie.  And his kids.  It’s the whole package.  If it wasn’t Izzie, the kids wouldn’t be enough?  Also indicates that even with Jo was not exactly where he should be.

I’m also going with “some clues in various directions to satisfy various viewers but really offending most of them because this is all 10 years ago and people are newer viewers or forgot or hated Izzie when she left etc.”  But preponderance of evidence leans in favour of this choosing what makes him happiest over what makes him happy.  

ETA: he has a life for Izzie in his head because if she’s not happy, he can’t leave her where she is.  He sees her as an optimist, the opposite of him and good things happen when you lean in that direction.  He imagines her somewhere woody because that’s where they lived when they were married.

ETA2: Izzie didn’t notice Alex wanted to be exclusive.  Because Izzie sees the good in him, but she doesn’t try to justify or explain things.  She takes him at face value (mostly, she knows superficial crabbiness is just an unpleasant personality trait.)  Until/unless she has very good evidence to he contrary.  And THAT is why he has to take an active role and go to her.  He does have to work for the relationship.

(Briefly skipped to a scene in season 6 (avoiding that season) and he actually says “I can’t be your nurse” which is so much character growth.  Because I was afraid he’d gone full out into caregiver mode, which is not healthy for either of them.  He’s protecting himself, but also pushing her to face up.)

CODAS

Watched Alex calling for/hallucinating Izzie when shot.  Maybe it’s a Miranda thing?  After freaking out right after she died, about how he can’t live without her, his breakup speech was essentially about how he realized he could survive without her.  He doesn’t need her like that.  And he was really hurt by the really shitty thing she did, leaving him. Thus valid conclusion that they should part ways and he’s not caught in the love/hate.  But at some point after that, per hallucination conversation, he really wants her to...  come back for him.  To love him enough to not be able to stay away and come back for him it’s funny because the best way for her to love him was the respect his wishes and not come back.  I mean she doesn’t even say anything after he asks that.  

Interesting point “we married...”  It’s a promise.  He starts with “I’m sorry.”  His breakup speech to her - rehearsed?  He’s speaking from love and hate all blended and I think he’s a lot more honest and self aware, and he’s almost always been honest with Izzie.  So his dying speech was also fear based?  He’s scared, he’s in shock, like, physical shock.  To when is his mind taking him?  It’s natural to have regrets after a painful but necessary breakup.  It’s been months but that’s still recent enough.  So on the whole, inconclusive except yeah, he isn’t over her, but he admits during their breakup that he loves her “so much.”

Also love his “frozen together in time... and now we’re not.”  They’ve both grown and changed, and so has their relationship, but there connection hasn’t.  That hasn’t changed.  

So back to his Izzie speech, which is meaningful intentionally as in 300th episode, where years later he was wondering still about her, enough to create a good life for her.  A happy, rich and full life.  He imagines it clearly and deeply enough to add smell to it.  Smell is heavily linked to memory and emotion.

As happy as he is with Jo.  Maybe it’s contentment?  Something missing for each of them but not something he consciously knows?  Meh.  Back to frozen.  He has an image, a full rich image of her and her life.  It’s immersive but static, a snapshot.  And the him who looks at that snapshot is the same him over time.  

Letter to Meredith.  “It’s about me.”  Which is sorta back to breakup speech.  It was about him, ending the relationship.  He didn’t deserve to be left.  And this is about him, not leaving Izzie+kids.  There’s movement and beauty in this.

Meredith/Alex talking true love.  So I’m torn.  Jo refused his proposal, and the question is if you only get one true love.  Did he think Jo was a true love, and if she refuses him it’s not?  Or is he hoping that true love happens after they’re married?  Given the constancy of his love for Izzie, from fairly early on, even if he didn’t call it that at the time I’m pretty sure it’s indisputedly much earlier than marriage, and she turned him down all the time, which would forestall true love worse, right?  Can’t say as I’m not watching any Jo/Alex, cannot will not no need don’t gotta.

[junkercrush]

junkrat x gender neutral reader being dipshits with fireworks? just going absolutely bonkers and almost setting themselves on fire

Who said we can’t have a Fourth of July story during the holiday season? 

It’s about time I wrote this one up. Here’s “Fireworks”

“Fireworks” 

SFW

Pairing: Junkrat/Gender Neutral Reader

Words: 1,210

                                                      *~*~*

“Hey Rat, what happened to the baby blue whale when it became an adult?”

“Wha?”

“It blew up!”

You and Junkrat burst out laughing for the millionth time in the backseat. Junkrat was so tickled he held his stomach, tears streaming down his soot-covered face.

If people saw you two right now, they would’ve thought you were high. Ya’ll were just giddy. It was the Fourth of July, you and Rat chowed down on a bunch of tacos.

Roadhog didn’t mind the taco wrappers and bags scattered all over the car. Besides, it was stolen from a car dealership not too long ago.

“Hey!” Hog boomed. “You have another burrito left back there? I’m still hungry.”

“You’re always hungry, mate.” Rat giggled as he passed a freshly wrapped burrito to Hog. The giant man wolfed it down in two big bites.

“Damn, we should’ve bought more.” Hog groaned.

“You can always get more after we grab the fireworks.” You suggested.

Hog grunted with approval. “I like that.”

Junkrat was so excited he was shaking his fists. He was ready to blow up the sky.

Mako dropped you and Rat off in front of a Wal-Mart. Rat was already receiving stares from customers. He looked like he stepped out of a destroyed fireworks factory. His hair was sizzling, and his clothes badly burnt.

An elderly woman grimaced at Junkrat’s scent and pinched her nose with pure disgust. You’re used to Rat’s smell by now.

“You got ten minutes,” Mako said. “Make it quick, no bullshit.”

You already knew it was going to take longer than ten minutes. You just knew.

“Right!” You and Rat exclaimed. Mako tossed a large wad of $100 bills into your hands. It was the right amount for all the fireworks Junkrat was going to load.

“MINE!” Junkrat swiped the money from your hands and dashed inside.

“Fuck.” You sighed and ran after him into the store. You heard Hog chuckling behind you as he drove away to a close parking spot.

Junkrat was already dropping fireworks into a shopping cart. “Mine, mine, mine! It’s all mine!” He yelled.

“Look, Daddy, that dirty man is getting lots of fireworks!” A cute, curly-haired girl pointed out.

“Sweetie, don’t stare at him.” The father said. He took his small child away from you and your maniac.

You placed a hand on Junkrat’s shoulder. He stopped. “That’s enough,” You laughed. “We’re stacked.

“Let’s blow them up!” Junkrat lit a match.

One man noticed Junkrat’s light. “Oh shit!” He screamed and ran away. You immediately snuffed out the match.

“Wait, Rat, goddammit!” You couldn’t help but laugh. Junkrat laughed along with you. “Give me the money. I’ll pay for it. You go back to Hog, got it?”

Junkrat sneered. “Sure.”

You watched him as he hobbled his way out of the store and headed to the self check-out aisle.

“I saw him. He was ‘bout to blow up the whole store!”

You turned one corner and saw the frightened man from earlier talking to a Wal-Mart employee. Both glared at you. Yeah, it was time to go.

You paced out of the store and found Hog leaning against the car.

“Where’s Rat?” He asked. You froze.

“I thought he came to the car.” You said. Roadhog shook his head. Shoot!

You passed Hog your shopping cart and raced back into the store. You tried dialing him with your phone. No response.

Did he return for more fireworks? Nope, he wasn’t in any of the aisles. Perhaps he went to the electronics section.

Before you made a run to the looming displays of gadgets and gizmos, you found Junkrat wandering down the breakfast aisle. He opened a box of pop-tarts and started eating out of it.

“Junkrat,” You shouted, making the man yelp and drop his box. “The hell are you doing?”

“Eating. What does it look like, mate?” He replied.

Junkrat picked up a carton of almond milk. “You know, Hog said he wanted some of this nut juice. Said regular ol’ milk made his big belly feel funny.”

Suddenly, Rat placed a palm over his head. “Whoa, I’m feeling a bit funny myself. Time to get some meds!” He stumbled a bit and bumped into a huge cereal display, knocking the colossal monument over.

“Whoops!” Rat said.

“Junkrat!” You cried.

Too late, the Aussie ran off again. For someone with a peg leg, he was a fast one. You chased after him and found him in the medicine aisle. He already had a few medications stuffed in his shorts.

“Oooh, look at this.” He pulled out a box of Magnum XXL condoms from the shelf. He wiggled his eyebrows at you.

“The heck are you going to do with those?” You asked, blood rushing to your cheeks.

Junkrat stepped closer to you. “What do you think, love?”

“Ahem.” Someone cleared their throat. A manager stepped into the aisle. His name tag: “Buck.”

“What the hell do you want?” Junkrat barked.

“You gotta pay for those, sir.” Buck pointed at the medicine bulging out of Junkrat’s shorts.

Junkrat whipped out a firework and lit it in front of the manager.

“No!” You yelped.

“Pay for this!” Junkrat shouted. The firework shot right into Buck’s direction. Buck ducked just in time.

“Security!” He shouted.

“Shit, Rat!” You hissed. You grabbed Junkrat’s prosthetic hand and dragged him out of the Wal-Mart. Roadhog was still waiting.

“That was 25 minutes. I said ten.” He growled.

You pinched Junkrat’s flesh arm out of mild annoyance.

“Ow!” Junkrat yelped.

“This fella over here shot a firework at the manager.” You said.

“He was bothering me,” Junkrat whined. “I wanted some balloons.”

Your mind flashed back minutes ago when Junkrat was showing off the box of condoms to you. Shit, he didn’t know the difference. You decided to keep quiet.

Junkrat gave Hog the almond milk he stuffed in his shorts. “Got ya some nut milk, mate!”

Police sirens wailed in the distance.

“And the cops are coming.” Hog groaned. “In the car. NOW!”

You and Junkrat raced to the backseat. One police car already made it to the Wal-Mart parking lot.

“Oooh, the cops!” Junkrat giggled. “Let’s say hello!”

“Let’s not.” You replied.

Roadhog finally started the car and zoomed out of the area.

“That was fun! I love the Fourth of July!” Junkrat said, hopping in his seat. He turned to you. “Can I blow up just one now? Please?”

“No!” You snapped. Junkrat whimpered.

“Let the damn rat light one.” Hog moaned.

“Fine, fine.” You sighed. You gave Junkrat one firework, and he shot it out of the car window. “Better now?”

Junkrat nodded and passed a firework to you. “C’mon, give it a light.”

You shot a firework out of the window. It burst into sparkles of red, white, and blue.

“Who wants to go to Dairy Queen?” Hog asked.

You and Junkrat cheered as Roadhog sped down the road.

“Wait,” A thought popped up in your mind as you glanced at the taco wrappers at your feet. “We’re supposed to get more tacos!”

“Shit!” Hog hissed and swerved the car around.

You and Junkrat continued shooting fireworks out of the car, scaring drivers off the road. The police trailed behind.

THE END

[wardencommanderrodimiss]

Dying @ the Borderlands AU post to be honest. (At work. 8') ) GIVE US THE BORDERLANDS ACE ATTORNEY CONTENT WE DESERVE. (Did you ever actually post that fic with the train push-off though??) ... I should look into playing that game. (Those games? Heck if I know. I like the artstyle though.)

I posted the first chapter of the fic, though at some point as I massaged out details, I did start trying to rewrite that chapter. So plot-location-wise, that’s a bit of a mess, but the general vibe of it is the same.

I think I had some other completed excerpts I never posted, and so if I get to writing up a huge big summary of the thing, which I want to do now, I can intersperse it with a few written bits. There was a thing with Ema, and then later with Kay.

(Those games, yeah, there’s three shooters and then one….idk how to describe Tales from, I own it and haven’t played it. But yeah, there’s Borderlands, Borderlands 2, and Borderlands the Pre-Sequel for the shoot-em-up main entries of the series that I’ve played. I love all of them, but I love the Pre-Sequel a little less because low-grav combat made me want to die.)

To summarize the AU, or the start of it, for everyone who doesn’t remember/wasn’t here, the main cast, and what their class names would tentatively be in-game, include:

APOLLO, the Sharpshooter, a sniper with an eyepatch who never misses a shot

(The eye patch is significant, I’ll come back to Apollo’s powers in another post.) He lived on Elpis for most of his life – Elpis is the moon of Pandora, which is the planet that most of the games take place on – and until the start of the story, works for the corporation Hyperion with his best friend Clay, an engineer. They’ve both come to be pretty important in Hyperion’s ranks, pretty quick – Apollo for his sniping skills is the personal bodyguard/assistant to Hyperion’s CEO, Kristoph, while Clay is one of the top engineers and most valuable people except for periodically when they’re forced to pay out the ass to run some antivirus/debug software on his brain, because Clay has a USB port in his head and sometimes he tries to download every cat video ever and gets a virus. Kristoph puts up with this, barely. (It is not the worst financial crime being committed in Hyperion’s ranks. Klavier is embezzling millions into pointless endeavors and Kristoph can’t lock him out of the system no matter what he tries. But that is, again, something to come back to later.)

Apollo and Clay start to suspect that there is a lot amiss about Hyperion and the kinds of experiments they do and what they want from Pandora, and together they start investigating into what, exactly, Kristoph is doing. In the midst of this, Clay is (apparently) killed, and Apollo not allowed to investigate anything about his death. This is the final straw, so Apollo takes what he knows, destroys what he can on the way out, and flees the Hyperion moonbase and Elpis, stowing away on a freighter shipment down to Pandora, intending to disappear into the wilds of Pandora. 

CLAY, however, isn’t dead – just in a coma, with his brain wired into Hyperion’s mainframe. He hacks the ECHOnet to get into Apollo’s communicator and serves as a “voice from above” font of “advice” and “wisdom”. (He’s taking the role of, to quickly spoiler-free summarize from the games, the Guardian AI called Angel, who throughout Borderlands and 2 offers advice and points you in the direction you need to go on your quest. Clay is an infinitely shittier at his job version.) Because of some limitations hacked into his brain, he can’t tell Apollo that he’s Clay, that he’s alive, and that he’s sort of being forced into trying to manipulate Apollo and friends into doing Hyperion’s bidding, but he can be very inefficient at it and sabotage from within as best he can. Also, sometimes he accidentally sabotages, like when he’s like “I’ve made the calculations and your vehicle can definitely make this jump” and they try it and crash because he was using the gravitational constant of Elpis, which has much less gravity than Pandora. 

On landing on Pandora, Apollo is waiting for one of the Hyperion trains that still runs to take him west and get as far away from this landing site as he can. There, he meets three other travelers and apparent fugitives:

ATHENA, the Berserker, who takes on robots with her fists and a sword and maybe sometimes she’ll use a shotgun;

KLAVIER, the Doppelganger, the spitting image of Hyperion’s CEO;

and TRUCY, the Siren, one of six women throughout the galaxy marked with strong magical powers and glowing tattoos that make her a target for everyone who knows the legend.

Hyperion robots stop the train and begin a search for the fugitive Apollo – the four of them take down the robots and jump off the train, and that’s where their adventures really begin.

ATHENA and TRUCY have a mind to go to the city of Sanctuary, the only free city on Pandora that isn’t corporate-owned or a bandit shithole. Trucy’s father and all her friends live in Sanctuary; Athena, too, lived there for a few years. Before that, they both lived in the city of New Haven, which was razed by Hyperion in their search for the man who screwed Kristoph out of getting his hands on a piece of the Vault Key and a Siren.

-inhales- quick more Borderlands plot context. Vaults are ancient alien caches of powerful weapons, treasure, or monsters scattered throughout the galaxy. These can only be opened by special keys, which are ancient artifacts that tend to be broken and scattered in pieces. In Borderlands, a corporation called Atlas and their military arm, the Crimson Lance, are trying to acquire all the pieces of the key scattered across Pandora to open a Vault to get the loot inside of it. You play as a Vault Hunter, who are not-quite-bandits who for whatever reason are interested in the lore of the Vault, or just kinda ended up on Pandora and fell into it accidentally. In Borderlands 2, about five years later, Hyperion is going after a different Vault, also on Pandora, also with the key in pieces, but the opening of the first Vault in the first game has done some funky stuff to the planet in the form of a mineral called Eridium. Both times, you are trying to stop the corporations from getting to the Vault, with help from some allies, such as the AI Angel and an independent resistance group, based first in New Haven, then in Sanctuary and called the Crimson Raiders, headed up by some of the player characters from the first game. In 2, the Vault Key can only be used naturally once every 100 years; otherwise, it has to be artificially charged with an Eridium-powered Siren. Thus, Hyperion needs a Siren. 

phew okay back to the AU, context thus set for Trucy.

TRUCY has spent a few years traveling Pandora on her own, trying to learn more about Eridium and its connection to her Siren-powers. At this point, however, she’s had enough being on her own, and wants to go back home to Sanctuary. She knows she’s a Hyperion target, and that’s partially why she’s been out on her own. She wanted to protect her friends and family. But she’s been reasonably undetected thus far, so she thinks she’s safe. Safe enough as anyone can be on Pandora. She wasn’t born on Pandora, actually, though her mother was from here. She spent the first years of her life living with the Troupe Gramarye, a gang of notorious con-artists who traveled the galaxy scamming people and looking for Vaults. How’d she fall in with Phoenix? Maybe that’s for next time.

ATHENA was not actually born on Pandora, either. She was born with strange, non-Siren powers, probably from her mother’s exposure to weird alien elements; Metis tried to keep this secret and devise ways to help Athena, but eventually people found out, wanted to turn Athena into a lab rat, and so Metis fled to Pandora, knowing its reputation for lawlessness because one of her former coworkers, a woman named Aura, fled there after she vaporized three people for stealing and copyrighting her own personal work. Aura’s brother followed her, after stabbing the people who showed up on his door looking for Aura. Metis knows she can rely on them, and so she takes Athena and goes.

Athena just acclimated really, really well to Pandora. In the course of fighting against Hyperion, however, some time after the attack on New Haven, Metis is murdered by an unknown infiltrator. Simon and Aura agree that they can’t raise and protect Athena the way she deserves, not when they are both dead-set on avenging Metis, and so Simon takes Athena off-world and settles her down somewhere safe. She has a normal teenager-hood in a normal part of the galaxy, goes to college, gets a degree in psychology – all the while chafing at the normalcy of it all. When she’s confronted with her massive amount of college debt, she says her final “fuck it” and abandons her responsibilities to run home to Pandora and find Simon again.

She hilariously has zero secrets that she’s keeping from the others. 

And KLAVIER was born and lived most of his life on Elpis – not that he says it, or much of anything, about himself to the others. He has obvious affiliation with Hyperion, but since Hyperion’s ‘bots are out to kill him as much as they are Athena and Trucy, they both accept that he’s on their side. Apollo isn’t quite so sure, because Apollo knew Kristoph and knows that Klavier looks just like him, thus knowing that Klavier was probably someone very important in Hyperion. 

Except Apollo can’t say that, because Kristoph (unlike Handsome Jack, Hyperion’s egomaniacal CEO in the games) doesn’t plaster his face everywhere and make himself well-known, so the fact that Apollo recognizes Klavier’s face to be shocked at him means that Apollo was also someone important in Hyperion to know Kristoph and so Apollo and Klavier are just the Spider-Man Pointing meme at each other over their Hyperion involvement. Except Hyperion has bounties on both their heads, so they’re like, okay, okay, cool, I guess I will tolerate you.

After some horrible misadventures involving Pandoran wildlife, which Klavier and Apollo are not prepared for even though Elpis also has horrible wildlife, they reach Sanctuary. Sanctuary is home to the resistance against Hyperion, called the Crimson Raiders, made up of random people and some of the remains of Atlas Corporation’s Crimson Lance who were hunting the Vault years earlier. There in Sanctuary, they catch up with former colonel EDGEWORTH formerly of the Lance, and former commandant VON KARMA also formerly of the Lance. They were once sent to Pandora to acquire the key and quash the Vault Hunters who were chasing it; however, a certain persistent Vault Hunter and his Vault-researcher friends won them over to his side, and so they turned on Atlas and the Lance. The two of them run Sanctuary and the Raiders, Von Karma handling a little more of the military matters, and Edgeworth with the mayoral matters, but mostly, they’re an apparently seamless team. 

Aaaand….I think that’s enough for one post. I could probably do, like, four more posts? One for the rest of the people of Sanctuary, one for Apollo and Klavier’s various fucked-up backstory secrets, one for Gramarye Bullshit, and one mapping out the very loose plot points moving forward.

But I’ve spent like all day writing this, so I guess I’ll do this in installments if I’m reminded. 

[jacewilliams1]

A flight of firsts doesn’t quite go according to plan

This flight was a primary for multiple events, including my first flight as pilot-in-command (PIC) without an instructor since I received my private pilot license, first passenger flight, and the first time I truly had to exercise my aeronautical decision making skills. Admittedly, I came out of the aircraft somewhat shaky, but safe. I immediately debriefed the flight with my passenger on the drive home, and I have been stuck with the memory of this flight since.

I had received my PPL in the end of June in 2017 as a rising 17-year old high school senior, thanks to an extremely generous instructor who trained me at a reduced rate in his own aircraft. However, once I received my PPL, the airport owners informed my instructor and me that I would need 500 hours before I could fly solo out of the grass strip, so I was unable to thus fly his aircraft to gain more PIC time. This resulted in my extended endeavor to find an aircraft to fly. I settled on a flight school in Milton, Florida, Peter Prince Field (2R4), which had a small fleet of Cessna 172s. I checked out in the 172 in September and began planning for my first passenger flight.

Taking Dad for a flight – is there anything better?

Since I was still a high school student, I was restricted to flying during the weekends when I was not working (my local area of northwest Florida has regular storms most afternoons, so this further restricted flight availability). I finally found a seemingly good day that worked out for both my Dad and me, who was to be my first passenger, hoping that I would be able to take him west along the Florida coast for a beautiful aerial tour.

I elected to rent one of the aircraft that I had been checked out in and flown recently – N7806G, a classic-looking 172. We arrived at the airport about 20 minutes early and I began my preflight: briefly checking the weather (which reported VFR), reviewing takeoff plans, thorough pre-flighting the aircraft, and reviewing paperwork ensuring all maintenance was up to date. We then loaded up, and I continued a thorough engine run up before entering runway 36. I then advanced the throttle, and began to feel the thrill of acceleration.

Takeoff is by far the best part of any flight, and I was ecstatic to be able to share the experience with my father. My plan was to take off and immediately contact Pensacola Approach, since I would be flying in their Class C airspace, then fly 20 miles or so southwest until I was over the coast. From there, I intended to fly above the Emerald Coast at 2500 feet until I arrived at Jack Edwards Airport (KJKA). The initial plan was simply to fly over the airfield and then return to Milton, but that was not the way things were to happen.

The takeoff was satisfying, and I began to anticipate flying over a beautiful, sunny beach with white sands, blue water, and an even bluer sky. To my horror, I instead witnessed a ring of thick clouds, and we were in the middle. The bowl was rather large, so I reasoned that I would be able to still make it to the coast and continue on, since the winds were apparently pushing the clouds away. I continued climbing through hundreds, then thousands of feet, and then switched over from the Milton frequency to Pensacola Approach. I explained my plan and told them it should take about an hour.

As I continued to climb further, I saw that the clouds were now getting larger and larger. I began to move in a more westward heading and ended up flying parallel to the coast. I stayed about a mile north of the clouds, and continued my path, hoping that the weather would be clearer in a few miles. Then, another surprise. My dad’s door popped open, and we immediately felt the wind in our faces. This was not the first time this happened to me, since I had the door open twice during my training (I guess some nearly 50-year old doors old just sometimes don’t like staying shut). My dad was definitely surprised, since having a door open mid-flight is not something most passengers like to think about (albeit at only 100 mph). He immediately pulled the door in, though it did not lock all the way, so I asked him to open it again and try slamming it shut. This seemed to work well, though my dad was still holding on to the door for the rest of the flight, for good measure.

Then my next problem arose. When I contacted Pensacola, I could not understand what the controller was stating. The radio was muffled and scratchy. I asked the controller to repeat, but to no better avail. I could hear myself fine in the aircraft, but not any incoming transmissions. I began to think the problem was related to my headset (being a high school aviator, I only had a cheap pair of headsets that were less than $100). I reported to Pensacola I thought my headset was bad, and I was at least able to make out that they understood what I stated. All the while I was still navigating parallel to the coast and was not seeing any blue sky. Rats.

So much for the lazy sightseeing flight.

I began troubleshooting the problem. My dad was having similar problems, and so I learned it was likely too much of a coincidence to be both headsets. I then theorized the air vents were blowing on my mic (this previously happened to me on an instructional flight), so I moved my vents around to every possible angle, but to no avail. My dad then attempted the same with his, but still no difference.

I then made out on the radio that the controller was asking someone to switch frequencies. I did not hear the tail number, and reasoned it probably was not me. Then the controller repeated again, so I responded that I would switch over. The controller immediately called back and told me to stay on the frequency, and that he was talking to a different aircraft. Due to my radio issues, he had to be repetitive, and I could tell I was beginning to annoy him with my frequent requests for repeats and occasionally misunderstanding his instructions. At this point, I began evaluating myself. The weather was only getting worse, and there seemed to be a wall of clouds a few miles ahead. The door had given its share of trouble, and now I was annoying a heavily-tasked air traffic controller. I was flying into a deteriorating situation.

At this point I then figured out how to fix the mic problem. I realized the air was still coming in the aircraft from the door (which was still not fully shut), and it was hitting my Dad’s mic. I unplugged his microphone and told him that I would be able to talk with him, but that he would probably have to physically communicate with me if he needed to. As soon as I unplugged the mic, the static vanished. At least one problem solved. I was then asked to switch to a different frequency, so I was no longer dealing with an annoyed controller. However, as soon as I switched over, I realized that the wall of clouds in front of me was not giving way to anything pleasant. At this point, I determined that the weather was deteriorating, and I made a mental switch from a relaxed leisure flight to a get-on-the-ground-ASAP flight.

I informed the controller that I would not be able to make it to KJKA, that “clouds were in the way,” and I would be promptly returning to 2R4. The controller quickly instructed me to maintain VFR, and to proceed as required in order to do so. I completed a turn around and saw scattered clouds in my path back to the airport. I informed the controller I was climbing to 3000 feet in order to maintain cloud clearance, and he immediately informed me to maintain VFR. I was relieved when I finally had 2R4 back in sight, and the controller let me switch over frequencies. Now I simply had to land the airplane safely.

I entered the pattern for 2R4, and realized I would need to land on runway 18. I entered the right downwind leg and began to prep for landing. Slowed down, flaps down, pattern calls made, and preparing for some rather gusty winds associated with the inconvenient weather. As I entered the base leg, I saw I was high, so I pulled the throttle and continued a full-flap descent. Somewhere in the mix of gusty and erratic wind controls, I lost track of airspeed. I saw that I was about five knots slow, and shoved the nose down and increased the throttle to recover. Next, I continued on final, but overflew my intended touchdown point. I eventually settled down onto the runway after an elongated final, and after a solid, uncomfortable bump, smoothed out and taxied off. Definitely not my best landing. However, my dad and I were safe, and I did not damage the aircraft, so in that sense, it was a good landing.

When I walked back into the FBO, the crewman inside commented on how the winds could not decide where they were going. Since I was already in the pattern, I had stuck to the runway I was set up for, though the winds were apparently shifting in all sorts of directions – explaining the unusual crosswind controls. Once I paid and was on my way driving home, I debriefed the flight with my first passenger.

My assessment of my flight: fair. What I definitely could have done better was to conduct a more thorough weather briefing, and probably could have turned back around sooner. However, on the positive side, I believe that I was calm and did not panic when I had a multitude of undesirable events arise. While flying with a door partially opened, with a static radio, with an annoyed controller in deteriorating weather, I remembered from my studies that every aviation accident is a chain of events. As soon as I lined all of these up, I realized I should end the flight before it ended me. I firmly believe that I made the right choice, but the next question that follows, is how much sooner should I have made it?

My lessons learned: conduct a thorough briefing, be ready for anything, and use your resources. My best resource on this flight by far was ATC. Without their assistance in allowing me to deviate in order to maintain VFR, I may not have been here to be able to write this story. Although I had somewhat irritated the first controller, understandably so, ATC provided immediate help to anything I needed, as they strive to do to every pilot.

The post A flight of firsts doesn’t quite go according to plan appeared first on Air Facts Journal.

from Engineering Blog https://airfactsjournal.com/2018/09/a-flight-of-firsts-doesnt-quite-go-according-to-plan/