#Social interaction. Volunteering somewhere. Etc

[yakamozarda]

Ngl im just sad that a lot of people dont have the social/financial means to go outside of their social circle or their comfort zone and have to stick with whatever they get online/on media etc etc but like. You need to make sure you are not clinically online and stuck in your echochamber. Pick an essay to read that you dont understand. Idk watch a history documentation. If you can go to a party where you will be exposed to people outside your social circle, listen to their life story while they are drunk and chatty. Im begging you

[my-castles-crumbling]

hello cas! swiftie anon, I was planning on sending this earlier but I've been feeling shitty and wasn't motivated enough to type shit out.

so, I was going to send you a message that everything with volunteering at vacation bible school was fine or whatever. so a little pretext, since me and my brother did check-in, that was only for the first thirty minutes, and after that we just look for things to help out with.

so on thursday we had to walk around and take photos of the kids in the classroom. and I was really uncomfortable with walking in there, and just taking photos. probably my anxiety, but I suck at like, feeling I belong somewhere. anyway, I shoved the phone into my brother's hands and told him to do it. he got kinda mad, since I hadn't taken many of the photos, bc I got nervous.

and I just couldn't really take it. bc something is wrong me me cas. I already knew that. and I thought my brother of all people would understand. so I started crying, which was really embarrassing, and I went to the bathroom to cry. I think I was hyperventilating, and I kept thinking about how there's something wrong with me, and how it's hard to be around me bc of that.

I left the bathroom after a bit bc I think there was a bathroom break for the kids, and I was still crying in the hallway, and it was just really icky. my brother doesn't really get mad, and if he does he usually gets over it in like a few minutes. he said sorry, and told me that he needed to take me home. I said no, bc I didn't want to talk about it with our parents. so I just stayed there and cried in the hallway for a few more minutes, and a few adults saw me (which will be important later). I may or may not have started hyperventilating again, and my brother told me that I needed to leave. My sister asked what was wrong (she was a classroom helper, and it was her break) and I told her I didn't want to talk about it. I left, we went to the library, and I just read there until we had to go pick up my sister at 12. we had a family night at church later that night, and some of the adults that asked if I was okay, and told my mom that I had been crying earlier.

my parents wanted to talk to me about it. and, idk why they thought I would. I don't talk to them about...anything. Actually, I don't really talk to anyone about how I feel, probably bc I'm pretty emotionally repressed. I already know what's wrong with me, and why I react to things the way I do. and then they got kinda mad, like "you'll have to interact with people when you're older." etc. and then they brought up how I didn't have to do a social studies presentation bc I started crying and hyperventilating, and my teacher said I didn't have to do it, and she would just grade my slideshow. my mom said "that's not something you can get away with in high school." and I hate her so fucking much, she acts like everything is my fucking fault and my choice, and that presentation thing wasn't something I "got away with" it just happened. I was going to do it, I just couldn't.

also, I've just kind of, lost my appetite lately, which I forgot to mention in my last message. is it a depression thing? Idk. I usually skip breakfast, but I've skipped lunch the last few days. which, ik is an issue, but i just can't find the motivation to eat, yk? My brother has kind of been forcing me to eat the last few days, so, ig that's a good thing.

so tonight my brother was playing video games with his friends, and came down to dinner late. my parents got so pissed, and we used to have a set time where we had to be down for dinner, or else we got our phones taken away. they've been more lenient these days. anyway my parents asked "what time are you supposed to be down here?" and my brother said "6:30, idk, i'm stupid." and they've called us, him, stupid so many times. they were talking about if they should call him down for dinner, and my dad was like, "idk how he plays video games for so long without being stupid" and idk, I just hate that they expect us to know everything, and I hate them for expecting us to be okay with it.

they never apologize for the things that matter, and I think that they think that they're okay parents. I just really hate them, bc it doesn't feel like they care about us.

idk, this was really long, so that'll be all for now. have a good day/night!

Hi hon!

Okay, the way you're talking about yourself here is bothering me. "Something is wrong with me" like...yes, it seems like you might be depressed/anxious. (loss of appetite is a sign of this) But that's not something to be embarrassed or ashamed of. You deserve support and love. And I am so sorry that it seems like you're not getting it. I'm also so sorry your parents are saying rude things. Remember, you deserve unconditional love.

I'm always here if you need to talk!

[colemckenzies]

hi sorry to bother you but do you have any advice on how to make friends in your 20s? seeing you happy and enjoying your friendship group is so good and wholesome and everything i kind of want out of my life lol <3 any advice appreciated!

aw this is so nice!!!

i mean the biggest impetus for me was moving to a new city where i knew literally not a single person and then living alone in said city, so i had no choice but to go out and meet people like there was nothing else i could do. and i will say it has been really hard, particularly as i work full-time and study part-time, and have been recovering from some Stuff that happened in 2020, and even now it's sometimes A Lot because it does take me a solid 5 years of knowing someone before I'm like Yes Okay We Are For Real Friends And I Can Be Myself With You lol. but it has also been really gratifying and i do always recommend getting out there and connecting w people irl!!!

i obviously don't know what you're situation is or how much it aligns w my experience but with that said here are my Top Tips:

apps. when i first moved i met most people my age through Bumble BFF which is a bit cringe and awkward but it was a great starting point, it basically kick-started my entire social life bc you know that the people on it are ALSO actively looking for friends (literally the first person i met was so invested that they threw loads of networking events for everyone they had met and started a groupchat and i met a lot of people that way). also tinder lmao the two people i talk to/hang out with most are both people i met on tinder it's a great way to specifically roll with the el gee bee tees

clubs/societies. personally i find clubs really hard to commit to (see the work/uni time commitment lol i just get too tired) but the thing to remember is you don't have to do them forever. i joined all sorts of groups for a few months, and then when there were people there i really liked (who i knew shared an interest in whatever thing it was) i just stayed in contact with them. and then obviously if you really like a group you can keep doing it (i still do theatre and LOVE literally everyone there). these groups are good as well because they really cultivate Local Community investment in particular and i think it's important to interact w people from different backgrounds/age groups you wouldn't necessarily be Friends with but like they ARE your local community

community centres/local businesses. like that tiktok that says about Just Show Up Somewhere Regularly, like this could be going to your favourite coffee shop/community space and then just keeping an eye out for who else is always there at the same time as you, but ALSO could be more active than that. most of my main friend group are big contributors to the local queer arts scene and organise events w the local arts centre/pubs/etc so don't be afraid to ask your local institutions what's going on or if you can volunteer. again i think actively investing in local community is really key here and provides you a wide net to rely on and full of more individuals you can meet one-on-one

group chats are your friend. i love a groupchat these days i used to hate friendship groups in school bc it was so cliquey and required so much maintenance and ive always preferred hanging out with people one-on-one (still do) but now im in sooo many groupchats and it's nice if i have a free evening and feel like doing something and i can just post 'hey is anyone free' and then people r free and sometimes they will bring people THEY know and then i meet more people.

reddit. was not expecting this to be a thing and i only had an account for a very short while but my city's subreddit was SO useful when i first moved for finding out about events/clubs that weren't advertised elsewhere and getting local insider info. i personally didn't meet anyone this way but i know they did organise meet-ups and have a CITY DISCORD SERVER so that may work for u if your city has something like that lmao

be open to making friends. with the above said as ways to meet people u have to be willing to actually make friends with people!! in my town instagram seems to be the main way to low-committal connect w people so i made a public account and now whenever i meet the vaguest stranger at an event who seems cool im like oh yeah let's follow each other lol. say yes when people invite you places and be willing to invite other people to hang out if you think you would be friends! a good way to bridge the gap between Acquaintances and Friends is to tell the acquaintance abt something you're doing anyway so then it's no pressure. like if you're part of a local group (see point 2) or going to an event (see point 3) just be like 'oh I'll be at this thing maybe see you there!' and then if they are there you can talk to them more and if you do this enough times you are now friends. or just in general be willing to (casually) do nice things for people even if it might seem a bit weird like when I got new neighbours i put my phone number through their letterbox in case they needed anything i got someone i didn't know That well a gift just because it was something specific they'd been talking about i thought they would like i saw someone on instagram say they loved handwritten letters so i asked if they minded sharing their address - as long as you're polite and not pushy about it and don't mind if people just ignore it then it's nice!

cast a wide net. as u may have noted from the above points lol i think it mostly comes down to meeting EVERYONE and being open to EVERYTHING and not putting too much pressure on anything or anyone in particular so that you will just organically get closer with the people you're supposed to get close with and nothing is forced. its great to find your Platonic Soulmate or w/e but you do also just need a certain base level of socialisation and u gotta work with what you have. if you just assume that most human beings you interact with on a day to day basis are kind people with good intentions not only does life feel a lot easier but it's easier to remember that you are just Someone Who Lives In A Place and so are they and it's all fine.

think about people you already know. obviously it's great when you really Click with someone and meeting new people is refreshing and interesting but is there anyone you already know nearby who you've never been Friends friends with but you get on and could see yourself being friends if you actually invested time in it? reach out!! i think this is esp good bc as much as personality is a factor in friends never underestimate the power of just Knowing Their Name For A Long Time lmao. shared reference points in your history are huge even if you didn't actually talk to them at the time those reference points happened.

still take time for yourself. obviously the above takes a lot of time and energy and emotional effort and it's taken me over a year to get to the point that im at. sometimes it's really hard because i will have plans literally every day of the week and ive met so many people i COULD be friends with and then i feel guilty bc i haven't seen X person for three months lol. but i think it's nice to know that you COULD meet up with someone and invest in any one of those friendships you have but instead you are going to Choose to spend the weekend by yourself bc you are an individual WITHIN this large web of interconnected people and u still exist the whole time. like at the end of the day i am still in fact an introvert and when im with people i don't know that well i still mask a lot so i do need to take time to be by myself sometimes! and everyone is fine w that !

[angelvyxen]

Omg if you did become his manager and publicist what are some things you’d do and change 🎤 *hands you the mic*

Ooo, this is a good one. Okay so, 🥸

- Seize all control from J.J’s fat peanut head ass & scrap all the useless side hustles and ‘companies’ he’s created under Melo’s name. (Sorry Ms. Jonnie, the candles gots to go)

- Move J.J to solely take care of the 1 of 1 league and not touch shit else. I’ll handle it, he just needs to worry about those boys dribbling those balls.

- Scrap the snacks for now.

- Switch the DRNX bottle design back to the original. The Galaxy everywhere is overkill.

- Promote DRNX way better. I’m thinking have him do a shoot like this where he’s practicing in the gym and have DRNX in the background somewhere. Sneaky little promos.

- Have him do community service. There are a lot of impoverished kids in Charlotte that would love to see Lamelo Ball. (Back to school drives, host a field day catered by local black owned business’ in Charlotte at a park to get kids outside [bonus points if we have the DRNX truck pull up and give out free bottles], soup kitchen volunteering for a weekend, going around Charlotte and giving out candy to trick or treaters, Christmas toy drive, etc.)

- A professional revamp of the LaFrance website because it looks a hot ass mess right now.

- Get an actual team of design artists for LaFrance (because right now the design team looks like him and custom ink)

- Introduce an affordable LaFrance kids wear line. Nothing can be more than $30.

- Have LaFrance launch more clothing like this, this, this and those cute basketball shorts that have things written across the front. Also, make more tracksuits & sweatpants, those were a good idea. And hats.

- Have LaFrance sell posters & run deals like the first 200 posters sold will be signed (how they haven’t thought of this yet, I don’t know).

- Shoot a campaign for LaFrance with people who live in Charlotte rather regular models or in his case J.J’s sons. It’ll boost his popularity in the city.

- Urge him to interact with fans more through socials

- Interviews. Interviews. Interviews! GQ 10 things I can’t live without, Vogue spend a day with me, things like that.

- An official YouTube channel. It doesn’t have to be super active but an occasional ‘Cooking with Lamelo ball’ (like how Ari does) or a ‘Come practice with me’ once a month will suffice.

- Literally just have him go outside more and post it.

- Possibly a sunglasses line? It would make more sense than watches since he loves glasses.

[chartreuseorigami]

Tips on how to subtly avoid interaction when you’re forced to be somewhere

It has recently come to my attention that not everyone knows how to avoid interacting with people—or specifically people they don’t like—when needed. As a resident introvert, I have built up a bit of a successful repertoire in this area. Some of these tips apply to specific situations (family reunion, school, party), but most are adaptable.

Starting off simple: the bathroom is your friend. Go frequently and stay for as long as socially acceptable (even longer if you can claim a line!), whether or not you actually have to go. People might think you have some sort of bowel issue. Who cares? You don’t even like these people.

If a question comes up in conversation—offer to look it up! I don’t care if you know the answer or if it only takes 30 seconds, this is now a complex Google search that requires multiple articles and cross checking. This is also a great way to find something to say if you feel the need to contribute to a conversation. Because people will likely move on, you can wait until a natural break to speak up about your findings (or longer). Also, if you ever find yourself wanting to be on your phone, just make sure that after a little bit you chime in with something relevant to the earlier conversation so people will assume you’ve been looking it up this whole time.

Similar to the last—find a task to do. Cleaning up, setting up, getting something from another room, looking for something/someone, even braiding someone’s hair. Find some way to make yourself look busy.

Stare at something. Pictures on the walls, a garden, an instruction manual, you name it—look very intently at this chosen item (if there’s any words, mouth these silently) as if you are fascinated and studying it.

Go check on something. Check on the pets, that friend, the food, the door, etc and always make sure that it takes twice as much time as it should. Sometimes I’ll just mumble and generically point and then disappear for five minutes. People assume I had some reason.

Pretend you didn’t hear. Someone calls to you in the hallway? You didn’t even notice. They knocked on your door? Sorry, you had headphones in. They asked you a question? You were distracted by something else. With this, master the art of “innocently oblivious” face.

Make a “quick phone call.” Your family member needs to order something by tonight so they don’t miss a sale and they need your input. Your coworker has a question about an email. Your friend is lost. No obviously fake serious emergency needed to fake a phone call—just something simple and urgent.

Play tag team. If you and someone else both don’t want to interact with people but can’t acceptably just interact with each other, play tag team. For example, if you’re at a family reunion, have your sibling talk to the relatives while you disappear (all the attention on them), and then return and pull all the attention to you so they can disappear for a bit.

Get two people into a discussion so you can slip away. Kind of like the last one, but with an unsuspecting victim instead of a volunteer.

Leave early. I don’t just mean from events—I mean from conversations too. If you think a group is soon to disperse, don’t get stuck being one of the last ones where it’s awkward to leave! Get out when you can.

Always be vague about how much work you have. Never tell someone that you’ve finished your work for the day because it’s a great excuse for getting out of something. If they ask, you always have something else you *could* work on and were thinking of getting done later.

Finally, with all of these: milk your time. Walk slow, perform a task slowly, take more time than necessary where you can. Don’t make it obvious, but recognize that a few precious minutes will go undetected.

[recommendedtoelle]

Social Skills

Compliment people behind their backs

Say “you’re right” instead of “I know”

Ask “what don’t you want?” when deciding what to eat

Listen without asking for more info or giving advice

Talking to Kids

When they ask “Why?”, reply “I don’t know, what do you think?

5 positive interactions to every 1 negative interaction

Sapphic Flirting

Physical touch: use appearance/fashion compliments as an opportunity, e.g, tattoos, a watch, earrings

Compliment gay fashion choices, e.g, rainbow accessories

Subtle comments, e.g., “I like your style”

“I’d love to make out/etc with you” followed by telling them what moment made you interested eg “I’ve had a crush on you ever since we had that conversation about XYZ topic when you made me feel XYZ way” or “ever since we did XYZ thing at XYZ location that one time”

Responding to Fboys

“When am I going to see you?” When I’m horny

“I miss you”/“I love you”/“I care about you” Aww that’s so cute

“I don’t have hoes but I bet you do” You’re right

Ways to Make Friends

Book like 3 meetings with people a day so you don’t care if someone cancels

Get a part time job somewhere you like your coworkers

Go to yoga classes or random free classes from Facebook events

Student Orgs

Go to a bunch of random Facebook events

Say yes to as much as possible

Try to do certain things at the same time of day each week to see familiar faces

Meetup.com events

Bumble BFF

Go to a park, take a walk read, and cook if you have free time outside of school and errands

Random volunteer events

Foster Parenting

Maybe Days book

“I’ll always tell you what I know about your case”

All the food belongs to everyone, you’re welcome to take a few things to keep in your room

Let’s tape your case worker’s number up by your bed. She says you can call her whenever. You can use our phone to call her

Goodnight! We never ask kids to leave. Your caseworker and judge will decide where you’ll go, but we will never ask you to go

[schnees-and-schnugs]

I’m going to create a canon divergence that is so self indulgent- *insert willow-whitley and kitty AU*

This is a concept I want to write in multiple short parts until I get bored and wear it out- so consider this just a pt. 1

I also wrote this with these last few   fics in mind, so you can think of this as a continuation of those. Or not. But a lot of the same themes do apply.

This is probably going to be first fic that I don’t write in one/two sittings but my classes are a pain in the ass ;_;

tw: eating disorder, alcoholism 

_______________________________________________________________

  “I want a cat.”

  Willow blinked. “What?”

  Her son fidgeted nervously on his feet. “A cat. I want to adopt a cat.”

  Well this is a... surprise. 

  Despite her and Whitley having lived on their own in Patch for a few months, he’s hardly spoken a world to her since the fall of Atlas. Or spoken a word to anyone, really. She put it up to the radically new environment, and well, the fact that Atlas is gone, the SDC is in shambles, and Jacques had been MIA (probably dead) since the fall. Winter and Weiss had insisted that Willow and Whitley settle down somewhere quiet and safe, and the islands off the coast of Vale weren’t exactly next on Salem’s attack checklist. 

  It was two of Weiss’ teammates who suggested they head to Patch, even offering to let their father know about their arrival. Willow had gently denied the kind offer, saying that Tai Xiao Long didn’t need to bother with them. They’ll be fine. She pretending not to notice the look on all their faces: a depressed alcoholic and her previously isolated, emotionally traumatized son?  Fine on their own? 

  She had then turned around, gathered Whitley (who was sitting on the bench behind her, ignoring attempts made by a few of Weiss’ companions to cheer him up even a little), and bought tickets for the next ship going from Vacuo to Vale.

  Yet when the ship docked on the shore of the island, there stood a blonde, muscular man with a sign that read: Willow and Whitley Schnee, Welcome! in sharpie. He must have saw the confusion (and honestly a little fear) on her face from his standpoint on the harbor because he had quickly flipped the sign over and scribbled on it before holding it up again. My name is Tai Xiao Long. Yang and Ruby’s Father.

  It seems that Weiss’ friends didn’t listen to me.

  Nevertheless, Willow had breathed a sigh of relief. She had quite a few run ins with people on the journey east who recognized her and/or Whitley. The interactions have ranged from stares that were a little too long to pure hostility. It also didn’t help that some people thought it was okay to just grab any well known person they see- she almost broke a man’s arm after he had suddenly seized Whitley’s wrist and jerked him around. He’d probably be dead if Winter and Weiss were there, but Willow had settled on ripping the mans arm away with a glyph and dragging Whitley off quickly.  

  And now here they are, three months later and Willow was drinking a can of soda while enjoying the afternoon breeze on the front porch of their little cabin when Whitley approached her.

  “A cat. I want to adopt a cat.”

  She looked up at her son’s face and saw a familiar look of apprehension that everyone in their family had when faced with the prospect of having to ask for anything. Of course, before it usually involved asking Jacques, or begging more so. Willow had to approach this carefully or else Whitley is just going to recede back into his shell and not speak a word for another three months.

  “Well... we can ask Mr. Xiao Long about it. He surely would know about any animal shelters around here.”

  He scrunched up his nose, a face that she knew in Whitley Terms meant yeah okay... but I’m not happy about it.

  Willow knew better than to suspect that Whitley disliked Mr. Xiao Long specifically. He avoided everyone these days- friendly neighbors, SDC businessmen, etc. Tai had made sure they were comfortable every step of the way. He had shown them around, introduced them to soon-to-be friends, brought them into his home for meals until Willow figured out her way around a kitchen, even invited Whitley to study at Signal Academy. He refused, but Willow appreciated the offer. And she knew Whitley appreciated it too, but he’s having a hard enough time coming to terms with Willow’s protectiveness of him, much less accept the fact that a stranger may also care slightly about him.   

 “Then what do you suggest we do?” Willow couldn’t help but to smile at his childish apprehension. She relished any show of adolescence in her son these days. After years of walking on eggshells and maintaining a facade just short of perfection, he needed to clumsily blunder around like any young teenager would do.

  Whitley tugged at his long red sleeves. “There’s a stray kitten that comes around here at night...” 

  “You have that one in mind?”

  He nodded. “I always hear it meowing outside my window. I want to try to bring it inside- I leave scraps outside my window but it always disappears by the time the sun rises. Maybe if I could get it to come to the porch... In Atlas, they said in the animal shelter that it takes a few weeks to socialize a kitten.”

  He started at her expectantly. Willow had forgotten that Whitley would occasionally volunteer at one of the few animal shelters in Atlas. Jacques only allowed him to go just so he could milk all the PR he could out of it, obviously. But to this day, she had never actually heard Whitley speak about it unprompted. It must have been something he genuinely liked if he was so quiet about it. He knew full well that any hobby that he actually outwardly enjoyed was the first on Jacques’ chopping block if Whitley ever slipped up. 

  Willow stood up on the porch steps and faced her son. “Very well then. Tonight we’ll leave food out on the front porch and watch to see if it comes by.”

  Whitley’s face brightened for the first time in months. “Really?”

  “Mmhm.” She hummed. “Hopefully soon enough the kitten will like us and come inside...”

  Willow’s chest ached at the overwhelming surprise on his face. Asking Jacques for anything always came with a catch, a quid pro quo. Looking back, Willow always knew love was a transaction to him. But being young and blinded by the man- she just accepted it as a slight character flaw. Whitley didn’t know anything other than this.

  She was going to get him this kitten even if she had to crawl in the shrubbery at midnight looking for it.

  For the next few hours he assisted Willow in the kitchen for the first time since they got to Patch. Mostly because he wanted to get the kittens food out as fast as he could, but she wasn’t complaining. She watched as Whitley cut up a cooked chicken breast into bite sized little pieces, his tongue slightly sticking out as he concentrated. She wondered, briefly, if it was safe to allow him to handle a kitchen knife. Willow shook the thought away. He isn’t a child. She wouldn’t insult him by treating him like one. But she still had to be a mother... if it wasn’t too late.

  She tried to be as hands off as she could in these last few months while trying to muster what parental authority she could without scaring Whitley away. He was free to spend his time to do whatever he liked just as long as it was safe and he went to bed on time. Eating three solid meals a day was also a requirement, but that was a sensitive issue that Willow didn’t know how to approach with conviction. He has been cooperative for the most part in this aspect- which came as a surprise since Whitley has spent years trying to maintain whatever little control he had over his own life by strictly regulating what went inside his mouth and when. Which often meant very little eating.

  Willow didn’t want to name the condition out loud. If she did, then it would become a problem. Then she would have to admit that all of this still wasn’t enough to fix everything. Then she would start wanting a drink-

  Maybe everyone was right. Maybe her and Whitley were simply too broken to be able to live on their own.

  But they haven’t been living on their own, have they? Mr. Xiao Long still came by a few times a week to “check up on how y’all are adapting”, as he says. More like to make sure I’m not passed out drunk and Whitley hadn’t taken the opportunity to jump off a cliff, Willow thought bitterly.

  She still didn’t know how much Weiss and her friends told him - but they must have been pretty honest if he was going to be this concerned. Willow cringed at the thought of how he must see her - a failure of a mother. Not only that, but one who’s too afraid to confront the fact that her son is sick and needs help, but she can’t help because she’s not enough-

  “I’m done.”

  Willow blinked out of her increasingly chaotic thoughts to see Whitley holding a small bowl of chopped chicken, staring at her expectantly.

  Maybe I should stop thinking so much.

  “Lets put it out on the front porch then,” Willow grabbed both their plates of spaghetti off the kitchen counter. “We can eat by the window and watch for the kitten.”

  Whitley frowned. “Can we keep the front door open? Maybe if it sees us enough times then it will get used to us eventually.”

  “Whatever you want darling,” She replied, already on her way to the living room.

  And so they sat eating dinner, she on the edge of the couch and he on the floor on front of the open door. They sat in silence, but it was a comfortable one - Whitley watching the outside intently for the kitten and Willow watching him absentmindedly eat. A few minutes turned into an hour and she began to wonder if the kitten was going to show tonight, but a tiny scampering sound brought her and her son back to attention.

  The kitten emerged from the shrubbery.

  It was beautiful.

  It was small, only about a few weeks old. Its pitch black fur made it almost impossible to see without the aid of the moonlight. Its little white socks on its paws and glowing eyes gave it away as it inched slowly towards the now cold bowl of chicken. 

  Willow held her breath, and she knew Whitley was too. The kitten tentatively ate from the bowl, unaware of the two humans watching it. It seemed about half way through when Whitley, unknowing, leaned forward- causing his now empty plate to slide off his lab and hit the wood floor. The sound wasn’t loud, but in the silence of the night it was like a gunshot.

  The kitten’s head snapped up, ears perked in attention. For an almost comical millisecond, the kitten stared at the two of them and they stared back, everyone wide eyed. Then it turned and ran off back where it came, leaving behind nothing but a bowl of half eaten chicken.

  Willow braced herself for Whitley’s inevitable disappointment. But instead, when she turned toward him she saw an expression of joy. His eyes are brighter than she had ever seen them, not since he was a child.

  “She’s a girl,” He said.

  She furrowed her brow. “How do you know that?”

  “When she turned around and ran - I saw her backside. I think she’s a girl.”

  Willow smiled. “Very well then. One discovery is good enough for tonight.”

  Standing up, she reached for both of their used dishes and softly closed the front door shut. “Time for bed.”

    Whitley didn’t complain. He headed off the bed while Willow cleaned up the kitchen- a menial task that she never had to do back in atlas. But she found a peace in it. If given the choice, she would take a lifestyle of chores over the decadent one she had before. Ten times out of ten. This felt real.

  In the back of her mind, she remembered the chicken left outside. After considering, she decided to leave it out in case the kitten came back. She would make sure that Whitley would have this kitten eventually. It was the least she could do.

[diamondluxesugar]

College Be Like...

This is part 2 of the above ask. Part 1...

Now it seems to me that you aren’t taking advantage of all of the opportunities your school has to offer, especially if you feel like you’re missing out on opportunities. I’m going to break this down for you in two chunks. Social involvement and academic involvement.

Social involvement might seem like fun, but it will get you the most capital on campus with your peers. This will have you connecting with the future legislators, business owners, and CEOS. If you haven’t noticed by now, most of the people who are hardworking and will make it somewhere in life will be involved in on campus activities. I’m talking president of xyz club, volunteers with this group, RA, orientation leader, etc. The people who work in various offices know their name. Those are the people you want to rub elbows with. Now, this doesn’t mean become one of those people who only associates with people who can get them something. You want to be genuine with your actions; be involved in your passions and things you care about. You’ll interact with people who want to achieve the same goals as you and eventually start moving in circles that you hadn’t even thought about. Trust me when I say, being involved on campus will have a TON of perks and put you in rooms, conversations and on the radar of people that you didn’t even know existed. Just to give you an idea, from being active on campus, coordinating a strike, and having the name recognition to support the strike and be a viable threat, I was placed on the radar of the vice presidents and president of my university. And yes, our demands were met. Also yes, the president still knows me and respects my opinion 6 years later.

I mentioned in the sorority post, the importance of having good grades. Good grades got me into 2 honors societies, and countless other opportunities. Through the network your grades get you, you get access to an entirely different subset of people. While social involvement gives you the network of people who will grow with you and be future superstars, good academics give you access to the people who are already established. I’m talking the board members of organizations, vice presidents, hiring managers, legislators, etc. The people who can make a big difference in the trajectory AND the starting position of your life. You can network with an impressive amount of people and it’s not necessary that you need to be at a PWI. What is necessary is that you need to academically achieve the very best you can. If there is a class you want to take or a conference you want to attend, see if you can get sponsored to attend. Depending on your coursework, you might be able to secure sponsorship by your department or by one of your professors. If you have people who are invested in your success, you will do far better than trying to conquer everything on your own.

So now you have awesome social involvement and people in bringing up your name for opportunities that aren’t brought to the general campus population.

AND

You have great grades that support you when people bring up your name up for opportunities that aren’t brought to the general campus population.

Do you see the common trend?

So what’s a girl to do? LIVE YOUR BEST LIFE! Have fun! Enjoy everything that college has to offer! Go on the free trips and to the parties! If your university offers the opportunity to try something you never have before, DO IT! If there is something you want at your school that isn’t there already, try to bring it! If there is something at a neighboring PWI that you want to do, like an event or a conference, or even a speech series, call the sponsoring department and find out if you can attend as a visitor! If you want to go to a sporting event there, go for it! A lot of times you don’t have to be a student to attend certain things. I’ve been to events at other colleges that I simply had to register for. College is really what you make of it and you don’t have to be at a PWI or an HBCU to get the best experience. The location is just the means. What you do with it is what really matters.

[quiltwork]

Befriending the Emotional Brain

From the book The Body Keeps the Score: Brain, Mind and Body in the Healing of Trauma by Bessel van der Kolk. Read this last winter and wrote down a lot of what I learned that was spiritually safe, so here we go!!

•   1.   Hyperarousal (Hypo) - Strength training and regular stretching is really calming and wakes up your body. Deep breathing counting 4 going in, 4 holding, and 4 going out helps. OR change up the count time. I typically make it 4-7-8. A new computer program called Neurofeedback seems to be promising in nonverbally talking down the brain into calming down. Other than that, the healthy coping techniques (to distract from triggers or process memories) of TF-CBT, DBT, or the Extensive Preparation and Stabilization period of EMDR should help with this. I would also recommend Kati Morton on YouTube for her great videos on coping techniques.

•   2.   Body Awareness - Are you aware what your body feels like during each emotion? If you’re not sure, print out or make a wheel of emotion like these babies:

Cause once you know what you’re feeling, you can journal about it. Other descriptive words of what that’s like, what you notice yourself leaning towards doing because of this emotion, such as negative coping mechanisms of lashing out at others and being passive aggressive, pushing and running away into your work, going into your daydream world and sleeping, addictions to alcohol, drugs, food or starving and purging, self harm, love, sex, porn, video games, technology etc. Or maybe you cope badly by people pleasing and being codependent on toxic people so they don’t leave you. Deciding whether to distract or sit and feel (process) through that emotion till it’s gone. 

•   3.   Safe Relationships - Family, friends, AA meetings, veterans’ organizations, church communities, and therapists. People who will let you talk about your trauma and feelings, who understand and have empathy and compassion (because that drives out your shame and helps you heal). I know it’s hard to find someone who will actually emotionally support you the way you might have supported them in the past, but I’ve been told people like this exist somewhere, so don’t give up looking. At the most, a therapist is trained in understanding and compassion, and a support group gives you a chance at talking without being judged and interrupted or being given bad advice, and the more you go the more you feel a bit more comfortable in trying out the Steps and Principles they’re based on. Looking after horses at a Recovery Ranch or maybe animals at the shelter, or any kind of pet also helps you to heal if people are too scary to work with at the present, cause the animals gradually help you to relax and open up around people eventually. 

•   4.   Rhythm and Synchrony - Singing, dancing, theater, writing, drawing, painting, Sensorimotor therapy, Dance/Movement therapy, Somatic Experiencing therapy, EMDR therapy, sensory integration, parent-child interaction therapy. I don’t know how true it is for PTSD sufferers, but for C-PTSD sufferers who struggle with varying amounts of dissociation and amnesia, trauma is stored in the body, like in the nervous system, so-to speak. Trauma changes your brain so the frontal cortex of executive functioning skills are now dysfunctioning. Memories aren’t being processed so they’re being relived. And it seems like your personality isn’t what it once was, or your past interests have left the building. In time while recovering, you may regain some aspects of your personality and interests back or you may not, but that’s alright you’re still recovering and becoming your best self. So with this, we process with our bodies and not with our thinking brain, which is offline while dissociating during a trauma, flashback and trigger. This type of therapy works a whole lot better for a lot of people who can’t talk about their trauma yet. Trauma can be pretty unspeakably awful, so this is a great way to go about it.

•   5.   Body work - Therapeutic massage and the FeldenKrais Method, if you’re up for it. Some people are willing to work through their anxiety and discomfort to go through with it in order to relax the body that experienced trauma in the past so it’s not so tense or numb. I can barely handle a massage chair at the local workout place near me, so you do you lol

•   6.   Taking Action - Self defense and the Model Mugging Program are pretty cool things to check out if you’re looking to try to keep yourself physically safe. I thought it was awesome that the model mugging program has women shouting to pump each other up that they’re worth something and they can do it. Another way of taking action I believe could be simply just spreading awareness of how trauma works, how trauma bonds work and supporting other survivors in recovery. You could even volunteer somewhere to help kids with the same issues possibly, or go to college and become a social worker, lawyer, or whatever else you feel is a good fit for helping people.

[a-room-of-my-own]

Hey, I was wondering if you have any advice for an intern that has to run some aspects of social media posting for a non profit (mostly about one or two specific programs to recruit volunteers/give updates). I have received no advice from them and know that there’s a huge amount of info on how to do it well somewhere out there but social media is Not something I’m well versed in at all

Well the first thing would be to ask those questions to your manager

- What tone should I use?

Should you be formal and corporate? Friendly and accessible? Is it ok to use emojis? Don't hesitate to take a look at how they communicate in general, by checking their website and their printed media. You can be friendlier on social, but you have to preserve the integrity of the brand's identity.

- Can I interact with the community? If so, how?

On social media you receive comments and messages, some other accounts may talk about subjects that are close to your interests. You have to be given a clear view of how you should deal with this. Do you interact or not? Do you delete negative comments or not? etc...

Then the best thing to do is to make a planning. Sit down with your manager and try to figure out what your post frequency should be. Do you have enough content to post every day etc... My advice would be to have a regular schedule. It's better to post 3 times a week on a regular bases rather than posting 5 posts one day and then nothing for a week.

If you don't have a lot of content, you can try to use holidays, important dates for the brand (on this day in 20-something we did *this*). A good thing is also to create thematic posts. It can be many things, but people like to see what happens backstage and how brands work. So it can be an employee focus, an igtv about a project... Anything to engage your followers and give them exclusive content.

The best thing to do is to prepare your posts on an excel spreadsheet and have them validated by your manager. And then, if you have a business account, use social media planner (I use hootsuite). It will save you soooo much time. You can't do everything with a planner - hootsuite doesn't do stories for example but the free version allows you to plan up to 30 posts for all your accounts which is already quite handy. Others exist like buffer and later, and they all have their advantages. It' s especially convenient if you have several accounts to manage because you will have everything on the same dashboard, and on your computer, which is so much more comfy.

If you have any other question don't hesitate :)

[andyouweremine]

I went on a long rant at @ohemgeeitscoley the other day about how tumblr is too much of a social media to actually be an effective fandom space and I’m gonna try and recap most of it cause I liked my points.

My first introduction to fandom was a combination of fanfiction.net, forums, and livejournal. Of the latter two—because fanfiction.net basically just....hosted fanfiction—both of them had something really important in common: mods.

One of my first interactions with fandom was a Narnia forum on a website that I don’t think exists anymore. It was moderated by no small number of members, and members knew that if something went on that was a violation of the rules, they needed to get a mod involved.

If you were on livejournal in the... idk, 2000-2010s? or maybe even before the 2000′s, you had a personal journal, and then you were probably part of communities. Communities which had moderators. Communities which had rules. Break one of the rules? Yeah, your post was probably going to get deleted. Try again next time. It mostly depended on who the mods were, but there were certain communities and certain lines that just got you banned outright.

You want to join a community? A lot of the most common ones often wouldn’t admit you unless you had so many posts on your livejournal and other people who were mutual friends. You also had to agree to play by the rules. What were the rules? It depended. Most of the time it was like: “play nice, no spoilers unless they are under a cut until a week after the episode airs, here’s how our tag system works, etc.”

Here’s the thing: If you ‘misbehaved’, the mods had the authority to ban you. If you broke the rules of posting, the mods would delete your posts. Did mods get paid? Nope. They loved the community, so they agreed to moderate it. They reached out for volunteers to mod as communities grew bigger.

Say you didn’t like the rules of one community? You could always create your own, or find a different one that suited your needs. Maybe one of the fic communities for your favorite ship doesn’t let you post fic tagged above a M rating? Create your own community. Or find one. It probably exists. But there’s no need to scream at the community that already exists that they need to let you post your explicit fanfiction. Their community members don’t want to see it (or maybe they do and they’re members of both that community and the one that lets authors post E rated fic).

Or say you were in a community and the mods weren’t running it well, you could leave. Go somewhere with more experienced moderators. Start your own community. Lots of options there. 

Fandom, as it exists, doesn’t have that ability to self-police anymore. There’s no “adults/mods/person-in-charge” generously stepping in and reinforcing the guidelines. All there is now are text posts circling around with unenforceable suggestions for how to behave or how something should be done.

Tumblr doesn’t create communities, and it never has. It creates echo chambers. It creates a system of “tags” that do nothing to bring fans of them same thing together. Instead of creating positive spaces, the only recourse is to just keep scrolling, or to individually block people.

Tumblr is not a good platform for fandom space. It’s actually probably one of the worst possible platforms for fandom space. I don’t think it can be changed to make it what it needs to be, and I think the toxic nature of the spaces Tumblr creates is only going to continue to get worse and worse.

When kids or teenages end up in fandom, there aren’t any mods to nudge them in the direction of fandom etiquette. There’s no mature ‘i have been here and see shit’ people watching to delete inappropriate posts or warn someone that if they keep being a dick they’ll get banned. There’s not a list of rules to post in the tag. Do whatever you want. Say whatever you want. Send anon hate. Bitch about ships you don’t like.

Where will fandom end up after that? Who knows. But God I hope it’s somewhere that actually fosters a sense of community and somewhere that fandom can create and enforce it’s own rules.

But that’s just never gonna be tumblr.

[prorevenge]

Boy meets girl

I often pressed V for information on how she earned income but she would give conflicting answers about grants and scholarships until one day.... About 6 months after our first meeting, she finally tells me and IT. IS. NOT. GOOD. I was interviewing at a professional school when I receive the call, she's in trouble, BIG TROUBLE, and needs my help. She tells me she earns money by doing others' assignments for them. $200 to write a paper and $800 to complete an online class, usually a 100 level introductory course. She describes the method she uses to circumvent the ITs detection of others completing others assignment and how her client wasn't doing his part to copy/paste and submit from his own computer. He is failing the course and blames her. He threatens to turn her in. Her plan is to refund his money and wants me to 'follow him to see if he goes somewhere alone and take his phone' because that has all the evidence of their communications. HOLY SHIT! SHE WANTS ME TO COMMIT STRONG ARMED ROBBERY, a FELONY for her! I'm not going down for this or with her and I know nobody would believe me. ENTER: military experience - if there's no record, it didn't happen. So, I agree to help her, somehow, as soon as I return to town. I go to V's dorm the next night and she shows me EVERYTHING. Her list of clients, their blackboard passwords, how she meets them, how she defends them during honor code violations, etc. So I tell her not to worry, I'll handle everything on the day she refunds his money. Relieved, she goes to bed but before she lays down I ask to use her computer for on assignment and she says "sure do whatever you want". In my state, if you let someone use your electronics, its called "having privilege" and anything you do with their computer which may harm them is legal as if it your own computer. So, I took screenshots of her conversations with her clients, I open google settings and screenshot all the blackboard users and passwords stored on her computer. I go to her messenger and screenshot their conversations. Back home, I compiled our recordings and saved our facebook conversations. A week later, I made up an argument about an upcoming New Years Party and broke up with her. Then sat on the information I had on hand for 2 more weeks thinking about what I should do.

I remembered how she has a history of arrests from high school to freshman year for stealing from outlet malls and selling their loot online. Never formally charged. She, of course, omitted this from her application into professional school. How she admitted "finding a mark" and using them to pass her courses. How she denigrated others who were completing courses through hard work. How she used her position as honor council to get her friends out of trouble while helping to expel others for doing exactly what she was doing. How she cheated on me multiple times, used me, manipulated me, tried to make me commit a felony and ruin my life. SHE HAD TO BE STOPPED.

Knowing she was friends with the faculty on the honor council, they often bought each other gifts, I had to go above their heads. I gave names and descriptions of the events to my program director. He then goes to the honor council, anyway. I was called into the honor council's head office of "Corrupt Administrator" CA. CA tells me I should delete the information I have because it could become a civil matter and I should consider my "self preservation." She schedules another meeting with me a week later. I return and she asks if I want to make a statement about V. Guess what I said, I tell her "no, I deleted everything and I don't remember" because I was in the military and I know how to 'play ball' when superiors tell you to shut your mouth. But the most important reason I decided to not file against V directly was due to the fact I was applying for a military scholarship to pay for professional school. Since I did not follow through, the program director filed an honor code violation complaint against V on a date [suggested by CA]. A month later they tell me their investigation was inconclusive and they will close the case due to the director waiting 1 day too long to file according to the school's academic policy. CA set us up! However, since the director used my name as a source, they must notify V because students have rights to know their accusers. FUCK.MY.LIFE. CA fucked me and ruined any chance for a case against V based on a technicality. Now I fear for my safety because V tried to get me to strong arm rob someone now I just implicated a dozen cheaters who have as much as her to lose. CA schedules a meeting with V and tell her about an ongoing investigation and tells her she will be kept up-to-date. I know the investigation is over and now they are just doing formalities. V requests the information of the investigation and they promise to email it to her. V calls me for support even though we aren't together. She is crying and talking about killing herself. She tells me her dad had been paying for her college this whole time and starts coming clean with other lies. I feel bad and almost regret everything. Maybe she is not a sociopath, maybe she is really sorry. She stays at my house the next few days, I'm watching her trying to keep it together. THEN HER FUCKING CLIENTS START COMING TO MY HOUSE. She is still doing their assignments! She NEVER LEARNS!

Finally she gets the investigation info and there's my name. She calls me 130 times in 3 days, sends her friends to my classes to tell me to come to her house, finally I do. But I don't go into her room because she will trap me. She takes my phone so I can't record. She tries to get me to sign a paper saying I fabricated everything and its all false. I tell V, "They already closed the investigation, you wont get in any trouble why should I implicate myself and get in trouble? It wont solve anything!" And she pleads, "Do you still love me?" I shake my head and walk out. Two days later, police are waiting at my house to serve a 72 hour emergency protective order (EPO) commanding me to stay away from V. I know what she is up to. She is trying to get me to violate the protective order, discredit me, and send me to jail. Its very easy to lie to create one and lie to say it was violated.

NOW ITS NOT JUST REVENGE TIME, ITS WAR

Here's the plot twist: I never really deleted the files as I told CA. TYVM, Google drive.

After the 72 hours EPO expired, another EPO arrives which lasts two years but requires a court appearance. This is a huge problem because I am in the US Army reserves and it requires the handling of firearms which is illegal under an EPO. Her lawyer calls me and threatens me not to "participate in anymore investigations against her" and sends a paper tiger. I get a lawyer, lets name him "Folds like a lawn chair". He tells me "who will they believe: a pretty girl or you?" I fire him. Get a better lawyer, a trial lawyer, called "Miss Badass Esq." and prepare for war. Miss Badass requests a copy of V's EPO from the court. It essentially says I was blackmailing her, threatening to beat her up, and I broke into her room to steal incriminating information against her. All lies. I provide my lawyer the entire history of our relationship: 600 pages of facebook and text messages showing she is the aggressor, the abuser, in the relationship, phone call history, all the recordings and screenshots of her cheating ring. I make a poster sized chart of her room and the events that transpire there the day in question when she tried to trap me into signing a statement taking responsibility for her actions.

Courtdate: We made V and her lawyer look REALLY stupid. They were going with the 'pretty girl' strategy. But the dorm gave us records showing she was signing me in and out of her room, so it discredits the need to break in. The call logs: 130 times in 3 days and aggressive texts showed she wasn't actually afraid of me adn it was her, not me, being aggressive. And when he asked what I had to use to blackmail her, her lawyer said "just some tutoring papers" for which the judge said, "that doesn't sound like anything wrong. What power did that give him over you?" They had no response. My turn to speak, I explain how she tried to get me to rob a guy, how she wanted me to write a letter to take the blame, how she used her position as honor council chair to break state law and violate academic policy. And summarized we were only there because she wanted revenge on me. I watched V and her lawyer stutter and squirm uncomfortably under the judges questioning, case dismissed.

All that information I gathered to defend myself was not going to go to waste. I took it to a newly hired honor council investigator called "Meg" who had no affiliation with V. I told her what CA had done to defend V. A week later, I was told the by Meg there had been a meeting with the school police, the provost, their legal team, then the provost himself decided filed a complaint against V. I had to meet with the police to file a statement about V trying to recruit me to rob someone but other than that I was out of the loop. I later learned the results: V lost her her slot at that school's professional program, her program director yelled at her at the top of his lungs, "YOU WILL NEVER GO TO ********* SCHOOL, I KNOW ADMISSIONS AND I WILL SEE TO IT", she got expelled, her TWO degrees (biomedical engineering and biology with a minor in chemistry) were withheld for 6 years and her transcripts would carry a permanent mention of an honor code violation, her clients who graduated had their degrees retracted with similar mentions on their transcripts, and current clients were also expelled. The school changed its policy on reporting date requirements to like 60 or 90 days. Me? I am in professional school. V had her chance to get away with all of this until she tried to get revenge on me. I reduced this super villain from owning a fleet of beta male minions, being the most connected person in the university, and having a lucrative future in ripping people off in the medical industry to the last time I saw her: riding a fucking scooter.

(source) story by (/u/Apophis1942)

[pallanophblargh]

I'M ALWAYS DOWN FOR ANYTHING YOU WANT TO SHARE ABOUT AEQUIS. :D

I need to start thinking about things beyond just vague loose wiggly concepts before forgetting about them again! D: I feel like it’s been years since I’ve actually made attempts at worldbuilding.

For now, Aequis are having to coexist with human settlers in a (likely) post earth scenario, think “solar-punk” vibe/tech, but with some typical dark human undertones. I’ve decided that anything akin to fossil fuels/nuclear has been banned from use “on-world” and I’m trying to decide if this planet has a markedly higher oxygen content? (I admit I know nothing yet about the effects of long term exposure to higher oxygen concentrations) Humans (some, not all) are still finding ways to exploit natural resources (bacteria/plants/fungi/etc) despite there being lots of red tape and widespread bans on the practice. Genetic meddling is very much a thing, but to what and with what methods I’ve yet to decide. All I know now is at least one political figure has their hands dirty in very illegal genetic engineering of Aequis. Which is where my characters Matilda, and her adopted “test tube” Aequis Shirk, come in.

At this point in time, Aequis are likely the most intelligent indigenous species on their planet, and if it hadn’t been for some positive first encounters with human settlers, the dynamic between the two species might be very different than it is. Aequis “tech” is largely simple tools/organically built structures and basic observational scientific knowledge. The two species interact largely on Aequis terms, in response to their own whims. Aequis have a knack for taking advantage of humans and knowing the limits of human generosity. Despite this, Aequis are smart enough to never let their guards down, no matter how much food and lodging and comfort they may be given.

“Urban” Aequis are obviously the most friendly/social/accommodating, and will volunteer their services on a semi regular basis for the best food, lodging, and grooming humans have to offer them. Aequis come and go as they please. Said services might involve a multitude of courier/light freight work, scouting, surveying, highly sensitive communications relay, hunting, etc. Also, spying... and maybe a little espionage? (Ha!) Most urban Aequis will have a good grasp of human language. Humans aren’t nearly as well versed at understanding Aequis languages. (We THINK we know how they use the long-range language, but we’re probably wrong. We CERTAINLY can’t speak it, but we’ve tried cobbling together audio samples to say things back. The Aequis mocked us for it.)

I’ve decided that the desert and grassland types are on average the most friendly. The arboreal types are most social, but that doesn’t mean they’ll be actively friendly with humans. Offend one of them, and the entire rookery will know. Do anything worse, and the consequences will be decidedly frightening.

Thankfully Aequis are unlike birds in that they don’t imprint onto the first thing they see upon hatching. So, even though the first thing baby Shirk sees is Matilda, he doesn’t go through life believing he is human. He sees her as the maternal figure she is, however, and otherwise relates to her as his adoptive parent. Any potential instinctively Aequis behaviors are not applied to her, though. (No attempts to groom her hair as though she has feathers/etc.)

I desperately need to start thinking again about Aequis cultures, and maybe start writing things down somewhere for once? (I think I had an ask some time ago that started some thoughts on this, but who knows where it is now?)

[neshabeingchildish]

Do you think that, in Nickelodeon, but also in general, there are shows that can really satisfy and make children more attentive to certain themes? Do you think there are characters, particularly counterproductive or, on the contrary, very useful?

If I’m reading this incorrectly, please forgive me. I think that you’re possibly asking me about meaningful children’s shows with topics that children can digest and my recommendations for that are probably not gonna be from Nickolodeon. I just... Don’t recall anything that they’ve had in recent years that have made me think so, but then again, I haven’t watched a lot of Nickolodeon in years (I am very old for this fandom, and don’t mind admitting that).

First and foremost. Andi Mack (it was on Disney, not Nick). There were some issues that I had with it, of course, BUT, they addressed sexuality, hair politics (which believe it or not is a pretty prevalent issue for Black people with natural hair that doesn’t look Eurocentric enough), social justice & peaceful protests, bullying, there was deaf representation in a couple of episodes, the trials that can come with being in a military family, teenage pregnancy, coparenting, gun control/safety, Jewish representation, Chinese representation, they even had a bit of divination thrown in a couple of episodes. I loved it. I would have definitely changed the way certain things were handled, but overall, it was a well done series that I could have conversations about with the kids I lived with at the time.

Steven Universe on Cartoon Network is a cartoon, but definitely has very deep and meaningful metaphors on the broadest range of the identity spectrum that I’ve seen and even touches on some very serious topics such as toxic relationships, abuse, neglect, abandonment, and imperialism. Like... I live for that show and it’s done in such a way that children may not necessarily feel like they’re getting a lesson out of it, but there’s always an underlying one and they’re always on the right side of the conversations.

Shera and the Princesses of Power, I think it’s a Netflix series, but it has a lot of valuable takeaway and a lot of representation. It doesn’t exactly point out everything or set it up as a lesson based series like SU kinda does, but I recommend it for kids. 

As far as counterproductive characters... I’m VERY critical about the representation that is given in children’s series, so I may be a terrible person to ask about that. Almost every children’s show that I turn on, I can find just a complete list of reasons why they f***ed up with the direction that they chose to go in. I work with kids in the foster system and they all have warped views about normalcy, so my brain is hypersensitive to even the slightest and most innocent seeming themes and jokes if they in any way, shape, or form push negative or harmful stereotypes, leave injustices/mistreatment unchecked, makes light or humor of real issues that real kids suffer from, etc. I can’t think of a single show that doesn’t do that in some type of way. People complain a lot about PC culture and snowflakes and such... But, children are literally delicate and vulnerable and honestly deserve to have wholesome but realistic entertainment that includes them all and shows them the beauty of themselves and others. 

If somebody has recommendations of shows that do that without too much problematic content to address (because problematic content can be helpful in small dosages, because you can use those examples as a learning point for what not to do and how not to act), but I would welcome any suggestions here for such series. Nickolodeon, or in general. 

I didn’t mean to be so long winded. Child advocacy is my passion, and before I worked as a caregiver, I did nanny stuff, helped raised other people’s kiddos, church youth aid and volunteer work with children. (Of course, it all started with babysitting gigs in my youth), but - I’m very vocal and long winded about childcare and child safety, and I fully believe that the things that kids see and how they process them has a very strong impact on how they will interact with the world. Thank you for your question and your time. Hopefully, that was at least somewhere in the area of what you were asking.

[lovecaitlined]

☆.｡.:*Oblivious.｡.:*☆ Jaehyun College AU

 Jaehyun College AU

(◍•ᴗ•◍)❤ Just some fluff since I’m busy studying~ ah wish me luck that I stay in my course and ace it! 🥰🙏🏻

You first meet Jaehyun at the welcoming orientation for college freshmen~

He’s tall, thin, and he has the prettiest face you’ve ever seen, all smiley eyes and deep dimples.

Although you don’t say much to each other, you hit it off pretty well.

He’s quiet and soft-spoken, but so are you!

He’s double majoring in business and accounting, and taking a minor in music, which he explains is his hidden passion~

“I mean, I’ve always wanted to be a singer, and my voice teacher tells me I have a pretty nice baritone, but—got to get this bread, huh?”

It’s pretty impressive. You’re only taking up business management, after all, and sure, yours is an honors course, but it all pales in comparison to the passion of Jung Jaehyun.

Afterwards, you don’t see him around campus much

But you hang out in the library pretty often while your friends are out partying.

You pull out your notes to study, and then suddenly, to your right, Jung Jaehyun is there.

You always chat for a bit before getting shushed by some kid (understandable).

By the time second semester comes around, you two follow each other on social media. But while you interact online, it’s mostly liking each other’s photos and the occasional message on fbc.

And then, for a fleeting moment, you two are classmates—you have the same English Literature II class—but he manages to switch his schedule up so he takes the same class but in a different time frame.

You’re not sure why, but apparently it has something to do with that class conflicting with his practice—voice lessons, maybe!

Anyway, you don’t see him again for the entire summer, except for an Instagram update here and there.

You like each other’s pics, that’s all—his photo with his parents in his family house in Gangnam is pretty cute.

You two don’t interact again until sophomore year, when you’re grabbing your usual order of a regular iced matcha macchiato, and you’re short a few cents of change~

You’re about to pull out a larger bill from your wallet, when a voice behind you says, “I have change.”

You whirl around and it’s Jung Jaehyun, dimply smile and all, towering over you in his lavender hoodie and loose jeans and sneakers.

You try to protest, but he stops you.

Once you’ve gotten your drinks (medium iced Americano for him), you insist on paying him back, but he balks.

“It’s just 20 cents...I think I’ll live.”

You sit together for a while talking, making conversation, until you convince him to let you pay him back, and you two decide on a meeting place sometime later this week

And he adds, half-jokingly, “If you really wanted to see me that badly, all you had to do was ask.”

You think he’s flirting again, of course,

Surely he didn’t mean that.

Because what kind of guy would mean that, right?

I mean, this is Jung Jaehyun...

Who, as you enter your second year of uni, is pretty well-known despite being quiet, for his niceness, his intelligence, and yes, let’s face it: his looks.

But Jaehyun is endearingly kind

He knows he’s handsome, that’s for sure

But he’s never conceited about it.

So it’s kind of hard to hate him or peg him down as some fboy.

Going back to the 20 cents, he ends up—after much convincing on your part—exchanging numbers with you.

Honestly, you didn’t even think it would get this far. You were just planning on asking around for someone who wanted to break your bill down to some loose change, but he just tells you to contact him.

“Give me your phone, I’ll input my number. Here’s mine.”

Andddd you end up meeting him before your marketing class, right outside your classroom. You triumphantly hand him the 20 cents. “See you around!” you say.

You’re prepared to never meet with the Jung Jaehyun again, but as you grin around, he says, “Actually...I think we’re in the same class.”

You looked at him, surprised, sure you didn’t see him last week, and he explains he switched his schedule up again because his initial class conflicted with something else in his schedule.

“So we’re going to finally be classmates, since I had to switch out of EnLit last sem.”

You’re not sure how you feel about this, but Jaehyun sits beside you in the giant lecture hall, and it’s nice to have someone taking down as many notes as you are by your side.

You’d think that would be your last encounter with Jaehyun, but you’re wrong.

You see him all the time now in uni, which makes you wonder if you were just oblivious or unobservant when it came to passing by him in the hallway before.

He likes to hang out with you, to walk you to class at times,

And when he knows your friends’ breaks don’t match yours, he always invites you to sit with him somewhere.

It’s usually with his friends Taeyong, Johnny, Mark, and the like

They’re all pretty friendly people, though, so despite your shyness you actually kind of like being with them.

And you guys begin to chat more online about nonsensical things~

Until one day, your friends insist you must go to a house party

You refuse at first, since you don’t do parties that well—

You’re too shy, and you’re not someone who particularly enjoys drinking—

But your friends insist, so you decide to tag along and stay just for a while.

You dress up a bit and put on more makeup than usual,

And when you get there, to your surprise, Jaehyun is there as well.

He looks as surprised as you, though, so at least it’s not one-sided.

He tells you he didn’t know you were coming, and that he thought you weren’t one for parties.

To which you agree with. “I just came to tag along with my friends.”

But the night is pretty fun~

You end up talking with each other for two whole hours, feasting on pepperoni pizza, Cheetos, and Coke.

It’s getting pretty late, so you look for your friends and tell them you’re gonna go.

While your friends don’t want you to leave, saying it’s dangerous, Jaehyun steps in.

“Actually, I’m walking her home!”

They take one look at Jaehyun, give you a knowing smile, and all but push you out of the door.

You try telling Jaehyun that it’s alright, that he can stay, and he’s all, Are you kidding me? It’s dangerous at night, etc. etc., besides, he says he doesn’t like parties much as well—he only went because his friends dragged him out.

And that walk home pretty much takes your friendship with Jaehyun to another level!

You don’t think much of it at first, but Jaehyun slowly becomes your best friend~

You’re not really the type who notices romantic stuff and all, so when your friends tease you about him, you’re just like...We’re just friends.

They’re all, Girl, have you seen yourself in a mirror? Have you seen what he does for you? etc. etc. but you refuse to get your hopes up.

Truthfully, you’re beginning to fall for him, too, but he’s being just the usual friendly so far...right?

It may sound a little bit cliché, but Jaehyun really does go all out for you.

He’s always inviting you out to eat, to hang, and the like

He offers to walk you home, and sometimes he drops off little gifts at the place where you stay.

And you guys usually walk around the campus together, or study—not together, but side-by-side, at least—at the lib.

But you’re adamant about your friendship

You also have bigger things to worry about, like your majors

You don’t see it, but Jaehyun gets a little bit frustrated when he’s with you.

Honestly, it’s baffling to him as to why you don’t notice that he obviously loves and has feelings for you,

Meanwhile, your friends are already shipping you two together, and you’re still insistent that he doesn’t like you.

“Don’t be so oblivious, girl!” they always say.

But you’re not the type to set yourself up for disappointment, thank you very much.

One of your friends even says that one of Jaehyun’s friends claims that you two are practically dating at this point, and that Jaehyun really likes you, but you pay her no heed, until...

One Friday night, though, Jaehyun asks if you’ll be free, and you say you are—you just have to check out an online paper in the lib.

As usual, he volunteers to go with you, but then...

As you’re clicking through the lib computer, he asks what you’re searching for.

“Oh, for psychology, we’re just learning a bit about Sternberg’s Triangular Theory of Love, like relationships and—”

“That’s cool. Do they ever talk about how some people are just so oblivious when it comes to relationships?”

You’re the only two people in that area of the lib then,

And you swear, in that empty part of the campus, you can hear your heart drop.

You look at Jaehyun’s eyes, and, well,

There’s a world of meaning in them.

Needless to say you forget about Sternberg and psychology for a moment.

As you two walk out the lib in silence, you try searching your head for something to say.

Maybe it was your shyness, but you were, indeed, oblivious.

You’re not sure how to tell Jaehyun what you feel—

Heck, you’re not even sure what you feel,

But as you approach your place, Jaehyun holds your hand, and you freeze right then and there.

“That was a bit of a jerk move, and I’m sorry, it’s just...I’ve liked you for so long, and, well, no matter how hard I try, everything remains stagnant—it’s like you don’t even realize, you know?”

“What I mean is...I like you, I really do. And...I’d like to be with you.”

“What I’m really trying to say is, Will you be my girlfriend?”

He says it, just like that,

And you look into his eyes and you think of what a fool, yes, an oblivious fool you were—

You can’t believe you forced yourself to be blind all this time.

And speaking of time, to make up for all the time you lost, you tell him, “Yes.”

Jaehyun, as it turns out, is a pretty great boyfriend—

He’s responsible, passionate, and kind,

And always introduces you proudly to his friends as “My girlfriend.”

He also thinks you’re the prettiest girl in the world.

You don’t believe him, as usual, but he always says, “Look at yourself!”

And well, Jaehyun makes you realize a lot of things about yourself

You realize you’ve been forcing yourself to be blindsided to a lot of opportunities in your life.

And you begin to gain self-confidence, seeing yourself in a better light.

It makes you realize how closed off you’ve been before,

And even though your friends are full of I-told-you-sos, it doesn’t matter any longer.

You’re no longer oblivious to what you can achieve.

You go out with Jaehyun frequently,

And it’s easy to say he’s one of the best parts about your life.

Sure, he can get clingy at times—

Instead of studying in the lib, he tells you to come over his place at least twice a week because he misses you too much—never mind that you pass by him in the halls at least once every single day.

His roommate, Johnny, is always there, though, but he’s always welcoming, so that’s okay~

But in his room, Jaehyun still manages to be romantic—

Even if it’s just helping you solve a problem or praising you for some minor thing you’ve done.

Eventually, however, you tell him it’s good you two finally became classmates again; you wouldn’t have been able to see him as much if you weren’t.

And then he admits to you he really didn’t have a scheduling conflict this time,

He made it up just so he could be in the same class as you.

“Don’t laugh at me!”

But you’re already laughing,

And he hushes you with a kiss.

Loving yourself wasn’t easy, but at least you knew how to do it now,

But loving Jung Jaehyun?

It’s the best decision you’ve ever made.

The End

♡

[comicteaparty]

February 3rd-February 9th, 2020 CTP Archive

The archive for the Comic Tea Party week long chat that occurred from February 3rd, 2020 to February 9th, 2020.  The chat focused on Park Planet by Sammy Newman.

Featured Comment:

Chat:

Comic Tea Party

BOOK CLUB START!

Hello and welcome everyone to Comic Tea Party’s Book Club~! This week we’ll be focusing on Park Planet by Sammy Newman~! (http://parkpla.net/)

You are free to read and comment about the comic all week at your own pace until February 9th, so stop on by whenever it suits your schedule! Discussions are freeform, but we do offer discussion prompts in the pins for those who’d like to have them. Additionally, remember that while constructive criticism is allowed, our focus is to have fun and appreciate the comic! Whether you finish the comic or can only read a few pages, everyone is welcome to join and chat with us!

DISCUSSION PROMPTS – PART 1

1. What did you like about the beginning of the comic?

2. What has been your favorite moment in the comic (so far)?

3. Who is your favorite character?

4. Which characters do like seeing interact the most?

5. What is something you like about the art? If you have a favorite illustration, please share it!

6. What is a theme you like that the comic explores?

7. What do you like about the comic’s story or overall related content?

8. Overall, what do you think the comic’s strengths are?

Don’t feel inspired by the prompts? Feel free to discuss anything else that interested you!

Eightfish (Puppeteer)

first impressions are that the art has an attractive newspaper-comic style and is very clean for being a rare traditionally drawn comic

RebelVampire

Attractive newspaper style is a good way to describe it. What I like about the art the most though are the unique merger of the complex designs and the simplicity. For example, the faces are a bit simple to match the tone and overall nature of the comic. Yet at the same time, there's all these interesting alien designs throughout that are all very unique. But everything fits so seamlessly together. Which I feel is kind of the strength of the comic. Is it does a really great job with balancing different aspects. Complexity and simplicity, serious drama and comedy, etc. It's one of those comics that feels like warm soup because it has a bit of everything.

Ranger

Indeed, thus far it blends individual vignettes with characterization very well to remain fresh while still maintaining enough coherency to be enjoyable. Will definitely keep reading it

snuffysam (Super Galaxy Knights)

I think "warm soup" is a great way to describe the comic! It has this cozy, nostalgic feel that you'd get from a well-written Sunday newspaper comic - but the concept is also super unique and intriguing on its own! - Can we talk about how great of a character Paisley is? She's got the whole emotionless robot vibe going, but she's one of the kindest characters in the comic despite that. And the way her character develops over the course of the comic is super satisfying (e.g., getting a date at the dance)!

FeatherNotes(Krispy)

I'm in love with the charming stylization of letters and layout so far-- its easy to sink in a read some pages during downtime and pick right up for the next read. Page 5 of 'craft time' made me snort out loud, these jokes are always landing and play out well! And as far as fav character, Paisley is so sweet and is def hitting chords for me!

varethane

I love the end of this page where Paisley lights the fire with her eyes to impress the campers!!! http://parkpla.net/index.php/page/book-0001/004-paisleys-day/

RebelVampire

I do like the interesting blend Paisley has going on between being robotic and being human. I actually like that the story doesn't go too serious on the whole theme of humanity when it comes to non-humans. Although my favorite moment regarding Paisley is when the translators break and Paisley's joke is to speak in binary. It's definitely one of my favorite things about the beginning of the comic since I think it really captures both the comedy and unique alien aspects of the comic.

However, if I had to pick a favorite character I'd go with Wurlitzer. Cause I can't even. This is legit one of the most unpredictable characters to me, and I enjoy every moment Wurlitzer is around, because its just the sort of character that causes conflict by being in the same room as any other character.

I'd actually even say my fave moment is the company get together where Wurlitzer is doing introductions and is just kind of oblivious to everyone's attitudes and awkwardness. It's both funny, but also makes the social awkwardness relateable since it's easy to imagine having a boss like this. Overally, though, I also like any moments where the alien thing is brought up. This to me is the best part of the content cause there's so much to explore here and it just brings this really unique concept to webcomics by combining it with a park.

Ranger

Paisley is a favorite thus far

Eightfish (Puppeteer)

Everybody loves Paisley and so do I

I think "warm soup" and "Sunday comic" are great descriptions

But the world with the non-human characters brings uniqueness

Found a mistake on this page:

http://parkpla.net/wp-content/uploads/2019/09/SM5_tumblrtest.jpg

The dialogue randomly changes into type

sssfrs (JOE IS DEAD)

I love this art style

snuffysam (Super Galaxy Knights)

i think the type is intentional

sssfrs (JOE IS DEAD)

That might have been an intentional choice if the artist was pressed for time or something

snuffysam (Super Galaxy Knights)

she's talking like through her teeth and mumbling

Eightfish (Puppeteer)

I thought that may be the case, but his text also changes into type? So I think the author typesets by hand tracing over typed text, and forgot to do it here, maybe?

Comic Tea Party

DISCUSSION PROMPTS – PART 2

9. What do you think happened to the humans and Earth? What do you think necessitated the creation of the park, and do you think it’s helping to preserve what’s left of Earth?

10. What moment of the work mixer did you relate to or enjoy the most and why? What about the entire scenario in general captures what it’s like to socialize at events like this?

11. What aspect of human-alien interaction have you enjoyed the most so far? How has this changed or given context to your thinking in how much of our lives are culture based?

12. What do you think this comic can teach us in general about fitting in with others, especially when we personally feel socially outcasted?

Don’t feel inspired by the prompts? Feel free to discuss anything else that interested you!

RebelVampire

To address one of the prompts I didn't get to, I like seeing Wurlitzer interact with basically anyone. I never really know what I'm going to get when it comes to Wurlitzer, so any strip goes to unexpected and fun places in those cases. Onto story stuff though! As for what happened to the humans, definitely some sort of mass extinction event. Probably something like climate change not fixed because of the fact they're also trying to preserve animals from earth as well. So I have a distinct feeling Earth isnt habitable in the comic's setting. >_> I also mentioned my favorite moment from the mixer earlier. However, in regards to the second part of the question, for me what really capture what its like to socialize at events like this is the facial expressions. Every single person is just a bit stiff, and even if they arent miserable, theres this hint in their expressions that they don't really want ot be there. And I feel most ppl feel that way about company get togethers. It's more tedious than it is fun. XD For human-alien interactions, it's actually probably this strip http://parkpla.net/index.php/page/book-0001/005-upcoming-events-at-hartwood-park/ Particular the last panel where the alien is making fun of ice cream for being so filled with sugar. I kind of feel this comic in general is a good reminder that "normal" is malleable. What's normal somewhere really isn't normal elsewhere. And it's usually the stuff we take for granted as normal. Like I'm sure one day there'll be aliens who see us eating with forks and go "WTF are these weirdos doing they have perfectly good hands." But either way, I kind of feel the comic shows a lot of scenes like that where just a bunch of mundane things are novel and weird to aliens.

Comic Tea Party

DISCUSSION PROMPTS – PART 3

13. What are you most looking forward to seeing in regards to the comic?

14. Any final words of encouragement for the comic?

Don’t feel inspired by the prompts? Feel free to discuss anything else that interested you!

RebelVampire

In regards to what this comic teaches us about fitting in, i think for one, it's difficult. However, I think it also shows a little bit that we'll never fit in if we don't try. Like certainly the mixer was awkward, but imagine if nobody had gone to it. Nothing is ever gained by not trying. Also, I think this comic also kind of teaches a bit of self fulfilling prophecies. In that if you think too much that you won't fit in, then you probably won't fit in because the confidence just isn't there. Anyway, what I'm most looking forward to the comic I think is just learning a bit more about the human situation and also just seeing in general more human-alien interactions. I think this is the most interesting part of the comic since there's so much you can do in regards to questioning what is universal and what is just being human, and the writing is pretty all around great with this interesting aspect.

Comic Tea Party

BOOK CLUB END!

Thank you everyone so much for reading and chatting about Park Planet this week! Please also give a special thank you to Sammy Newman for volunteering the comic and creating it! If you liked Park Planet, make sure to continue to support it via some of the links below!

Read and Comment: http://parkpla.net/

Sammy’s Shop: https://www.sammynewman.com/shop

Sammy’s Twitter: https://twitter.com/otterlogic