#Sunshine international learning center new year celebration

[tiny-feisty-gay]

remember how i said i wanted to write enid’s pov?

well, here it is

or read on ao3

If Enid is sunshine, Wednesday Addams is a storm cloud.

The day she arrives at Nevermore, she makes it incredibly clear that she isn’t here to make friends. In fact, she isn’t here to stay at all, and will be absconding as soon as possible – her words, not Enid’s, because who really uses the word abscond in casual conversation?

She soon discovers that there is nothing casual about Wednesday to begin with. The first time that she discovers this, it’s because the color has been ripped off exactly half of the window splitting their room down the center. Wednesday has managed to not only divide it perfectly, but somehow sapped every lingering morsel of color from her own side of the bedroom.

It’s dark and depressing, and Enid takes solace in the loudness and color of her own side, because really, who can live in such dull monochrome? How can she possibly get anything done with so little background… anything?

Wednesday has a penchant for sucking the life and vibrance out of everything in her vicinity. She’s dry and sarcastic, and she baffles Enid, who has never failed to make someone smile before in her life. Briefly, she wonders if she’s losing her charm, and has a minor internal freak-out over that because she’s made charming her sole measure of success in recent years.

Yoko assures her that she is just as enchanting as ever, and her goth roommate is just exceptionally weird.

Enid doesn’t argue, but she wants to, and when she bites her tongue she tastes blood.

---

Wednesday is a storm cloud, and Enid learns she rumbles like thunder at provocation.

She catches Enid crying right after the accident (well, she thought it was an accident) at dinner that put Yoko in the infirmary. Why Enid craved Wednesday’s company to vent was beyond her and not something she wanted to unpack right now, but to her credit, Wednesday takes her rant in stride.

And when she clarifies it was intentional, that Bianca was behind it, and volunteers herself as Enid’s new co-pilot, her brain short-circuits. Enid steps forward, all emotion and softness and gratitude, and Wednesday shuffles back like she’s been burned, but the intensity of her stare rattles Enid. Hatred and rage burns in her eyes, the most emotion she’s seen Wednesday express since her arrival.

“I want to humiliate Bianca so badly that the bitter taste of defeat burns in her throat.”

Wednesday Addams definitely does not do casual.

In fact, she may be more like a hurricane than a storm cloud.

When they win the Poe Cup with Thing’s assistance, Enid can’t help herself. In her excitement she grabs Wednesday to celebrate with their small group, and it may be the first time Wednesday hasn’t shunned her. Even a hurricane has an eye.

She catches a smirk on Wednesday’s lips as she looks around, and her heart makes a little swoop.

---

Enid ignores whatever conflicting emotions she has. Wednesday is just odd, and she’s intrigued because she’s never met someone like her, and that’s all it is. She throws herself into a lukewarm crush on Ajax and convinces herself that it’s bigger. This is how she always feels about boys, anyway, and the other girls must feel the same. They choose a boy to feel something for, and eventually it grows into something genuine. Hanging out with Ajax feels good, and he’s nice to look at, and she has no doubts that it would feel nice to kiss him.

Okay, she has a couple doubts, but only because those feelings just need a little time to grow. But she’s genuinely excited for her date. It’ll take her mind off the events of the day and the explosion, and all the weird little taxidermy critters at that antique shop.

She frets around the room and in her frenzied state, she asks what Wednesday thinks of her outfit. Why she does that is beyond her, but she expects to be ignored and is pleasantly surprised when Wednesday glances at her – only to immediately turn back around.

“I feel like you just napalmed me, Enid.”

Well, that’s about what she had expected. She tries not to be disappointed with that answer and refuses to acknowledge what it means that she cares at all. After all, she’s dressing to impress Ajax. Not her anti-social, anti-color, anti-happiness roomie.

But she still seeks one last sliver of reassurance, unable to help herself when she asks Wednesday to wish her luck.

She doesn’t.

“If he breaks your heart, I’ll nail-gun his.”

Somehow, that’s even better.

---

Ajax ditches her, and when she tells Wednesday, she’s met with the whir of a drill that her roomie holds up threateningly. It’s sweet, but Enid doesn’t want blood on her hands for something as stupid as being ghosted.

Still, it makes her heart flutter a little in excitement, because Wednesday does care, and that’s as good a consolation prize as any.

It’s hard to read Wednesday, but she gets better at it every day. She demands they go shopping; Wednesday goes into town with her and then promptly shies away from the dress store.

“You’re a gazelle; I’m a wounded fawn. Cut me loose and go run with the pack.”

She tries not to focus on the softness in Wednesday’s voice when she says it, the way she expresses without malice that she isn’t comfortable here, and especially not on the implications that she finds Enid graceful. When she joins the other girls, that happy floaty feeling is back.

She agrees to go to the Rave’N with Lucas Walker because she wants to make Ajax jealous.

Just Ajax.

---

It was fifty-fifty if Wednesday would even show up, honestly, and the fact that she walks in with the sheriff’s kid is… lackluster, at best. Enid can’t take her eyes off Wednesday. Typical of her to buck the trend and show up in all black, fuck what anyone else thought of her. It’s a trait she’s quickly growing to admire, even if it comes off a bit harsh sometimes. But wow. Wednesday sure cleans up nicely.

If Lucas notices her staring, he doesn’t mention it.

She watches from the sidelines, and her mouth goes dry when Wednesday claims the entire center of the dance floor as her own with moves Enid has never even heard of. It’s ridiculous and unique and so wholly Wednesday that she’s transfixed, and there’s a jolt of disdain for Tyler because he just stands there.

It’s unbearable to watch, and even if Wednesday seems to be enjoying herself, the fact that her date is the equivalent of untoasted bread eventually gets to Enid and she tries to drag Lucas onto the floor with her.

He breaks off, and she barely spares a glance before moving closer. She doesn’t cut in, but she keeps an eye on Wednesday the entire time.

She’s beautiful, Enid thinks, and if anyone tries to say otherwise, they’re getting a face full of claws. Tyler had better appreciate how precious that moment he gets with Wednesday is.

All hell breaks loose shortly after, and the betrayal from Lucas is so much that her heart cracks a little. Zero for two on dates lately, and her heart was barely in it to begin with.

Ajax swoops in and he’s chivalrous on her behalf, and at least for now, she’s happy to let him be a distraction to her.

---

Enid’s greatest strength is her positivity. She takes everything in stride, and she always has. Her perfect, solid veneer of happiness is what keeps darker, more cumbersome thoughts away, and it’s her shield against her other flaws – well, flaw. The biggest one, at least.

If she deflects to her sense of humor and sweetness hard enough, she can avoid the negativity licking at the corners of her mind for a while longer.

Parents’ Weekend shatters it in one fell swoop when her mother hounds her about her wolf. Whether she can transform fully yet – and she still can’t. Just claws. She demonstrates again, and her mother is less than impressed by both her claws and her attempts at brevity. It’s just the usual disappointment, at first. She can handle that, even if it hurts.

It’s when her mother brings out conversion therapy pamphlets that she breaks.

She isn’t sure how long she sits out in the forest, alone, before Thing finds her. He’s always so reassuring, and she vents her feelings to him while he comforts her. They talk well into the afternoon, making twists and turns, and somehow end up on the topic of funerals. Thing tells her they’re the most important Addams family events, and she tells him in return how the full moon –especially the blood moon—are the most important family event for her pack.

She can’t even participate in it.

That night, she watches Wednesday from her own bed as she taps away on her typewriter. She admires Wednesday’s ability to be unaffected by those around her, and even though she knows how Wednesday hates to be interrupted, she can’t help herself.

“How do you care so little about everyone else?”

Wednesday freezes, and Enid can’t tell if it’s out of annoyance or offense. She can’t imagine it’s the latter, considering how proud Wednesday is not to feel her feelings.

She doesn’t face Enid, but she’s silent for a long moment. That’s not unusual for Wednesday, but the way she’s frozen in place is… slightly more unsettling.

“I don’t know,” she finally replies, and it feels genuine. But Enid can hear resignation in her voice, and no matter how curious she is, she knows better than the pry. Maybe she had read things wrong. Maybe Wednesday actually does feel a bit more than she lets on.

---

She knits them both snoods, and Wednesday is unimpressed. But she takes the gift anyway, and Enid takes it as a win.

When she says it’s too unique for anything but a wedding, Enid puts on her best sad face even though she’s beaming inside.

Funerals are the most important event, to an Addams.

---

They nearly die, and Enid is finally sick of it. Especially after Wednesday lured her out with the promise of spending real, quality time together. She’s sick of having her emotions played, of being manipulated, of Wednesday not caring how she feels at all.

They pick at each other, and even in her rage Enid still feels a pang when Wednesday lists the ways Enid has annoyed her. Because that means she’s been paying attention, and if Enid doesn’t leave now, she’s going to say or do something stupid, and then things will really be ruined.

But she experiences the storm that is Wednesday Addams for herself for the first time, and she nearly buckles under the force of its ruthlessness.

She holds strong. Just barely. Just enough that she can get out of the room without losing herself, and Yoko welcomes her with open arms when she bursts through the door with tears already welling in her eyes.

But she doesn’t stay away long. The first time she returns is a few hours later. Wednesday is just finishing up with her evening cello, and doesn’t acknowledge her when she comes in. In fact, she makes a point of turning her back.

So Wednesday Addams is angry at her? Fine. She was a lousy friend, and Enid didn’t need that.

Enid was just hoping that maybe there was some remorse buried deep in that black soul of hers.

---

Wednesday calls her out the third time she comes back, and this time she’s genuinely surprised. It’s the first time Wednesday has acknowledged her existence since their fight, and Enid genuinely wants to make up. She’s had enough time –and sleep—to cool off a bit, and if Wednesday would just apologize she would happily come back.

She doesn’t. In fact, she insults Enid directly to her face. She clenches her jaw, and her unblinking stare bores into Enid’s eyes, and if she didn’t know better, she might think she had actually hurt Wednesday’s feelings.

Yoko is convinced she doesn’t even have feelings, and Enid is starting to think she could be right. But it still hurts, and she hears the crack in her own voice when she tells Wednesday to enjoy her solitude.

It’s torture to care about Wednesday, with her single-minded focus on justice above all else, horrifying creepy things and rigid structures.

But the longer she’s away, the more time she has to think. She’s still hurt. Wednesday has been kind of insufferable lately.

Wednesday is stubborn and has a single-minded focus on justice that nothing else rivals, not her own safety, nor anyone else’s. She thinks emotions are weakness, and hates them.

Yoko tries her best to be a good friend. She’s comforting and kind, and they spend time doing mani-pedis and gossiping.

Enid finds herself missing the darkness. Yoko’s room is like maximalist meets occult, and it’s a little overwhelming. She starts to understand why Wednesday can’t stomach looking at her side of the room for too long when she tries –and fails—to focus on one single item from Yoko’s room.

And… she kind of misses her boundary. Yoko keeps leaving things on her desk and it annoys her. Wednesday has never crossed her side, not once. And she’s certainly never left a vial of half-drank blood on Enid’s desk to spill on her brand-new eyeshadow palette.

When the news about Thing reaches her, she doesn’t have to think twice before rushing back.

Something has shifted between them. She feels it when Wednesday finds her unpacking her clothes. There’s a tension there that wasn’t before, and she’s even managed to confuse Wednesday, which she will take great pride in.

She asks question after question, almost disbelieving that Enid came back, that she’s actually here, and when Enid says that they just work together, she swears she sees a flicker of… something… in Wednesday’s eyes.

She’s softer. More open. It’s not perfect, but she’s trying.

“Thing said he missed you,” she says, and it’s the most emotion that Enid has seen in her eyes. It’s almost pleading. Wednesday won’t say it outright – she can’t. It’s too vulnerable, Enid knows, and that’s okay. She’ll meet that emotion where it is, let Wednesday feel secure in it.

She gives Wednesday a gentle smile, the kind that tells her that Enid knows what she really means, and says, “I missed him, too.”

Wednesday isn’t a storm today. She’s a gentle rain patter outside, and even Enid can appreciate the allure of curling up with a book and a cup of cocoa when it storms.

But Enid can’t handle this softness, and she’s been keeping tabs on Wednesday and knows how to get her out again, because she actually liked that Tyler kid. She tells Wednesday he’s working late, and deals with the mix of heartbreak and relief on her own when Wednesday rushes out to see him.

---

When the battle comes, nothing matters to her except keeping Wednesday safe. It’s the final trigger for her wolf, something she never expected to see, and she shifts just in time to tackle the Hyde –Tyler—off of Wednesday. She’s never felt such power, and she catches Wednesday’s eye just long enough to smile at her, all teeth and fur. She hopes Wednesday still likes her like this. Really, if she’s going to like any form of Enid, it’s probably going to be the one closest to rending flesh and bone with her bare teeth, but she’s still a little self-conscious.

She’s exhausted by the time it’s over, and she blacks out for some amount of time. Her job was to protect Wednesday, and it exhausted her to take on a Hyde all by herself. She rests, and when she wakes, she finds her jacket and any un-ripped clothing to put back on.

Oh god. Wednesday.

She doesn’t care about anyone else. Ajax meets her when she stumbles out of the woods, covered in blood and dirt and entrails, but her focus is trained on the gates just beyond the campus. Please, she thinks. Please, please be okay.

She’s running low on hope when three figures limp out.

Enid would recognize that silhouette anywhere.

She runs.

When she tackles Wednesday, she knows she’ll be pushed away immediately, but she just needs a second to feel flesh and blood under her hands, to know that Wednesday is really here and okay and safe.

Wednesday’s hand on her shoulder pushes her back, and it’s the first time that she truly looks at Enid. And Enid is really trying to put on a brave face, but she can feel her lip wobbling and her eyes watering, the adrenaline of her very first wolf-out and her terror over losing Wednesday finally catching up to her.

And much to her surprise… Wednesday is the one to pull her back in. And not just into a chaste hug. She wraps herself around Enid and buries her nose in Enid’s shoulder, inhales deeply and exhales slowly, and she thinks she might swoon. She’s everything to Enid in this moment; the rain, the clouds, the sky. She’s ruthless and stubborn and sometimes unpredictable, but she brings a sort of life and depth to all who surround her in a way Enid could never describe.

Wednesday holds her and it feels like home. And Enid swears she can hear a pulse like thunder between them.

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[rhysiana]

Off of the Podium, Into His Heart

I was watching the snowboard halfpipe prelims the other night and suddenly struck by a desire for a Cherry Magic Olympics AU. (Kurodachi, T, ~3400 words)

[Also on AO3]

(Content notes: will contain non-graphic references to an injury sustained in competition and Olympic isolation bubble logistics for plot reasons)

*

Everything about being at the Olympics was already weird, so Adachi thought he could be excused for forgetting it was also his birthday. He really didn't see any reason he couldn't have been on-call to make graphics for the live reporting team from his own apartment, but no. Here he is, in a foreign country, running errands and retrieving lost passes for the media team between occasionally being asked to do his actual job, and now he's hearing other people's thoughts? Everyone here is so stressed!

It's certainly educational—he's learning how to curse in so many languages—but he's also thinking very seriously about what it would take to become a true shut-in when he gets home. He boards the bus in a daze, following his colleagues automatically.

He only realizes what event they're attending when he gets out and sees… him. Smiling brighter than the sunshine glinting off the snow of the halfpipe behind him: Kurosawa Yuichi, Japan's winter sports darling and Adachi's most embarrassing celebrity crush.

/Why is this idiot just standing in the way?/ someone thinks loudly as they bump into him from behind, and the world snaps back into focus just in time for him to catch the extremely heavy gear bag the cameraman is handing to him. Right. Work.

*

Kurosawa, meanwhile, is having a fairly normal one, for standards of normal that include competing at the Olympics. Just another international competition, he's telling himself, as he smiles and high-fives the same people he's seen at venues all over the world.

His practice runs went well; he feels good about the order of his tricks; he's been getting excellent air here. He does hope the sun stays out so the light doesn't go flat, but he always hopes that.

(He determinedly doesn't think about the media questions he'll get asked if anything goes wrong. They've always been part of his job, but he really hates that sensation of letting people down, let alone the whole country.)

His first run... isn't spectacular. It's going great right up until he hits the lip on his next-to-last trick and the rest is scrapped. That score will definitely not get him to the final, but that's what the second run is for. He'll just have to go big!

*

"Hmmm, he better go big on this next one, or he might not even make it to the final," the reporter next to Adachi says. /And wouldn't that be a juicy piece of news,/ he also hears as her hand bumps his. He moves carefully away.

To be honest, he always turns the broadcast off when they get to the "how do you feel about letting down the nation?" part of an interview. He always feels too bad for the athlete to watch. It's not like they did it on purpose! No one likes to lose.

The crowd, sparse as it is due to the weirdness of this particular year, is still large enough to make some noise, and their collective gasp and sudden silence jerks his attention back to the hill just in time to see Kurosawa sliding uncontrolled down the center of the pipe.

He stands frozen in place as trainers and medics rush out. Fortunately, the big screens seemingly everywhere show Kurosawa smile and wave as someone takes off his helmet, so even though a stretcher ends up being involved, it mustn't be too bad.

The rest of the event passes in a blur. He couldn't even have said how the rest of Team Japan did. Which is why he's so bewildered when he finds himself deposited in front of Kurosawa's door in the Olympic Village hours later.

"You can do your job from anywhere, right?" his boss asks. He puts an encouraging arm around Adachi's shoulders as he knocks on the door. /Thank goodness we had someone with us we could so easily spare./

Adachi just nods. It's what he'd been thinking this whole time anyway.

"Kurosawa-san, we brought you an assistant!" his boss calls, and then Adachi is practically shoved through the door, stumbling to a graceless halt in front of the world's most perfect man.

*

Because he is perfect, the first thing Kurosawa does is smile at him and give an awkward little bow from where he's sitting with his leg propped up in a cast. "I'm so sorry to cause you trouble," he says.

"No no no," Adachi replies, waving his hands in flustered negation. He probably looks like an idiot. He's blushing furiously and not for the first time is actually grateful to be wearing a mask. "It's my pleasure! Um, just. Anything you need, let me know."

Kurosawa's brow crinkles ever so slightly. "I hope I'm not interrupting your work too much."

Adachi awkwardly holds up his laptop bag. "No, no, I can work from anywhere. They didn't really need to bring me," he confesses.

"I'm sure you've been a big help anyway!"

Adachi sets about unpacking his work stuff onto the desk rather than respond to that. That only takes about five minutes, though, so then he's left standing there, unsure. "Would you like tea? Water? Should I… turn on the TV?" What did athletes do when injured? Rest, surely.

"Tea would be very nice," Kurosawa says. "If you'll have some with me."

"S-sure." Adachi tries not to look like a deer in headlights as he heads to the electric kettle. He can make tea. He does it every day. This is fine.

When it's ready, he carefully sets his own mug down on the coffee table first, mind conjuring up visions of spilling too-hot tea on Japan's favorite boy next door. Then he hands over Kurosawa's mug.

Their fingers brush.

/How did I get so lucky?/ Kurosawa thinks, and Adachi nearly drops the mug anyway. /Of all the people they could get to help me, I get the cute boy from the plane!/

And then Adachi is treated to a vision of himself asleep on the flight, glowing in a pool of warmth from the reading light. He is 100% sure no lighting in the history of planes has ever been that flattering.

He snatches his hand back as quickly as possible.

"I'm sorry they couldn't find someone you actually know," Adachi says, picking up the tea in hopes of distraction only to realize he's still wearing his mask. He hesitates.

"Oh, don't worry," Kurosawa says, removing his own. "We're all in this bubble together, right?"

His foot brushes against Adachi's thigh as he leans forward. /And it's not like it matters for me now,/ he thinks wistfully. There's surprisingly little bitterness, but Adachi vows to do his best to make Kurosawa as happy as possible under the circumstances.

"My parents were sad they couldn't come," Kurosawa continues out loud, going back to Adachi's original comment. "They were always telling me their own Olympic stories growing up."

Adachi decides there's no point in acting like he doesn't already know Kurosawa's well-reported lineage. Instead he asks something he has always wondered: "Why didn't you go into skiing, like them?" He's honestly kind of shocked he's never seen an interview address this before.

Kurosawa settles further back into his end of the couch with his tea and looks thoughtful. "You're not a reporter?" he asks.

Adachi's eyes widen. "Oh, no! I make graphics. Animations and graphs and things. I would never…"

Kurosawa smiles at him again, and he's struck once more by how… un-bro-y he seems, compared to many of the snowboarders he's seen interviewed.

"I started in skiing," Kurosawa admits, "almost before I could walk. But it's very high-stress. More traditional."*

His gaze drifts to the window and his smile turns more inward. "But then one year, when we were just on vacation, not at a competition, I asked if I could try snowboarding, and it changed my life. Everything was so much lower pressure. More friendly, more encouraging."

"I made so many friends on that trip, and at the end, the teacher told my parents I had real promise." He looks down modestly. "It was mostly because I already understood so many basics from what they'd taught me, of course."

Adachi tilts his head, hair falling into his eyes as his considers what he knows of Kurosawa's parents. "I can see how downhill and ski jumping would get you used to speed, but isn't snowboarding very different, mechanically? I think your teacher was right."

He's surprised to find Kurosawa blushing when he looks up. Adachi's leg brushes Kurosawa's foot again, and he gets a flash of /Ah, he actually really thought about that! Usually I just hear how lucky I am to have had such good preparation! Cute and thoughtful!/

He nearly jumps off the couch when his phone buzzes in his pocket. "Work!" he says as he fumbles to check his messages. "I have to! Um."

"Of course!" Kurosawa waves his own phone cheerfully. "I can keep myself occupied, don't worry."

Adachi does his best to lose himself in work. He's exquisitely aware of Kurosawa's ever-present aura of friendliness behind him at first, but eventually (somehow) he gets used to it. The next two hours are probably the most relaxed he's felt since arriving at the Olympics.

When he finally gets everything sent off to his boss, he turns to find Kurosawa asleep on the couch. Suddenly, without Kurosawa's sparkling personality making him seem so untouchable, Adachi realizes they're actually about the same age. Kurosawa's already done so much with his life, Adachi forgot. Thinking back over the news coverage he worked on in the run-up to the Olympics, he realizes Kurosawa is probably very tired, and not just due to his injury.

Careful not to disturb him, he gets an extra blanket out of the closet and covers Kurosawa as gently as he can. Let him sleep.

*

Things Adachi has learned about Kurosawa in the past two days:

-he is incredibly popular with his teammates (no surprise there)

-his coaches love him (also not a surprise)

-he really is that naturally personable (of course)

-… and he finds it very tiring (huh)

Also, he's secretly a huge nerd. Adachi discovers this when he comes back from fetching lunch while Kurosawa had visitors and finds Kurosawa 1) alone, and 2) looking at a manga volume Adachi had in his laptop bag.

He looks up at Adachi standing frozen just inside the door and blushes. "Ah, I'm sorry, I hope you don't mind. I saw it sticking out of the top and I haven't had a chance to read this one yet…"

They spend the rest of the afternoon discussing the latest plot arc.

Adachi had expected spending time with Kurosawa in real life (well, sort of real) to kill his crush, because of course Kurosawa would be far too cool for him to relate to, or not actually that nice, or… something, but that's simply not happening. To be honest, it's just getting worse.

And it would be even without his newfound mind-reading or whatever it is! Frankly, he doesn't think Kurosawa needs this unfair bonus from the universe. Because now Adachi is burdened with the knowledge that he's not just being polite but actually likes Adachi specifically.

A travel organizer comes by the next day to apologize once again for not being able to get Kurosawa on an earlier flight home. Adachi's hand brushes Kurosawa's as he hands him a water, and he hears, /I'm so glad my time with Adachi doesn't have to end yet./

Adachi is forced to add to the list of things he now knows:

-Kurosawa is an incredible romantic

He also has a surprising number of daydreams about cooking, which is perhaps not surprising given the catering situation, but Adachi wasn't prepared to start appearing in them! They're really starting to make him hungry. And also cause some weird heart fluttering.

It's when the announcers on the TV mention that the games are half over that Adachi realizes there's probably someone from the snowboarding team free to help Kurosawa now. It would probably be a relief for everyone involved!

He's about to offer to find one of them when Kurosawa shifts further down on the couch, foot once again touching Adachi. A wave of melancholy washes over him, no real words this time, just a kind of dread of going back to Japan and rehab and eventually his normal life.

Oh, Adachi realizes. Kurosawa, who's friends with everyone, is actually very lonely. He's trying to figure out what to do with this knowledge when Kurosawa says, "Will you tell me about what you do?"

Adachi blinks at him. "Um. My job is pretty boring, really."

"Okay," Kurosawa says easily, "then tell me about what you really like to do."

Which is how Adachi finds himself showing his celebrity crush his portfolio and getting showered in compliments he can't deny are sincere, because Kurosawa is sitting so close their thighs touch.

How did his life get so weird?

He falls asleep that night to the memory of one of Kurosawa's daydreams about feeding him an entire homemade banquet. The last thing he remembers before true sleep takes him is being hand-fed a strawberry.

*

This strange bubble of unreality can't last, of course. The travel coordinator finally succeeds in getting Kurosawa a new flight.

As soon as Adachi hears this, he starts filing the whole experience away in his mind under "the most amazing thing that ever happened to me." A treasured memory to marvel over for the rest of his life, because nothing like it will ever happen again, that's for sure.

Kurosawa is mostly packed already, so he starts a last sweep of the room for stray belongings. He's unprepared for Kurosawa's hug.

"Oh!"

"Thank you for all your help," Kurosawa says sincerely. /I wouldn't have survived the week without him,/ his thoughts echo. /I wish he could come with me always./

Before Adachi can even begin to react, Kurosawa is pulling back and giving him one of his trademark sunny smiles. "I hope our paths will cross again."

"That would be nice?" Adachi manages, wishing with all his might it had come out as less of a question as Kurosawa is led away.

*

The Olympics end, the whole crew flies back to Japan, and Adachi returns to his normal life. Or what passes for normal now, with his unwanted mind-reading powers. He starts eating lunch near Fujisaki; her thoughts are so much more soothing than everyone else's. He thinks she might be his friend now.

Tsuge (whose thoughts are exactly as intense as Adachi always suspected) tells him he should be glad his experience with Kurosawa was a one-time event. "Love is too complicated."

"You write romance novels!"

"Exactly. I have studied the matter extensively."

It's fine. Adachi is beginning to doubt it all anyway. Oh, sure, he knows the mind-reading is real (it keeps happening; there's no way to deny it), but surely his memory of how much Kurosawa had seemed to like him is exaggerated.

That's the only thing that makes sense. All his memories of the Olympics seem more brightly colored than reality, heightened by adrenaline, not quite real.

(He hasn't answered any of the texts Kurosawa has sent him since then. It wasn't real, after all.)

(It's better this way. Soon Kurosawa won't even remember him. He'll just be one of the many, many people Kurosawa has met and forgotten in the course of his busy, exciting life. Adachi will fade into the background, like always. No use pretending otherwise.)

He's working on some personal designs at home in the evening, news on in the background, when he hears his name in a familiar voice: "… I would have been much more upset in the aftermath of my injury if I hadn't had the support of my good friend Adachi in Beijing."

The marker falls out of Adachi's hand as he stares at the TV in disbelief. What is happening? It's been a month! Even Adachi barely even thinks about their time together. (Just whenever he eats. Or tries to fall asleep. Or reads manga. Or wears his Olympics scarf.)

Tsuge texts an hour or so later about meeting at their izakaya. They haven't been for weeks, now that Adachi thinks about it. In a daze, he says he'll be there. Maybe Tsuge can tell him this is all a dream.

Instead, when he gets there, Tsuge is sitting next to a man with blond hair, looking… smug, Adachi thinks. The blond man is on his phone, but he and Tsuge are sitting unusually close. What on earth has been going on in the last couple of weeks?

"Hello," Adachi says uncertainly.

"Adachi, this is Minato," Tsuge announces, and reaches over to cover Minato's free hand where it rests near his drink. Minato looks up at him and smiles.

Oh. Oh!

Then Tsuge's foot nudges his under the table. /I know you can hear me,/ he thinks loudly. /It's all real. The cherry magic, the way Kurosawa feels for you, everything. I was wrong./

"What?" Adachi says blankly out loud. "What is happening?"

"Did you know you're famous?" Minato asks gleefully in reply, which is not helpful.

"What?" Adachi says again.

Minato holds out his phone. "The whole internet wants to know who this friend Adachi is that Kurosawa is talking about so much."

"It was just one interview, I don't think…"

"He's mentioned you in every interview he's had this week," Minato says. "Since he started taking interviews about how his rehab is going."

"You should call him," Tsuge says firmly.

"What? No! I couldn't."

"You don't have his number? I bet I can get it for you," Minato says, fingers already hovering over his phone.

"No, I do. I just… I can't. I'm nobody."

Minato cocks his head. "Clearly not to Kurosawa." Tsuge nods in emphatic agreement.

/Love is worth it,/ Tsuge thinks at him, practically kicking him under the table.

"But I haven't answered any of his texts," Adachi admits.

Tsuge's eyes widen. "Then you have to make a big gesture," he declares. (Minato, for some reason, hides a huge smile behind his hand at that.)

"Look," Tsuge says, his own phone now out, "here's a florist in his town, you can send him a bouquet. No! A bouquet for every text you haven't answered!" (Minato is now clearly trying to hide his laughter in his beer.)

"No," Adachi says, pushing Tsuge's phone down. "I'll do it myself. Thank you, though."

He manages to distract Tsuge from further meddling by asking how he and Minato met. That chaotic tale carries them through the rest of the evening.

When he gets home, he steels himself and then buys a train ticket. He has to do this. He'll never believe any of it if it's not in person. His magic will be good for this one thing.

*

He pats his pockets over and over the next morning, confirming once again that he has his phone, his keys, until finally it's late enough that if he doesn't leave right now, he's going to miss his train.

He opens his door and nearly runs into Kurosawa, poised to knock.

"Ah!" He trips backward over his suitcase.

Kurosawa reaches out to catch him before he can fall. "I'm so sorry, I didn't mean to—"

"I was just coming to see you!" Adachi blurts out anxiously at the same time.

"Really?" Joy surges through the points where they're touching.

In surprise, Adachi manages to trip again and ends up sitting down hard on top of his suitcase. Blushing furiously, he looks up at Kurosawa. "Really," he confirms.

Scrambling back up, he manages to shove the suitcase back into the apartment. "Would you like to come in?"

In answer, Kurosawa steps inside and folds him into a full embrace. This time, Adachi lets himself melt into it.

Kurosawa stays for a week. Adachi learns that the domestic fantasies he'd glimpsed in Beijing were only the tip of the iceberg. By the end of the week, he can't see Kurosawa's fantasies anymore, but that's okay, because he's living them.

A month after that, he quits his job and buys another train ticket. One way.

*

[One year later]

Press release: "Kurosawa Yuichi announces his own line of snowboards and snowboarding gear, in collaboration with graphic designer Adachi Kiyoshi..."

 (*Note: Kurosawa's fictional opinions of competitive skiing vs. snowboarding culture are his own.)

[nerdygaymormon]

Sometimes I really hate being Bi. I know know the Church is true and I'll never leave it, but man is it a struggle. I started to think I was Bi on my Mission, and wow, that was scary. Ever since I got home, little over a year ago, I feel like I'm attracted to women more and more and I hate it. (I know I'm Bi and not Lesbian.) I see a cute gal, and I want cuddles and dates, and so many other things, but I can't act on it. (Especially since I'm at BYUI.) Do you have any tips on not hating yourself

Everyone has some things about themselves they don’t like or about which they’re hyper-critical. Often these are about not living up to our ideals, actions we wish we had or hadn’t done, not living up to some societal ideal, about a failure in our life. This is normal and part of being human. 

Queer people in particular must deal with self-hatred that goes beyond just a normal part of being human. We grow up hearing negative messages about people like us and we internalize those messages. And often we have an inner voice that is authoritative and may sound like our parents or religious leaders and thus when it speaks to us, that voice gives those messages extra heft. These things cause us to see ourselves as lesser and to feel shame over our feelings and how we experience life. 

An important part of unraveling this self-loathing is to recognize the negative messages, refute them, and replace them. 

For example, your world won’t end just because you’re bi. Some people may view you differently if they find out, but a lot of people will continue to respect and love you. Perhaps you’ll lose some people, but you will not lose everything and everybody you care about.

That’s recognizing and refuting the negative messages, now let’s replace them. Being bi is a wonderful part of what makes me the person I am and I’m lucky because it brings many important gifts into my life. I can find beauty and love that others miss. 

When you’re at church or school and hear a negative message about queer people, push back against it. You can raise your hand and speak up. If you’re not feeling brave in that moment, it’s okay, and explain to yourself why that comment was wrong and replace it with a positive comment. 

Another thing you may have heard is that being gay or bi is a choice or the result of a lack of faith or some other reason. Fact is that it’s biological and a natural part of this world. This is literally how we’re made. 

Associate with other LGBTQIA people.��

I always feel so much better after I’ve been with other queer people. Being with them helps fight the things I was taught about the queer community, I can see & experience that they are normal people. They are fun, loving, caring, and supportive, exactly the opposite of what I’d been told. You can attend USGA-Rexburg and there’s a new resource center going up in town. 

The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints spends quite a bit of time teaching and celebrating early pioneers. It’s quite a legacy and something to be proud of. The same is true of the queer community, we have amazing pioneers. We are a brave people. You have claim to two incredible legacies. Read about some of our queer Mormon heroes of the last decade.

Shame withers in sunshine

If you’re not yet out to friends and family, that’s okay, you have a blog and can write about your experiences and thoughts online. You can also find & connect with other queer Mormons. 

One thing I’ve experienced, which has surprised me is that as I write and post about things of which I was embarrassed, the shame associated with them goes away. By sharing with others, it is no longer a secret that needs to be hidden, but something I’m taking ownership of. 

If you’re awesome on paper, then you’re awesome in person

I used to know that I could write things on paper about myself that would sound great, but I didn’t have positive feelings about them. That person on the paper looked good, but somehow I didn’t have those same feelings about myself. I was the first person in my family to get a college degree, I now have an MBA, I served a mission, I am the favorite uncle in my family, I play the piano, I am kind and trusted and so on. 

Learn to draw boundaries

Often when we don’t feel great about ourselves, we make up for that by seeking the approval of others, more so than is usual or healthy. We end up agreeing to do things we may not want to do just so that we seem agreeable and worthy of their approval, even from people we don’t care about that much. There is power in being able to say “no.” Schedule time to get your school work done, to participate in activities you enjoy, in having time for friends, for contributing to the community. You can agree to spend time helping others with things they want, but protect your boundaries and don’t overstretch yourself. 

Boundaries also are important when it comes to people and messages you associate with. Try to find allies and queer people that you can associate with. Even if you’re not “out,” you can present yourself as an ally and be with people who express positivity about queerness. 

You don’t have to accept everything you hear at church, what church leaders have said, or even all the “doctrine.” Church leaders have been tragically wrong in the past, they are not perfect conveyers of the love of our Heavenly Parents. You don’t have to believe the terrible things taught about LGBTQ people. I know this is easier said than done. It helps if you’ve experienced God’s love for you, or if you’ve thought about how illogical it would be for loving Heavenly Parents to send queer children to earth with no way for them to express who they are or to have happiness. We are supposed to experience joy in this life. 

Take care of your health

When I met with a psychologist because I was suicidal and also wanted help with my internalized homophobia and low-self esteem, the first things we discussed were if I was getting enough sleep, was I eating a healthy diet, was I getting exercise. Our physical well-being contributes to our mental well-being. Sometimes a good cry is what I need to express the feelings I’m having, followed by a nap, then I feel much better. 

Allow for growth and forgiveness

We all learn and change and grow. As others grow in understanding and do better, allow them the grace of forgiveness by recognizing things said by their past selves were said in ignorance and recognize the growth they’ve undergone. This also applies to you and your past self. 

A common exercise that helps is to think of what you would say to someone else in a similar position. So often we speak of love and acceptance and not being hard on themselves, and it’s pretty great advice which we could apply to ourselves. Another exercise is to have a picture of our younger self, or even of just some young person around ages 5~12, and know that they are going to grow up queer, what advice would you give them? You deserve the same compassion, kindness and love that you show to others. 

Growth and change also happens to our faith. Here’s a post where I shared about faith transitions and I found it very helpful in understanding how I experience my faith is different from my family, it’s because we’re in different stages. 

Take pride in trying, not in failure or success

Coming out is freaking hard and takes a lot of courage. Like a lot of things in life, many people attempt to do this and then fail, they back down, the moment feels wrong, they get panicked, or whatever reason. Failure isn’t the worst thing, not trying is. And the more we try, the more successes we’ll eventually have. And once you have some wins under your belt, it gets easier to do those things that were once hard. 

When being bi brings happiness, it’s easier to love this about yourself

For so many people, being queer is only associated with negative things in their life, but when you can start associating it with positive things it becomes easier to accept and love this part of yourself. When you have queer friends, when you have experienced the excitement of a crush on a boy and on a girl, when you go on dates, or someone sends a message that your posts about your feelings really helped them, those positive experiences will be associated with being bi. 

Add voices and writings that affirm you and your experiences

So often scriptures are used as a weapon against queer people. A lot of people think they know what the Bible says about queer people based on a few verses pulled out of context, but they’ve not put in any real study to the original language, situation or what those verses read like when put back in context. Nor are they aware that there’s also positive scriptures about queer people. I put together a collection of things I learned that I hope will help others. 

This year I’ve really been enjoying the Beyond the Block podcast, which has a Black man and a gay man discuss each week’s Come, Follow Me lesson. I also have liked the Faithful Feminists podcast. Both of those podcast highlight principles and concepts from the scriptures which are important for marginalized people. 

Find blogs, podcasts, books, videos, lectures, classes, twitter accounts and whatever else that helps affirm you and helps you understand yourself.

[onthevirgeofdestruction]

Would you mind if I request some more of the Logince family with baby Patton and older brother Virgil? Who did they adopt first? What was the meeting between Virgil and Patton like? Did they like each other right away or no? For Anon

I split this into two chapters.

Words: 2,051 Warnings: Anxiety, Jealousy, Insecurity Characters: Virgil, Logan, Roman Ships: Logince Universe: Kid!Patton & Teen!Virgil Adopted by Logince Genre: Family 

  Some part of Virgil registered that his dads had already started the adoption process. That they wanted him there and that they loved him. That it had been two years with them now and they had no plans of letting him go. But there was a very loud voice saying that he would be replaced by another kid. That the other kid would fit better and be better and they’d change their minds or ignore him. And he’d go back to scraps and struggling alone because there was no one to help him when things too overwhelming.

   Virgil knew it didn’t make sense. His dads would never do that to him. They even asked Virgil if he’d be okay if they could foster another younger child. Virgil agreed to it. Papa had said that taking Virgil in had made them so happy they wanted to spread the love. Dad was clear that them wanting another kid didn’t mean that they would love or support Virgil any less. And Virgil honestly felt secure in that moment. Papa wrapped him up in an enormous hug when he agreed and they went out to Virgil’s favourite pizza place to celebrate. It was a nice day. He’d had lots of nice days since he got to the Sanders.

   But now that the day where a new kid would come was here, he couldn’t help but hate the new kid. He’d never even met him. Dad said his name was Patton, and he was six. He was shy and his communication was a little stunted. And that all sounded well and good. Until Virgil’s stupid fear of abandonment issues started acting up.

   Virgil fiddled with his hoodie strings while he sat alone in his bedroom, balled up against the wall on his bed. He knew he was being stupid. He was completely aware. Why couldn’t he stop? He didn’t even know this kid, and he hated him from an irrational fear. It wouldn’t even bet this kid’s fault if he got abandoned, it would be his parents. It made even less sense the more he thought about it. But he also couldn’t stop hating him. Virgil yanked on either side of the string and stared down at his lap blankly. His parents want this. Why can’t he be happy for them? Why can’t he be happy for the new kid? Virgil groaned in frustration and dropped his head to his knees.

   “Virgil?” Logan said, peeking into Virgil’s bedroom. Virgil glanced up and gave Logan a weak wave in acknowledgment. “I had a feeling,” Logan said, opening the door and coming into the bedroom.

   “A feeling, huh?” Virgil laughed grimly and wrapped his arms around his legs.

   “I’ve learned a lot from you, Virgil. Do you mind if I join you?” Logan asked, stopping a foot or so from the bed. Virgil shook his head and Logan climbed up on to the bed and sat next to Virgil. He paused for a moment of consideration and wrapped his arm around Virgil’s shoulders and pulled him closer. Virgil exhaled and leaned against Logan.

   “Why do I have to be like this?” Virgil asked quietly.

   “I’m afraid I’m missing some important context. Would you like to elucidate me?” Logan asked, rubbing Virgil’s shoulder a little.

   “Not really,” Virgil muttered. He didn’t want his dad to be mad at him.

   “Well then, I suppose the argument is nature versus nurture in a more broad sense. Is it your genetics or your experiences who make you who you are today? Is anything really you and your choices and wants or is everything considered ‘you’ determined by chemical reactions in your body?” Logan mused and leaned against Virgil.

   “That’s… weirdly philosophical of you. And a little terrifying,” Virgil looked up to Logan in confusion.

   “Finding out what motivates us is important to the progress of ourselves. We can’t be more if we can’t find out what makes us want more,” Logan explained, sounding fascinated.

   “What makes us want more?” Virgil was even more confused now. “What do you mean?”

   “There are two types of motivation. And motivation is what keeps us moving forward. One kind is intrinsic motivation, which comes within. The other is extrinsic motivation. That’s external motivation. External motivation is important, of course. This is things like validation from peers and rewards in the real world. But intrinsic motivation is the things done for the sake of the satisfaction of the activity, even when there’s no reward to be found,” Logan continued on. But Virgil still felt a little lost.

   “What does that have to do with why I’m like this?” Virgil asked, furrowing his eyebrows and looking to Logan at an angle.

   “I don’t know exactly what you’re talking about. I just know what motivation is an important part of being who you want to be instead of what nature or nurture has already provided for you. Why you could be one way or another. You don’t sound satisfied with where you are, so we should find what motivates you to help you change. Roman, for example, has lots of talent, but he’s very insecure. These two things conflict for him. But when people cheer for him or he receives accolades, he finds happiness and satisfaction despite the internal conflict,” Logan motioned to the door, perhaps towards where he last saw Roman.

   “Okay,” Virgil nodded. He felt like he was following now.

   “And consider me. I find happiness when I complete things of my own merit. I like proving to myself that I’m capable, and I don’t mind if nobody cheers for me as long as people respect me and take me seriously. I can get insecure when people do not take me seriously, but I can still find happiness in my own tasks without interaction,” Logan said.

   “So you guys are like the two kinds of motivations?” Virgil said.

   “That’s correct. So which kind makes more sense for you?” Logan asked gently.

   “I don’t like it when I’m the center of attention. But I also don’t like it when no one recognizes when I’ve worked hard. I don’t think either make sense for me,” Virgil admitted quietly. “So I’m like this because I’m unmotivated?”

   “No, I don’t think so. Not everybody is one way or the other. Plenty of people need a combination of both. When I’ve worked particularly hard, I like my work to be acknowledged by others, too. And when Papa practices and rehearses, he does that alone and is motivated by his own drive to be the best he can be. Maybe you’re more balanced between the two. So what makes you feel good?” Logan asked, giving Virgil a small squeeze with his arm.

   “I don’t know. When people like me, I guess. I like feeling included and stuff. Music makes me feel good. I dunno if that’s a motivator, though,” Virgil admitted softly.

   “It can be if you’re interested in it. Music could be intrinsically motivating for you. If you are feeling dissatisfied, we can consider a musical pursuit, but I don’t understand the root of the problem. I would like it if you didn’t exclude details so I could assist you better,” Logan said, sounding somewhere between concerned and perturbed.

   “I can’t say it. I’m sorry,” Virgil muttered. “Thanks for caring, though,” Virgil added, feeling a little less sour. He pressed into Logan and reached up to squeeze his arm briefly.

   “I’ll always care for you, Virgil,” Logan said softly. “Both of us will always be there for you,” Logan rubbed Virgil’s shoulder again. And hearing him say that helped much more than Virgil wanted to say out loud. Part of him still hated the competition and the unknowns. But even the day they were expecting Patton to come, Logan took time out to talk to Virgil and reassure him even when he didn’t know what was wrong.

   “Hello, gentleman!” Roman popped his head in. “Are you alright, my little stormy sky?” Roman stepped in and sat on the edge of the bed.

   “Yeah, I’ll be all right. My head’s just in a weird place,” Virgil looked up to Roman and gave him a weak smile.

   “Being in a weird place helps you know when you’re in the right one, sometimes, as strange as it sounds,” Roman smiled. “We’re here for you, though, every weird place, nice place, and bad one. If you tell me what you want and I will move heaven and earth to find it for you,” Roman put his hand to his chest and raised his other one dramatically.

   “Papa,” Virgil groaned and rolled his eyes.

   “Virgil said he is interested in music,” Logan sat up a little and looked to Roman with a sly smile.

   “Music? My boy? Really?” Roman beamed and looked like he was glowing with excitement.

   “Papa,” Virgil groaned harder. “I’m just interested, okay, I like it,” Virgil tapped on his legs.

   “Well what part of music are you interested in? Singing? Playing an instrument? Music production?” Roman asked brightly, deeply invested, leaning toward Virgil with a bright smile.

   “I don’t know!” Virgil leaned back against the wall.

   “How about you do some research and come back to us with something that sounds intriguing to try?” Logan asked.

   “Oh, that’s boring, let’s go to a music store and you can play with all the instruments and tools and see what feels right for you,” Roman objected with a little pout towards Logan.

   “Guys,” Virgil groaned. But he liked it a bit, if he was honest with himself. It was all reassuring. But Virgil wouldn’t really know for sure how they’d treat him until it happened.

   “I’ve never heard you sing, Virgil. Maybe you can practice with me sometime?” Roman offered. “I can teach you the basics,” 

   “If I wanted to later, would the offer still be open? I don’t know if I want to, but…” Virgil trailed off.

   “Anytime, sunshine, all I need is a sign,” Roman sang with his arm in the air.

   “Fine,” Virgil chuckled. If the offer really stayed open, then Virgil could maybe shut his head up about it.

   “A poet in the making!” Roman declared dramatically. Logan chuckled and rolled his eyes.

   “How about we reconvene in the living room and do something more active help put you in a better head-space, Virgil?” Logan offered. “It will not help any to be alone with your thoughts no matter what you are going through,” He added in that helpful way he did that always just skirted annoying. But it sounded nice.

   “Can we play spoons?” Virgil asked, looking up to Logan.

   “I will get the finest deck of cards!” Roman declared, standing up.

   “Roman, we have two decks of cards,” Logan huffed, flipping his hand free hand flippantly. 

   “I will get the one with the gold foil and make fruit punch mocktails so we can feel fancy!” Logan adjusted his statement.

   “I have some solid gold coins in plastic containers we could use as the proverbial ‘spoons’ if you wanted to feel extravagant,” Logan said, rubbing his chin.

   “What? That would be so cool!” Virgil shot, unable to contain his excitement at the prospect. He’d never seen a real gold coin and wanted to play with it. It would be much more fun than spoons. Like being a thief in the night as he sneaked a real gold coin under their noses.

   “Can you both promise to be careful with them and not drop them? It’s important they stay in their casings or they will lose value,” Logan asked, holding up a finger.

   “Yes, dad,” Virgil and Roman both intoned, then looked at each other and laughed. Logan rolled his eyes and gave Virgil a last squeeze before getting up off the bed. Virgil watched them head into the living room and tried to gather himself. Okay. He was starting to feel better. Kicking their asses at spoons would probably help, too. So maybe he didn’t really know what motivated him so he could be less insecure and worry less about being abandoned again, but it sounded like they wanted to help him find that what did, even if Virgil couldn’t admit what was really bothering him. Logan was always telling him he had to try before deciding he hated something. So Virgil could try. 

taglist: @elizabutgayer​​

[jellystonesteel-blog]

One True Seven💜

Fan girls are not just fan girls, we are dreamers.

They call it Hallyu, the Korean wave: the idea that South Korean pop culture has grown in prominence to become a major driver of global culture seen in everything from Korea dramas to Korean skincare regimens, and at the heart of Hallyu is the ever-growing popularity of Kpop - short for Korean pop music.

Kpop has become a truly global phenomenon thanks to its distinctive blend of addictive melodies, slick choreography, production values and the endless parade of attractive South Korean performer who spend years in grueling studio learning to sing and dance in synchronized perfection.

One of the top Entertainment companies in Korea is Big Hit Entertainment, from where my One True Seven BANGTAN SONYEONDAN came from.

I am a fan of BTS, otherwise known as an A.RM.Y. It was April of 2016 as I first watched BTS music video specifically "I NEED U" who suddenly popped up as I was browsing YouTube. After listening to it I actively follow BTS and eventually become a Stan.

Bangtan Sonyeondan has 7 talented handsone member forned in Seoul in 2013, literally means, "Bulletproof Boy Scouts". According to J-hope, the name signifies the groups desire to block out stereotypes, criticisms and expectations that aim on adolescent like bullets.

Kim Namjoon (Rapper and leader)

The official leader of BTS, RM was the first member scouted by BTS founder Bang Si-Hyuk. He is known for his rapping and collaborated with artist like Wale and even was the first of the group to release his own rap mix tape. He’s the only member of the group who speaks English fluently. In September 2018, he delivered an English-language speech to the U.N General Assembly in New York City supporting youth empowerment.

Min Yoongi (Rapper and producer)

Suga is the second oldest BTS member, and is often described as the dad of the group because he takes care of things around the dorm for the others. He started as an underground rapper with the stage name of Gloss. He is known for his rapid-fire rhymes. He is also a producer having contribution to award-winning songs on other artists' projects as well of many BTS own tracks.

Jung Hoseok (Rapper and dancer)

J-Hope is one of the best dancers in the group, and also a literal sunshine angel! He is the third member who joined after RM and Suga. He was first known for his dancing and was a part of an underground dance crew in his province of Gwangju. He also released his own mix tape in March entitled Hope World.

Park Jimin (Singer and dancer)

Discovered by Bighit Entertainment during High School, Jimin is known for his sharp dance moves and he focused on modern dance. He is known for his impressive abs. Jimin is perhaps one of the most affectionate members, towards his fellow band mates and fans. But he can also be quite self-conscious of both his skills as an entertainer and his looks.

Kim Seokjin (Singer)

Jin is the oldest BTS member, although he doesn’t often act like it. He is known for his dad jokes, describing himself as “Worldwide handsome” in response the times his pictures have gone viral, and winking or blowing kisses to the camera whenever it lands on him. Jin was originally studying acting and was infamously spotted on the streets by a Big Hit Entertainment staff member. 

Kim Taehyung (Singer and dancer)

V, also known as Taehyung, Tae, or TaeTae was the last member of BTS to be revealed. He actually did not even mean to audition for Big Hit but had joined a friend for moral support and was convinced by a staff member to try out as well. One word to describe V would be, unique. His voice easily stands out from the other vocal line because of his soulful and deep tone. He loves to play around with fashion and has a great appreciation for art as well. 

Jeon Jungkook (Singer, dancer and center)

Jungkook is the youngest BTS member, also known as their Golden Maknae because he seems to be good at basically everything. Along with his vocal and dancing skills, Jungkook is also quite athletic and artistic. He was also the only trainee that was sent to America for dance training prior to their debut. By the time the group did debut, he was just 15 years old. Jungkook is my ultimate bias and the love of my life.

BTS is now the biggest boy band in the world, topping charts and setting records as they continue on their world tour. 2018 has been an extremely fruitful year for BTS as they have achieved many awards for their music and also become one of the most influential people to date. Gaining even more international coverage from Rolling Stone, Forbes, Vogue, CNN and so on. After releasing their third full length album “LOVE YOURSELF: Tear” in May, one of the biggest events that happened to BTS is most probably their world premiere of ‘FAKE LOVE’ performance on Billboard Music Awards 2018 (BBMAs). In addition to that, they had also claimed the ‘Top Social Artist’ award twice in a row, since 2017. Aside from international achievements, they have also recently walked home with 9 different awards on Mnet Asian Music Awards 2018 (MAMA). During Melon Music Awards 2018 (MMA), they received 7 awards and also 7 in Asia Artist Awards 2018 (AAA)! It is expected that they will also be sweeping even more awards on the upcoming Seoul Music Awards 2019 and also Golden Disc Awards 2019.

No one loves anything more than a fan girl loves her fandom. My love for them can be obsessive, weird, overenthusiastic and extreme, but it's something I am unapologetically proud of. I am an avid fan girl who actively goes to any BTS events whether it is a BTS member birthday celebration, movie block screening and Fan gatherings.

I am a part of Army of Cebu. As a fan, I do love buying merchandise. I have tons of BTS merchandise at home. As a collector, just looking at the albums, magazines, DVDs, photo cards, and all the stuffs that I have accumulated all these years gives me a sense of happiness. I also feel that buying their merchandise and even the products they are endorsing is my way of supporting them as a fan. 

I found BTS during a very low point in my life and I am really grateful for that. They taught me to have a positive outlook in life. They taught me to love and embrace my flaws and turn it into a positive one. BTS is my comfort zone. They let me realize that I am worth it. Just like them, I will run endlessly towards my dream.

No matter how many of us are in the crowd, when they say "Saranghae ARMY," I feel like they are addressing me and the importance of my existence. When they give out advice for us through interviews, when they put out lyrics that really mirrors the current generation's situations or even just mundane lyrics that we can relate to, I feel like they know me personally. They are just so humble and real. They never forget where they started, never take their feet off the ground, and no matter how big they have gotten, they stay true to themselves. 

From desserts to the seas, we were always together.

[russian-dallas]

Sunshine International Learning Center встретил 2020 Новый год

Sunshine International Learning Center встретил 2020 Новый год

Каждый Новый год приходит в детский садик «Солнышко» весело, ярко, завораживающе и празднично.

Традиционно детки младшей и старшей групп устраивают для родителей праздник — поют песенки, читают стихи, танцуют, играют в игры. Лучшей радости для родительского сердца нет, чем видеть, какой талантливый их сынок или доченька. Эти таланты в детях педагоги Sunshine International Learning Center раскры…

[yogaadvise]

Summer Soul-Searching: Yoga and Meditation Events to Check Out

Looking to make some exciting plans this summer? Do some soul-searching? Nourish your mind as well as body?

Summer is the ideal time to getaway, and pairing time off with an occasion that will certainly fuel your mind, body, and soul will certainly make sure that valuable getaway time is well spent. Whether you can afford to take a week or more away from the grind, or you only have time for a weekend break, a soul-nourishing trip is a great means to decrease stress and hit the interior reset button.

The initial method to intending your summer season trip at a soul-charging occasion is to establish what you're looking for. Address the following multiple-choice questions to target your occasion style, after that inspect out the referrals below for handpicked occasions. Each supplies a really various experience, so you can match your holiday design with the appropriate retreat.

Mini Quiz: Ask Yourself the Following Questions

Choose the solution that finest suits your current state.

What are you looking for this summer? a. I want to learn how to meditate b. I'm looking for adventure, a dose of natural charm, as well as great deals of yoga c. I intend to find out about holistic health and wellness practices, nutrition, and how to locate physical as well as mental balance d. I want to relax completely

Which of these are you most thinking about practicing and also learning more about while you're away this summer? a. Meditation and some yoga b. Yoga exercise as well as outdoorsy activities c. Ayurveda d. A little bit of whatever, yet I prepare to spend a lot of time in a hammock, too

The place of your dream holiday looks like ... a. Luxurious: Top-notch lodgings, beautiful yards, lovely swimming pool, as well as whole lots of sunshine b. Outdoorsy: Camping or resort forgeting the mountains c. Easy to reach and also facilities galore: I such as to maintain traveling basic and treat myself while on vacation d. Unique: A treehouse in a foreign place with falls, rivers, and also lots of hiking

If you were to provide your excellent summer holiday event a state of mind, what would that state of mind be? a. Peaceful, easy, restorative b. Lively, active, celebratory c. Involving, transformational, enlightening d. Relaxing, exotic, rustic

Your idea of soul-searching vacationing is ... a. Getting very quiet and also having a lot of solo time b. Meeting new individuals as well as exploring brand-new areas and also practices c. Knowing brand-new practices to bring back to your everyday life d. Unplugging entirely, spending time in nature, and also going with the flow

What would certainly your ideal occasion style look like? a. An extensive, week-long hideaway: I such as things all prepared out for me and also I need a week to truly integrate b. A weekend break of alternatives where I can mix it up with various classes, experiences, as well as gatherings c. A long-weekend workshop, loaded with lectures and also courses on health and balance d. A week of yoga exercise in nature, waking up to the audio of birds tweeting and also falls nearby

Tally your numbers, examine out the referrals, and also take advantage of the summer sunlight as well as at one of these motivating getaways.

If You Responded to Mostly A's, Try This Reflection as well as Yoga Retreat

Spend a week finding out to practice meditation and exercising yoga exercise at the Chopra. A resort created and led by Deepak Chopra, Seduction of Spirit offers the special chance to find out reflection, yoga exercise, as well as the Seven Spiritual Law of Success-- bringing your deepest needs into clear emphasis and also getting in touch with your true self.

This July, Deepak will be joined by Don Miguel Ruiz as well as Don Miguel Ruiz, Jr., bestselling writers and also internationally well-known specialists on how to break without restricting ideas and also live to your greatest potential.

This Event Is Great for: Spiritual seekers, individuals searching for quality in their lives, luxury-minded travelers, anyone who intends to discover to meditate or grow their practice

Event Date: July 12-18, 2015

Event Location: Carlsbad, CA

Learn More

  If You Answered Mostly B's, Try a Yoga Festival

Sounds like you're trying to find a weekend break of yoga exercise, reflection, and also songs, with a sprinkle of journey-- take a look at Wanderlust for every one of that and also a lot more. Wanderlust hosts 6 weekend break yoga exercise celebrations throughout the summer in different places-- all naturally magnificent places, like Lake Tahoe, Aspen, and Whistler.

Wanderlust weekend celebrations are all-out events of conscious living, providing a variety of special tasks like stand-up paddleboard yoga exercise, airborne yoga, mountaintop meditations, path runs, sundown hikes, and hill biking tours. Where else can you take a yoga class, hear a lecture, choose a mindful walking to the top of a mountain, and dancing at a performance done in eventually? Plus, the festivals are kid-friendly, so you can turn it into a weekend break for the entire family.

This Event Is Great for: Yoga fans, music enthusiasts, adventurous spirits, individuals trying to find a vibrant, socially conscious experience

Various Summer Dates as well as Locations

Learn More

  If You Answered Mostly C's, Attempt a Mind-Body Healing Immersion

Head to bright Southern The golden state to detox as well as ignite your wellness at Journey Into Healing, the Chopra Center's Signature Mind-Body Healing Workshop. At this four-day weekend workshop, you'll discover just how to tune into the knowledge of your body and recognize (before illness or ailment strikes) when something is wrong and needs to be rebalanced. You'll discover just how to incorporate easy-to-master Ayurvedic recovery strategies, which came from India over 5,000 years ago, right into your modern-day lifestyle.

This powerful weekend break of wellness, where you'll discover just how to change the method you manage your wellness and health, is led by Deepak Chopra, Kris Carr, and also Dr. Mark Hyman.

This Event Is Great for: Physicians as well as doctor, luxury-minded vacationers, Individuals thinking about taking their health into their very own hands and also recovery themselves in a holistic way

Event Date: August 6-9, 2015

Event Location: Carlsbad, CA

Learn More

  If You Addressed Mainly D's, Attempt an Eco-Yoga Retreat

Pack your sun block, yoga floor covering, and also river hiking shoes ... this summer takes you to unique lands. There's an obscure hideaway center in the jungle of Costa Rica where you can exercise yoga, discover to instruct, relax in one of numerous hammocks, and also check out the falls nearby.

If standing up close as well as individual with Mother earth, oversleeping a treehouse, consuming locally grown food, as well as doing yoga outdoors seems like your type of getaway, discover what The Haven at 2 Rivers has to provide this summer.

  This Event Is Great for: Eco-conscious travelers, yogis, nature-lovers and also outdoorsy people

Various Resort Dates in June as well as Trainings in July and August

Event Location: Cabuya, Nicoya Peninsula's Blue Zone, Costa Rica

Learn More

For Everyone…

There's one occasion perfect for everybody happening this summertime. Don't miss The Chopra Center's 2nd Yearly International Meditation. Song in from anywhere in the world to join the largest reflection event in background on July 11. Thousands of hundreds of people from virtually every nation on the planet will certainly collaborate in reflection to spread concern. Will certainly you sign up with us?

Event Date: July 11, 2015

Learn More Regarding the Worldwide Reflection for Compassion

[theplaylistfilm]

THE FILM SOCIETY OF LINCOLN CENTER ANNOUNCES

THE FEMALE GAZE, JULY 27 – AUGUST 9

A two-week survey of 36 films shot by 23 female cinematographers

Agnès Godard, Natasha Braier, Joan Churchill, and Ashley Connor in person

The Film Society of Lincoln Center announces The Female Gaze (July 26 – August 9), spotlighting the amazing work of such accomplished international female cinematographers as Agnès Godard, Natasha Braier, Kirsten Johnson, Joan Churchill, Maryse Alberti, Ellen Kuras, Babette Mangolte, and Rachel Morrison. Laura Mulvey’s landmark 1975 essay “Visual Pleasure and Narrative Cinema” suggested an imbalance of power in film dominated by the male gaze and heterosexual male pleasure; this series poses the question: is there such a thing as the “Female Gaze”?

This year, Morrison made history as the first woman nominated for the Best Cinematography Oscar for Mudbound, a triumph that also underscored the troubling issue of gender inequality in the film industry. Few jobs on a movie set have been as historically closed to women as that of cinematographer—the persistence of the term “cameraman” says it all. Despite this lack of representation, trailblazing women have left their mark on the field through extraordinary artistry and profound vision. As seen through their eyes, films by directors like Claire Denis, Jacques Rivette, Chantal Akerman, Ryan Coogler, and Lucrecia Martel are immeasurably richer, deeper, and more wondrous.

The Female Gaze opens with a double feature of unforgettable collaborations between Agnès Godard and Claire Denis—from the sensual gaze on male bodies in Beau travail to that of familial love in 35 Shots of Rum—launching the series’ central dialogue with Godard in person. Then on July 28, cinematographers Natasha Braier, Ashley Connor, Agnès Godard, and Joan Churchill join Film Society audiences to discuss their careers, experiences in the film industry, and their interpretations of the Female Gaze in a free talk, sponsored by HBO®.

Full line up.

Maryse Alberti Creed Ryan Coogler, USA, 2015, 133m The legend of Rocky lives on as Michael B. Jordan’s gutsy Adonis Johnson—son of Apollo Creed—sets out to prove he’s got what it takes to be the next champ, leaving his luxe L.A. life behind to train in the hard-knock gyms of Philadelphia with the Italian Stallion himself. After the breakout success of Fruitvale Station, director Ryan Coogler shows his facility for major budget spectacle, balancing a rousing underdog sports story with a poignant portrait of intergenerational friendship. The virtuoso lensing of Maryse Alberti astonishes in a dazzling four-and-a-half minute fight sequence that unfolds in one bruising, breathless take. Thursday, August 2, 1:30pm Sunday, August 5, 9:00pm

Velvet Goldmine Todd Haynes, UK/USA, 1998, 35mm, 124m The birth of Oscar Wilde; the staged death of a flamboyant rock star modeled closely after David Bowie; the delirious inebriation of London at the height of the glam era: Haynes’s discourse on celebrity culture is as sprawling and multi-tracked as his previous film, Safe, had been clinically restrained. Much of Velvet Goldmine, the story of a journalist who tries to reconstruct the sordid life story of the failed glam rock star he’d idolized as a young man, was shot in London, and the move gave Haynes a chance to abandon the cloister-like suburbs of his earlier films for a much more colorful, Dionysian milieu. Haynes and cinematographer Maryse Alberti crafted one of the most visually thrilling music movies of the 1990s. An NYFF36 Selection. Sunday, July 29, 8:30pm Tuesday, August 7, 4:15pm

Barbara Alvarez The Headless Woman / La mujer sin cabeza Lucrecia Martel, Argentina/France/Italy/Spain, 2008, 35mm, 87m Spanish with English subtitles DP Barbara Alvarez imparts a restrained—and very strange—spatial texture to Lucrecia Martel’s excitingly splintered third feature, about a woman (a stunning María Onetto) in a state of phenomenological distress following a mysterious road accident. Martel’s rare gift for building social melodrama from sonic and spatial textures, behavioral nuances, and an unerringly brilliant sense of the joys, tensions, and endless reserves of suppressed emotion lurking within the familial structure is here pushed to another level of creative daring. An NYFF46 selection. 35mm print courtesy of UCLA Film & Television Archive. Saturday, July 28, 1:00pm

Akiko Ashizawa Tokyo Sonata         Kiyoshi Kurosawa, Japan, 2008, 120m Japanese with English subtitles What strange deceptions lurk beneath the placid veneer of the average Japanese family? Horror maestro Kiyoshi Kurosawa’s unexpected—but wholly rewarding—foray into family melodrama-cum-black comedy quivers with an undercurrent of dread as salaryman dad (Teruyuki Kagawa) loses his job and desperately attempts to maintain the illusion that he’s still employed; his grade-school son (Kai Inowaki) rebels by secretly taking (gasp!) piano lessons; and mom (Kyōko Koizumi) finds what she’s been looking for with her own kidnapper. The elegant long shots of Akiko Ashizawa toy with the meticulous framings of Ozu as Kurosawa guides the film through a series of increasingly audacious tonal shifts. An NYFF46 selection. Tuesday, August 7, 6:45pm

Diane Baratier The Romance of Astrea and Celadon / Les amours d'Astrée et de Céladon Éric Rohmer, France, 2007, 35mm, 109m At the age of 88, Éric Rohmer bid adieu to cinema with this enchanting mythological idyll, which brims with all the vitality and freshness of youth. Frequent Rohmer cinematographer Diane Baratier conjures a sun-dappled bucolic dream vision of fifth-century Gaul, where a beguiling fable of romantic misunderstanding plays out when a band of druids and nymphs intervene in the lovers’ quarrel between androgynously beautiful shepherd Celadon (Andy Gillet) and his jealous paramour Astrea (Stéphanie Crayencour). Introducing hitherto untapped themes of gender and sexual fluidity into his work, Rohmer crafts an exalted paean to love both spiritual and carnal. An NYFF45 selection. Friday, August 3, 2:00pm Thursday, August 9, 7:00pm

Céline Bozon La France Serge Bozon, France, 2007, 35mm, 102m French with English subtitles In the fall of 1917, as World War I rages, a lovelorn soldier’s wife (Sylvie Testud) disguises herself as a man and sets off for the front in search of her missing husband. Along the way, she meets up with a company of soldiers under the command of a gruff lieutenant (Pascal Greggory), who reluctantly allows Camille to join their ranks. From time to time, these surprisingly sensitive, introspective men break out an assortment of homemade instruments and perform original songs written for the film by Benjamin Esdraffo and the artist known as Fugu, styled after the American “sunshine pop” of The Beach Boys and The Mamas and the Papas. Exquisitely shot by Céline Bozon (the director’s sister), this unclassifiable hybrid of war movie and movie musical is truly unlike anything you’ve ever seen before. Print courtesy of the Institut Français. Wednesday, August 1, 6:45pm Wednesday, August 8, 1:30pm

Natasha Braier The Milk of Sorrow / La teta asustada Claudia Llosa, Spain/Peru, 2009, 35mm, 94m Spanish and Quechua with English subtitles Fausta, the only daughter of an aged indigenous Peruvian mother, is said to have been nursed on “the milk of sorrow.” This accursed designation is bestowed on the children of victims of the former terrorist regime. Fausta has learned of her mother’s past and her own presupposed fate through invented song, which is both an art form and oral history tradition. Upon her mother’s death, she must venture beyond the safety of her uncle’s home and choose whether or not to lend her gift of song so that she can pay for a proper burial. Llosa and DP Natasha Braier capture the striking beauty of Lima’s outskirts, as well as a revelatory performance by Magaly Solier, with dignity and grace. Winner of the Golden Bear at the 2009 Berlin Film Festival. A New Directors/New Films 2009 selection. Sunday, July 29, 3:30pm (Q&A with Natasha Braier)

The Neon Demon Nicolas Winding Refn, Denmark/France/USA/UK, 2016, 118m Like a 21st-century Showgirls meets Suspiria, Nicolas Winding Refn’s delirious plunge into the fake plastic horror of the image-obsessed fashion industry trafficks in both high-camp excess and kaleidoscopically stylized splatter. Elle Fanning is the guileless recent L.A. transplant whose fresh-faced youth and beauty almost instantly land her a high-profile modeling contract. Whatever “it” is, she has it. And a coterie of monstrously jealous, flavor-of-last-month Hollyweird burnouts will stop at nothing to get it. Working in a supersaturated, electric day-glo palette, DP Natasha Braier fashions a sleek, freaky-seductive vision of L.A.’s dark side. Saturday, July 28, 8:00pm (Q&A with Natasha Braier)

Caroline Champetier The Gang of Four / La bande des quatre Jacques Rivette, France/Switzerland, 1989, 160m French and Portuguese with English subtitles Four women, a shadowy conspiracy, and a whole lot of acting exercises: we’re firmly in Rivette territory in one of the director’s most spellbinding explorations of the sometimes terrifyingly thin line between everyday life and the strangeness beneath it. A quartet of aspiring actresses live together while studying with a demanding coach (Bulle Ogier). As they rehearse Pierre Marivaux’s La Double inconstance, offstage drama creeps into their lives in the form of a menacing mystery man (Benoît Régent) with a sinister story to tell. Caroline Champetier’s moody lensing—muted reds, golds, and browns—creates the feeling of an all-enveloping universe operating according to its own paranoid logic. Friday, July 27, 3:15pm Wednesday, August 8, 6:15pm

Holy Motors Leos Carax, France, 2012, 116m French and English with English subtitles Cinematographers Caroline Champetier and Yves Cape both lensed this unclassifiable, expansive movie from Leos Carax about a man named Oscar (longtime collaborator Denis Lavant) who inhabits 11 different characters over the course of a single day. This shape-shifter is shuttled from appointment to appointment in Paris in a white-stretch limo driven by the soignée Edith Scob (Eyes Without a Face); not on the itinerary is an unplanned reunion with Kylie Minogue. To summarize the film any further would be to take away some of its magic; the most accurate précis comes from its own creator, who aptly described Holy Motors after its world premiere in Cannes as “a film about a man and the experience of being alive.” An NYFF50 selection. Saturday, August 4, 7:15pm Monday, August 6, 4:00pm

Le Pont du Nord Jacques Rivette, France, 1982, 129m French with English subtitles Paris becomes a labyrinthine life-size game board in one of the most elaborate of Jacques Rivette’s sprawling, down-the-rabbit-hole cine-puzzles. Bulle Ogier and her daughter Pascale star, respectively, as a hitchhiking ex-con and a leather-clad tough girl who meet by chance on the city streets, come into possession of a curious map, and find themselves caught in a sinister cobweb of underworld conspiracy. Shooting seemingly on the fly, almost documentary-style on the streets of Paris, cinematographers Caroline Champetier and William Lubtchansky telegraph a freewheeling, anything-goes sense of play, as well as a creeping surveillance paranoia. An NYFF19 selection. 4K restoration from the 16mm negative, supervised by Véronique Rivette and Caroline Champetier at Digimage Classic, with the help of the CNC. Friday, August 3, 6:30pm

Joan Churchill Aileen: Life and Death of a Serial Killer Nick Broomfield & Joan Churchill, UK/USA, 2004, 93m Just months after Monster made Aileen Wuornos a household name—and Charlize Theron an Oscar darling—documentarian Nick Broomfield and co-director/cinematographer Joan Churchill unleashed this riveting portrait of the real-life serial killer. Of the two films, it remains the more chilling experience, an unflinching face-to-face encounter with a deeply damaged soul who, as she prepares for her imminent execution, is at once eager to set the record straight, angrily defiant, and increasingly delusional. Daring to find the humanity in one of the most vilified criminals of the century, Broomfield and Churchill—whose camera remains ever-alert and skillfully unobtrusive—craft a haunting, complex look at a life gone wrong. Monday, July 30, 6:45pm (Q&A with Joan Churchill)

Ashley Connor Sneak Preview! The Miseducation of Cameron Post Desiree Akhavan, USA, 2018, 90m Based on the celebrated novel by Emily M. Danforth, Desiree Akhavan’s second feature follows the titular character (Chloë Grace Moretz) in 1993 as she is sent to a gay conversion therapy center after getting caught with another girl on prom night. In the face of intolerance and denial, Cameron meets a group of fellow sinners, including amputee stoner Jane (Sasha Lane) and her friend Adam (Forrest Goodluck), a Lakota Two-Spirit. Together, this group forms an unlikely family with a will to fight. Akhavan and DP Ashley Connor evoke the emotional layers of Danforth’s novel with an effortless yet considered attention to the spirit of the ’90s and the audacious, moving performances of the ensemble cast. A FilmRise release. Sunday, July 29, 6:00pm (Q&A with Ashley Connor)

Josée Deshaies House of Tolerance / L’Apollonide: Souvenirs de la maison close Bertrand Bonello, France, 2011, 35mm, 122m French with English subtitles “I could sleep for a thousand years,” drawls a 19th-century prostitute—paraphrasing Lou Reed—at the start of Bonello’s hushed, opium-soaked fever dream of life in a Parisian brothel at the turn of the century. House of Tolerance is, among other things, Bonello’s most gorgeous and complete application of musical techniques to film grammar, his most rigorous attempt to sculpt cinematic space, his most probing reflection on the origins of capitalist society, and his most sophisticated study of the movement of bodies under immense constraint. A shocking mutilation, a funeral staged to The Moody Blues’ “Nights in White Satin,” a progression of ritualized, drugged assignations and encounters: Bonello and frequent collaborator Josée Deshaies capture it all with a mixture of casual detachment and needlepoint precision. Wednesday, August 1, 2:00pm Sunday, August 5, 4:30pm

Crystel Fournier Tomboy Céline Sciamma, France, 2011, 35mm, 82m French with English subtitles A sensitive, heartrending portrait of what it feels like to grow up different, Céline Sciamma’s beautifully observed coming-of-age tale aches tenderly with the tangled confusion of childhood. When ten-year-old Laure’s family moves to a new neighborhood during the summer, the gender-nonconforming preteen (played by the impressively naturalistic Zoé Héran) takes the opportunity to present as Mickäel to the neighborhood kids—testing the waters of a new identity that neither friends nor family quite understand. Sciamma’s warmly empathetic tone is perfectly complemented by the soft-lit impressionism of Crystel Fournier’s glowing cinematography. Print courtesy of the Institut Français. Monday, August 6, 2:15pm Thursday, August 9, 9:15pm

Agnès Godard Beau Travail Claire Denis, France, 1999, 35mm, 92m French, Italian, and Russian with English subtitles Denis’s loose retelling of Billy Budd, set among a troop of Foreign Legionnaires stationed in the Gulf of Djibouti, is one of her finest films, an elemental story of misplaced longing and frustrated desire. Beneath a scorching sun, shirtless young men exercise to the strains of Benjamin Britten, under the watchful eye of Denis Lavant’s stone-faced officer Galoup, their obsessively ritualized movements simmering with barely suppressed violence. When a handsome recruit wins the favor of the regiment’s commander, cracks start to appear in Galoup’s fragile composure. In the tense, tightly disciplined atmosphere of military life, Denis found an ideal outlet for two career-long concerns: the quiet agony of repressing one’s emotions and the terror of finally letting loose. An NYFF37 selection. Print courtesy of the Institut Français. Thursday, July 26, 7:00pm (Q&A with Agnès Godard)

35 Shots of Rum / 35 rhums Claire Denis, France/Germany, 2008, 35mm, 100m French and German with English subtitles When is a rice cooker more than just a rice cooker? When it’s in the masterful hands of Claire Denis, who somehow transforms it into a moving metaphor for the evolving relationship between a Parisian train conductor (Alex Descas) and his devoted twenty-something daughter (Mati Diop) as he gently nudges her out of the nest and each tests the waters of new relationships. Warmed by the ember-glow of Agnès Godard’s beautifully burnished cinematography, Denis’s delicately bittersweet take on the Ozu-style family drama conveys worlds of meaning and emotion—attraction, heartache, loss, hope—in a mere glance, a gesture, and, yes, a kitchen appliance. Thursday, July 26, 9:30pm (Introduction by Agnès Godard) Tuesday, July 31, 1:00pm

The Intruder / L'intrus Claire Denis, France, 2005, 35mm, 130m French, English, Korean, Russian, and Polynesian with English subtitles Rich, strange, and tantalizingly enigmatic, Denis’s crypto-odyssey is a mesmeric sensory experience that haunts like a half-remembered dream. Inspired by a book by philosopher Jean-Luc Nancy, The Intruder skips across time and continents—from the Alpine wilds to a neon-lit Korea to a tropical Tahiti suffused with languorous melancholy—as it traces the journey of an inscrutable, ailing loner (Michel Subor) seeking a black market heart transplant and his long-lost son. An impressionist wash of hallucinations, memories, and dreams are borne along on the lush textures of Agnès Godard’s shimmering cinematography. Print courtesy of the Institut Français. Saturday, July 28, 3:00pm (Q&A with Agnès Godard) Thursday, August 9, 4:15pm

Kristen Johnson Cameraperson Kirsten Johnson, USA, 2016, 102m How much of one’s self can be captured in the images shot of and for others? Kirsten Johnson’s work as a director of photography and camera operator has helped earn her documentary collaborators (Laura Poitras, Michael Moore, Kirby Dick, Barbara Kopple) nearly every accolade and award possible. Recontextualizing the stunning images inside, around, and beyond the works she has shot, Johnson constructs a visceral and vibrant self-portrait of an artist who has traveled the globe, venturing into landscapes and lives that bear the scars of trauma both active and historic. Rigorous yet nimble in its ability to move from heartache to humor, Cameraperson provides an essential lens on the things that make us human. A 2016 New Directors/New Films selection. Friday, July 27, 6:30pm Thursday, August 2, 4:15pm

Derrida Kirby Dick & Amy Ziering, USA, 2002, 35mm, 84m Postmodern intellectual rockstar Jacques Derrida receives an appropriately self-reflexive portrait in this playful, probing documentary. Framed by the French philosopher’s statements about the inherent unreliability of biography, it finds co-director Amy Ziering attempting to tease out the links between Derrida’s radically influential thinking (he expounds on everything from forgiveness to Seinfeld) and his own life. Even as the alternately witty and reflective Derrida remains cagey about personal matters, Kirsten Johnson’s attentive camera captures revealing flashes of the man behind the ideas. What emerges is a fascinating interrogation of filmic truth: a documentary that relentlessly deconstructs itself. Friday, July 27, 8:45pm

Ellen Kuras Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind Michel Gondry, USA, 2004, 35mm, 108m The feverish imaginations of DIY surrealist Michel Gondry and screenwriter Charlie Kaufman kick into overdrive for the great gonzo sci-fi romance of the early 2000s. When nice guy dweeb Joel (Jim Carrey) encounters blue-haired spitfire Clementine (Kate Winslet) on the LIRR, there’s a spark of attraction, but also something familiar—almost as if they’ve met before… Cue a ping-ponging, time- and space-collapsing journey through memory and a star-crossed love gone sour. The high-contrast handheld camerawork of Ellen Kuras enhances the whiplash sense of disorientation in what is, ultimately, a heart-wounding parable about the ways in which we inevitably hurt those we love most. Wednesday, August 1, 4:30pm Saturday, August 4, 9:30pm

Swoon Tom Kalin, USA, 1992, 35mm, 93m One of the most daring works to emerge from the New Queer Cinema movement of the early 1990s, Swoon offers a radical, revisionist perspective on the infamous Leopold and Loeb murder case. Channeling the spirits of Dreyer, Bresson, and Jean Genet, director Tom Kalin challenges viewers to identify with two of the most notorious killers of the 20th century, their crime—the Nietzsche-influenced thrill killing of a schoolboy in 1920s Chicago—and punishment recounted in ghostly black and white by Ellen Kuras. Throughout, Kalin cannily deconstructs the ways in which Leopold and Loeb’s homosexuality has been historically sensationalized and demonized—a provocative analogy for queer persecution in the AIDS era. Monday, July 30, 2:00pm Monday, August 6, 8:30pm

Sabine Lancelin La captive Chantal Akerman, France/Belgium, 2000, 35mm, 118m French with English subtitles Chantal Akerman’s hypnotic exploration of erotic obsession plays like Vertigo filtered through the director’s visionary feminist formalism. Loosely inspired by the fifth volume of Proust’s In Search of Lost Time, it circles around the very-strange-indeed relationship between the seemingly pliant Ariane (Sylvie Testud) and the disturbingly jealous Simon (Stanislas Merhar), whose need to possess her completely in turn renders him hostage to his own destructive desires. The coolly contemplative camera style of Sabine Lancelin imparts an unbroken, trance-like tension, which finds release only in the thunderous roil of the operatic score. Print courtesy of Cinémathèque Royale de Belgique. Sunday, July 29, 1:00pm

The Strange Case of Angelica / O Estranho Caso de Angélica Manoel de Oliveira, Portugal, 2010, 35mm, 97m Manoel de Oliveira’s sly, metaphysical romance—made when the famously resilient director was a mere 102 years old—is a mesmerizing, beyond-the-grave rumination on love, mortality, and the power of images. On a rain-slicked night, village photographer Isaac (Ricardo Trêpa) is summoned by a wealthy family to take a picture of their beautiful, recently deceased daughter Angelica (Pilar López de Ayala). What ensues is a ghostly tale of romantic obsession as Isaac finds his dreams—and his photographs—haunted by the spirit of the bewitching young woman. The crisp chiaroscuro compositions of cinematographer Sabine Lancelin enhance the film’s otherworldly, unstuck-in-time aura. An NYFF48 selection. Friday, July 27, 1:00pm Wednesday, August 1, 9:00pm

Jeanne Lapoirie Eastern Boys Robin Campillo, France, 2013, 128m French with English subtitles Jeanne Lapoirie’s surveillance-style camera, looking from above, masterfully follows the men who loiter around the Gare du Nord train station in Paris as they scrape by however they can, forming gangs for support and protection, ever fearful of being caught by the police and deported. When the middle-aged, bourgeois Daniel (Olivier Rabourdin) approaches a boyishly handsome Ukrainian who calls himself Marek for a date, he learns the young man is willing to do anything for some cash. What Daniel intends only as sex-for-hire begets a home invasion and then an unexpectedly profound relationship. The drastically different circumstances of the two men’s lives reveal hidden facets of the city they share. Presented in four parts, this absorbing, continually surprising film by Robin Campillo (BPM: Beats Per Minute) is centered around relationships that defy easy categorization, in which motivations and desires are poorly understood even by those to whom they belong. Monday, July 30, 4:00pm Saturday, August 4, 4:45pm

Rain Li Paranoid Park Gus Van Sant, USA, 2007, 35mm, 85m At once a dreamlike portrait of teen alienation and a boldly experimental work of film narrative, Paranoid Park finds Gus Van Sant at the height of his powers. A withdrawn high-school skateboarder (Gabe Nevins) struggles to make sense of his involvement in an accidental death. He recalls past events across tides of memory, and expresses his feelings in a diary—which is, in effect, the movie we are watching. The extraordinary skating scenes, filmed by cinematographers Rain Li and Christopher Doyle in a lyrical mixture of Super 8 and 35mm, depict their subjects soaring in space, momentarily free of the earthly troubles of adolescence. An NYFF45 selection. Tuesday, August 7, 9:15pm

Hélène Louvart Beach Rats Eliza Hittman, USA, 2017, 95m Hittman follows up her acclaimed debut, It Felt Like Love, with this sensitive chronicle of sexual becoming. Frankie (a breakout Harris Dickinson), a bored teenager living in South Brooklyn, regularly haunts the Coney Island boardwalk with his boys—trying to score weed, flirting with girls, killing time. But he spends his late nights dipping his toes into the world of online cruising, connecting with older men and exploring the desires he harbors but doesn’t yet fully understand. Sensuously lensed on 16mm by cinematographer Hélène Louvart, Beach Rats presents a colorful and textured world roiling with secret appetites and youthful self-discovery. A 2017 New Directors/New Films selection. A Neon release. Thursday, August 2, 9:00pm

Pina [in 3D] Wim Wenders, Germany/France, 2011, 106m German, English, and French with English subtitles Wim Wenders began planning this project with legendary choreographer Pina Bausch in the months before her untimely death, selecting the pieces to be filmed and discussing the filmmaking strategy. Impressed by recent innovations in 3D, Wenders decided to experiment with the format for this tribute to Bausch and her Tanztheater Wuppertal; the result sets the standard against which all future uses of 3D to record performance will be measured. Not only are the beauty and sheer exhilaration of the dance s and dancers powerfully rendered by Hélène Louvart and Jörg Widmer’s lensing, but the film also captures the sense of the world that Bausch so brilliantly expressed in all her pieces. Longtime members of the Tanztheater recreate many of their original roles in such seminal works as “Café Müller,” “Le Sacre du Printemps,” and “Kontakthof.” An NYFF49 selection. Sunday, August 5, 2:00pm Tuesday, August 7, 2:00pm

The Wonders Alice Rohrwacher, Italy/Switzerland/Germany, 2014, 110m French with English subtitles Winner of the Grand Prix at the Cannes Film Festival, Alice Rohrwacher’s vivid story of teenage yearning and confusion revolves around a beekeeping family in rural central Italy: German-speaking father, Italian mother, four girls. Two unexpected arrivals prove disruptive, especially for the pensive oldest daughter, Gelsomina. The father takes in a troubled teenage boy as part of a welfare program, and a television crew shows up to enlist local farmers in a kitschy celebration of Etruscan culinary traditions (a slyly self-mocking Monica Bellucci plays the bewigged host). Hélène Louvart’s lensing combines a documentary attention to daily ritual with an evocative atmosphere of mystery to conjure a richly concrete world that is subject to the magical thinking of adolescence. An NYFF52 selection. Friday, August 3, 9:15pm Wednesday, August 8, 3:45pm

Irina Lubtchansky Around a Small Mountain / 36 vues du Pic Saint Loup Jacques Rivette, France/Italy, 2009, 35mm, 84m French with English subtitles     The final film from arch gamesman Jacques Rivette is a captivating variation on one of the themes that most obsessed him: the ineffable interplay between life and performance. Luminously photographed by Irina Lubtchansky in the open-air splendor of the south of France, it revolves around an Italian flaneur (Sergio Castellitto) who finds himself drawn into the world of a humble traveling circus led by the elusive Kate (Jane Birkin), whose enigmatic past becomes a tantalizing mystery he is determined to solve. In a career studded with sprawling shaggy dog epics, Rivette’s swan song is a deceptively slight grace note that contains multitudes. An NYFF47 selection.

Preceded by: Sarah Winchester, Ghost Opera / Sarah Winchester, Opera Fantôme Bertrand Bonello, France, 2016, 24m North American Premiere A film to stand in for an opera unmade: Bonello’s moody, baroque meditation on the heiress to the Winchester rifle fortune plays like a ballet-cum-horror film, an ornate tapestry of enigmatic images, chilling synths, and traces of a tragic and eccentric life. An NYFF54 selection. A Grasshopper Film release. Friday, August 3, 4:15pm Wednesday, August 8, 9:15pm

Babette Mangolte The Camera: Je or La Camera: I Babette Mangolte, USA, 1977, 88m Though perhaps best known as the cinematographer for Chantal Akerman’s groundbreaking 1970s work—as well as for her collaborations with avant-garde icons like Yvonne Rainer, Trisha Brown, and Marina Abramović—Babette Mangolte is a singular cinematic visionary in her own right. In this structuralist auto-portrait, Mangolte allows viewers to peer through the lens of her camera as she produces a series of still photographs, first of models, then of the streetscapes of downtown Manhattan. As we experience the act of image-making through her eyes, what emerges is a heady consideration of the art and act of seeing and of the complex relationship between photographer, subject, and viewer. Monday, August 6, 6:30pm

Jeanne Dielman, 23, quai du Commerce, 1080 Bruxelles Chantal Akerman, Belgium/France, 1976, 35mm, 201m French with English subtitles A landmark of feminist art, Chantal Akerman’s minimalist masterpiece is both a monumental and microscopic view of three days in the life of a fastidious Belgian single mother (a sphinx-like Delphine Seyrig) as she goes about her housework, peeling potatoes and washing dishes with the same clinical detachment with which she makes love to the occasional john. And then slowly, almost imperceptibly, things begin to go awry… The rigorous, relentlessly impassive gaze of Babette Mangolte’s camera is transfixing but, in the words of the director, “never voyeuristic”; it’s a uniquely feminine way of seeing made manifest by one of the most sui generis filmmaker-cinematographer partnerships in history. Tuesday, July 31, 3:15pm Saturday, August 4, 1:00pm

Claire Mathon Stranger by the Lake / L’inconnu du lac Alain Guiraudie, France, 2013, 97m French with English subtitles Alain Guiraudie’s Cannes-awarded exploration of death and desire unfolds entirely in the vicinity of a gay cruising ground that becomes a crime scene. Franck (Pierre Deladonchamps) is a regular at a lakeside pickup spot, where he finds companionship both platonic and carnal. But his new paramour Michel (Christophe Paou) turns out to be a love-’em-and-leave-’em type, in the deadliest sense… Guiraudie has long been a singular voice in French cinema: anti-bourgeois, at ease in nature, a true regionalist and outsider. Here he and DP Claire Mathon capture naked bodies and hardcore sex with the same matter-of-fact sensuousness they bring to ripples on the water and the fading light of dusk. An NYFF51 selection. Monday, July 30, 9:15pm Thursday, August 9, 2:00pm

Reed Morano Sneak Preview! I Think We’re Alone Now Reed Morano, USA, 2018, 93m Pulling double duty as director and cinematographer, Reed Morano finds the melancholic beauty in the end of the world with this gorgeous and strange drama starring Peter Dinklage and Elle Fanning as the last people on Earth. When the film opens in a desolate upstate New York, the misanthropic Del (Dinklage) is performing rote, custodial tasks to clean up the chaos left around his hometown—and relishing his newfound solitude—until another, sprightly survivor (Fanning) arrives. Winner of the Special Jury Prize for Excellence in Filmmaking at the 2018 Sundance Film Festival, I Think We’re Alone Now is a visually audacious entry in the postapocalyptic genre and an idiosyncratic take on loneliness and grief.   Thursday, August 2, 6:30pm

Rachel Morrison Fruitvale Station Ryan Coogler, USA, 2013, 85m Coogler’s remarkable debut feature explores the life and harrowing death of Oscar Grant (played by Michael B. Jordan), a 22-year-old African-American man killed by police in the early hours of January 1, 2009. Six months after sweeping both the Grand Jury Prize and the Audience Award at the Sundance Film Festival, Fruitvale Station opened on the same weekend that jurors in Florida acquitted George Zimmerman in the death of Trayvon Martin. Rachel Morrison’s gripping, exploratory Super 16 on-location camerawork dramatizes the unseen complexities and personal relationships of Grant’s inner circle with a startling sense of urgency, emotion, and the unflagging awareness of a preventable tragedy too often seen in the news cycle. Sunday, August 5, 7:00pm

Free Talk: The Female Gaze Join us for an hour-long conversation with cinematographers Natasha Braier, Ashley Connor, Agnès Godard, and Joan Churchill as they discuss the series and reflect on their careers and influences, and how they approach their craft. Sponsored by HBO®. Saturday, July 28, 6:30pm* Elinor Bunin Munroe Film Center, Amphitheater, 144 W 65th Street

[northcountryschool]

June 1, 2020

Photo: Crabapple blossoms by the Main Building front entrance.

The end of the academic year on the North Country School campus holds many beloved traditions, both large and small. Some of these traditions require many hours of work on our community’s part, while others arrive suddenly, like gifts. The spring theater production and our graduation ceremony require many hands and a great deal of teamwork, while the new green leaves papering the mountainscape delight us each May as nature brings warm sunny days and erases all signs of the long winter. Each year, as graduation day approaches, we watch the apple and crabapple trees around campus, looking for signs of flower buds, knowing that whatever the weather, those trees nearly always hit full bloom just as our graduating class departs.

This year, as our campus and the larger world around us faced many unforeseen challenges, the resilience of nature has been a constant source of hope and optimism for us here at North Country School. Though the winter has been a long one in many ways, this week the apple blossoms all around campus bursted into bloom like clockwork, providing the perfect backdrop for our end-of-year festivities and graduation ceremony. It is a reminder that, though we will face obstacles and setbacks, there still is and will continue to much beauty to behold all around us. 

Join us in celebrating the end of the 2019-2020 academic year, and in honoring our 9th-grade graduating class. We know that our graduates will go on to do great things, and can’t wait to see all they accomplish in their next endeavors.

Note: Our campus has been closed to all students for the spring term, with the exception of the international students who remained here during spring break rather than returning to their home countries during the early stages of the outbreak. These students, along with our houseparents and faculty have been taking appropriate safety and prevention measures.

SPRING MUSIC RECITAL

Top: Spring Recital opening shot of campus. Middle 1: Azalech’s singing performance. Middle 2: Mia’s piano performance. Middle 3: Tsinat’s music production project. Middle 4: Duncan’s drum performance. Bottom: Choir performance. 

This year’s Spring Music Recital was an impressive feat, assembled by students, staff, and music teacher Joey Izzo over the course of the spring term and embodying our core value of “art every day.” The final product highlighted both our student body’s incredible musical talent, as well as their dedication to collaboration and hard work. The performances spanned a wide array of musical skills honed throughout their time at NCS, and included a beautiful vocal performance where 8th-grader Azalech harmonized with herself; piano performances from students including Mia, Jack, Tianyu, Kalina, and Koga; music production projects from students Hart and Tsinat; a drum performance from 5th-grader Duncan; and several choral performances featuring Ella, Teagan, Summer, and Tiri, recorded in their separate homes and edited together into moving collaborative compositions. 

To view the Spring Musical Recital, CLICK HERE.

APPRECIATION TOWN MEETING

Top: Cascade House girls, including Mountain Cake winner Cocona, attend Town Meeting. Middle 1: Mountain Cake winner video. Middle 2: Mountain Cake winner list. Bottom: The community  celebrates the Work Award recipients at Town Meeting.

Each year to celebrate the end of the academic year, our campus community gathers together for a final Town Meeting event to honor members of our student body and express appreciation for one another. Though this year’s event looked a bit different, the spirit of this Town Meeting was stronger than ever. Students and teachers joined remotely from locations around the world to reflect on the past year and to highlight one another’s many accomplishments.

The Town Meeting included our annual Mountain Cake ceremony, which recognizes the students who covered the most ground (and water) while hiking, skiing, and canoeing in our outdoor program this year. 8th-grader Cocona was able to celebrate with her on-campus housemates as she was awarded the honor of “Most Overall Miles,” while the other students honored in the ceremony celebrated from home alongside their families. The Town Meeting also recognized the four students who have most embodied our core value that “many hands make light work,” volunteering their time to help the community throughout this past year. Students Emily, Ella, Sky, and David were awarded this honor, and their names will join past generations of caring and compassionate students on the Jamieson Roseliep Work Award Plaque that hangs on the wall of the Main Building. To end the Town Meeting, everyone was invited to express thanks and appreciation for one another, to remember significant moments from the year, and to begin their summer vacations knowing that we will continue to find creative ways to connect and support one another, regardless of any obstacles that may appear on the horizon. 

DEAR LEVEL ONE ME

Top: David’s video. Middle 1: Julia’s video. Middle 2: Jessica’s video. Middle 3: Bladen’s video. Bottom: Sally’s video.

One of North Country School’s long-held traditions is for our graduation class of 9th-graders to send videos to their past selves, imparting the lessons they’ve learned throughout their time at NCS. These “Dear Level One Me” videos are then edited together into a compilation of each student’s takeaways, which range from the comedic to the poignant, and are shown to the community at large during the final week of spring term. This year’s “Dear Level One Me” compilation highlighted the many challenges and successes of our graduating class, and included lessons about the importance of trying new things; encouragements to connect with and learn from those with different backgrounds; advice on how best to dress for hiking in subzero mountain temperatures; and reminders that, though it might be tough to wake up early for barn chores, those hours spent grooming horses, feeding baby chicks, and caring for newborn lambs will be sorely missed when it comes time to depart our campus. In a year when so many in our community left campus sooner than expected, the insightful thoughts and reflections of our 9th-grade graduates feel particularly relevant, and are a reminder for all of us to appreciate what we have each and every day.

To view this year’s “Dear Level One Me” compilation, CLICK HERE.

END OF YEAR PRODUCTION

Top: Ella’s Alice scene filmed in the WallyPAC. Middle 1: Mia and Dominica act together from home. Middle 2: Campus screening of Alice. Middle 3: Jessica and Sally act together in the WallyPAC. Bottom: Jonah films his performance as the Mad Hatter from home.

Our core value of “art everyday” is particularly relevant each spring term at North Country School, as nearly our entire student body puts in long hours participating in our annual spring theater production, whether it be on stage, behind the scenes, or providing musical accompaniment from the rafters. This year’s spring play faced the lofty challenge of adapting to an all-remote structure. Theater teacher Courtney Allen, music teacher Joey Izzo, and the NCS student body met that challenge head-on, collaborating to produce Alice Through the Looking Glass: A Miniseries in Four Parts. The four sections of the miniseries were distributed nightly this past week to the greater community, and brought together scenes filmed on-campus in The Walter Breeman Performing Arts Center (WallyPAC) with scenes and musical accompaniment recorded in students’ homes around the world. The final product was enjoyed by all and proved that sometimes what appears to be a setback might be an opportunity to look at something with new eyes, to think creatively, and to work together to make something interesting, innovative, and surprising. 

All four links to NCS’s production of Alice Through the Looking Glass: A Miniseries in Four Parts can be found HERE.

SIGNS OF SPRING

Top: Horses in the Garden Pasture. Middle: Goose family on the lake. Bottom: Sally makes a dandelion crown.

The crabapple and apple blossoms around campus weren’t the only springtime sights on the NCS campus this week. Over in the garden pasture our horse herd snacked on fresh green grass and blooming dandelions against a backdrop of Adirondack mountains, while down at the lake our resident family of Canada geese has been enjoying some sunshine as they explore their home. Students and adults living on campus also enjoyed the beautiful spring weather, canoeing, hiking, and spending time relaxing outside when not participating in the array of end-of-year activities. 

Top: Garden Manager Tess with seed potatoes. Middle 1: Kentaro, Koga, and Amon mark the garden bed with planting spots. Middle 2: Jess explains planting to Sam. Bottom: Ella carries a bucket of seed potatoes.

On-campus students and faculty families joined together for the last community farm event of the year this past week, spending some time in the dirt alongside Garden Manager Tess during NCS’s annual Potato Planting. As always, many hands made light work, and after a quick and fun out-time of planting, everyone was able to cool off by taking a dip in Round Lake. The students who helped plant this season’s potato crop joined the years of NCS students before them who have helped tend to our farm and gardens, playing important roles in caring for and feeding our community as they learn about the natural world around them. We look forward to seeing many of their faces back on campus in the fall to participate in the other half of our potato season for our annual community-wide Potato Harvest, and to enjoy the delicious fruits of this meaningful and authentic work. 

GRADUATION

Top: Graduation flower arrangement displayed in the WallyPAC. Middle: Hand-woven senior books. Bottom: Emily’s diploma bound in her senior book.

Like so many commencement ceremonies around the world, North Country School’s graduation looked quite a bit different than it has in years past. Though the distances between us are in many ways antithetical to the heart of this powerful event that focuses on community and connection, we were still able to join together to celebrate our talented graduates. In a ceremony filled with optimism and inspiration—attended simultaneously by our greater community and by those on-campus—the fifteen graduating students were recognized and awarded their diplomas, bound in NCS’s traditional handmade senior books. The senior books, this year woven by art teacher Noni Eldridge, contain thoughtfully made pages of thanks and appreciation made by NCS students and teachers. The books have been one-of-a-kind keepsakes for generations of NCS students, and are often brought along to North Country School reunion events. We hope that these beautiful books help our current class of graduates reflect upon and remember their time at NCS.

Top: Teacher Josh Briggeman gives the graduation keynote address. Middle 1: Emily’s graduation “thank you.” Middle 2: Larry Robjent gives his advisee Sky’s graduation speech with help from his family. Bottom: Student Will congratulates the class of 2020 from home.

This year’s graduation ceremony included both live streaming and pre-recorded messages to our graduates from NCS administrators and teachers, and featured a keynote address from history teacher and houseparent Josh Briggeman. Josh—who has been a part of the North Country School family for eight years and has seen many former students go on to great things—acknowledged the challenges of this particular moment in history, and offered his thoughts on how the resourcefulness and resilience learned during their years at NCS will serve our graduates well as they strive to make positive change in the world. We also heard thoughtful reflections from each graduating student and their advisors, and were delighted to see many of the students and their families attending the ceremony live from their own homes, sharing in one another’s joys and successes.  

Though spring term and our final celebration week was missing many of the elements so many of us value about the North Country School experience, we have been continuously inspired by the countless ways our extended community has displayed the resourceful and resilient spirit highlighted in our graduation address. The NCS community is made up of creative, caring, and compassionate individuals who understand that we are stronger and better when we work together. Many hands truly do make light work, and though there is much work to be done in the world, we believe that our graduates will go toward their next adventures ready to make positive and impactful change. We wish them all the best, and can’t wait to see all they are capable of.

To watch the NCS Graduation Ceremony, click HERE.

We at North Country School thank you for spending the 2019-20 year with us. We wish you all a safe, happy, and healthy summer, and look forward to returning with updates from our mountain campus in September 2020.

Check out this past week’s final installments of CONNECTING WITH OUR COMMUNITY:

Monday: Check our Facebook page for the last video of the year from our School Counselor, Lauren. This past week Lauren shared a technique for dealing with grief and loss.

Tuesday: Creature Query- In this past week's Creature Query, Barn Manager Erica explained how chickens benefit from taking a dust bath. Check it out on our Facebook page.

Wednesday: What’s Cooking at NCS and Camp Treetops?- This past week Edible Schoolyard instructor Elie Rabinowitz provided us with two simple dessert recipes: Rhubarb Fool and Wildflower Honey Cookies. These delightfully delicious desserts are made with seasonal ingredients, including dandelion petals and rhubarb from our garden. Check out all of the recipes on Facebook and on Tumblr.

Thursday: Birding with Jack- This past week 6th grade English teacher Jack Kiernan taught us about red-eyed vireos. Check it out on our Facebook page.

Friday: Check our Facebook page for a final Japanese mini-lesson by teacher Meredith Hanson. This past week Meredith gave a surprising lesson on the Japanese words many of us already know. You'll be surprised by how many there are!

For more information about the #This Week At NCS blog, contact Becca Miller: bmiller@northcountryschool.org

For general school information, call 518-523-9329 or visit our website: www.northcountryschool.org

[vacationsoup]

New Post has been published on https://vacationsoup.com/thank-you-veterans-from-new-smyrna-beach-florida/

Thank You Veterans, from New Smyrna Beach Florida

Thank you Veterans, from New Smyrna Beach

This Monday, November 11 is Veterans Day . It’s the one day set aside each November to honor those who have served and continue to serve our nation. The holiday also offers a great opportunity to teach civilians about the sacrifice service members and their families make year-round.

What is Veterans Day?

Veterans Day (originally known as Armistice Day) is a federal holiday in the United States observed annually on November 11, for honoring military veterans, that is, persons who have served in the United States Armed Forces. It coincides with other holidays including Armistice Day and Remembrance Day which are celebrated in other countries that mark the anniversary of the end of World War I. Major hostilities of World War I were formally ended at the 11th hour of the 11th day of the 11th month of 1918, when the Armistice with Germany went into effect. At the urging of major U.S. veteran organizations, Armistice Day was renamed Veterans Day in 1954.

List of Ideas to Celebrate Veterans Day

Communities all over the US hold special activities each Veterans Day. Parades, military ceremonies, free dinners at local restaurants, special school events, and of course - Veterans Day sales. How do you plan to celebrate this year? Here are some ideas for activities to try at home, school and work.

At Home Wear a red poppy or yellow ribbon to show support for veteran and active duty service members. Organize a care-package packing party. If you don’t know someone currently stationed overseas, contact a nearby base or an organization like Blue Star Moms to identify troops in need. Visit a veterans’ hospital. Chatting with elderly or injured veterans is a great way to brighten their day, plus you’re likely to hear some highly fascinating stories about their time in the service. Get creative. For young children, a fun project is a great way to start teaching about the holiday and its importance.

At School Encourage your child’s teacher to develop a Veterans Day lesson plan. A timeline or short writing project is a great way for students to learn about the holiday’s history. Invite a veteran—a parent, grandparent or faculty member, perhaps—to speak to students about what it’s like to be in the military. Don’t know any veterans to invite? Contact your local VFW or VA; their Public Affairs Officer will likely be able to identify a good guest speaker. There are many veterans who work at VA facilities and would be happy to be to speak to students.

At Work Take time out of the day to acknowledge veterans in your workplace. Consider an office-wide coffee break featuring treats such as remembrance poppy cookies or a yellow ribbon cake. During the event, make sure to recognize each veteran employee. (Plan ahead to make sure you don’t miss anyone.)

Retired Army 1st Sgt. William Staude, of Elliott, Pa., salutes soldiers from the 316th Expeditionary Sustainment Command, stationed in Coraopolis, Pa., as they march past him during the Veterans Day parade in downtown Pittsburgh, Nov. 11.

Find an Event in Your Community Want to find a local Veterans Day event? Many communities hold parades and vigils. Contact your local VA for more information. Links to 3 webpages with lists of local Veterans Day events: http://www.volusia.com/veterans-day-events-information-volusia-county/ , https://www.facebook.com/events/riverside-park-new-smyrna-revised-new-smyrna-beach-florida/veterans-day-ceremony/309097516239404/ , and https://www.news-journalonline.com/news/20171109/veterans-day-events

Honor Veterans Year-Round Celebrate with service. Show service members your gratitude throughout the year with a home-cooked meal, thank you note, or day of volunteering. Take your gently-read books to your local VA Hospital or VFW. Contact your local VFW or American Legion to volunteer with their projects.

Support a veteran-owned business. A number of websites can help you identify such businesses in your area - such as buyveteran.com, Veteran Owned Businesses by State, 6 Veteran-Owned Businesses to Hit This Holiday Season, and Top 25 Veteran-Founded Startups in America.

Express thanks Whenever you see someone in uniform, extend a simple word of gratitude or small act of kindness to show how much their service means to you. Source: veteransunited.com, Elisa Essner

Merchants Thank Veterans with discounts and freebies

Free meals, free desserts, free admission tickets. Click for a list of nationwide free meals, deals, and discounts. I have been to Golden Corral on Veterans Day with my father and husband, both vets. The atmosphere is very special in a restaurant crowded with vets - young, old and inbetween. Everyone stands if they can, for singing of the Star Spangled Banner.

Local NSB and Volusia County Specials for Veterans include:

Coleman Condo, our 2BR 2BA beachfront condo in New Smyrna Beach, offers a free one week stay for a veteran and his/her family (one week per year total). In addition, we offer a 10% discount for veterans all year long.

Free admission to state and national parks.

iOutdoor Fishing Adventures. Daytona Beach, FL

Veterans save $25 off any listed fishing charter tour with the code DYTAVB19 during the month of November.

Warbird Air Museum. Titusville, FL

11/9 to 11/10 all veterans get free admission

Kennedy Space Center. Merritt, FL

Admission tickets are free from Nov. 9-11, 2019 for themselves and up to three guests. Admission includes other activities like Space Shuttle Atlantis, Kennedy Space Bus Tour, and IMAX Theater 3D films. Veterans, active-duty, retirees, and reservists are eligible at the ticket proof with military ID or proper military status documentation such as DD214.

Read more: https://militarybenefits.info/local-area-veterans-day-deals-for-veterans/#ixzz64YA6yxPP

New Smyrna Beach Veterans Day Celebrations

There are many events around NSB and Volusia County to commemorate Veterans Day. VETERANS DAY CEREMONY. The City of New Smyrna Beach along with the VFW Post #4250, American Legion Post #17, and American Veterans Post #2 will recognize Veterans at an annual ceremony at 11:00 a.m at the Brannon Center, 105 S. Riverside Dr, New Smyrna Beach.

A PATRIOTIC SALUTE TO VETERANS will be held on Friday, November 8, from 6-9PM at the Hub on Canal Street . Join us for an evening dedicated to our veterans! Shannon Rae will join The Hub's Veterans Band for a delightful program of songs that bring back memories and evoke patriotism. Along with the evening’s musical entertainment, you’ll learn about The Hub's Veterans In Art (VIA) program, including our involvement with Guitars for Vets. AMVETS VETERANS SERVICE: Amvets Post No. 13, DeLand, will sponsor a ceremony starting at 11 a.m. in Bill Dreggors Park, 230 N. Stone St., honoring area veterans for their service and remembering those who died in combat. MONTFORD MARINES HONORED: Three Daytona Beach residents who were members of the Montford Point Marines — James Huger, Eli Graham and James Steele — will be honored during a service at 1045 a.m. at the Greater Friendship Missionary Baptist Church, 539 George Engram Blvd., Daytona Beach. All veterans are invited to attend a free breakfast starting at 8 a.m. PONCE INLET VETERANS MEMORIAL: The Ponce Inlet Veterans Memorial Association will sponsor an appearance by Col. Herb Fix, who is retired from the Marine Corps. His 11 a.m. appearance will include a missing man ceremony, “Taps,” a flyover by the Spruce Creek Gaggle and a dedication and wreath laying at Davies Lighthouse Park. VETERANS DAY CEREMONY: Retired Col. Irving Davidoff will be the speaker at an 11 a.m. event in Riverside Park, New Smyrna Beach, sponosfored by VFW Post No. 4250, New Smyrna Beach. VETERANS DAY TRIBUTE: entertainment, speakers, light refreshments, 1 p.m., Ormond Memorial Art Museum & Gardens, 78 E. Granada Blvd., Ormond Beach. FREE. 386-676-3347. VETERANS DAY TRIBUTE: Veterans of Foreign Wars Post 3282, 5810 S. Williamson Blvd., Port Orange, will host a tribute starting at 2 p.m. in Barden Hall at the post. VETERANS DAY CONCERT: with Crashrocket, Back From the Ashes and Epidemic, 2-7 p.m., Sunshine Bowling Center, 595 E. International Speedway Blvd., DeLand. $5 to benefit the Wounded Warrior Project. 386-738-5566. KOREAN WAR VETERANS CERTIFICATE OF APPRECIATION PRESENTATION: 2 p.m., Port Orange Amphitheater, 2001 City Center Circle, Port Orange. A total of 150 Volusia County residents who are vets will be honored with certificates of appreciation. 386-760-7163. A TRIBUTE TO THE USO: presented by Halifax Health, featuring the Beu Sisters, Peter Alden as “Elvis,” Lauren Chapin from TV’s “Father Knows Best,” 3 p.m., Peabody Auditorium, 600 Auditorium Blvd., Daytona Beach. $15, $5 U.S. Veterans to benefit Halifax Health Hospice’s Veterans programs. 386-322-4747. VETERANS DAY PROGRAM: presented by the African American Museum of the Arts, honoring Charles P. Bailey and all veterans, includes guest speakers, refreshments, 10 a.m., Noble “Thin Man” Watts Amphitheater, 322 S. Clara Ave., DeLand. FREE. 386-736-4004. FLAG BURNING CEREMONY: The Girl Scout Troop Daisy/Brownies No. 825, in conjunction with Sandalwood Nursing Center, will honor veterans, including 11 residents of the center, with a flag-burning ceremony at 6:30 p.m. The flag will be cut into 13 stripes, representing the 13 original colonies, then burned according to U.S. Flag Code. The ceremony at 1001 S. Beach St. is open to the public. VETERANS DAY CELEBRATION: includes commemoration at The Landing, Nunamann Hall; Veterans Center ribbon-cutting, dedication, open house, light refreshments, Lenholt Student Center; talks, full color guard, patriotic music, noon-1 p.m., Daytona State College, 1200 W. International Speedway Blvd., Daytona Beach. 386-506-3000. HONORING OUR VETERANS PERFORMANCE, NOV. 13: music, dance, art and presentation, 6 p.m., Ivy Hawn Charter School of the Arts, 565 S. Lakeview Drive, Unit 110, Lake Helen. 386-228-3900.

Thank you Veterans, from New Smyrna Beach Florida

Thank you Veterans, every day.

[namelesswolffreak]

Galantly- Another Victuuri Prince AU

(Sorry, I'm just really addicted to the idea of Yuuri and Victor being royalty. I cant help myself!)

Victor felt his heart drop to the floor upon the sight of, his now proclaimed to be betrothed, glide across the garden path where he had planned a festive soiree with his parents and other notable dignitaries. He hadn't rather cared for them after watching the beauty saunter off to the deeper section of the gardens. He's mine. I have to have his hand in my name! Victor preens internally. He hears slight whimpers thinking it's maybe his faithful brown poodle at his side, but the lack of curly fur at his feet makes him realize the straining feeling on his vocal cords. Embarrassed he quickly leads off to follow the divine human being in the flowing gown like kimono without so much as a goodbye to the currently distracted Christophe who was dancing the evening away with some of his "ladies in waiting". He never understood the name considering they were all, but. He maybe drew the complaint up to his father one time who disregarded it as a silly, childish tangent. What was Victor expecting? Muffled hums of contentment make his light footfalls leave harsh dents in the earth once he has the younger royal in view, smelling delicate flowers and the rare, Nikiforov kingdom exclusive ice roses that were currently in season. He found the sight of the other smiling and relaxing draw his smooth lips into a welcomed curve. The others movements were graceful, that of a slight dance with each joint that twirled the flower along his porcelain fingers. Compared to most other dancers of the ice and stage he's encountered all were outmatched by the divine beauty of the ravenette prince before him. A sigh of his own contentment slipped as he watched on, completely lost and enthralled beyond words. He didn't even take notice to the sparkling aria of the ice roses anymore, the prince's face glowing much brighter and more gorgeous than those rare roses.

"Oh!"

Victor jumps back as innocent brown eyes distract him from everything else.

"Your highness! I-I did not mean to intrude with all honesty, your greatness!"

Victor still shocked, held in a breath, unable to breath. His tight suit just made it worse. The chocolate iris' are so beautifully and delectably breathtaking he can't see anything else.

"If you wish I will go. I'm sorry for inconveniencing you."

Yuuri had overstepped his bounds. He knew this right away otherwise the prince wouldn't be seeing him quickly back to the banquet with the other guests. He swallowed and prayed that by letting himself leave the prince would spare him a punishment.

"I shall take my leave now."

He only took a foot forward past Victor who only now fell back down to Earth.

"No! Please wait!"

He never thought he'd see anything cuter than a sleepy Makkachin, but boy was he wrong when the latter blushed.

"I find your company rather......nice. Care to stay and admire the roses with me?"

He got a barely notable nod and beamed brighter than the sun.

"Mind telling me your name, your gracefulness? I note your decoration as royalty, but I'm afraid I am not familiar with such attire. Do you happen to herald from the Northern continents?"

He somewhat linked arms with the lad and noticed the uncomfortable stiffness in the way he held back. It scared his heart into skipping a beat when the boy choked on his own anxiety.

"U-uh, I'm Prince Katsuki Yuuri of the Asian Kingdoms. I rule over a smaller section of Japan my family has called, for many generations, Hasetsu."

Yuuri let a breath slip and the sweat piling up on his forehead to finally fall freely with no trouble, the lines coming out easy and practiced on his tongue as he was trained.

"Ah, a bit a ways away from your homeland?"

He unhooked their arms and took Yuuri's hand in his own thumbing over his pale skin delicately, practically radiating sunshine and acceptance.

"I welcome you to the Nikiforov palace of Russia."

He dragged the well kept skin to his lips, smirking, holding them there a tad longer than necessary, but Yuuri would never catch it as a romantic gesture instead tradition as he retracted his buzzing hand, blushing.

"I hope you visit more often."

Victor winks and this time Yuuri does notice the deepened tone in Victor's words.

"I-I promise!" He blurts.

"U-um I mean! I really like your flowers."

"Then they shall be yours oh equally beautiful one."

This time Yuuri audibly gasps, hiding in his face in his arm as Victor plucked an ice rose from the professionally trimmed hedge and carefully weaved it behind the back of his ear. Yuuri's eyes seemed to brighten and maybe even glow when presented next to the icy rose.

"Ha, ha. You look absolutely beautiful, Yuuri Katsuki. These ice flowers can't hold a candle to your perfections."

"T-thank you.....dear prince."

He curtsied like the ladies that entered his court. Victor was intrigued by the reversal gender regard, but kept his inquiries to himself. As the prince bowed, his eyes doted on the perfect way his hair shined in the light and how well his robe bended with his form in such a way a dancers costume would, but he bet the kimono was much comfier than the tightly fitted suits he wore for performances. He copied the practiced motion, correctly of course, with a smile.

"I-"

"VICTOR!? Where are you old friend!? I wish to dance with you and show these rookies who knows best! Their divine prince Christophe or their talented dance tutor!"

"You should go." Victor felt a slight shove on his shoulder when he turned around.

"No, no my Yuuri, I wish to spend time with you! You live in such a vast land that to leave would be a mistake. Besides, Christophe is a friend who will accompany me on many journeys to come, you on the other hand....." His lips brushed Yuuri's knuckles. "I fret your pretty face may never return here again."

"If I promise to still be waiting for you here will you accept his invitation? I wouldn't want anyone to notice your absence." His lips pulled away.

"You wish to be rid of me so quickly." He smirks down casting his gaze.

"I didn't mean to offend, Victor!"

"Ha, ha, ha! I know, I know. I just like to see you all flustered. Red is definitely a complimenting color on you."

Yuuri was all stutters and panic, too much love radiating from Victor to comprehend and synthesize. He can only swallow hard and accept the warm kiss that is too quick to part from his lips as he watches his prince saunter off in the direction of party music and roaring voices.

"I shall see you again, Yuuri Katsuki. Dasvidaniya."

"I-I I'll try..." He watches him go.

They don't see each other for a sum of five years. The ongoing wars keeping them apart, but no one seemed to interrupt their communication through letter so it did not take long for the two to be enamored with one another in less than a few weeks. They plan their visits in advance with "I love yous." and the letters come back to each desk littered in more kisses and ribbon from Yuuri and well preserved ice Roses from Victor. Soon Yuuri has a full vase he waters regularly when he can and Victor has several new Princely shirts with ribbon at least somewhere on them. The weeks turn to months and months to years as their 5th year apart is upon them. They plan their wedding and merging of Kingdoms for Christmas day, Victor's birthday as Yuuri had come to learn. The celebration had been joyous and bigger than either of the couple could comprehend. Family, friends, dignitaries and much more had attended and no one was left out, except prince JJ. He could be a little much. The couple danced their night away and found themselves attached at the hip and not being able to part even when the dance sequences called for it. They remained the lovely center of attention for the entirety of the night until finally being permitted to leave and relish only in the others company. Though the reason be quite embarrassing to the couple they relaxed in the silence of Victor's room now dubbed their room.

"I've missed you."

"I believe I've missed you a lot more, your highness." Yuuri pecked Victor's cheek. They had never been happier before then. Victor's striking blue eyes fondly fluttering closed as he grabbed his bride in a warm, tender kiss.

"Never leave me again."

If Yuuri hadn't been so close to Victor he didn't believe he would of heard the words.

"With all my heart, I promise."

And he never did, a kiss sealing that promise.

[mrmichaelchadler]

Your Roger Stories: The Critics

As we celebrate empathy this week on the fifth anniversary of Roger Ebert's passing, we'll be sharing some of your Roger stories. In this installment, we've gathered memories from critics about their interactions with him, and how he influenced them as writers and film viewers. Over the next few days we'll be sharing other stories from fans of Roger's, along with tales of those who met Roger over the years. 

GRANT BENNETT

My first job out of college was at a small-market radio station. I was a DJ, the webmaster, and, somehow, a movie critic.

I would always wait to read Roger's reviews until after writing mine. As far as I was concerned, Ebert was the only critic that mattered, if for no other reason than he and I agreed 98% of the time, and for the same reasons. He was a far better wordsmith than I am, though. 

I remember "Slackers" - not Linklater's "Slacker", but the teen movie with Big Pete from the eponymous show with his brother. Cute movie. Clever. And a good remix of classic film noir. 

I gave it 3 1/2 stars, I think. Roger gave it considerably fewer. 

I emailed him about this. 

He replied! 

I don't remember verbatim what he said, and the letter is so much digital dust by now, but, the gist of it was "Stick to your guns. I was the only critic in America that liked 'Tomb Raider'." 

Thanks, Roger.

COLIN BIGGS

In Roger Ebert's review of “La Dolce Vita,” he said “Movies do not change, but their viewers do. When I saw La Dolce Vita in 1960, I was an adolescent for whom “the sweet life” represented everything I dreamed of: sin, exotic European glamour, the weary romance of the cynical newspaperman. When I saw the movie around 1980, Marcello was the same age, but I was 10 years older, had stopped drinking, and saw him not as a role model but as a victim, condemned to an endless search for happiness that could never be found, not that way. By 1991, when I analyzed the film a frame at a time at the University of Colorado, Marcello seemed younger still, and while I had once admired and then criticized him, now I pitied and loved him.” It had never occurred to me before reading that review that revisiting a film could inspire a different reaction. Inspired, I went to the video center on campus and watched “Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind” again. This time, watching the film through the lens of my first failed great love. I first saw 'Eternal Sunshine' in theaters at 14, and while the film's ingenious premise was intriguing, I found it hard to relate to a person who would give a piece of themselves away voluntarily just to salve over the pain. Such logic was abundantly clear to a heart-broken 19-year-old. At 25, I watched that film again with my soon-to-be wife, and the conclusion I came to was just as different as it was at ages 14 and 20. Now, I grasped that Joel's (Jim Carrey) memories, while painful at the time, like mine, were informative to making me who I am today. Thanks to “Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind,” and Roger's words, I understood that while memories may not change, the lessons we learn from them change constantly. Not just in the theater, but in every facet of life.

MISS BANSHEE

Back about 7 or 8 years ago, I wrote a story about Roger, and how he and I had both lost our voices (mine was temporary, his of course, was not) and sent it to him on Twitter. Much to my surprise he re-tweeted it, followed me, and we became internet pals. In the years that followed, Roger and I would chat on Twitter proper, and on direct messages about my ridiculous antics, and our common interests. It was a sweet and lovely friendship. 

And yet, it was so much more than that. Roger encouraged me to keep writing, even when my mental illness made it mostly impossible to do anything but hide in the dark, much less write. He never judged me (well, once. I overly advertised my recap of Twilight: New Moon on Twitter and he told me to cool it, not that many people cared. Roger that, Roger.) He was the reason I met so many friends on the internet, friends that kept me relatively sane during my darkest days. 

It’s been so long since we talked last. I never got to thank him for everything he gave me. Advice, laughs, and friendship. I wish he were here now. I wish I could say a proper goodbye to my friend.

IAN DAWE

My story has the virtue of being short, no matter how meaningful it was to me. Reading Ebert’s Home Video guide was my introduction, in retrospect, into not only thinking seriously about film but to writing itself. Days and weeks spent flipping through it as a child left a deep impression. Although I originally pursued a career in science, inspired by Roger I later finished an MA in Film and have since written over 400 articles about film and popular culture. While his influence on my writing is fairly obvious, I think that by now I have developed my own writer’s voice, something I know he would have appreciated.

But here’s my story. Long before I went to film school and was in a bad way in life, I wrote Roger an email. It was long, it was emotional and frankly it was embarrassing. Among other things, I mentioned that my two heroes were him and Orson Welles. I thought that spontaneous gesture, akin to Mike Yanagita in Fargo blurting out, “You’re such a super lady!”, would lead nowhere, but I underestimated Roger. He wrote back. His note was short, but I committed it to memory: “You’re very kind, but if your two heroes are me and Orson Welles, you should go on a diet!” I loved it, and fondly remembered it on the day of his death. I treasure it to this day.

That’s my story. I couldn’t ask for anything better. I miss Roger, like so many others, particularly his intellect and his wit. But my generation carries on in his wake. He leaves behind a rich legacy.

ROBERT KOJDER

Roger Ebert was one of the driving forces behind me becoming a film critic. As I expanded my taste in movies throughout high school I would always check out his review afterward. Most of the time we were in agreement, but actually, the times we were in disagreement are what made me further respect him as a writer, primarily because his perspective typically came from an unexplored angle of the film that made me rethink my own perception, especially if I held an opposing opinion. That's not to say I molded my own thoughts to fit his own, but that he had such a powerful voice and way with words that I, and probably all of his readers, felt challenged to really explore their own judgment and how to better support their case.

I followed most of his writing and life up until his untimely passing from cancer, but what stuck out most, and what inspired me to chase my film critic dreams, was his dedication to putting in professional work even in the face of such a terrible condition. Even at the disease's worst, he would for example travel to the Oscars not just as a fan like the rest of us, but first and foremost a journalist that took pride in covering the event. Born with Muscular Dystrophy Type 2 and living a very difficult life, I took that as the ultimate proof and encouragement that even with the crappy hand I had been dealt, I could accomplish my goals.

So far, I like to think I have more than achieved success. Admittedly, I started out covering my other passion, video games (Roger Ebert is probably the only person in the world that could lay out well-articulated reasons as to why they should not be considered art without having me upset, which is another testament to his class and general respect for what he was arguing against), but the more I wrote online the better at stringing words together I became, and quickly I found myself doing what I had always wanted to do: review films. Since then I have been quoted on national television for popular blockbusters such as last year's Logan and accepted into the Chicago Film Critics Association, something I never thought would happen so soon. 

I vividly remember Steven Prokopy of Third Coast Review asking me if I had submitted my application yet, responding no and mentioning that I would do it before the deadline; I just underestimated my own skill as a writer (something I clearly do a lot and have done ever since high school) and assumed I did not have the necessary amount of film journalism experience to get in. Keep in mind, I didn't have the opportunity to go to college, self-teaching myself everything I know. Much to my surprise, I was accepted on the first try, but it didn't fully settle until announcing a winner at the annual CFCA awards dinner. That was one of the happiest and proudest moments of my life.

I never met Roger Ebert, but I deeply wish I could have; he is the reason for my accomplishments. However, prior to a screening beginning, Dann Gire of The Daily Herald came up to me and complimented my work, and as our conversation extended over to Facebook Messenger he told me Roger would have approved of my writing. It's conversational, but I also feel that I look for the same things in movies as Roger, putting a high emphasis on empathy and relating to characters. Most of all, I just want to carry on that spark he gave me to chase my dreams, encouraging others to never give up and always persist. Whether it's cancer or Muscular Dystrophy or something else entirely, anything is possible. Just do what you love; for me, that's watching and reviewing as many movies as possible. And Roger's work ethic, whether he was healthy or on death's door was the greatest inspiration behind my dreams becoming reality.

SCOTT RENSHAW

In January 1999, I sat down to dinner at a Park City restaurant with the man who helped make film criticism accessible for a generation -- and helped make it possible for me to do what I do.

It was thanks to the Internet-based film critic James Berardinelli -- whom Ebert had been corresponding with for a while -- that I got that chance for a dinner with Roger Ebert at Sundance '99. Ebert had been an early adapter to the significance of the online world, and had made it a point in his annual Movie Yearbook beginning in the late 1990s to single out the Internet-based film critics he considered worthwhile. Mr. Berardinelli was one of those -- and, in Mr. Ebert's opinion circa 1998, so was I.

I was fairly dumbfounded when an online acquaintance made me aware that I'd made the cut in Ebert's Yearbook. After all, I'd been watching since his PBS Sneak Previews show with Gene Siskel in the early 1980s; he was a Pulitzer Prize-winner at a craft I'd barely begun to feel competent at; he was The Man. A thumbs-up from Roger Ebert was the most astonishing indication I'd yet received that maybe there was a shot for me at this crazy film-criticism thing. And I don't think it hurt my bona fides when I walked into the Salt Lake City Weekly offices in spring 1999 and showed the publisher a copy of those words of praise from Roger Ebert.

So in January of 1999, I was able to thank Roger in person for that kindness. I wish I could remember more of that dinner conversation; I think I was too awestruck for it to feel casual. I do remember his casual jests about Gene Siskel, who would pass away himself only a couple of months later. And I remember that he picked up the check.

In subsequent years, I'd see him periodically, and while there's no way of knowing whether he'd have remembered my name without those ever-present press badges, he always greeted me and was willing to chat. That seems to be the memory of so many people: That someone who had reached the top of his profession, instead of becoming a standoffish jerk, was instead kind and inviting.

CARRIE RICKEY

I can remember the date. It was May 14, 1998, the day Frank Sinatra died, though Roger and I didn't know yet. We were at Cannes, walking down the steps of the Palais after the 8:30 am "seance," or screening. I don't remember the movie.

Chaz ran up the steps to collar Roger, breaking through a rank of paparazzi and videocams descending on him. Chaz beckoned Roger, whispered something in his ear, and apologized to me, it was "personal," she said. As she spoke, the blood drained out of Roger's typically rosy face. I thought someone had died. The journalists pressed in on Roger, wanting him to comment about Sinatra's death. As he composed himself he looked back at Chaz and asked, "How did Marlene sound?" Marlene, I knew, was Gene Siskel's wife. So I knew something was not OK with Gene. And I knew I was not supposed to know. Roger hugged Chaz. Then turned around to greet the press.

A French journalist shoved a mic into Roger's face, demanding a eulogy of the actor/singer. Even by Roger standards, he surpassed himself. A perfectly constructed sentence that he later used for Sinatra's obituary. "When the book of 20th century popular entertainment is written, Frank Sinatra will get a chapter as the best singer of his time. As an actor, he will be remembered for the good films, and for a distinctive screen persona as a guy who could win a heart with a song." I was awestruck by his composure and fluency.

Roger, Chaz and I walked down the steps and down the Croisette towards the Old Palais where we were to see Todd Solondz' "Happiness." I took Roger's hand and squeezed it (Chaz was squeezing the other) and said only, "Amazing assessment of Sinatra, and I don't know how you did it because you clearly have just had bad news. " He nodded. "Gene's sick." I nodded, "So I gathered." "How did you know it was Gene?" he asked. "Because your first thought was of Marlene." He gently said, "And you don't know."

Ten months later, Roger's professional partner died. Siskel & Ebert were a team for 24 years, five years longer than Laurel & Hardy.

from All Content https://ift.tt/2GLqUch

[disneyworldenthusiast]

With the groundhog predicting six more weeks of winter, I am so excited to be counting the days until spring will arrive and along with it the 2017 Epcot International Flower and Garden Festival. Recently Disney revealed a few more details about what we can expect this year. Here’s the scoop:

Celebrating 24 years when it kicks off March 1, 2017, the Epcot International Flower & Garden Festival will jump-start spring with blooms aplenty and gardens of edibles including toothsome morsels from the new Northern Bloom and The Berry Basket Outdoor Kitchens. A new, next-generation Belle topiary from “Beauty and the Beast” will debut in France, and a redesigned “Cars” play garden will introduce a colorful new character topiary sure to capture children’s imaginations.

The 90-day festival, open March 1-May 29, will feature an irresistible array of new gardens and character topiaries, popular entertainers and tasty food and drink offerings:

Fresh, farm-market food and beverage flavors will debut at the new Northern Bloom and The Berry Basket Outdoor Kitchens that will join 13 returning Outdoor Kitchens. Delectable chef-inspired bites from Northern Bloom include Seared Scallops with French Green Beans and Butter Potatoes with brown-butter vinaigrette and Applewood smoked bacon. A Maple Popcorn Shake for sipping can become an adult libation with the addition of some Crown Royal Maple Whiskey. At The Berry Basket, the Lamb Chop with Quinoa Salad and Blackberry Gastrique can pair with the new Founders Raubeaus Pure Raspberry Ale.

The new generation of princess topiaries (Snow White, Anna and Elsa – the first to be designed and created with topiary facial features) will welcome a brand-new Belle topiary as fans remember her from the Oscar-winning Disney film, “Beauty and the Beast.” Located outside the France Pavilion with the Beast topiary, Belle will come to life with sculpted facial features and her yellow ball gown created with golden blooming Joseph’s Coat and Creeping Jenny plants.

Another festival first will be a 6-foot-tall topiary of Figment, the feisty dragon mascot of the park’s Imagination! Pavilion, perched atop a 5-foot-diameter ball fashioned from yellow Joseph’s Coat.

This year’s Epcot front-entrance topiary garden, “Welcome Spring Fun, Food and Flowers,” inspired by a vintage Walt Disney short film will spring to life with a floral-festooned maypole featuring Mickey Mouse, Minnie Mouse, Daisy and Pluto.

The popular Garden Rocks concert series will expand to four days each week, with three concerts each Friday through Monday presenting pop musicians that span multiple genres over five decades. New acts this year: Simple Plan, Exposé and Berlin featuring Terri Nunn. Festival favorite Jon Secada kicks off the series March 3-4, and Dennis DeYoung featuring the music of STYX wraps the long weekend March 5-6.

New Garden Rocks Dining Packages will be available on select days at several Epcot restaurants. Guests can book packages at 407-WDW-DINE.

Redesigned interactive play gardens will include the new “Cars”-themed Road to Florida 500 garden introducing the new “Cruz” character topiary from the June 2017 release of Disney•Pixar’s “Cars 3.” Music Garden Melodies play area will return with a new garden design, musical note topiary elements and climbing nets.

During the first festival week, the Festival Center will open Wednesday, March 1 and each day through Sunday, March 5 with an entertaining mix of gardening seminars and DIY workshops. Throughout the rest of the festival, the center will be open each Friday through Sunday.

One of the popular Outdoor Kitchen gardens, Urban Farm Eats, will return with savory bites, sweet treats and ideas for planting produce that can inspire growing numbers of guests who want to learn to grow their own edibles.

“A lot of people, including young children, are serious foodies now, and they have lots of questions about gardening,” says Eric Darden, festival horticulture manager. “We’re getting more and more people in their 20s and 30s asking, ‘How can I grow this?’ I think we’ll be creating more gardeners because people can see what’s possible.”

The 2017 festival forecast will be sunny with colorful floral bursts by day and a nighttime landscape aglow with twinkling lights:

Topiaries of Donald Duck and nephews Huey, Dewey and Louie will share Future World space in front of Spaceship Earth with Chip and Dale for a “Fresh Epcot” selfie and family photo opportunity.

Anna and Elsa topiaries will return to the Norway Pavilion festival landscape in celebration of the park’s new Frozen Ever After Nearly 100 festival topiaries in all will include up to 70 character creations such as Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs, Lady and the Tramp, Simba, Timon and Tinker Bell.

Guests can plan on special appearances related to Earth Day and other spring activities including: March 31-April 2 and April 28-30: Disney’s Animals, Science and Environment and Conservation Specialists from Disney’s Animal Kingdom; April 22-24: Celebrate Earth Day with featured personalities and activities; May 5-7: Discover the Bounty of Florida Agriculture by learning from Sunshine State specialists; May 12-14: Florida Federation of Garden Clubs presents floral designs that defy description.

The Butterflies on the Go garden will return with the story of the Monarch’s epic journey across the continent and featuring butterflies emerging from their chrysalises.

On the way to the new Soarin’ Around the World attraction in The Land Pavilion, guests can discover gardens featuring edible flowers, plants that benefit health and healing, and a pollinator paradise.

Dozens of Disney-crafted “flower towers” and beds of multi-colored blooms will transform the park’s landscape.  At least 70,000 bedding plants will surround the Future World east and west lakes alone; on the water, 220 mini-gardens will be set afloat.

The festival, including all gardening programs, exhibits, concerts, complimentary English Tea Garden tours and special appearances, is included in regular Epcot admission.

Heading to Disney World this Spring?

If you are planning a vacation to Disney World, be sure to check out these valuable resources to help you save time and money:

Check out my new book 501 Ways to Make the Most of Your Walt Disney World Vacation for secret insider tips and tricks that you won’t find anywhere else!

View the latest Disney World discounts currently available!

Guarantee the best vacation price by clicking here for more information!

Will you be attending the Epcot International Flower & Garden Festival? What are you most excited about? Please leave a comment!

More Details About The 2017 Epcot International Flower And Garden Festival With the groundhog predicting six more weeks of winter, I am so excited to be counting the days until spring will arrive and along with it the 2017…

[runawaywidow]

Always fun to relive the year and think about the highs and the lows.  This year I did get my fill of traveling.  I started home renovations and it was relatively painless and such an improvement.  I went to my youngest child’s college graduation (and celebrated the oldest son’s graduation from law school which occurred the same day).

I got married!! And even though I worked full time, I went on three amazing international trips: Iceland, Greece and South Africa.

Along with the best moments came the awful realization that my mom was getting older and she left us on October 3rd. I was blessed to have a wonderful relationship with my mom and we did bond these past few years as I suffered the loss of my husband and father of my children, dealt with grief and eventually met a new love to share the rest of my life with.

Here is my touch on lessons that this year has brought.

Spend time with your sister, if you are lucky enough to have one.  We had the best trip to Iceland.  Taking a tour and spending some time on our own gave us memories and a love for travel that we plan to continue to develop in the future.

Before

After

Home renovations are messy but sooo worth it.  I changed a small hall bathroom and closet in my 80 year old home to an (almost) ensuite bathroom.  I also equipped the closet with a new washer and dryer from the basement to steps from my bed!  Such a great move.

A weekend in NYC is always amazing, especially with tickets to the hottest show on Broadway and time spent with my fiancee.  I love a good show and meal out and I don’t always have to travel far to experience such a great city – a one hour train ride opens up so many opportunities for adventure.

Impressed and proud to announce that my youngest graduated from University of Mississippi in May.  After a rough start with the passing of his dad one week after moving into his dorm, he persevered and made it through 4 years including a semester in Japan.  When he puts his mind to it, this young man can do anything.  I will always be his biggest cheerleader!

Family and friends helped share the excitement building as the date for my wedding got closer. Who doesn’t enjoy a surprise bridal shower or a day at the beach!! Planning the wedding was such fun and the day was a blast.  So glad we made the decision to have a big celebration.  The sad times will come anyway, we need to celebrate the good times with loved ones when we can.

Dressing my sons alike to walk me down the aisle in flip flops. Somedays I pinch myself and wonder how they grew up so fast. I remember and miss those baby and childhood years. I love those young men fiercely. I’m so proud of them and know they will always be a top priority in my life.  And I am so glad they like my new husband and are happy for me.

Marrying Pete – a man who has made me smile again and feel so special and happy.  He is kind, generous and handsome and my life is better with him in it. Knowing loss, I now appreciate life and love and the people who we have in our lives so much more.

At our wedding, I did invite my in-laws.  My brother in law has been so steadfast and supportive over these past few years, especially dealing with the lawsuit.  And Mike’s mom has graciously shown me how to be a mother-in-law.  She was always the kindest and happiest of guests when they stayed with us.  She and her husband would cook, build stuff, shop and take care of us when they visited.  We would laugh over a glass of wine and she would exclaim how amazing I was as a mother! Couldn’t ask for a better mother-in-law.  She passed away 3 weeks after this photo was taken at my wedding to Pete.  She was crying – happy tears for me and I do miss her.

Greece for our honeymoon was actually planned before the wedding! A dream come true destination. We traveled in style in a balcony suite room on the cruise ship to different islands and excursions. The salads and fresh fish in Greece are out of this world – we will have to go back again, just to enjoy the food!

Africa!! A major bucket list trip that I was fortunate to experience this past summer.  With 3 women from my book club we planned a trip to South Africa that included a 6 day safari and visits to 2 major cities.  Our days were filled with new adventures and animals that I had only seen in books or zoos until now.  The poverty and history in Africa is alarming and made us appreciate where we live.  Of course traveling to this country also made me realize how much I do love to travel and see new places.  I will be adding new places to that bucket list soon!

This is the last picture I have of my mom. We checked her out of the nursing home rehab center and took her for lunch at her favorite restaurant. She’s been a regular for years and she enjoyed her lobster roll and the sunshine that day. Taking time out of my busy schedule to be with her that last month was my best decision- just wish I had taken more time.

This year I spent a lot of time in the hospital visiting loved ones.  I learned that it is very important to know your health needs and that we can’t really count on the hospital to make us better.  That needs to begin with us.

And for me that is a huge wake up call.  It is time to make my health a priority.  I would like to imagine that my retirement years are not too far away.  I would also like to imagine that I can live a healthy, care-free, active lifestyle for a few more years.  That does not come guaranteed.  It takes work.

More exercise, less sweets; more fruits and veggies, less pasta; more water, less wine.  It seems so easy.  One day at a time.

What habits are you building to improve your life and health this year? Pease share…

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Top 11 Memorable Moments of 2019 Always fun to relive the year and think about the highs and the lows.  This year I did get my fill of traveling. 

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Dating Quotes

Official Website: Dating Quotes

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• A lot of people wouldn’t feel miserable in this environment. A lot of people aren’t dating my girlfriend. – Dov Davidoff • About age 30 most women think about having children, most men think about dating them. – Judy Carter • After a number of years dating, we decided we were good partners. – Melinda Gates • Are you kidding? I’m a terrible cook, but John is a really great one. Literally, I never cook. The whole time we were dating, I prepared two officially romantic meals. Both of them were such disasters that he begs me never to go into the kitchen again. – Rebecca Romijn • At the time that I knew them, they were not living together. They began dating again after their divorce, so I didn’t really see fighting. – Kato Kaelin

jQuery(document).ready(function($) var data = action: 'polyxgo_products_search', type: 'Product', keywords: 'Dating', orderby: 'rand', order: 'DESC', template: '1', limit: '68', columns: '4', viewall:'Shop All', ; jQuery.post(spyr_params.ajaxurl,data, function(response) var obj = jQuery.parseJSON(response); jQuery('#thelovesof_dating').html(obj); jQuery('#thelovesof_dating img.swiper-lazy:not(.swiper-lazy-loaded)' ).each(function () var img = jQuery(this); img.attr("src",img.data('src')); img.addClass( 'swiper-lazy-loaded' ); img.removeAttr('data-src'); ); ); ); • Bill Clinton is a man who thinks international affairs means dating a girl from out of town. – Tom Clancy • Busy’ is another word for ‘asshole’. ‘Asshole’ is another word for the guy you’re dating. – Greg Behrendt • Celebrities say they date other celebrities because they have the same job. But I think they just like dating famous people. Celebrities attract each other, like cattle. – Jason Lee • Computer dating is fine, if you’re a computer. – Rita Mae Brown • Dating a new man is like holding a strawberry milkshake; first the taste, then the pleasure. – Marilyn Monroe • Dating is a give and take. If you only see it as “Taking,” you are not getting it. – Henry Cloud • Dating is a place to practice how to relate to other people. – Henry Cloud • Dating is about finding out who you are and who others are. If you show up in a masquerade outfit, neither is going to happen. – Henry Cloud • Dating is just awkward moments and one person wants more than the other. It’s just that constant strangeness. I think it’s a very real thing. – Jason Schwartzman • Dating is like pushing your tray along in a cafeteria. Nothing looks good, but you know you have to pick something by the time you reach the cashier. – Caprice Crane • Dating is pressure and tension. What is a date, really, but a job interview that lasts all night? – Jerry Seinfeld • Dating is primarily a numbers game…. People usually go through a lot of people to find good relationships. That’s just the way it is. – Henry Cloud • Dating is probably the most important aspect of a single person’s life. – Linda Sunshine • Dating is really all about sex. In the conventional context, this means that the man invites the woman to go through a social encounter, the ultimate purpose of which is sexual engagement. – Alexander McCall Smith • Dating now is a lot like going shopping when you don’t have any money. Even if you find the right thing, you can’t do anything about it. – Joshua Harris • Dating should be a part of your life, not your life a part of dating. There is more to life than finding a date. – Henry Cloud • Dodi got a lot of criticism when he began dating Princess Diana. No one seemed to think he was good enough for her. – Lorna Luft • Encourage your children to come to you for counsel with their problems and questions by listening to them every day. Discuss with them such important matters as dating, sex, and other matters affecting their growth and development, and do it early enough so they will not obtain information from questionable sources. – Ezra Taft Benson • Envy is what makes you, when an acquaintance is lustily telling you that she’s dating a Greek god of a guy, ask, ‘Which one, Hades?’ – Gina Barreca • Everyone was like, “Why do you need to meet someone on Match.com?” My response was, “I certainly don’t need to meet more of the same broke, acting class guys that I’d been dating my whole life.” I needed to change that whole paradigm. So, I decided to meet some corporate guys and see how that worked. So, I went on Match, but I didn’t put a picture up, because I’m on television, and I didn’t want anybody contacting me for the wrong reasons. So, I had to do the hunting, as it were. I didn’t anticipate meeting my husband online, but there he was. And it all worked out! – Essence Atkins • Gay men should not adopt the sophomoric model of heterosexual dating; gay men should always have sex first. – John Rechy • Good-looking individuals are treated better than homely ones in virtually every social situation, from dating to trial by jury. – Martha Beck • Here’s the funny thing about the response I’ve been aware of to my dating famous people: It’s been very negative. I’m either not good-looking enough, not a good enough actor or not successful enough for these people. – Dax Shepard • Honeymoon: A short period of doting between dating and debting. – Mike Binder • How many of you have ever started dating because you were too lazy to commit a suicide? – Judy Tenuta • I also find it interesting that a lot of people in their 30s are not married and don’t have kids. There are a lot of people in this age bracket that are out there dating and trying to find love. And I never thought that at my age I would be. – John Stamos • I came to the realization that I started dating my now-wife junior year of college, before you actually went on a date. You didn’t take girls from college out to dinner. I’ve never been on a date. I’ve never been on a date where I didn’t know the end game. I’ve never casually dated someone. I’ve only been out to dinner with the woman who would eventually be my wife. – Jon Gabrus • I can’t imagine dating a boy, meeting him only outside the home. What’s a home and family for if it’s not the center of one’s life? – Loretta Young • I can’t wait for my little sisters to start dating, because it will really be fun to pick on their boyfriends. – David Gallagher • I could be a party girl, dating whoever I want and being reckless, but I like being in a relationship. When you have somebody who grounds you and keeps you sane, it helps. – Eva Longoria • I do like dating cynics – they tend to be incredibly funny. – Chris Pine • I don’t have the best dating track record. – Lauren Conrad • I don’t know the first real thing about the dating game. I don’t know how to talk to a specific person and connect. I just think you have to go to person by person and do the best you can with people in general. – Jason Schwartzman • I don’t really comment on my personal life because I feel like any comment at all is opening up a whole can of worms. I’d just rather not talk about who I’m dating. – Josh Hartnett • I don’t think courting and dating is a liability. I actually think it can be a blessing. – Rebecca St. James • I don’t understand the whole dating thing. I know right off the bat if I’m interested in someone, and I don’t want them to waste their money on me and take me out to eat if I know I’m not interested in that person. – Britney Spears • I feel like I’ve always had gay fans, I don’t think my dating a woman has changed my demographic, but it certainly changed the way I feel about politics. – Sia Furler • I got that experience through dating dozens of men for six years after college, getting an entry level magazine job at 21, working in the fiction department at Good Housekeeping and then working as a fashion editor there as well as writing many articles for the magazine. – Judith Krantz • I grew up between the two world wars and received a rather solid general education, the kind middle class children enjoyed in a country whose educational system had its roots dating back to the Austro-Hungarian Monarchy. – George Andrew Olah • I grew up in the world of bad television, on my dad’s sets and then as a young schmuck on dating shows and so on. – George Clooney • I have been dating someone that treats my heart like it’s monkey meat. I feel like a delusional, invisible person half the time so I need to learn what it’s like to be treated well before it’s too late for me. – Hannah • I just can’t fathom tweeting, and I’d rather spend my time writing a book than a blog, but I rather grudgingly agreed to a Facebook page. I had a brief, intense romance with Facebook. It’s weirdly addictive, but anything that time-sucking is a danger for a writer who writes as slowly as I do. Now I post only occasionally and nothing very confessional. I think I’m carbon dating myself as I speak. – Debra Dean • I just don’t like when there’s a rumor that says I’m dating someone who is below my standards. But when I got divorced, my ex-wife said I was spending all my time with Lindsay Lohan and Angelina Jolie. I was like, ‘Thank you for the big ups!’ – Marilyn Manson • I knew dating the son of Satan would turn out badly – Darynda Jones • I like the idea of dating, but I’m not dating anyone exclusively, particularly right now. It’s hard to be in a relationship unless you’re ready to go public with it. So it’s a lot easier for me to not be in a relationship. I really don’t want that part of my life to be tabloid fodder. – Cory Monteith • I love being a single mom. But it’s definitely different when you’re dating. – Brooke Burns • I prefer ordinary girls – you know, college students, waitresses, that sort of thing. Most of the girls I go out with are just good friends. Just because I go out to the cinema with a girl, it doesn’t mean we are dating. – Leonardo DiCaprio • I started dating older men, and I would fall in love with them. I thought they could teach me about life. – Daphne Zuniga • I stopped dating for six months a year ago. Dating requires a lot of energy and focus. – Daphne Zuniga • I think a man’s dream woman changes as he goes through different stages in his life. I’m fortunate to be dating my dream woman now. – Wissam Al Mana • I think I should date a normal girl. I am tired of dating heroines. While I believe in marriage as an institution, I am also petrified of it. – Shahid Kapoor • I think I’m definitely more open. You know the thing is I wouldn’t have said I was closed before, but like, it’s the kind of thing that you don’t even think of other options. I’ve been dating black men for really, for like, I don’t know, 10 years. You know, I haven’t really dated outside of that. Now I think I’m probably am more open to the idea. – Sanaa Lathan • I think more dating stuff is scheduling. It’s needing people who understand your work schedule. – Jennifer Love Hewitt • I tried to tell them about the dating process because I’m single now and how horrible it is and how many foolish experiences I had had dating. So I was really selling him hard, but the whole time he really wanted me! – Andie MacDowell • I want my audience to know me for my work, not because of who I’m dating or what drugs I’m on or what club I went to. – Shia LaBeouf • I want to start dating the man that I’m gonna marry. I want to start having some fun with someone that I know I’m gonna be with. I don’t play any games. I’m too old for that. I’ve been there, I’ve been around the block. – LisaRaye McCoy-Misick • I was dating a guy that was a huge wrestling fan and I’m embarrassed to say it now but I used to make fun of him for watching it. – Torrie Wilson • I was dating this guy and we would spend all day text messaging each other. And he thought that he could tell that he liked me more because he actually spelt the word ‘YOU’ and I just put the letter ‘U’. – Kelly Osbourne • I was thrown into the fashion world, dating models – and you’d read about me dating a new starlet every month. That’s just where my life was. But I’ve grown up a lot. – Stephen Dorff • If you want me to be straight, gay, into monkeys, dating Kylie, whatever, I’m happy for people to project whatever onto me! – Darren Hayes • I’m a bad dater – I’m just not good at it. It’s so weird dating in this town. It’s like high school. I get a lot of people who have their publicist call my agent to ask, ‘Is she dating anyone? – Jules Asner • I’m dating a girl who’s pretty levelheaded. She’s a nurse. She’s a real, normal girl. Which is what I need because my life isn’t normal. – Kenny Chesney • I’m dating a homeless woman. It was easier talking her into staying over. – Garry Shandling • I’m dating a woman now who, evidently, is unaware of it. – Garry Shandling • I’m friends with a lot of my exes, but it took time. We didn’t just get into it. I don’t think you can be friends until you’re cool with them dating someone else. That’s when you know. – Rashida Jones • I’m much more interested in what an actor has to say about something substantial and important than who they’re dating or what clothes they’re wearing or some other asinine, insignificant aspect of their life. – Ben Affleck • I’m not cynical about marriage or romance. I enjoyed being married. And although being single was fun for a while, there was always the risk of dating someone who’d owned a lunch box with my picture on it. – Shaun Cassidy • I’m not great at dating, but I need to do it to relax. – Lena Dunham • I’m not interested in serial dating; I’d honestly rather be single. – Tamsin Egerton • I’m not very experienced with boys or the whole dating thingy. – Vanessa Hudgens • I’m not with anybody, I don’t have time for dating. Not to get too personal, but it’s weirdly harder to meet new people now. But for the first time in my life since I was a little kid, I’m not so concerned about it. – Justin Vernon • I’m of the belief that dating “potential” is almost always an exercise in frustration. – Mallory Ortberg • I’m so an all-or-nothing person in dating, always. I’m big on not wasting time. And so, yeah, if something’s not working, it’s time to not hold people back. – Ginnifer Goodwin • In its purest form, dating is auditioning for mating (and auditioning means we may or may not get the part). – Joy Browne • Is it a bad sign when someone asks you about the person your dating and a tear falls from your eye as you leap into oncoming traffic? – Dov Davidoff • Is it a bad sign when you see the person you’re dating and get the same feeling as if you just saw police lights in you’re rear view mirror? – Dov Davidoff • It was funny actually because that was still during the time we were dating. He would get all these calls because supposedly before we broke up, we had already broken up in the trades, in the rags or whatever. – Rosario Dawson • It was really shocking to me that when I was dating a dude I could get married and my taxes were 8 grand less, blah blah blah. – Sia Furler • It was V-day and I was stuck at home while the guy I was dating was at an Anti-Valentine’s Day party. How wrong was that? It was one thing to be totally alone on V-day, but another to want to be with someone who would rather spend the evening protesting love instead of making it. – Kate Madison • It’s always been my personal feeling that unless you are married, there is something that is not very dignified about talking about who you are dating. – Luke Wilson • It’s amazing how much time and money can be saved in the world of dating by close attention to detail. A white sock here, a pair of red braces there, a gray slip-on shoe, a swastika, are as often as not all one needs to tell you there’s no point in writing down phone numbers and forking out for expensive lunches because it’s never going to be a runner. – Helen Fielding • It’s so easy to misuse social media as a dating tool. I think it can be useful but it’s scary when you think about who can access this information and what they’re doing with it. – Justin Long • I’ve been dating since I was fifteen. I’m exhausted. Where is he? – Kristin Davis • I’ve been dating younger men since my 20s, When I was 29, I dated someone 21… younger men are just more fun. I like their energy. I’ve always been kind of young for my age. – Dana Delany • I’ve been in plenty of situations where someone I’m dating had more time for a console than me. – Josie Maran • I’ve done a number of studies with speed dating and Match.com and what’s interesting is that you know we still walk into a speed dating event, you know, thinking about what it is we’re looking for in a mate and so you ask people, like women will say “I’m looking for somebody who is really kind and sincere and smart and funny.” – Sheena Iyengar • I’ve had a little bad, bad media luck the new year. Well, apparently I’m dating Bill Clinton, which makes me nervous. I didn’t know, though. – Julie Bowen • I’ve learned that I don’t want to be as open or public about relationships anymore. In my first relationship, I thought I could hold on to the normalcy of just being like “Yeah, we’re dating,” just like if it were high school and I was telling my friends. But in high school, there aren’t articles written everywhere when you break up and you don’t have everyone in the school coming up to you and asking what happened or sharing their opinion with you. It didn’t feel like ours anymore, it felt like everybody else’s. – Camila Cabello • Just because times change and alot of people think that dating multiple people is the thing these days, it just isn’t a solid foundation at all in matters of the heart. I still believe in marriages that have a physically powerful foundation. – Angela Merkel • Like the guy I was dating. White, liberal, educated. I went to meet his family and I think that they probably didn’t know they had a problem with it until he walked in with me. And they definitely had issues. Mom had issues with it. Could not, didn’t want to see her son. And I don’t think she had anything against me. But it was about her son bringing me home. And I felt that for the first time. I was like, ‘Wow, that’s deep.’ It’s really simple: I don’t fit their picture. – Sanaa Lathan • My husband is the only guy I’ve ever dated where I’ve never been drunk around him. I couldn’t handle dating without drinking in the past. – Alison Rosen • My mom always complains about my lack of a boyfriend. Well, next time she asks, I’m going to tell her I’m dating two different guys-Mr Duracell and Mr Energizer. – Michelle Landry • My mom is going to kill me for talking about sleeping with people. But I don’t want to put myself in the position where I’m in a monogamous relationship right now. I’m not dating just one person. ‘Sex and the City’ changed everything for me because those girls would sleep with so many people. – Lindsay Lohan • My original inspiration was my mom: a few years after the death of my dad, she started dating one my teachers! – Meg Cabot • My philosophy of dating is to just fart right away. – Jenny McCarthy • My wife and I have been together since 1986. I graduated in ’86 and she graduated in ’88. We began dating when she was 17. Actually she turned 18 when we started kissing and stuff. – Cuba Gooding, Jr. • No one knew me until I met my wife Lulu. Lulu’s mother used to ask, Which one is Maurice? For six months she thought Lulu was dating Barry. – Maurice Gibb • Nothing defines humans better than their willingness to do irrational things in the pursuit of phenomenally unlikely payoffs. This is the principle behind lotteries, dating, and religion. – Scott Adams • Of course, a lot of courtship and dating is about sexual attraction. If you’re an attractive person, you have that sort of interest from people, whether you cater to it or not, but when you get older, that’s not really the leading thing anymore. – Patricia Arquette • Oh, my dating skills are the worst. No, I pick the wrong men; it’s amazing. I am awful, the worst dater. – Paget Brewster • On girls night in we talk about dating; the ups and downs of the previous week. Our collective laughter is uncontrollable and tearful, even the most disappointing dates become meritorious on girls night in. – Cilla Black • On the Hugh Grant romance rumours: We’re not dating and I’m not pregnant. We have not kissed or touched. We have not fought and broken up. – Sandra Bullock • One of my best friends is dating my other best friend, Lena! – Taylor Swift • Pamela Anderson Lee released a statement confirming that she has had her breast implants removed. Doctors say that Pamela is doing fine and that her old implants are now dating Charlie Sheen. – Conan O’Brien • Rumors about me? Calista Flockhart, Pam Anderson, and Matt Damon. That’s who I’m dating. – Ben Affleck • So if I was dating somebody now and the relationship didn’t work out, I’d take that as failing – Gavin DeGraw • Some burns,” Clary said. “Nothing that matters” “Everything that happens to you matters to me.” “Well that certainly explains why you haven’t called me back once. And the last time I saw you, you ran away without telling me why. It’s like dating a ghost.” Jace’s mouth quirked up slightly at the side. “Not exactly. Isabelle actually dated a ghost. She could tell you–” “No,” Clary said. “It was a metaphor. And you know exactly what I mean. – Cassandra Clare • Tess realized one of the great modern dating sadnesses: everyone is so used to the comforting glow of the computer screen that no one can go so far as to say “good morning” in public without being liquored up. – Amelia Gray • That’s the advice I would give to women: Don’t look at the bankbook or the title. Look at the heart. Look at the soul. Look at how the guy treats his mother and what he says about women. How he acts with children he doesn’t know. And, more important, how does he treat you? When you’re dating a man, you should always feel good. You should never feel less than. You should never doubt yourself. – Michelle Obama • The global economy is becoming a place where women are more successful than men, and these economic changes are starting to rapidly affect our culture – what our romantic comedies look like, what our marriages look like, what our dating lives look like, and our new set of superheroes. – Hanna Rosin • The Google algorithm was a significant development. I’ve had thank-you emails from people whose lives have been saved by information on a medical website or who have found the love of their life on a dating website. – Tim Berners-Lee • The inspiration for this movie [Something New] was this Newsweek article that came out a couple of years ago that talks about 42.4 percent of black women in America aren’t married. Black women are shooting up the corporate ladder way faster than our black male counterparts. And (black men) are either dating outside their race, in jail or dying. And so if you want to have a family, you want to be married, you have to look at other options. – Sanaa Lathan • The learned are not agreed as to the time when the Gospel of John was written; some dating it as early as the year 68, others as late as the year 98; but it is generally conceded to have been written after all the others. – Simon Greenleaf • The love is so powerful that both people have to surrender. I think that’s the funny thing about dating somebody for the first time, it’s kind of a question of who wears the pants, or who’s gonna text you first, how much am I supposed to put myself out there, and it makes you feel a little bit crazy. But at the end of the day, it’s not about that. And if it’s the right person you don’t have to worry about that. – Zella Day • The most difficult part of dating is the initial invitation. – Janell Carroll • The number of people who have either gotten married or had kids or started dating or just made great friends over Instagram is countless. I think we’re the only platform that continues to be successful in bringing people together in real life for these real relationships. – Kevin Systrom • The United States is now relearning an ancient lesson, dating back to the Roman Empire. Brutalizing an enemy only serves to brutalize the army ordered to do it. Torture corrodes the mind of the torturer. – James Risen • The whole dating ritual was different when I was a kid. Girls got pinned, not nailed. – Bill Maher • The woman I am currently crazy about was a vegetarian for a year until I started dating her. As is the case with most vegetarians, she had never eaten properly prepared meat, only commercially packaged or otherwise abused flesh. – Steve Albini • There are three possible parts to a date, of which at least two must be offered: entertainment, food, and affection. It is customary to begin a series of dates with a great deal of entertainment, a moderate amount of food, and the merest suggestion of affection. As the amount of affection increases, the entertainment can be reduced proportionately. When the affection IS the entertainment, we no longer call it dating. Under no circumstances can the food be omitted. – Judith Martin • There is no golden rule of dating, except to make sure that it engages both of you; too many people go to a cinema for a first date and of course don’t say a word, that’s a bad thing! – Steven Hill • There’s an interesting story around that [“Heaven Without a Gun”], because the girl I was dating at the time got into a bike accident and couldn’t make it into the studio, and the gentleman Dave Hamlin who worked on this record along with Ohad sort of took it, rearranged it. Dave went and sonically changed it and changed the keys so that Andy could sing it better. All these pieces came together that suddenly displayed that the song was meant for Andy [Kim] to sing. And he always said, “I’ll never understand it, but I’ll sing it with all my heart.” – Kevin Drew • There’s no way to get around it; online dating is work. And some people are more skilled at this kind of communication than others. – Rachel Martin • We had two rules growing up in my house: If you’re going to take a shower, do it with whomever you’re dating so you don’t waste water; and if you buy one for yourself, buy six, because everybody’s going to want one. – Moon Unit Zappa • Well, dating has become a sport and not about finding the person you love. – Rashida Jones • Whats nice about my dating life is that I dont have to leave my house. All I have to do is read the paper: Im marrying Richard Gere, dating Daniel Day-Lewis, parading around with John F. Kennedy, Jr., and even Robert De Niro was in there for a day. – Julia Roberts • When I had been dating my husband for a while, the president Obama said to me, “When is he going to put a ring on it?��� And I was like, “Oh, come on. We are so busy. We don’t need to think about that.” He said, “He needs to put a ring on it because you’re worth it.” And the thing is, I’m not even kidding you, it was about a week or two later that we got engaged. – Alyssa Mastromonaco • When I met Nathan, I told my tour manager he was too good-looking for me. I don’t have a history of dating good-looking men. I’ve always complained that girls don’t get male groupies, and now I’ve married the first groupie I’ve ever had. – Nina Persson • When I saw music as a means to an end – more fame, more money, dating celebrities – that’s when things have gone terribly wrong. Now my life is focused on just trying to keep making music. Because when it’s really good, it’s just the most remarkable feeling on the planet. – Moby • When someone is good, but it doesn’t seem like their world will collapse if they don’t get the part, it’s more appealing. It’s like dating someone: You don’t want someone who’s too into you. – Steve Carell • While she could hardly fathom what had just happened to her that night, she reached some conclusions before she fell asleep, certain things now made perfect sense; Moon River didn’t sound so syrupy, mistletoe wasn’t such a bad idea, and perhaps dating was not such a frivolous waste of time after all. – E. A. Bucchianeri • With my husband it was never like “omg, should I text him?” or “he didn’t call me for two days.” So, I think I knew it was right because it just happened so naturally. That’s one piece of advice that I would give to women who are struggling in this crazy world of dating. – Lindsay Ellingson • Workshops and seminars are basically financial speed dating for clueless people. – Douglas Coupland • Would a dating service for people on the net be “frowned upon” by DCA? I hope not. But even if it is, don’t let that stop you from notifying me via net mail if you start one. – Richard Stallman • You know, I had my mother and my father convincing me that he would be going back to Hollywood and he’d be back with the actresses and dating them and that he wasn’t serious about me at all. So I had him saying one thing to me and my parents telling me something else. – Priscilla Presley • You shouldn’t be in a relationship with somebody who doesn’t make you completely happy and make you feel whole. And if you’re in that relationship and you’re dating, then my advice is, don’t get married. – Michelle Obama • You’re talking to someone who has been married to various people for the last 40 years of her life. Dating is not really something familiar. I’ve never really been a dater. – Stockard Channing

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