#a worthy post-degree endeavor

[snackugaki]

The Rona couldn’t kill me and I will use this mistake to make it every turtle body’s problem

[sapionic]

The 5th House: Romance and Kids

The Astrology Break Down of the 5th house in Astrology.

Take into account that degrees matter due to the decans and the rulership of those as well, but we are not going into that part in this post. Personally, I am still piecing together the degrees in general. I know what each degree is ruled by, but the variations and more have to be studied.

I am actually going to be posting regarding the Planets and NOT the signs. We already know what the signs represent, but the planets really show you what's up.

Mars in the 5th house makes a person impulsive in their intimate/romantic endeavors. Things happen quickly. They don't care to wait or anything. They want it now, quick, and fast. Kids could even come about early for a person with this planet in their 5th house. This causes a person to be quite bold and assertive with their love and lovers. This planet brings about speed to a person's sex life and romance is probably always happening. They can break up with one and end up getting action from others. They initiate with their desires. Kids could also come about due to being in the moment.

Saturn in the 5th house is actually good because this makes someone very disciplined in matters of becoming a parent. We know that Saturn talks about longevity or time so this is someone likely to have kids with someone they have known for a while unless it just ends up being an older person. It's probably not going to be an older person all the time, but you can bet time was put into their connection with the person before a kid came about. This can make someone quite stern in how they scan a person's worthiness of their intimacy as well. This is someone that zones in on everything about a person. They will remember their sexual experiences with detail and the same with their sexual encounters. Love could have even started early for them and something transpired that caused them to slow down in their future dealings. Usually this supports them anyway even though they may not feel like it does when they are focused on what they want.

Sun in the 5th house likely will have kids with someone who actually makes them happy. They are likely going to make sure their relationship is solid and fulfilling before they even think about having a kid with someone. Happiness is important for them in general, especially with love matters. These can be people that have partners that come off positive or jolly.

Pluto in the 5th house gets down and dirty. Likely has a romantic/intimate life where change is inevitable whether internal or external. Deep romance is a priority and it may be approached with depth and taken serious. They could even choose to use sex for a life enhancement. They want to explore the depths of sex and romance that isn't common. They don't mind. Children can cause major changes for these individuals most likely. Likely to have kids with someone who changed their life in a big way.

Do we really need to do Moon? We know how the Moon operates already....

Moon in the 5th house: All you gotta do is make them feel safe, loved, and comfortable. They'll likely have kids with someone they love and/or who loves them. Likely to have a romantic connection that's big on the emotional bond. Kids can even come about through emotional sex. Of course that wont always be the case, but it can be "A" case.

Venus in the 5th house give me vibes of people who may be big on wanting to be married. Kids can come after marriage, definitely, but not only. Likely to have a stable, solid, loyal lover/lovers. Kids can come when there is some decent or more than decent stability in this person's life. Wining and dining is no stranger to this person. They probably get the red carpet rolled out for them by their partner. Likely to respect their partner and vice versa.

Jupiter in the 5th house makes a person a fun, open, optimistic person. They themselves can be opportunists in love or they attract these experiences. Likely to have a fun or informational lover. Likely to have kids with someone that has brought experience, wisdom and knowledge into their life. They may even in some cases have literal circumstances where the lover is philosophical if not an actual teacher. Their love life can be expansive. Likely to also have a partner that is simply smart or travels a lot. This can also be the nature of the relationship where them and their partner teaches each other.

Uranus in the 5th house can make a person have lovers or a lover who is sexy, famous, funny, but still have something unusual about them or in their life. A person with this placement has an unusual love life whether they switch partners often or they simply don't go about love like people would expect. They may like someone who is different and not of commonality. Likely to have unexpected pregnancies. Babies can come about when not planned or expected. Likely to want ultimate stimulation from their lovers. Fun, limitless desires for their romantic life. Likely to have kids with someone who does something extraordinary for their lifestyle.

Neptune in the 5th definitely give me phantom pregnancy vibes. This has likely occurred in some way with these people. Either that or they are pregnant when they don't know. Could find out late or even have a situation where they are giving birth after living life regularly. Could have a relationship based on spirituality, escapism, fun, or a true blissful romance that makes them feel safe and special. Lover can be sensitive, a substance user, smoker only, spiritual, intuitive, or private. Likely to have weird relationships or relationships where they barely see their partner that much for various reasons. Could even have gaps in their love life.

[klarity-jane]

Good day, my beloved fellow Traveler 🤗

As a student of spirituality, I've witnessed many individuals, including me, struggle with feelings of self-worth and self-value. It is easy to fall into the trap of believing that our value is based on external factors, such as our accomplishments, possessions, or relationships. However, true self-value comes from within, and it is something that each of us can cultivate with intention and practice. In this post, I will share nine steps that can help foster self-appreciation from the space of Truth.

Step 1: Recognize our inherent worth

The first step to developing self-value is to recognize that we are inherently valuable simply because we exist. Our worth is not based on what we do or have, but on the fact that we are each unique and valuable expressions of the Divine.

Step 2: Practice self-compassion

It is important to practice self-compassion and kindness towards ourselves. Treat yourself as you would treat a beloved friend. Practice self-care and make time for activities that bring joy and relaxation.

Step 3: Accept that we are constantly evolving

Consider that we are flawless life extensions. In this school of Life, there are always opportunities for growth. Stop aiming for perfection and unhealthy comparisons to focus on self-expansion with fresh curiosity. Mind your own business: We don't know another's path, and we're actually just learning and developing our own. Accepting that there's forever room to do, be, and have better is a crucial step in cultivating self-value. Let's embrace challenges and employ them as opportunities for maximum development.

Step 4: Pay more attention to personal strengths

Instead of dwelling on weaknesses, focus on strengths and allow them to flourish. Identify those talents and abilities and celebrate them. Delight in these unique gifts that only you have to share with the world.

Step 5: Know your limits

Setting healthy boundaries is an important part of developing self-value. Say no to things that do not serve or align with your personal values. Prioritize your needs and well-being, which leads to harmony in service with others.

Step 6: Give thanks frequently

Thankfulness is a powerful tool for cultivating self-value. Take time each day to reflect on the things in life that you are thankful for. Appreciate yourself and your accomplishments, regardless of the degree of importance or amount of effort.

Step 7: Connect with your own spirituality

Connecting with your own spirituality helps with engineering a deeper sense of self-value. Whether through prayer, meditation, or nature; discover and design routines that support connection with the higher self.

Step 8: Be surrounded by good vibes

Be encircled with people who uplift and support you. Avoid relationships or situations that drain your energy or attempt to discredit your worth. Nurture loving thoughts and embody feelings that cherish the treasure that is you. Cultivate harmonious relationships that elevate your spirit.

Step 9: Be graceful

Similar to Step 2, alongside kindness within, there's got to be forgiveness for the self. Grant compassion for past mistakes or regrets. Again, allow me to remind us that we are on the learning journey. Get that we are a work in progress and that every day is an opportunity for advancement and self-enhancement.

Be mindful that developing self-value is a method that takes time and practice, just like with any other worthy endeavor. Respect the process. By embracing your inherent worth, practicing self-compassion, accepting any perceived limitations, attending to your assets, honoring your boundaries, giving thanks and praise for the here and now, connecting with your spirituality, surrounding yourself with positive influences, and allowing grace within ourselves and with others; you will cultivate a deep and abiding sense of self-worth that makes you unstoppable. Remember, you are valuable simply because you are here. The world thirst for you and all that you have to give ❤️

[ptecoaching]

Specializes in Managed Services Pre-Sales and Solution

Spends significant time in Oversaw Administration Pre-Deals and Arrangement planning with a generally Managed  Services Experience of over 15 years.

By and by he is driving Oversaw Services Pre-Deals capability for Intertec and has significant involvement with both Oversaw Services Plan and Conveyance with area skill in ITIL Cycles, Devices, and Mechanization.

The Changing Scene of Managed  Services

The scene of Managed  Services is quickly evolving. 10 years back, Oversaw Services would normally mean labor supply Services bound with different abilities, extension, SLA, and on occasion actual accessibility. The Expertise prerequisites for the Oversaw Services Conveyance were restricted. Managed Services in Dubai Framework commonly implied on-premise equipment upkeep, network implied actual organization with various OEM-explicit arrangements, investigating abilities, and telecom support implied again OEM explicit equipment and related programming upkeep abilities.

Concurrence with Cloud

Today with the quick coming of the cloud, pretty much every client climate is changing into a cross-breed one. Information consistency across private-public organizations is another worldview. Indeed, even cloud conditions are different today. Application Managed Services in Dubai With different choices accessible in IaaS, PaaS, or SaaS, each business today is settling on the best appropriate cloud choice. What isn't evident is that, with each such endeavor, the activity range of abilities and necessities continues to grow.

Specialized Change Excursion

Today, MSP doesn't just need to deal with the On-Prem Infra yet, in addition, needs to guarantee that each cloud stage for Infra, Stage, or Programming is very much kept up with and coordinated. With Programming characterized by Organization and Security, with omnichannel openness for each application, with reconciliation prerequisites and conceivable outcomes jumping up once in a while, even Oversaw Services Tasks group today should address Specialized Changes as a ceaseless capability as opposed to a one-time Progress action of prior days.

Relationship-building abilities or Association Abilities

With more up-to-date advancements coming up each and every other day, the more established approach of completely in-house IT Tasks group's range of abilities is additionally being tested. Dissimilar to, in prior days, presently even MSP can't keep all fundamental abilities on location and the accessibility of a common pool of abilities from distant conveyance communities becomes basic. Bit by bit the impression of expertise is getting changed, instead of anticipating that a couple of recognized assets should have the expert abilities, presently the assumption is that the MSP will get the significant expertise accessible for help independent of the abilities of the tasks group included.

The assumption for 'Consistently On

With the Pandemic circumstance constraining the greater part of the representatives of any association to telecommute, the Assistance accessibility ruse has changed radically. Presently every client is supposed to have a similar degree of administration 24x7 across all areas, be it office or be it home. This has again raised the Managed  Services' assumptions across the globe and clearly, it won't ever return to the old guidelines.

Reception of Remote Help Model

One of a handful of the great practices which have anyway set in during these Pandemic times is that individuals have joyously consented to distant IT support. For quite a long time, remote help worthiness had been a test in many regions of the planet, however, in post Pandemic ages, I accept it will stop being untouchable. In the drawn-out impact, this pattern will push for an additional full-grown remote-worked Oversaw Services model, carrying genuine worth to Oversaw Services.

Combination of Different Services

Associations are quick to understand that it's in every case great to have one single point for clients for all conceivable IT activity needs and it's great to have all tasks, be it Business Applications, Server farm office The executives, board Room Sound - Video support, UPS The board or in any event, cabling support adjusted to one Activities Group. In spite of the fact that there are benefits and bad marks to this methodology, today numerous associations are viewing the all-encompassing responsibility of IT Activities as one of the vital drivers for development and MSPs are additionally quickly adjusting to this change.

Computerization is the situation

Cost advancement through upgraded proficiency has consistently stayed the greatest assumption from Oversaw Services. However, on the off chance that we think back over the course of the past ten years and a portion of, the concentration for the most part floated around activity mastery. Data Center Managed Services in Dubai Eventually, it came down to dealing with enhancement, cross-skilling, upskilling, episode end, Information base, preparing, and so forth. With the advancement of genuine computerization for oversaw Services in UAE stages now, the impression of IT Activities is quickly evolving. We are investigating executing tasks in a really mechanized manner, the Bot way. Be it the Working environment the executives, Administration Work area, Server farm Tasks, or UI, wherever now there is plausible of genuine computerization and in this manner genuine Expense improvement. This drive will ultimately disrupt all deep-rooted Oversaw Services Activities standards and before long, we will see the steadily changing face of Managed  Services through Mechanization.

     Change is the main consistency as we as a whole say and accept. With time Oversaw Services Practices have voyaged far. With these new changes in Oversaw Services patterns, most certainly Managed  Services Suppliers should develop to a worth conveyance position for their clients. It will without a doubt not be a disagreement the-factory round of ordinary tasks. The MSP should keep on expanding on Innovation Practice, Computerization practice alongside center Cycles and Individuals rehearses. Specialized Skill in the association, Involvement with Oversaw Services subtleties, client centricity, or more all solid drive for development will make the right MSP fruitful in this advancing business sector.

[walkthroughtheword]

Reading for November 16th 

Proverbs 14

Each heart knows its own bitterness, and no one else can share its joy (v 10).

Even in laughter the heart may ache, and rejoicing may end in grief (v. 13).

These two proverbs speak poignantly of the private thought life we all have–those thoughts and feelings known only to us and God. They speak of that grinding dissonance between the outward image we project to those around us and the real person we are on the inside. We all struggle with this, don’t we? We are all, to one degree or another, hypocrites (Greek “hypokrite” for “actor”).

So, when it comes to human interaction, what you see is never what you get. We all have something we are holding back—hurts, fears, inadequacies, sin, doubt. We are all partakers of the insidious corruption of hidden sin and inadequacies and this should motivate us to be more forbearing and forgiving in our interactions with one another.  After all, it is a condition common to all of us.

We must, as Paul enjoined in Romans 12:3, to ��not think of [ourselves] more highly than [we] ought, but rather think of [ourselves] with sober judgment, in accordance with the faith God has distributed to each of [us].”  We must soberly assess our own shortcomings and repent and, when doing so, cut others a little bit of slack and pray rather than criticize. 

Transparency and progressing toward a congruence between our inward and outward selves are worthy and Godly endeavors. We need to be less like a Greek actor (hypokrite) and more genuine, don’t we? The first step towards achieving congruence and breaking free from this dissonance isn’t a social media post to air the “dirty laundry” but rather a contrite spirit before God, realizing He is all-knowing and loves us in spite of all the garbage and is ready and able to change us on the inside so we can be His worthy ambassadors on the outside.  

We need His mercy and grace. And with God as our example, we need to extend mercy and grace to others.

[adelheidvonschicksal]

Ok but like what if hawks got his sweet little intern pregnant on accident? Would he make her abort it? Would he make her keep it and try to wife her up? Or is he just gonna play it off like “oh? Y/n’s pregnant? Huh, wonder who the father is” and ditch her?

original post | part three

I mean my gut tells me he’d take responsibility at least to some degree. He loves freedom too much to try to get married I feel; but given his history, I think he’d at least take responsibility in making sure you two are taken care of financially. He’d come have play dates with his kid and make sure no villains bother you (probably not watch the kid overnight much tbh).

BUT THEN, BUT THEN, THE OTHER PART OF ME CAN’T GET JERK HAWKS OUT OF MY HEAD ABOUT ABANDONING HIS SWEET LITTLE INTERN AND BABY.

You’ll tell him that you’re pregnant with his child (you’re sure since he’s the only one you’ve been sleeping with, the first and only one to ever been inside you, even if it wasn’t all that serious (at least from his end)). He’ll tell you that you can do whatever you want with the kid in terms of keeping it, refusing to believe the child is his, or rather he doesn’t care if it’s his or not. He doesn’t have time for a child, he craves keeping independence as much as possible.

If anyone asks, he’ll say those words, “Oh, (Name)’s pregnant? Huh, wonder who the father is,” and you’ll finally get the hint that he doesn’t want anything to do with you after hoping he’d change his mind. He knows you won’t tell anyone though. You wouldn’t dare try to slander Japan’s number 2 hero when the world is at a place it needs him the most. His sweet little bird wouldn't want to get him in trouble, now would you? So, you’ll keep your mouth shut and quietly disappear for him, right?

Hawks goes years without worrying about it. He doesn’t think much about his old intern. He hired a new one who’s doing well, a boy this time. What kind of hero would he be if he made the same mistake twice.

Speaking of Twice, let’s say around this time he’s investigating the league of villains. Dabi already knows all about who he is, about his spying, about this sweet little girl he has a few towns over. One he abandoned, no different from the awful father known as Endeavor that Hawks idolized growing up. How when he finished killing Hawks, he was going to go for her next and tell her all about the demise of her supposed hero of a father.

Or,

Endeavor telling Hawks that he saw Hawks’ old intern a few weeks back and that she had a child, clearly hinting at something. Hawks laughs it off of course. “Isn’t that what usually happens when someone gets pregnant? It’d be stranger if she didn’t have one.”

Endeavor adds, “Judging by the kid’s age she probably had the child pretty young. Young girls tend to idolize their heroes.”

Hawks also agrees. “Yeah. They sure do, don’t they?”

Endeavor grunting, Hawks should have a relationship with his child before it’s too late, and they start to hate him (next thing Hawks knows, they’ll be slurping soba at him in disdain).

Hawks sighs. "Your age must be catching up with you because I have no idea what you're talking about."

Hawks thinks Endeavor is the last person to scold him about that. All he did is abandon the kid, it’s not like he did something abusive. At worst, it’s neglect. The kid was probably fine. Plenty of kids turn out fine without their father. Hawks thinks he probably would’ve been better off without his own abusive father, and besides you were probably married by now.

After that conversation/almost dying, Hawks can’t help but wonder if only briefly how the two of you are doing. He’ll inwardly scold himself for letting a villain and a man with a family worthy of a television drama make him question himself. He valued himself, his freedoms, his joy, and creating an easygoing life much more than anything else to worry about something like that.

Eventually, Hawks decides to put his spy skills to use in finding you if only to satiate the nagging feeling inside of him telling him to at least see how things are going with you—you know just to make sure you’re not homeless or something.

Turns out, you didn’t move that far away, only a little bit out the main part of the city. Hawks sees you at the park with your daughter and knows right away that she’s his alright. She has a cute little pair of golden-brown gossamer wings coming in. They flutter behind her as she runs around the playground.

He’s so distracted that he barely missed you catching him from the corner of your eye. He’d blame his large wings for making him stick out like a sore thumb, but he knows you’ve always been good at picking him out no matter where he hid.

You hold your lips tight, eyes narrowed. Oh, you’re mad, so mad, but he doesn’t think that you could resist him enough to tell him off. You always had such a cute crush on him back when you were his intern.

Hawks lets out a casual “Hi, (Name), how’s it going?”

You didn't answer, staring at him in silence. It's broken by your little girl running up to you, grasping onto your hand. And oh her little flappy wings are so much more precious up close. He takes this time to note that you aren’t wearing any ring as your daughter begs for you to swing her.

She finally notices him. “Mama, who’s this?” she asks, and the soft pitches of her voice are so musical to his sensitive ears.

"I'm," he starts then he loses his voice as she looks at him. She looks so strikingly like him. Hawks can see all of himself there: the wings, the wavy, wild hair, those little dark triangles in the corners of her eyes, giving a sharp bird-like appearance to them.

Then, he is brought back to reality by you speaking, so much colder than he's ever heard from you in his life, “No one, absolutely no one.”

He's stunned for a few seconds before his lips curve into a lazy smile.

“Ouch, that’s kind of hurtful,” he says. He had said it jokingly, staying well hidden behind that jovial mask of his as you squeezed your daughter’s hand tighter. He even had himself fooled into thinking that what you said hadn’t bothered him because he never had any intention other than sating his curiosity.

Yet he couldn’t deny the tug in his heart when you walk away from him and he sees the miniature version of himself looking back.

[logicalbookthief]

Class Disparity and Narrative Framing

Since a bunch of people liked my tags on this post, I thought I’d expand on this this topic.

I’m hoping we delve more into this once we get a proper backstory for Mr. Compress / Oji Harima, as it seems to be the basis for Harima’s actions in his era.

This was originally going to be just an analysis of how similar characters of different classes are treated by the narrative (specifically in regards to Ch 299) but want to first establish the role that class plays in the story overall.

Let’s start with the Peerless Thief (Oji Harima) and what we know of his ideology.

And his criticism isn’t unfounded. Heroes make a lot of money.  And that’s in addition to the benefits they receive, such as medical care, education, internships. All free of charge. Once you become a hero, you’re pretty much set financially. That’s the main reason Ochako enrolls in UA, because she wants to help her struggling, working-class family.

But why did Harima find this system so unfair? If everyone has an equal opportunity to become a hero, where’s the harm in it being so profitable?

Except. Not everyone can become a hero. That is a fact Izuku had to contend with his entire childhood. For one thing, they need to have a quirk. So this eliminates the quirkless portion of the population automatically.

You need to also have a quirk that is useful in rescue & combat situations (eliminating more mundane quirks / quirks that have drawbacks that outweigh its ability) and a quirk that is marketable to the public (eliminating any quirks that are off-putting or unpalatable to people, such as Toga drinking blood or mutation quirks that aren’t “cute” or “aesthetically pleasing” enough to tolerate).

Essentially, you need to win the genetic lottery to get a quirk that qualifies you for heroism, an opportunity that offers a large degree of wealth and influence. And that’s where we get into the issue of class.

Class is defined as a group of people who share a socioeconomic status; and in BNHA, this is determined not only by birth, but also can be tied to quirks. The socio part is non-explanatory, as Izuku begins the manga showing how not having a quirk caused him to be treated differently by his peers.

The economic aspect of this is more subtle, but it’s started to come into focus with characters like Twice, Hawks and Compress.

Probably the reason Harima called for reform is this: Children inherit their quirks from their parents. Just as they inherit their socioeconomic status. Someone with a quirk that enables them to become a hero will not only pass on this wealth to their child, but also will likely pass on a quirk that would allow the child to pursue a hero career. This is why you see legacy heroes like Tenya, Shouto, etc.

This ensures that wealth remains in the family, generation after generation. Likewise, it can ensure that another family remains in poverty without any chance for mobility. In a sense, it’s the rich get richer while the poor get poorer.

Obviously, you have examples of mobility — Hawks and Ochako are the first that come to mind — but they had/have this opportunity because of their quirks.

Yes, you can still be a hero without the permission of the Hero Commission. Without a license, though, you will a) not be paid and b) be labeled a vigilante, which is the same as a criminal.

As an side-note, because I’m a nerd for words and history— in English, the origin for villain comes from the Medieval Latin villanus, or villa, a dwelling where poor farmers in the village would live. Yeah, that’s right: Villain used to just refer to a person of lower class. If you look at the etymology, many words with these connotations began as words associated with the poor. And in the hands of the aristocracy, they were effectively used to criminalize the poor.

And with that, we’ve circled back to the analysis of characters I promised at the beginning: Thief Takami and Enji Todoroki. Many have pointed out their similarity since Ch 299 was released. Rightfully so!

Both abused their children.

Both isolated their children.

Both of their wives (idk if it’s confirmed Tomie was married to Takami but that’s essentially how they lived) viewed their children through the lens of their fathers due to the unhealthy relationships they had with their husbands.

Both of the mothers were driven to a point where they couldn’t take care of their children, due to either the father’s presence/absence in the family.

What strikes me most in this comparison is how you can’t separate these characters from the issue of class. It permeates every panel and informs our understanding of their situations.

Takami is a piece of shit who blames his child for existing, something this poor kid had no control over. He views Keigo as a burden to him and his freedom and resents him for it. 

The glimpses we get of the house show they live in squalor. A child is an extra mouth to feed, an extra person to provide for. You can’t examine the abuse without acknowledging the role of their nonexistent finances: Thief Takami was literally a criminal so he could get money.

Meanwhile, you have Endeavor, who is also a piece of shit, wrapped in a shinier package. He bought his wife with the intention of making children -- as many as needed -- so he could create the perfect combination quirk. Money was no object. 

Expenses for Rei’s decade-long hospital stay, the nanny/housekeeper to care for the neglected kids, the fact he can so casually decide to build a new house for his family... It is never addressed by anyone in the story, because it doesn’t need to be. Money is no object.

I’m curious as to what class Rei’s family was (and I’m not exactly hopeful we’ll get this info, based on she’s been treated so far) that they agreed to this arrangement. If they were poor, the idea that their daughter would be taken care of financially might’ve enticed them. Hell, the idea that her family would be taken care of financially might’ve enticed Rei. 

Through this analysis, I’ve also realized just how paranoid / concerned the Takamis act in comparison. Thief Takami isolates his whole family out of fear they will sell him out. Tomie is afraid she will be criminalized by mere association and chooses a life on the streets over the risk of going to the police.

Contrast this to how Shouto has revealed his father’s abuse to classmates he barely knew. How Fuyumi mentions in front of his friends who are interning under Endeavor that Natsuo blames their father for Touya’s death; later, Enji admits he is responsible. Remember when Endeavor flat-out told All Might, who was the most influential hero in the country at the time, that he created his son for the sole purpose of surpassing the Number One??

Yet the narrative gives this none of the weight it deserves. Because there are no stakes for Endeavor and everybody knows he will face no consequences for his crimes. The difference is that Takami & Tomie were well-aware that they would be punished if they were caught; while Endeavor & the Torodorkis are well-aware that he would not.

Suffice to say, it is telling that while the narrative has no qualms with condemning Thief Takami for his crimes and abuse of his family -- as it should -- it gives Endeavor the benefit of the doubt and chance after chance to prove he is “worthy” of redemption, even though his victims have never once denied his guilt and they certainly hold him accountable. And the only difference is that one man is from poverty while the other is from privilege.

Anyway, I could say more on this subject -- I would like to touch on how Ochako fits into the class discussion but this got longer than anticipated, so I may have to make a separate post for her -- but I’ll leave it at that for now.

[bettsfic]

Hi betts, how do you separate yourself from your fanfiction works? As in having the mindset that ‘you are not your work’? I feel like I’ve fallen into the myth that positive feedback equates to readers liking me for me, when in most cases I imagine they’re solely interested in my content. I guess I’m expecting too much from fandom members? I just don’t feel like I belong to the fandom if it weren’t for my fanfiction. Thanks for your time.

this is a really great and really big question that for me anyway had far deeper roots in my mental health than i initially recognized. 

even before i found fandom, i strongly conflated love with being of use to someone, and then i would get upset that people used me. all of my relationships were either distant or volatile. i knew that i was the only thing all my relationships had in common, but i couldn’t figure out what i was doing wrong. 

what i was doing wrong was that i didn’t know how to love or be loved. i only knew how to need and be needed. i was defined wholly by my relationships with others; without them, i was no one. i changed everything about myself to fit with the people i was surrounded by. i had no ability whatsoever to see or assess myself. my worth was measured in others’ perception of me. if they hated me, i hated me. if they loved me...actually, i still hated me, because i believed that love was temporary, and it was only a matter of time they saw the “real” me and they would take their love away. it was much easier to mold myself into someone they could love. 

i once told a guy i was dating, i just want to be who you want me to be. and he looked at me like i was crazy, and asked, then how can i love you? 

when i found writing, i didn’t know what love really felt like. i only knew obsession and codependency. i didn’t know how to feel emotions in order to process them, so everything that had ever happened to me was still just sitting inside me, waiting. writing offered me a tool to begin working through the pile. it offered me a means to observe and validate myself, and feel my feelings. 

but when i was first developing a relationship with writing, i put so much of myself into it that i couldn’t help but use feedback as a measure of self-worth. 

i think to some degree, every artist needs a witness. almost everything we write exists to be made public to some degree, and it’s a totally normal thing to want to seek reception. but conflating other people liking you, and by extension your work, with your worthiness to exist, creates a lot of self-suffering.

i remember realizing that i had boxed myself into a corner, and i knew i had to reassess my perspective of myself and my work. i had found myself in the same position you describe, feeling bad because readers didn’t love me, they loved my writing (see: being of use and wondering why people always used me). especially with fanfic, which has so much to do with quantity, 90% of readers don’t even look at the fic writer’s name, let alone kudos or comment. reading is a self-fulfilling endeavor the same way eating is. all of us need stories to live. as writers, we’re just the chefs. when you eat a good meal, you don’t fall in love with the chef. most of the time you don’t even know their name. the food isn’t the chef and the story isn’t you. 

but also, i was, and always had been, disgusted and baffled by people who *did* love me, especially if i felt i had nothing useful to offer them. once, a friend of mine drove like 3 hours to come visit me for dinner, and then drove 3 hours back. for some reason i assumed he was on a road trip somewhere and just passing through. when he told me he had come just to hang out with me, my brain short-circuited. i couldn’t fathom why anyone would want to hang out with me like, for fun. 

after a few years of posting fic, a weird thing happened where a few people did seem to like *me* because of my writing, insofar as they would follow my blog and interact with me and eventually we became friends. there may even be people out there who like me and don’t interact with me. but that idea also kind of weirded me out for a long time, because i kept thinking, who am i? no one. i’m nothing. i’m boring. go read my writing, that’s what matters. 

and then i realized, i could not have it both ways. either i wanted to be seen, or i wanted to go unseen. i was schrödinger’s validation. 

so i think the very simple answer is “learn to love yourself,” but i was so far behind when it came to love, i didn’t know what loving yourself even meant. so i think a better adage is “learn love.” learn what love is, what it feels like, what it looks like. and then turn that definition on yourself and your work. 

i love myself, even when i mess up, even when i’m not meeting my expectations. i love my work, even when it’s bad. when other people love me and my work, that makes me happy. when they don’t, that’s fine, because i still have plenty of my own love left. 

in practicality, for a few years i basically had to constantly chant to myself “what other people think of me is not my business.” a reader’s relationship with your writing is not your obligation to know or control. it’s only your obligation to create the stories you want to tell, and maybe you share them so you can share the love you put into them, or maybe you don’t. maybe you eat the meal you cook, or maybe you share it with someone else. whether they like it or not has no bearing on who you are. it’s all just personal taste.

more importantly, you can’t generate self-beliefs externally. someone’s opinion of you or your work cannot define you, because no one has a wider view of you than you. you are the expert of yourself. it took me a long time to change all of my self-beliefs, or what i’ve come to call “life sentences,” into statements of temporality and priority. “i’m brave” turned into “i value courage.” “i’m bad at directions” turned into “sometimes i get turned around.” every time i’m about to make a sweeping judgment of myself, i try to recast it into something more malleable, because every state of the self is temporary, and i always want to give myself the opportunity to grow.

i won’t lie and say i have a totally healthy relationship with my writing. i still get jealous sometimes, although it’s much briefer and more bearable than it used to be. i still get deeply annoyed by tactless or rude feedback, but i rarely get upset. i *do* get upset when someone sends me a link to a forum or thread of people making fun of me; i think it’s hard to unlearn that. sometimes i still feel the need to defend or justify or apologize for my work. and i definitely still compulsively refresh my comment inbox whenever i post something i’m proud of. but for the most part, i’m in a much better place than i used to be.

currently i’m working on making peace with the idea of publication, that my original work treads a morally risky line that is easily misunderstood, and i’m publishing into a world of mob mentality and cancel culture. and moreover, once a work is published, once it’s out there, it can never go back in. i’m trying to figure out whether i’m confident enough now in my work to still stand by it in ten years or fifty. i’m also freaked out about how anything i publish will outlive me. as someone who has always lived with existential dread, it’s terrifying to think i may write something that could be read in a hundred years, that my voice might live longer than my body. there is a very slim chance of it, but as i’ve mentioned before, i think it’s better to plan more for success than failure. 

i’m not sure if any of this is helpful, but it’s the path i took to get where i am. i wish you the best of luck navigating your relationship with your work. 

my carrd | writing advice masterdoc

[pamphletstoinspire]

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My Top Posts in 2021

#5

St. Joseph, Our Patron of a Happy Death

Man’s necessities and sufferings on earth are many and manifold. One such trial is the lot of all. We all belong to the confraternity of death, just as we all are subject to sin. Death is the sad penalty of sin; no one escapes it.

Death is a hard and bitter lot for our poor nature. Above all it is the end of our corporal, physical life. The intimate union of soul and body that conditions and constitutes our earthly life is dissolved by death. The separation is violent and painful because the body, through weakness and dissolution, abandons the soul and forces it to leave its crumbling dwelling place.

The separation is furthermore a humiliating one because it is a punishment of sin, a sort of execution that separates body and soul, the two guilty associates in sin. The soul is handed over to eternity, the body to the earth, where by degrees it crumbles to dust and becomes something without a name. Death, then, is a bitter trial, a profound humiliation, the most stubborn of struggles, and the keenest of sufferings.

Death, moreover, is not only the end of our earthly life but also the beginning of the life beyond, the entrance into eternity and the commencement of our everlasting, unchangeable destiny, of the nature, greatness, and immensity of which, as regards punishments as well as rewards, we have no adequate concept. Death, finally, is the occasion of our meeting with God, before whom we must appear to be judged, punished or rewarded, justly, strictly, irrevocably, for all eternity.

In a word, to die is a lonely, helpless, and joyless thing. No one of our loved ones can help us. No human hand can penetrate into the inner sanctuary where the last, desperate struggle is being waged. We are alone, all alone. Only Heaven can come to our assistance.

Need For a Patron

At such an hour it is truly an important matter to have a kind patron who will aid and console us, and who can furnish us the means to die a good, edifying, peaceful, and holy death. Hardly a better patron than Saint Joseph could be found, for what deathbed was ever as beautiful as his must have been? All the conditions necessary to render his departure from earth a most happy and consoling one were united there.

The past showed the saint a life of innocence and purity; a life of the most genuine and sublime virtue; a life of untold merit in the service of Jesus, of Mary, of the Church, and of the whole of mankind; a life of labor, fatigue, and suffering, borne in the spirit of patience, of faith, and with the noblest love. This retrospect gave him no cause for regret or fear, but all was full of hope. We learn from his life what his death was. Does not everything combine to render his death not only good, but consoling and even joyful?

Joseph died in the arms of Jesus, his Son and God, and in the arms of Mary; both, especially at that moment, compensated all his endeavors for them with unheard of graces. They were helpers and consolers who not only supported his frail body, but who with powerful, soothing graces refreshed and rejoiced the heart and soul of the dying saint, while the Holy Spirit replenished him with a Heaven of consolation and joy.

The glimpse into the future reveals to our saint his happy meeting with his gloriously risen Son after a short stay in the quiet abode of Limbo, where the saintly souls of the Old Testament awaited their transfiguration; he sees the kingdom of eternal joy, where the Heavenly Father receives his worthy representative and faithful administrator, ministers to him, and sets him over all His treasures (Luke 12:37).

There was something extraordinarily grand and majestic in his departure from life, like the quiet effulgence of the setting sun, which at the end of a day’s work gazes back with rapturous joy on all it has accomplished and quietly sinks to rest in the bosom of God. There exists no more precious masterpiece of grace, no incense more fragrant before the Lord, than the death of a saint (Ps. 115:15).

Seeing Death Anew

Saint Joseph’s death is also a touching and desirable example for us. He can help us to make our death similarly beautiful, and that in a threefold way. First, the example of his passing encourages us not to fear a death in Christ and with Christ, full of faith, hope, and love of Him. The holy protecting powers that hovered near the saint’s deathbed and consoled him are at our command also in the means of grace given us by Mother Church, among these being Christ Himself in holy Viaticum. It was in the shadow of death that Christ had His Cross erected, and now He Himself comes to assist us mightily in our last struggle. With Him and in Him we are to make the last, hard sacrifices. He accepts them mercifully and unites them to His.

Secondly, Saint Joseph helps us to prepare for a good and consoling death by the example of his holy life, which teaches us the proper preparation for dying happily. The last act of our lives must be prepared just as carefully as any other work. Nothing is more certain than death and nothing more important, since at that moment our eternity is decided. Hence it must be prepared for in life and by means of our lives.

Death is not merely the end of life, but the echo of life. Indeed we should not only prepare for death, but should be always in a state of preparation; for death comes soon, quickly, and unexpectedly, and only once. The beautiful life of our saint, his freedom from sin; his pious, devout life; his constant, meritorious self-denial, filled with love for Jesus and Mary, teaches us in what this preparation consists.

Thirdly, Saint Joseph obtains for us a happy, trustful, consoling death by our devotion to him. These pious practices in his honor are so many compacts formed, indeed, in life, but having their efficacious reward and blessing at the hour of death.

Hence, it is well for us frequently to recommend our last hour to Saint Joseph. He will not be wanting in his clients on that important occasion. How happy we shall be to have Saint Joseph close our eyes in death (see Gen. 46:4)!

FR. MAURICE MESCHLER

21 notes • Posted 2021-03-09 17:42:20 GMT

#4

Our Lady of Fatima and the Miracle of the Doves - Feast Day - 5/13/2021

First Miracle of the Doves

1946 was the year of Portugal’s third centennial of national consecration to the Immaculate Conception and it was the first centennial of an identical national consecration in the United States. Just one hundred years before...in 1846...the bishops of America in a conclave in Baltimore dedicated our nation to Mary Immaculate.

On that very day...the first centennial of America’s dedication to the Immaculate Conception...the day on which we had no fitting celebration of our Marian heritage in this nation discovered by a ship which bore her name and solemnly dedicated to her by the first Episcopal conclave...something else was happening in another part of the world.

It was the Miracle of the Doves.

Father Oliveira wrote: "The coming of the statue of Our Lady of Fatima from the Cova da Iria (where Our Lady appeared in 1917) to Lisbon, for the celebration of the third centenary of the consecration of Portugal to the Immaculate Conception, was too extraordinary to be adequately described.

"The statue was carried to Lisbon and back to Fatima on men’s shoulders, the entire way, and in each village or town where it was kept during the night, great crowds spent the entire night in adoration of the Blessed Sacrament, culminating in early Mass and general Holy Communion.

"Before I narrate the story of the doves in detail, I would like to describe the general events that centered around the statue upon its arrival in our capital city, Lisbon.

"It is to be remembered that not many years ago the Catholic Church in Portugal was persecuted. That is why this centenary...this commemoration of the third time that Portugal celebrates a hundred year mark in her state of national consecration to Mary Immaculate... was to be so important. During this past century, not only had Our Lady saved Portugal...but it was in Portugal that She made Her predictions of World War II with Her ultimate promise of World Peace!

"After its long journey (which for the people along the way seemed too short) the statue arrived in Lisbon on the evening of December fifth. Straightway it was carried to the beautiful new Church of Our Lady of Fatima of Lisbon, where it was kept until the vigil of December eighth. Crowds filled the beautiful church to the doors, constantly, day and night. All night long, adoration of the Blessed Sacrament was conducted by several priests. Celebration of Masses began at midnight and in the morning there was High Mass and general Holy Communion. On December 7th, at 3:00 o’clock in the afternoon, thousands of children were consecrated to Our Lady by Cardinal Cerejeira, Primate of Portugal. Finally, at 9:30 in the evening, in a brilliant candlelight procession consisting solely of men that reached almost from one end of central Lisbon to the other, the statue was carried to the cathedral. The passage took three and a half hours, so vast were the crowds.

"After the Te Deum, all the bishops with their mitres and crosiers, regular and secular clergy and great crowds of many thousands of persons, conducted the statue processionally to the square, Terreiro do Paco, where the flag of Blessed Nuno Alvarez Pereiral is annually saluted; there it was placed on a beautifully decorated frigate waiting at anchor in the River Tagus. Atop the main mast on the frigate flamed an illuminated cross, visible for miles.

"On the opposite shore, another crowd was waiting. Soon the statue was again being carried processionally, on men’s shoulders, back to Fatima.

"The scene of the departure from Lisbon was touching. I am sorry that I cannot adequately describe it. The great square, which is capable of holding many thousands of people, was actually illuminated by the number of candles. But in addition, flaming rockets constantly broke overhead and great searchlights wove back and forth across the sky. The crowd, many with tears in their eyes, waved their handkerchiefs and sang the adieu hymn which pilgrims always sing when leaving Fatima. Deep, throaty roars and whistle blasts from hundreds of boats echoed their cries.

"Truly the reception of the statue in the city, and all the ceremonies held in honor of the Lady, Queen-Mother, which the statue represents, are beyond description.

"Now, into this background of the greatness of the occasion, let me tell the incident of the doves, about which the newspapers here in Portugal have spoken so much and which is on the lips of every person in the nation.

"It began in a town called Bombazral, a short time after the statue had left Fatima.

"As part of the ceremony in that particular town, with the streets filled, people were singing hymns to Our Lady and pressing to be near the statue, someone freed four white doves. The greater part of the crowd hardly noticed it.

"After flying off into the air, three of the doves...instead of flying from the great crowd to some roof-top...made several evolutions over the statue and then suddenly, to the amazement of all who saw them, plummeted downwards, and alighted at Our Lady’s feet!

"This was the beginning.

"During the days that followed, midst ever-changing crowds, moving from one town to another night and day for almost two whole weeks, the doves did not leave the statue. They remained there at the very base of the statue, as though vying one with the other actually to stand on Our Lady’s feet. Yet bands played, people shouted, the bier on which the statue was mounted moved and swayed, rockets exploded at night and cascaded fire, while giant searchlights burned at them. They were constantly buffeted by flowers tossed to the statue from the surging crowds.

"But they did not fly. They blinked, shook off flowers that hit them, occasionally stretched their wings to keep balance. But they remained there at her feet during the entire two-week journey. They refused food or drink.

"When the statue was carried into Lisbon, I had the honor of walking at its side as Carmelite Tertiaries bore it triumphantly into the city. I was so close to it, and to the doves, that I could reach out and touch either. Cordons of militia and police were holding back the crowds of many thousands of people who had gone far out of the city to meet this most famous representation of the Virgin, coming for their greatest Marian centennial.

"All during the night of December 5th, in the Church of Our Lady of Fatima of Lisbon, the doves remained standing at the feet of the statue. By now they were more the object of comment than the beautiful statue or the glory in which it was enthroned. The newspapers had been filled with the story of their perseverance, their utter fearlessness, the strangeness of their position. Many must have wondered what would happen...now that they had actually accompanied the statue into the church that had been prepared for its reception, refusing to be brushed off or frightened away.

"The next morning, at Mass, they had their answer.

"The next morning, the doves flew.

"From midnight, Masses were constantly recited at the altar near the statue. As I mentioned in the beginning, the church was crowded to the doors with Lisbonites keeping vigil.

"In the morning, after the many Masses of the night, came the solemn High Mass, which was to be followed by a general Communion.

"During the Solemn Mass, most of the people in the great undoubtedly stopped watching the doves, to which they were not accustomed, to concentrate on the Mass. This was especially true in the solemn moment when the bell sounded, and a great hush fell over the crowd just before the elevation.

"In that moment of hush, there was a sudden fluttering of wings.

"To the utter amazement of all, two of the doves suddenly flew...after two weeks of refusing food or drink and of remaining at the feet of the statue...one sped straight to the gospel side of the altar, and the other to the epistle side! There, as the bishop straightened to raise the Consecrated Host, they alighted and folded their wings...one on each side...as though in adoration!

See the full post

21 notes • Posted 2021-05-12 11:03:08 GMT

#3

Our Lady of Lourdes - Feast Day February 11th - With Prayers

21 notes • Posted 2021-02-11 22:05:18 GMT

#2

The Hope & Despair at Christmas Time

We can all agree that 2021 has been a most difficult year. Some have succumbed to despair, while others are still searching for hope. We experience the tension between the weight of gravity and the lightness of grace. Saint John Paul II was well aware of this tension. “Do not abandon yourself to despair,” he implored us, “We are the Easter people and hallelujah is our song” (Angelus, November 30, 1986). This “song” is appropriate not only for Christmas, but for every day in the liturgical calendar. At the same time, the former pontiff emphasized the critical importance of hope: “I plead with you, never, ever, give up on hope, never doubt, never tire, and never become discouraged. Be not afraid” (In My Own Words).

Hope and despair are opposite poles. Therefore, they differ as day and night, being and nothingness. Despair is not a virtue. It is a concession. It is a moment when a person gives up, calls it quits, surrenders to the dark night of oblivion. No resources are required in order to despair. In fact, despair is the rejection of the resources that are still available to us. Despair is a choice to stop living before our life has finished its course. It is an end, not a new beginning.

Despair is not a solution; it is a temptation. And temptations can be resisted. We sometimes think that hope is what we might expect. Yet, Hope is far more than expectation. We expect the sun to rise each morning. But, if we wake up sick, we hope that we will get well. When our life does not run smoothly, hope enters the picture. The greater the difficulties are that we face, the greater must be our hope. “Hope never spread her golden wings,” Ralph Waldo Emerson stated, “but in unfathomable seas”. In a less eloquent manner, Frank Leahy, former coach of the Notre Dame Fighting Irish, would tell his players that “When the going gets tough, the tough get going”.

St. Thomas More’s encouraging words—“The times are never so bad that a good man can’t live in them”—are never out of season. An ocean of water cannot submerge a ship unless that vessel takes on water. A pandemic of problems cannot cause despair unless a person chooses to take it on board.

During the Christmas Season, joyful carols bring to our ears encouraging words that are ambassadors of hope. The words “God rest ye merry gentlemen, let nothing you dismay. Remember Christ, our savior was born on Christmas Day. To save us all from Satan’s pow’r when we were gone astray” urges us to reject dismay, which is a half-way house to despair. The theme of hope overcoming despair recurs again and again in Yuletide carols. In O Holy Night we sing “Long lay the world in sin and error pining, ‘till he appeared and the soul felt its worth, a thrill of hope the weary world rejoices”. Human beings are remarkably resilient creatures and have survived countless trials throughout history. Laughter, in addition to singing, are effective weapons against despair. They constitute proof that we can rise above our problems. We can laugh at nonsense and sing of hope. We also have community, church, heroes of past and present, great art, and God to assist us in these anxious times.

We survey the moral, political, and even religious landscapes of our era and are tempted to throw up our arms in despair. Our leaders are not leading, our morals are in tatters, and our economy is on a downward slope. The rates of abortion, crime and euthanasia are increasing. Yet, there is alive in us a spark of hope that can be enkindled by God into a flame. Christmas time centers on that hope, which gives us the strength to maintain self-possession, to resist the temptation to despair, and to continue on in spite of life’s difficulties. A Merry Christmas must also be one that is redolent with Hope.

DR. DONALD DEMARCO

26 notes • Posted 2021-12-22 12:19:47 GMT

#1

Christopher Columbus - The Real Story

In popular myth, Christopher Columbus is the very symbol of European greed and genocidal imperialism. In reality, he was a dedicated Christian concerned first and foremost with serving God and his fellow man.

Peering into the future, Columbus (1451-15­06) could not have anticipated the ingratitude and outright contempt shown by modern man toward his discovery and exploration of the New World. Few see him as he really was: a devout Catholic concerned for the eternal salvation of the indigenous peoples he encountered. Rather, it has become fashionable to slander him as deliberately genocidal, a symbol of European imperialism, a bringer of destruction, enslavement, and death to the happy and prosperous people of the Americas.

In the United States, the vitriol directed against Columbus produces annual protests every Columbus Day. Some want to abolish it as a federal holiday, and several cities already refuse to acknowledge it and celebrate instead “Indigenous Peoples Day.”

This movement to brand Columbus a genocidal maniac and erase all memory of his extraordinary accomplishments stems from a false myth about the man and his times.

The so-called Age of Discovery was ushered in by Prince Henry the Navigator (1394-1460) of Portugal. Prince Henry and his sailors inaugurated the great age of explorers finding new lands and creating shipping lanes for the import and export of goods, including consumables never before seen in Europe. Their efforts also created an intense competition among the sailing nations of Europe, each striving to outdo the other in finding new and more efficient trade routes. It was into this world of innovation, exploration, and economic competition that Christopher Columbus was born.

A native of the Italian city-state of Genoa, Columbus became a sailor at the age of fourteen. He learned the nautical trade sailing on Genoese merchant vessels and became an accomplished navigator. On a long-distance voyage past Iceland in February 1477, Columbus learned about the strong east-flowing Atlantic currents and believed a journey across the ocean could be made because the currents would be able to bring a ship home. So Columbus formulated a plan to seek the east by going west. He knew such an ambitious undertaking required royal backing, and in May of 1486 he secured a royal audience with King Fernando and Queen Isabel of Spain, who in time granted everything Columbus needed for the voyage.

On August 3, 1492, Columbus embarked from Spain with ninety men on three ships: the Nina, Pinta, and Santa Maria. After thirty-three days at sea, Columbus’s flotilla spotted land (the Bahamas), which he claimed in the name of the Spanish monarchs. Columbus’s modern-day detractors view that as a sign of imperial conquest. It was not: it was simply a sign to other European nations that they could not establish trading posts on the Spanish possession.

On this first voyage, Columbus also reached the islands of Cuba and Hispaniola. He stayed four months in the New World and arrived home to fanfare on March 15, 1493. Unfortunately, the Santa Maria ran aground on Hispaniola so was forced to leave forty-two men behind, ordered to treat the indigenous people well and especially to respect the women. Unfortunately, as Columbus discovered on his second voyage, that order was not heeded.

Columbus made four voyages to the New World, and each brought its own discoveries and adventures. His second voyage included many crewmen from his first, but also some new faces such as Ponce de León, who later won fame as an explorer himself. On this second voyage, Columbus and his men encountered the fierce tribe of the Caribs, who were cannibals, practiced sodomy, and castrated captured boys from neighboring tribes. Columbus recognized the Caribs’ captives as members of the peaceful tribe he met on his first voyage, so he rescued and returned them to their homes. This voyage included stops in Puerto Rico and the Virgin Islands.

The third voyage was the most difficult for Columbus, as he was arrested on charges of mismanagement of the Spanish trading enterprise in the New World and sent back to Spain in chains (though later fully exonerated). Columbus’s fourth and final voyage took place in 1502-1504, with his son Fernando among the crew. The crossing of the Atlantic was the fastest ever: sixteen days. The expedition visited Honduras, Nicaragua, and Costa Rica, and was marooned for a time on Jamaica.

Most accounts of Columbus’s voyages mistake his motives by focusing narrowly on economic or political reasons. But in fact, his primary motive was to find enough gold to finance a crusade to retake Jerusalem from the Muslims, as evidenced by a letter he wrote in December 1492 to King Fernando and Queen Isabel, encouraging them to “spend all the profits of this my enterprise on the conquest of Jerusalem.”[9] In this, he believed he was fulfilling conditions for the Second Coming of Christ. Near the end of his life, he even compiled a book about the connection between the liberation of Jerusalem and the Second Coming.

Columbus considered himself a “Christ-bearer” like his namesake, St. Christopher. When he first arrived in Hispaniola, his first words to the natives were, “The monarchs of Castile have sent us not to subjugate you but to teach you the true religion.” In a 1502 letter to Pope Alexander VI (r. 1492-1503), Columbus asked the pontiff to send missionaries to the indigenous peoples of the New World so they could accept Christ. And in his will, Columbus proved his belief in the importance of evangelization by establishing a fund to finance missionary efforts to the lands he discovered.

Contrary to the popular myth, Columbus treated the native peoples with great respect and friendship. He was impressed by their “generosity, intelligence, and ingenuity.” He recorded in his diary that “in the world there are no better people or a better land. They love their neighbors as themselves, and they have the sweetest speech in the world and [they are] gentle and always laughing.” 

Columbus demanded that his men exchange gifts with the natives they encountered and not just take what they wanted by force. He enforced this policy rigorously: on his third voyage in August 1500, he hanged men who disobeyed him by harming the native people.

Columbus never intended the enslavement of the peoples of the New World. In fact, he considered the Indians who worked in the Spanish settlement in Hispaniola as employees of the crown. In further proof that Columbus did not plan to rely on slave labor, he asked the crown to send him Spanish miners to mine for gold. Indeed, no doubt influenced by Columbus, the Spanish monarchs in their instructions to Spanish settlers mandated that the Indians be treated “very well and lovingly” and demanded that no harm should come to them.

Columbus passed to his eternal reward on May 20, 1506.

By: Steve Weidenkopf

53 notes • Posted 2021-10-11 15:13:41 GMT

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[ignitification]

I'm glad we could handle this respectfully.

Two questions

Do you think Endeavor will Die in the Future,Like Dabi Kills him?or will he stay alive throughout?

Also I feel like and hope him and Rei Should get a divorce.She should'nt be with someone who's hurt her Physically and psychologically.I think them not being married would be very healthy for them

And In response,People can change but I haven't seen the villians wanna change since they believe they're in the right.you have to want change in order to change.Shigaraki,Toga,Dabi and All for one have shown no signs of wanting to change.this is all my opinion but like They honestly don't wanna change since they believe,due to their pasts,that they're doing the right thing.Dabi has Murdered 30 innocent people,Toga is literally a wanted Serial Who drinks blood like Juice,and Shigaraki Murdered many heroes and ordered his Minions to destroy everything.

Imo,that doesn't look like wanting to change.

I feel like they work well as villians So Horikoshi probably won't redeem them But again I can't predict the future so I'm getting ahead of myself 😅sorry for wasting your time

It was just my two sense

Plus we need to fix hero society but they're doing it in a cruel and hypocritical way

I'd like to address the three points you made in three different sections:

Endeavour probability of staying alive (of which I already talked here, so it will be short)

Rei's involvment with Todoroki Enji

The Three Villains (the three mains) not wanting to change (on which I already hinted at here and here)

Trigger warning: mentions of suicide; violence; self-harm.

1.) Endeavour’s course of life (and action)

To be honest, I think this is the easiest point to address and I’ll refrain from going over and over again the same point. My answer, as before, is no. I do not think that Enji is going to die (refer to the linked before post for a more in depth analysis of why). However, on the question whether Enji Todoroki will still be alive at the end of the manga, I think the answer might be different. I utterly think that where the manga is going so far foreshadows a lot of pain to come. And I’ll let Horikoshi do whatever he plans, but my spider-senses tell me that even if he does survive, Endeavour is unlikely to get a happy ending (or at least a canonically happy one). He will be hold responsible of his actions, and that is the most important thing. As long as he gets on the right path, everything could happen. Especially considering the events of Ch. 300, which might be interpreted as a first step on regaining the real narrative of what went down (and which might be even more cruel than we think) , so this means we are getting at the root of the problem. 

2.) Rei’s involvement in Enji’s life

This, on the contrary, is the most delicate point of the post. Rei is introduced as a 'weak' and heavily mentally abused character. She is confined in a hospital and she seems to be closed in her own world so much she does not notice time passing and stares out of the window trying to make sense of the world. Which, on one hand, I think is very fitting for her, but at the same time I am included to think that this is the furthest thing from what Rei' character is supposed to be.

Rei Todoroki is a victim. But she is not weak. She made her mistakes (of which she is aware of and feels guilty about, but that's for another time because Shouto's scar - mental and facial - is a whole lot deal to unpack) and she had way too much time to think. Shouto never held it against her and now, he, together with Natsuo and Fuyumi helped her to regain the confidence she knows Enji took from her. He closed her off in a hospital to prederve her health, but instead he just took off years of her life from her children and viceversa.

However, I am not sure whether Enji and Rei are still married or separated or divorced or whatever. It seems like on paper they are still together, but there is a rift in their relationship.

I mean, look at this panel: Rei is behind her children, looking at Endeavour like the douchebag he is, and telling him promptly that, this, is not about him and that however he might feel, he is not the victim or the one who needs to be forgiven.

I, personally, have never thought much of her character, besides of her being sick, in hospital and trying not to relapse so hard.

The first time we see her, she looks lifeless. They looks listless. And I can't stress that enough, it is not that she did not try to fight it. But accepting that the trauma happened in the first time is a stress for her mental health. But instead of getting worse, Shouto and her family's presence revitalizes her.

Which beings me to the point made in the last panel. She knows that in his shallow way, Endeavour tried to tell her that he is still there, and while he does not want to impose his presence, he will still wait for her when she wants to.

Funny thing, is that we discover is that she does not want him back. She is done with everything that happened and she is ready to take the reigns of her life back. And in order to do that she needs to wash their dirty landry. And she does not care of how this might affect Endeavour, but instead she wants justice, truth and not tears and excuses.

Rei ia going to fight to have her way. Be it out of Endeavour 's life or inside the life of Touya, time only will tell.

And finally point 3.) The Big Three Villains' on change and saviours

I am very hard trying to get through to everyone out there while I say that change is something that comes to you regardless of whether you want it or not. Shigaraki, Dabi and Toga do not recognise that they might be able to change, and that they might be saved. In their minds, fairly, they do not have to change in order to be eligible for salvation. I already stressed this in my other answers, they should not change in order for them to ‘deserve’ being saved. Maybe they do not even want it. But if the chance presents itself, of them being offered a hand, would they dare to take it? Probably not. And this is not because they are happily wasting their time to kill and fuck around, no. It’s because it’s a mechanism ingrained into their minds: Dabi escaped home after he abused and neglected, Shigaraki accidentally killed his family and then was left to himself, and Toga was deemed weird and creepy and just cast aside as trash. Do you see a pattern here? If yes, well congratulations. It’s a quirk-based society, and since their quirks somehow became synonym to their worth, these individuals were deemed not worthy or villains from the get-go and they just choose to embrace whatever life threw at them, instead of just letting go. And let me tell you, that in their cases, letting go would mean die. They all, in some degree, suffer from auto-destructive and self-harm tendencies, which should be telling enough. And if it not, just think about why people behave this way. Why do people feel the need to destroy themselves? They do because they feel like the pain inside them feels a tiny bit lighter if they externate. Shigaraki told Izuku that as this failed society refused and never forgave him, he won’t forgive anyone in return. He does not care about his crimes because apart from those crimes he commits for a reason, he has nothing else going on. He does not have a family to go home to. He does not have a home. He does not have anything apart from the League, his memories hunting him and the eternal stigma of society labelling him as unsavable.

So excuse me very much when I say that they do not want to change and they might be right. Nothing changed, and nothing changes now. The only hope they have to be redeemed, it’s not for the heroes to forget their crimes, and to enjoy further destruction but to understand that the only way someone can help you is if believe in them. Dabi does not think he deserves to be saved. Toga had hopes which were destroyed right after Hawks killed Twice. Shigaraki put everything on the stake because the kid never knew how to genuinely smile. Let us for a moment think what would have happened to Eri if she did not get saved. It’s not hard after all: the kids of the League are all examples of what happens then.

It’s not because they change that they need to be saved. They need to be saved because they need to change. 

[ririretry]

Afraid Of Succeeding?

During my travels to and from Allentown all weekend, I listened to Emma Chamberlain's podcast, "Anything Goes." She discussed success and creativity, and I never realized how much I resonated with the discussion surrounding the declination of creativity as you become more successful.

Still recovering from overworking in high school, I begin to see how my creativity and stamina suffered throughout my experience. It seems that an abundance of us older teenagers suffer from Imposter Syndrome - in simple terms, you belittle your success and believe that you are undeserving of praise. Students my age, younger, and older often overachieve for our goals and often beat ourselves up to produce something perfect, or else it is not worthy of being presented at all. The cut-throat mindset sets us up for mental exhaustion, also known as burnout.

To an outsider, people consider me successful with my academia and other talents, but I sincerely feel like a fraud to myself. To explain, here is a list of all of the projects I have/have had in my life:

Perler Bead business (mostly made Minecraft stuff) (dead)

Selling paintings (I still do, but I no longer advertise it)

Selling painted shoes (same as above)

Selling custom pinback buttons (dead)

Writing poetry (dormant)

Youtube videos (dormant)

Selling Jewelry (I do not know)

Blog (ALIVE)

I have always had a knack for making trinkets and art while also having to form a business out of it - watching TV growing up, I always observed kids my age becoming entrepreneurs, and I wanted to be a part of that. It was easy getting started, right? I had nothing to lose, or I started creating for my enjoyment without anyone noticing. I gave up because I was succeeding, which sounds counter-intuitive, and it is! Shouldn't I feel more motivated now that things are going well?

Question: Why would I walk away from something that allowed me to make some money while doing something I love?

Answer: I imagined an unrealistic expectation after succeeding, assuming that I need to generate something even better and more unique faster or become the best. I no longer find joy in what I am doing because now I have this self-induced pressure that makes me feel like I am forced to do the thing instead of reminding myself that this is fun!

Concerning our mental health and hustle-culture, this is not new information. That is all it comes down to; the truth is that it is a self-induced trap. With hustle-culture and the media encouraging us to "work hard, play hard," our mental health comes into jeopardy as well. My age feels the need to be the most original and quirky to become the next influencer or gain popularity.

Creativity comes with no boundaries, full autonomy, and, personally speaking, total secrecy.

In the past 5-6 months, I have tried to move away from posting on social media about my artistic endeavors because I am worried and insecure - fearful of succeeding and unsure about myself (not my abilities, but just me as a person). I do not want to fall into the trap of giving up again, so I want to take my time and feel trusting and secure enough to create without pressure to do so.

At the same time, I love steering away from posting online because it forces me to create for myself and not others. In the past months, where I had the entire day to myself, I painted, drawn, read, wrote, and felt terrific. It felt even better knowing that it was on my terms without anyone knowing. Filling up my walls with pen drawings and paintings has given me a sense of pride and confidence in what I can do.

It is easy to care about what others think because thinking for yourself is complex as people throw opinions and beliefs at us at rapid speeds from everywhere. Keeping to myself also forces me to focus on making things for myself and building my brand - whatever that may be - before I step out again.

I think the fate of this blog is hopeful. I am not necessarily using this blog to become the next influencer, more so, allowing me to work on writing and share with whoever wants to read. This blog forces me to get a little uncomfortable and stick with it. Looking back on it, I noticed a pattern of giving up, and in all sincerity, I am not embarrassed by it either. I understand myself more than I did five years ago, so there is no reason to blame myself for something that develops naturally - maturity and a degree of self-awareness.

-Riri :)

[onlinecasinosone]

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Additionally, let us know in the remarks on the off chance that you have any inquiries or questions. One of our agents will reach you instantly and answer your inquiries. Numerous understudies can't apply. The individuals who can't have any motivation to stress. Discover the rundown of required archives from our site and record it. Gather the records whenever it might suit you and visit any digital bistro close to you and present the application structure.

[texxasserialroundup]

Incoming college students.. listen up!

I have been asked about some tips or advice for incoming college students, both traditional and non-traditional, so here it is.. enjoy!

So I am what you call a non-traditional student I did not go to college right out of high school it took a couple years for me to realize that it was important for me to pursue a higher education beyond my high school diploma. My very first freshman semester I took two classes, one of these was a developmental math course ( I ABSOLUTELY LOATH MATH!) and of course I dropped out of college soon after, honestly I don't even think I did like a full month of classes I just stopped showing up. I wasn’t motivated and all I really wanted to do was hang out with my friends and do hood rat shit (LOL)  Fast forward 4 years after that, when I AGAIN decide to get my act together, it took that mixed with having some personal experiences to kind of get my head straight in regards to my future endeavors and what I want to do with myself. When I say that it's hard to do college by yourself, y’all... it is so hard, it doesn’t help that I'm an introvert who doesn’t like to ask for help from tutors because I feel like I am burdening them and I’m worried that I will embarrass myself with dumb questions.  Neither of my parents graduated high school so that was no help with homework or studying and at the time I was going to a Community College and so the atmosphere is not quite like a four-year University. Everybody just kind of stays to themselves so it is not like it is easy to mingle make new friends, there is not a lot of on campus activities and stuff like that so that also made it difficult. But also I did not know how to study, honestly I'm not going to lie to you guys, I'm currently working on my third college degree and I still don't know how to study and sometimes that really kind of like puts things into perspective about our educational system in regards to the way that they teach towards a specific curriculum. I think that teaching students how to study is extremely important. The way that I get through my college classes is a lot of crying, and I am not being sarcastic, that is exactly what happens. I do a lot of crying, there is a lot of frustration, there is a lot of screaming at myself, there is a lot of self-bullying and personal demons that I battle with. I do not feel like I learn like everybody else, I cannot just read something or watch a video and retain information. Everything must be repetitive; I must read it over and over and over, I must highlight things and make up little phrases in order to remember topics like the Krebs cycle. So, it is repetitive, and it slows me down, it is frustrating, and the experience overall is overwhelming. Especially recently with covid a lot of my classes have been online which essentially translates to teach yourself a brand-new topic, good luck, and may the force be with you kind of thing. For people like me who deal with what my boyfriend calls “impostor syndrome” it really rattles any self confidence that I built throughout my college career and it makes me feel like the achievements that I've done so far aren't valid and that I don't deserve the degrees that I have and that maybe it was a mistake . With these things being said I just want to spread some positivity and some good vibes in regards to anybody who is a freshman going into college, a current college student, or a non-traditional student such as myself who feels like they might be too old to go back to school. Everybody is dealing with their own struggles and college is not easy, if it were everybody would have a college degree. Some tips from myself would be not to be afraid to ask questions, if you're like me, I have really bad anxiety and I don't feel like I can bring myself to ask a question during lecture in front of the class so I'll either email the professor afterwards or I will speak to the professor one-on-one during office hours or I'll try to grab her as soon as class is over before she leaves an ask her a question. The reason why I say this is because college moves very fast and the professors honestly it seems like they're not going to put any extra effort into helping you understand a topic if you don't express your confusion or if you don't understand the topic. At the end of the day you're paying for your college education and you need to create self-confidence and remind yourself that you're worthy and that your questions do deserve to be answered no matter how ridiculous they sound in your head no matter if you think that it will sound dumb. I cannot stress enough the importance of getting your questions answered. My second piece of advice is to utilize any type of group study offered, like I said before, I have really bad anxiety and it's hard for me to just walk up to a stranger and ask to be a study buddy. What I've noticed though is that a few students will get together or it will just be one student and they will start a group chat through either GroupMe or through text message or you know through canvas which is the educational platform that my University uses, and it really helps because you still have access to study guides, notes, or if you miss a day you can reach out and ask what you missed. As well as review and go over important topics and information posted. A lot of the times you don't even have to be face to face with these people, all of it is through text messaging or email. Another really good piece of advice is learn how to use OneNote and Google Docs and learn how to use it in a group format so that multiple people can work on one document together in real time so you can watch somebody else edit a midterm review while you're also adding to a midterm review it.will.save.your.life! Just spend a couple minutes, get on YouTube watch a quick tutorial nothing crazy just a quick rundown, y’all, I am telling you it will do wonders. Next piece of advice will have to be not to compare yourself to other students. My first semester of college at a four-year University I went all out on the school supplies, I bought so many journals, I bought so many sticky notes and planners and different colored pens and sharpies and highlighters. I had index cards, I had binders, I had sectional post-its, basically if office depot sold it I had it in my backpack.  I quickly learned that I did not need half of that crap, but when you're excited about going to your first year of college you want to be prepared and if you're like me I watched other people’s YouTube videos about their experiences and things that worked for them and so I tried to pick and choose what I thought would work for me. Long story short it did not  help and I think that really played a big part in my self-loathing in a sense because I would see all these other students super organized with beautiful handwriting, multi colored notes and just over the top every day, never faltering, just like the perfect student it seemed. It's okay not to be super organized, it's okay not to have the perfect notes, it's okay if all of your notes from all of your classes are in one notebook, if it works for you, it works for you.  No matter what that may be, just keep in mind that this is your college journey no one else’s. Finally, I will emphasize to invest money in a good backpack. Like do not take the backpack from high school with you, I did that, and it was a disaster honestly. It is like my dad used to say growing up, “you get what you pay for.” You are going to be carrying a lot of stuff, probably a tablet, a laptop, textbooks, journals, binders, you name it and you need support for your shoulders, for you back and for your neck. I say this from experience, my college campus is one of the largest public universities in the state of Texas, it takes me 20 minutes to get from my car to the campus, once on campus, I have another eight minute walk to get to my first class. So, it is detrimental to me and my physical health to have a good backpack with support that holds everything and equally distributes the weight correctly. I know this sounds crazy but that is probably the one thing besides getting a good laptop that I would invest a lot of money in. Lastly, I will leave you with this, college is a scary experience for many people and right now we're in very uncertain times which only adds to the stress, but I want you to know that there are resources out there for you and other students and faculty who are more than willing to work with you and accommodate accordingly. Please do not be afraid to reach out to anybody for any type of assistance whether it be academic, mental or physical help, we are all in this together. Be kind to one another and stay curious. -SLR

[everlarkficexchange]

Unmasked ~ Twenty-Two

Written by: ~ M ~

Prompt #88

Rating: E (Explicit) This fic will contain consensual sexual content; mild language; discussions of injuries, illness, and amputations in a historical setting; discussions of miscarriage; discussions of minor character suicide; references to non consensual sexual situations; minor character death. 

My thanks to the moderators of @everlarkficexchange for always running an entertaining event, and for playing along with a little fun and mystery. 

Dear readers, we continue with our game. I thank you for allowing me to write and share with you from behind a mask, for embracing this story wholeheartedly despite not knowing my identity. Remember, learn my name, you must use the clues in each chapter starting with 21 until the end to hunt for a word in the text of each chapter itself. Gather the words, hold onto them, for they will provide the final clue to the puzzle. 

Please enjoy the twenty-second chapter of this adventure. I apologize for the length of this one, but it could not be helped. Previous installments can be found here. Regards,

~ M ~

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

~~ Chapter 22 ~~

Miss Everdeen,

I cannot even pretend to understand what you must be feeling right now. I am certain none of it is charitable towards myself nor towards my relations, and I could not fault you for thinking so. I can only apologise a thousand times and hope that given time, your thoughts and feelings towards me might change, might soften perhaps.

I scarcely know what to write, an unusual predicament for me. I so rarely lose my way in words and yet today, I stumble through them like a fog, flounder in waves of them which I could not hope to swim.

~~

“Oh these are lovely,” I say softly, grasping several beautiful, vibrant orange dahlias by their stems, lifting them from the basket Mrs. Walters, our gardner, brought in earlier. Tonight is the final evening of the Harvest Festival. The sun shines still, though it now begins to sink inexorably towards the horizon, eventually to drop out of sight and bringing the day to a close, having warmed the earth for most of the day and yet making no progress in drying the land of the rain that doused it for the past day and a half.

I am swimming, swimming, swimming in months old words and move the flowers through the air, slowly towards the ivy crown in my lap. I imagine the petals of the blooms parting the cool, clear waters of the words I have now memorised, I read them so many times this afternoon.

~~

Your distaste today at the idea of marrying me was quite evident, although perhaps not unsurprising. Yet I hope to change that, to convince you that I am not a monster and am perhaps someone who could be worthy of your regard at least. I do not expect to do so with this letter. I can only hope that it is a start.

Perhaps I may be a bastard by birth, but I endeavor to live my life in such a way that I am not one in behaviour, in actions. Sometimes, I fail, most grievously. I failed several nights ago.

~~

Madge laughs, twisting the stem of a pink flower through the ivy in her hands and showing the work to Maysilee. Prim helps Delly with twisting her own length of ivy into a crown. It is a custom to wear such flower crowns on the last day of the Harvest Festival at Everdeen. I had almost forgotten about it until Madge had asked. Now we sit on the verandah, a circle of ladies seated around us, our dresses soft islands of colors with flowers and bits of green strewn between us. 

~~

If you are reading this, then it means I have already made my confession and you know, or rather I have at least told you, that it was not Robert you met at the masquerade but me, the lowly bastard son who then proceeded to prove himself to be one indeed.

I console myself that what I did, I did to protect my brother, and indeed that is true…to a degree. For some time now, the Marquis has been after Robert to marry – someone, anyone, so long as she were acceptable in the Marquis’ eye. He feared his youngest son becoming an itinerant bachelor and leaving the line only to Ethan to continue. You know already of Henry and Angelica’s plans to only adopt children, and of Ethan’s large number of daughters and single son. What you may perhaps be unaware of is that Ethan has already announced their intent to have no more children. As a bastard, I do not count, which leaves Robert responsible for the spares.

How cold and terrible we must seem to you, my sire already planning out your future, and you would be right to feel such fury. The Marquis, in all his infinite kindness, saw fit to lay some of the blame for Robert’s elopement at your feet. He had such hopes that you might snare his son and then when you did not…well he arrogantly assumed the fault must lie with you rather than his own precious son, where it belongs.

~~

Six orange dahlias adorn my crown. Six bright blooms of irrepressible hope. My mind accepts that the recent weather may make a return home impossible for Peeta. The post did not even arrive as expected today. And yet…I hope. He promised me, and while I would not wish him to come to harm in keeping his promise, I desperately hope he is able to do so safely.

~~

In some ways I wonder if The Marquis almost meant to punish us both in forcing the issue. You for not securing Robert’s undying love, me for not seeing the superficial nature of his interest in you. I’ve no way of proving it so I shall let it go and endeavor to make the best of the situation in which we find ourselves.

You already know that I myself had reservations about Robert courting you. My primary misgiving being that his affections seemed stronger than yours. You are already aware of my concern that you selected him for his purse. 

Here I must confess my motives to be already muddled, before you even so much as smiled at me that night. I believed his courtship of you to be real. I believed him to be falling in love with you. I believed it with great conviction until the moment his valet confessed to Robert’s whereabouts. Although the poor man did not know with whom Robert had eloped, I had my suspicions. We all did, and it turned out that we were correct. But that night, before I knew for certain, I could not help but wonder…had my perceptions of my brother been so wrong? Had my own interest in you hindered my ability to discern his feelings? Or had he eloped with you? We could not be certain and needed to ascertain the truth.

I arrived at the ball that night, intending only to converse with you, if you were even present, to distract you long enough to make you believe Robert still in town rather than already several hours on his way to Northwest Panem, and then to leave you. In that way, it was hoped that you could not cry foul before we could recover him, bring him home, and convince him to honor instead his courtship of you…or we would know that he had eloped with you, which while not the ideal wedding the Marquis had in mind, would be better, to his way of thinking, than the alternative.

I did not wish my brother humiliated and cut off from the family. I wished him happy, and if he were eloping with the person I suspected to be his partner… then I was no longer certain that I wished to stop him, for both their sakes. I knew them to be in love once, for many years. Perhaps I had been mistaken about his feelings and he was in love with her still. If not, I hoped that perhaps both of you had been taken with love for one another and chose to elope. Foolish, perhaps, but at least then you would not be hurt. In this way, my motives were at least in some part altruistic.

~~

I sit in a chair as Mary brushes through my hair and asks how I wish it styled for the night.

“Unbound,” I tell her and she smiles.

“Like a pagan goddess of old,” she says with a nod. “You glow like I expect one of them might. Mr. Mellark will be knocked clear off his feet when he sees you.”

I relax into the brush strokes and swim in the words, letting myself sink into their depth. I do not ask her which Mr. Mellark she means, for there is only one who matters.

~~

But that does not change the fact that I was partially dreading seeing you but more so…hoping to see you. If my motives were at least partly altruistic, there were parts of them that were not, that were utterly selfish. 

Prior to the masquerade, I had believed your feelings towards my brother to be rather tepid and based more in finance than the heart. My own feelings were more complicated and so I had chosen to ignore them, perhaps to my own detriment. I convinced myself of the wholeness of my motives when in fact… they were not. I found myself almost hoping that Robert had truly eloped with his longtime love…perhaps then he might have a chance at a loving marriage and I might have a chance to spend more time in your presence without conflicting emotions of protecting Robert and being enchanted by you. Without him present to necessitate my lurking in the shadows unwanted.

This knowledge will likely do nothing to soothe the sting you yourself must be feeling today. I apologise if I seem callous, I mean only to explain why this happened, in the hopes that one day it will be enough to help you heal from whatever wounds my brother and I have caused you.

~~

“There,” Mary declares, stepping back so that we both might admire her work in the mirror. My unbound hair falls in gentle waves over my shoulders and back. She has braided two small sections from my temples to the back of my head, then woven those together, a means of keeping my hair from my face. “Beautiful. Now for your dress.”

I stand from my seat and lift my arms to don the dress she holds for me. We work together to arrange fabric and layers until I am satisfied and able to slide my arms into the snug sleeves. This dress laces in the back and so I stand still as she works.

~~

One part of me wished only to serve as a distraction, a shield for my brother until he could return to you. And the other part of me… the other part of me recalled the swift wit of your words as you sat distressed in the mud, the worried response of your household when you were safely returned, the clear way everyone around you admired and cared for you, and the pert way your nose turned up when you sneered at me and reminded me of my manners. The spark of your spirit and the fire in your eyes. That part of me which remembered the bite of pepper in tea, the proud defenses of a woman forced into a less than ideal situation, but who would not be cowed by it, and the grace with which she set about attempting to determine her own fate as much as possible…that part of me which could not forget you nor the way I felt in your presence had been odious and admittedly envious of his own brother, for that brother was able to court you when I wished to and could not. 

Although as the masquerade continued, I began to suspect his feelings for you to be significantly less than what I had previously thought, and yours for him to be more. I found myself facing a new, and perhaps in many ways worse conundrum. Now I faced the likelihood that I was complicit in your broken heart and shattered hopes, a possibility that now seems confirmed in your reaction to our betrothal. 

A true bastard at last.

~~

The final touch is placed upon my head. A woven crown of green ivy and orange dahlias. Turning towards the mirror to examine the effect of my appearance, I laugh as Prim and Madge and Maysilee make sounds of appreciation from the sofa where they have crowded, all awaiting the completion of my toilet apparently.

“Should you not be getting dressed?” I ask and they shake their heads.

“Pointless.”

“You outshine the stars, Katniss.”

“And you will surely outshine all of us.”

Maysilee agrees that I am beautiful, declaring that my smile is made of the stars. 

I scold them ineffectually, for I am smiling like a loon, and send them scurrying, all of them giggling like girls. Then I take one more look in the glass, hands flat on my stomach as I caress over my belly. Nerves and pregnancy sickness turn my insides to crashing waves and roiling surf, yet I cannot help but think that somehow, this would have happened anyways.

~~

Then the worst thing happened. You smiled at me. Flirted, and it was like a crack of thunder across my skull. Somewhere between your fan on my chest as you scolded me for being late and the garden steps, I lost my way completely. I lost my way in your eyes and your smile and forgot my reason for being there. I meant to pretend to be Robert, to lie to you, to keep myself distant through a mask of pretend identity… and then I forgot how. I forgot even my reason for being there with you.

I could not now distinguish for you which moments during that night I consciously attempted to emulate my brother and which moments I forgot entirely what I was about other than simply enjoying the company of an extraordinary and exquisite person. And Katniss…you are extraordinary and exquisite. If I had any hope of escaping your effect, it was destroyed that night. 

I forgot to guard my own heart and selfishly took pleasure in the freedom of wearing a mask. That night, I gave of myself, safely hidden from you. Only myself set before you with my brother’s name as a shield from your censure, and I enjoyed the freedom to act around you as I had long wished to, as well as enjoyed your response to me immensely. I convinced myself even as you opened to me that I acted as a man besotted with you and courting you would do, and you gave so willingly and openly of yourself. I could not bring myself to turn away from you. For the first time in my life, that night, I was glad to be a near twin copy of Robert.

Until your simple remark informing me that my brother had proposed to you only that morning brought me straight back to reality and condemnation. I was reminded of the true nature of our connection. The impossibility of it because I had misled you, and my brother had already proposed to you, which I had no knowledge of until you told me, then fled with another. I was reminded that anything I believed I saw in your eyes, heard in your voice, or felt in your kiss, was not meant for me. And still, bastard that I am, I claimed one last kiss for myself, though it may console you to know that I regret that last kiss far more than the others, for it was truly false.

None of what I told you that evening, however, was an intentional falsehood, save for my allowing you to continue believing me to be my brother. In no way do I expect my honesty now to absolve me of my perfidy then. It is all so confusing even to me that I expect it shall make me appear even more loathsome in your eyes, but I am willing to pay the price of my actions. Indeed I already have begun to do so… 

~~

The evening air grows chill and I am grateful for the heavy stockings I chose for tonight, the woolen dress and the thick shawl tied about my shoulders. I order torches lit, lining the lane and the courtyard, flanking the stable doors. The recent rains make both fires and Peeta’s return unlikely, and yet… I have hope. Should he manage to return, I would have his way home illuminated, clear in the night. I gaze down the lane, empty and shadowed but glowing with warmth. I imagine it beckoning him home, to Everdeen, to me.

When the task is done, I join the festivities, standing on the fringes and letting my eyes roam over the heads of those already assembled.

There is laughter and music, dancing and food piled high on trenchers. The refreshments slowly dwindle as the day progresses into night. Casks of cider and of ale are emptied and replaced with fresh ones.

~~

… For the way you looked at me that night, the way you spoke to me… it was how I have always imagined a lady in love or one who has just begun to fall in love to look. It was something I craved to a frightening amount, and from you, it was heaven to me. 

But it was not meant for me to even see, certainly not for me to receive. You laid your heart out for the man you believed yourself engaged to, and I did not correct your misconceptions. I was a thief that night, and it was all that I could have wished for. You drew me in deeper until I was drowning in my lies and your lips, with no will to end it. My weakness, my fault, and it is now my burden to bear how selfishly I accepted what I desired from you, encouraged you to give more, when none of it was mine to receive. In receiving it under such false circumstances, I know I may lose every chance to truly deserve that very look I so crave from you.

~~

Jo partners with a buxom widow and sends us a lascivious wink. Sir Robert obliges every woman and girl left lingering unpartnered. He even manages to dance with his wife several times. She smiles prettily and surprisingly has him laughing with great mirth. Perhaps they will sort out whatever issues plague their own marriage. For Delly’s sake, I hope they do.

I stand along the fringes of the crowd, laughing with Madge, with my sister, even with Delly as we observe the dancing between their own partnered turns about the floor. It is a constant tide, an ever changing sea of faces. While the three of them are swept into the dance repeatedly, I decline all offers. My partner has not yet arrived.

~~

And yet… I have hope. I will do everything in my power to deserve your regard. I will wait, whether you read this letter and answer it or not. I will endure whatever lectures you aim at me, for I truly deserve them. The mending of your heart need come first before there can be so much as a drop of trust between us. I understand this, and so I will wait. I will wait, and I will hope to see that expression in your eyes again one day, meant for me this time, with no lies or masks between us. I already know that it will be worth every second of the wait.

Yours,

~Peeta~

~~

At first reading, his letter gave rise to such boiling fury. Yet it passed within a blink, leaving me clutching the letter and reliving the past with new eyes. Not quite nostalgia nor longing but rather, a sort of acceptance. He cannot change the Marquis or Robert. He cannot change the past, nor can I, but we can affect our future together in the choices we now make. I choose now to not allow the past to poison our future.

I wish to stretch the day into an unending bow of orange, to give my husband more time to return to me. The sun cares not for my wishes. It persists in sinking from the sky. The last of the light fades. Maysilee and many of the other children are sent to bed, protesting the whole way that they are not tired, begging for one more treat or one more dance.

With night upon us, I clap along to the songs, smiling at Madge when she returns from seeing Maysilee put to bed. She partners with Jo and laughs joyously. The night wears on, inexorable towards midnight. But with each dance that ends and brings no sign of Peeta, the more I worry. It grows late and dark, the roads that are questionable in the light, are treacherous at night. 

“The night grows late,” Sir Robert says, standing beside me and echoing my own thoughts, offering a mug steaming with cider. A peace offering, perhaps, or an acknowledgment of what we share right now, worry for someone we both love. For Peeta.

“Thank you,” I murmur and accept the mug. It cannot hurt to be polite, although I am still leery of him.

“You do not dance, Mrs. Mellark?”

“I do, if there is an agreeable partner.”

“You wait for my brother,” he says. I drink my cider and hope my cheeks do not reveal my blush. Am I so transparent then? Perhaps it is the orange flowers in my hair, or perhaps how my eyes are continually drawn in the direction of the house and stables, where Peeta would be coming from. “He may not return tonight.”

“I can wait. It will be worth every second of the wait.”

“Perhaps, but even if he does return tonight…he does not dance. Not since…” Not since he lost his leg. I lift my chin and stubbornly ignore Sir Robert’s words. For I know that as long as the conditions are right, Peeta can and does in fact dance. He will dance with me. 

“I cannot abide a lady sitting idle when there is dancing to be done.” I mutter a protest as Sir Robert removes the mug from my hand. I reach for its warmth and instead find my fingers within the grasp of his gloved hand. With a broad smile, he pulls me onto the floor. I’ve no idea where my cider disappeared to, and rather resent his presumptions.

He twirls me once, into line with the other women. Leevy Webster smiles at me and comments on what a fine night it is for dancing.

“Yes,” I agree, wondering how rude it would be to storm from the line right now, but the music starts and I’ve no choice but to dance. I attempt to scowl at Sir Robert and remain above all of it. 

I nearly succeed.

But the laughter about me as I progress through the steps proves infectious. I am smiling by the end of the dance, although ready to make excuses.

“I insist, Mrs. Mellark! At least finish the set. You should enjoy the evening and the company of so many happy tenants,” Sir Robert declares. “Surely your husband would not wish you to deny yourself such simple pleasures on his account!” The music precludes any argument as the dancers change partners and the music begins anew.

We dance, and before I know what is happening, I am enjoying myself. Sir Robert is relentless in spreading cheer, it would seem. When the dance finishes, he insists I stay for another with a new partner. Then another.

“The last for me,” I tell him when he once more claims me as his partner and he concedes.

“Only because you are smiling at last, Mrs. Mellark.”

It is a rather vigorous dance this time, with much bouncing on our toes and changing of partners, spinning about until I am breathless and dizzy. A strange darkening occurs on the edges of my vision. I lose my balance right at the end. Sir Robert catches me and Madge hurries over as the last notes fade, met with applause.

“Here, come sit,” Madge urges and guides me through the crowds.

“Is she alright?” Sir Robert asks. I hear other murmurs and Madge sending Leevy to fetch my mother.

“I am fine,” I insist. A cold glass is handed to me and I am ordered to drink. I sip slowly as my heart rate returns to normal and my head ceases to spin. “Is that expected?”

“Not unheard of, darling,” Mother whispers and brushes back some of my hair.

“No more dancing then,” I say to scattered chuckles. At least not for me. The music plays on, and other couples dance. Someone requests Madge as a partner and I insist she go. Mother leaves, needed by someone else, only after assuring herself that I am no longer dizzy. I finish my cold cider and hand over my cup to be cleaned. 

My father sits with me for a few minutes and while I am glad of his company, a melancholy still creeps in. He takes my hand in his and does not offer platitudes, only offers silent companionship and understanding. His acceptance of my fears, the fact that he does not dismiss them, makes them more manageable. So when he kisses my temple and is drawn to the floor with my mother again, I am able to happily let him go.

So happy they are, my parents. So in love, even after all their years together, a finely tuned pairing as they move and act in easy harmony. Like the winds and the currents.

As the hour draws close to midnight, I wander through the crowd and am overcome with a need for quiet, for a moment alone. The stables, I decide and make my way up the slight hill to their warmth, snatching two apples from the trestle tables as I go. I have been neglecting Sagittaria.

The torches cast a cheery glow about the stables. As soon as I enter, Sagittaria huffs and comes to her door, lifting her head over it and whickering at me.

“Yes, my darling, I know,” I say and present her treat. She huffs into my palm but accepts the apple. I murmur to her as she eats. “It is inconvenient, this being with child, everyone concerned for me. You would not throw me, would you my darling? Just a short ride would do us both a bit of good.”

She snorts and I sigh.

“Except your mother would have my hide. Then yours. Then Sagittaria’s, and if anything were left of any of us…” I turn slightly at the sound of Jo’s voice. She brushes the coat of a nag used often for chores around the farm. Of course I haven’t got the stables all to myself. I should have known better than to come here, although I wonder at her working so late rather than enjoying the festival.

An equine nose pushes against my arm and I turn towards the gentle brown eyes staring at me expectantly, almost accusingly.

“Oh Cicero, no need to stare at me so. I brought a second,” I say and produce the second apple. “In truth it was meant for Diablo but we shan’t tell him. I like you better anyways,” I whisper and run my hand over his dappled coat, up and down his nose, between his brows and then up to his mane between his ears as he munches. Johanna coughs and I gasp, spinning as soon as Cicero has finished his treat.

“Why did you not say something?”

“It was amusing to see how long it would take you to figure it out, Kitten.”

“Where is he?” I ask, and wonder that I did not see him at the festival. Why he did not come to me. Cicero has been cared for and safely stabled which tells me he has been home for some time.

“Oh that information has a price.”

“Johanna!”

“He’s with that dandified prat of a brother of his and neither of them seemed too happy to see one another, if you catch my meaning–”

“The point!” I shout. 

“I can’t leave this poor nag untended to eavesdrop on them, but I want to know if and how Peeta has finally let his brother have it.”

“Done,” I agree without thinking it over. 

He is home. Here, safe, with me. Finally. And that is all I care about right now. In a moment I will be in his arms. I can see his smile, hear his laugh. Oh heavens, I will be able to kiss him.

“They were headed towards the house,” Johanna says, the words barely out of her mouth before I break into a run. A mad dash across the courtyard. Into the house as I shout his name to no answer. Our rooms are dark and unoccupied, almost eerie. The drapes dance in the cool autumn breeze from the open window. Embers glow in the grate, the only source of light, and fresh wood stands sentry, ready to become a hearty blaze when someone returns. But there is no sign of Peeta.

Confused, I return downstairs. Perhaps he wished a bath before joining me. Yes, that must be it. He wanted to refresh himself after a long journey. I slide through the kitchens on my way to the bathing room, halting when I hear the murmur of voices coming from outside. I move towards the door leading into the vegetable and herb garden meant for the kitchen staff’s use. Two torches glow on either side of the door, turning the glass in the windows to prisms of midnight and orange, a macabre dance as I pause with my hand on the lever, finally able to distinguish the raised voices.

“You are complaining? What could you possibly complain about?” Sir Robert asks.

“You caused a mess, and I was left to patch it up!” Peeta answers, true anger in his voice.

“Please. You’ve no room to complain. You’ve somehow come out of this whole mess smelling like a rose. Everyone on this estate thinks the sun shines out your ass.” My hand flies up to my mouth at Robert’s coarse language and embittered tone.

“Again, you caused this mess. At least accept responsibility for your actions–”

“I am not asking much!”

“Ask the Marquis. You were always quite skilled at charming both funds and forgiveness from him.”

“Father has refused. Repeatedly. So have Ethan and Henry. My charms seem to have run out with them. You are all I have left, Peeta.”

“So you crawl here to beg as a last resort.”

“It is not as though you are struggling. Peeta, please. We are brothers. You suffer, I suffer with you, remember?”

“That agreement has always been lopsided.”

“Not by my fault, it hasn’t! You never complained about it before!”

I shift my position, closer to the window, dangerously close. A heavy sigh reaches my ear and through the fractured light, I finally see him. My heart hammers in answer. Air rushes in and out of my lungs as I gasp silently for it. I remove my hand from my mouth, for it makes my breathing louder.

He looks tired but well. His hair is windblown and wild, his cheeks and ears scorched red by the cool autumn wind. He wears no hat and I cannot see down past his shoulders. Despite all that, despite the unfamiliar grim expression on his face, I would know him anywhere. I now know what Delly meant when she said she could always tell the difference. I drink him in, even the stern look on his face, the livid clench of his jaw. “Fine.”

“Thank you,” Robert says with great relief. “Truly, it is a relief to know I can still, always rely on you. It has been terrible! Exiled up north with nothing to do for months, no diversions or entertainments, not so much as a race track for a bit of sport. Then being summoned back home with no notice. Dresses cost a fortune, did you know, and Delly had nothing suitable to meet Father and Mother as my wife. I had to see her completely made over! Father lecturing me at every chance and ordering me about like I am still a school boy. Mother has been worse than Father, if you can believe that, crying every time I walk into a room as though I were dead, not married. Oh and Father is pissed beyond reason with you. He thinks you are avoiding him.”

“How intuitive of him,” Peeta sneers. “I am avoiding him.” 

“You’ve got to show your face there sometime. But I digress. De Vale became insufferable. We had to leave, but there is only so long one can impose upon friends. And I promised Delly to send Elijah to school in England, if I could, which I can’t. I’d no idea how much it would cost! You’ve no idea what it’s been like, not knowing where the next meal comes from or if we shall even have a roof over our heads for the winter, always depending on someone else’s charity. She can barely find any work with all the jaunting about the country we’ve had to do. All the while, you sit here on your fat happy farm with your lovely wife, all comfortable and warm, so I can see why you avoid home, but it can only last so long. I swear this is the only time I’ll beg money from you and… Peeta?”

He stops speaking and I already know why. Robert’s words so carelessly uttered. A dark shadow has fallen across Peeta’s face, because it is Robert who has no idea.

“You think I’ve no idea what that’s like? Being poor? Cast out of my home? Starving? Desperate? Bounced from one temporary residence to the next? Depending on the charity and goodwill of another.” He says the last two – charity and goodwill – as though the words taste foul. Perhaps they do. Perhaps they were made to taste foul by his own kin.

“Well…” Robert fumbles and Peeta silences him with a shake of his head.

“We share features, Robert. A sire, a date of birth separated by two years. Not a history, not our childhoods. I come from a different life than you. What the hell do you think life was like in that year for me? For my mother?”

“Yes, I know. I’m sorry, I just…forgot.” Robert tries to laugh it off, but the sound is rather hollow.

“Forgot? Christ. I suppose you forgot that you proposed marriage to Katniss only that morning when you chose to elope with Delly that very same day. How did you plan on keeping two wives if you cannot even manage the one?”

“Are we back to that then?” Robert moans and heaves a great sigh. Peeta begins to pace as they trade rapid barbs.

“We never finished with that.”

“Are you not the one always telling me to follow my heart?”

“That was when I thought you had a decent one!”

“Delly still loves me at least. It can’t be all bad.”

“For the moment. She’s optimistic, not stupid. Eventually you’ll cock that up too.”

“Now you sound like Father.” Even I shrink from the words, knowing they are the worst insult Robert could fling at Peeta.

“As much as it pains me to admit it, the old wanker can’t always be wrong, now can he? You ran off with her and left another waiting for you.”

“You benefitted! Why are you complaining?”

“Because you broke her heart!” I gasp and snap my mouth shut, sitting silent and stunned. Faint sounds of the festival hover in the silence. Peeta cannot believe that.

Robert clearly does not, but then…he already knows. He laughs with no mirth and they shift so that now I see his face instead of Peeta’s. “Where the devil did you get that idea?”

“From Katniss,” Peeta says, sounding defeated and I shake my head. Words of denial fill my throat, and I hold them tight within.

“Really? Do we speak of the same Katniss? The one who informed me that she did not seek love, just a financially secure marriage with a halfway decent man. Not even a title, she swore. Just the security that matrimony could bring. Not exactly words to swoon over, and yet I proposed anyways–”

“And then eloped.”

“Yes, well–”

“Why even propose?” Peeta asks something I am suddenly very curious about myself.

“I was getting desperate!”

“For what? Surely not Katniss. You would have stayed, had that been the case!”

“For Delly! She stopped answering my letters!”

I nearly fall over. He couldn’t possibly mean what I think he does. No one is that selfish, that obtuse. And here I thought to perhaps forgive him.

“You proposed to Katniss to make Delly jealous.”

“Yes. No… Perhaps.”

“Which one is it?”

“Come on now, man. Father was up my ass to get married already. It was a last ditch effort. Marrying Katniss was not such a terrifying prospect. It would not have been a travesty if I had. She was desperate herself, just as you had warned me. She would have the funds and security she sought, I’d have Father off my back… And if it brought Dells around instead–”

“You’re despicable.”

“I told you I was desperate. I was not thinking clearly!”

“Fucking hell. Then at least make it worthwhile. You caused a nightmare. Why wouldn’t you at least withdraw the announcement before you left with Delly? It had to be you. No one else would have run that drivel and called it romantic.”

“Withdraw the…? Oh shite. I forgot.”

“You forgot? You forgot that too? You careless piece of–” 

I blush at the curse words that pour from Peeta’s mouth then. Oh my. I suppose it is not entirely surprising. The man did spend several years as a soldier, and at some point he lived on the streets with his mother. Their words now fly fast and thick, nearly overlapping one another and making their voices difficult to distinguish.

“How could you play so loose with the hearts and feelings of others? Have you no shame at all?”

“Would you cease lecturing me?”

“I will not! You are in need of a good lecture! Damn I wish for some of your forgetfulness! I wish I could forget we were related!”

“You don’t mean that. What’s really up your arse?”

“I wish I could forget the look of devastation on Katniss’ face when she found out you had eloped, and not with her! I wish I could forget that she was in love with you and may very well still be! No thanks to you, prancing and flirting with her tonight!”

“Now you’re mad! Stark raving mad! What made you think she loved me? I told you it was to be a cold, contract marriage.”

“The way she acted and looked at me – at you – at the masquerade. How could she be truly happy with the bastard when she could have had you? How am I supposed to earn her love…with you popping up to remind her of what she lost!”

For a moment they are silent, and I am grateful for the respite. I can piece it all together now. Peeta’s reluctance in so many instances, the meaning in his letter the day we were betrothed, his insistence on a courtship even after we were married. His reluctance to see his family. How many reasons he had for such things to begin with, and now I add another.

He thought me in love at the masquerade… with Robert. 

Foolish man. Foolish, idiotic, wonderful man. Doesn’t he know my heart beats for him? He gave me such space and time to mend my broken heart which was never truly broken, only perhaps bruised. He waited every step to ensure that I was ready. Why then did he not meet me at the festival and dance with me as promised? How could he possibly think I harbor feelings for Robert after all that Peeta and I have endured together, grown together?

Because he saw me dancing with Robert and fear overruled reason. The truth is much like a slap to the cheek. Peeta hides behind it now like a mask, unable to see the truth of what lays before him. Very well then. I will help him to see what he cannot.

“Oh so that is what Ethan meant!” Robert exclaims with a wide smile and a shake of his head. “You finally took advantage, did you? How did it feel to be me?”

“Shut up. Go dance with your own damn wife, Robert.”

“You’re an ass, brother. You ought to be thanking me, but you’re too stubborn and morose to see just how lucky you are.”

I have heard enough. I move back to the door and deliberately make noise in opening it. I step into the cool autumn air and the warm torchlight, standing on the wide stone step that leads into the garden. Peeta’s face registers shock, then fear. His anger fades away as both men bow to me.

“There you are, husband! Jo thought you were headed to the house. I’d nearly called out a search party.”

“Too little room for tempers in there, and now this garden grows stifling,” Robert says and moves to leave. “Brother, I think I shall take your advice, go dance with my own damn wife.” Then he smiles at me, a piercing look in his eyes as he once more gives me a slight bow. “Mrs. Mellark, my apologies for my coarse language. I bid you good evening.”

We stand in silence, listening to Robert’s retreating footsteps on the muddy paths. Peeta swallows and I lift one eyebrow at him. I let my eyes drag over his form, devouring the sight of him from his windswept hair to his broad shoulders and unbuttoned waistcoat. His muddy trousers and boots. The satchel he clings to that must have traveled tied to the back of his saddle and contain only his necessities. He looks wonderful and so handsome and somehow like he has been through hell in one night.

“You are nearly late and you still owe me a dance, husband. Are you to make a habit of this?”

“The bridge over Nine Willows River was washed out,” he explains.

“That at least explains why the post did not arrive. You however, look as though you waded through it.”

“I rather did.” At this, I scowl, anger rising up in me. “I did not wish to drag mud through the house. Thought I would enter through this door to mitigate as much of the mess as possible.”

“You think I care about the mud? I am more concerned that you would endanger your life so.”

“The kitchens are not so dangerous.”

“But fording a river is. You could have been killed! And what of Cicero? He would follow you!”

“Katniss… I am tired. It has been an exhausting couple of weeks and I have been riding since sunrise. I thought to stop at the inn at Seam, but I promised you I would be here tonight.”

“And you think a nearly kept promise would console me had you died?”

“As long as you had a body to bury, then technically I would have kept my promise,” he says.

“I do not think a corpse counts! And besides that, what would I do with a corpse? I certainly could not dance with one!”

“Bury it then dance on the grave.” He moves to leave the garden, to step around me into the house. He will not escape so easily. I block his retreat. My fingers spread on his chest. His heart beats steadily against my palm.

“We are not done discussing this, stubborn, obstinate–”

“Bastard?” he finishes and halts, gives me a wry smile. My fingers curl in his shirt, grasping hold of the damp linen. “One day, I would like someone to come up with a more creative name to call me.”

“Well at the moment it fits, since you chose to stand in the muddy garden instead of what you ought to have been doing,” I accuse and he runs a hand through his hair. Oh how I long to do the same. “Not greeting your wife and allowing me to tell you all that has transpired in your absence, acting as though we were married two weeks ago rather than several months, talking corpses and fighting with your brother when you should have been dancing with me.”

Panic invades his face and he pales.

“How do you know we were fighting? How much did you hear?”

“Enough.” Really, the man is being daft and I’ve about had enough of it.

“Enough? Enough for what?” He steps back away from me, my grip on his shirt forcing my arm to extend.

“Enough to know that you have several foolish notions in your brain that I need disabuse you of, and you are on the verge of ruining our reunion. I had quite a good time imagining it, too.”

“Did you? Pray tell how did you imagine it would go? Because this is not how I imagined it either.” 

I follow his retreat, stepping off of the stone and into the mud. I grasp hold of his coat lapels and pull him down towards me, standing on my toes to reach his lips. Only my feet slip in the mud and Peeta moves to catch me. He tosses aside his satchel then he too loses his footing and for a moment, we fumble and slide. 

He falls on his back on the muddy path. I land heavily on his chest, a tangle of limbs and a loud squelch of mud. Twin gasps escape us and then a moment of stunned silence. It would appear I am still an utter wreck when it comes to kissing my husband. 

“Not quite like that,” I grumble and a laugh escapes his lips. He stifles it quickly. But I have hope. His laughter hands it back to me as I notice the faint circles under his eyes. He is as tired as I, and that can affect one’s thinking, one’s perceptions.

Peeta holds tight to my arms and opens his mouth, probably to ask if I am alright because he is thoughtful like that when really, he ought to be kissing me instead of seeing to my welfare.

I bring my lips to his. He attempts to stop me, to speak, and I do not relent. Not until he releases a shuddering breath and his body melts beneath me, warm and solid and so very real. I feel the tension leaving his body as I kiss him. I feel it leaving mine, and then I’ve no need to relent to anything save the feelings inside me.

My eyes are shut and my pulse leaping in affirmation the second his skin touches mine. His hand caresses my cheek. He is chilled. So cold from his journey home to me and right now, I wish nothing more than to be the fire that warms and welcomes him home. And it feels so very right, near perfect, even with the mud now seeping into my clothes, or perhaps especially because of it.

There’s a rumbled moan of desire in his chest, then a sigh. I slide my hands up, up and inside the warmth beneath his coat. I wish to be rid of the layers between us but content myself with grasping tight to his shirt and do not let go. His lips slide beneath mine as he answers my kiss, returns it to me deepened and polished and perfect, a pearl in the moonlight. His cool fingers caress my neck then burrow into my unbound locks. 

There is laughter and shouting on the cool night air. I lift my head from his, holding myself suspended with my eyes shut and his fingers massaging my scalp, grasping my dress, my name a whispered kiss of warm and loving wind between us. 

“More like that,” I murmur and find the courage to open my eyes, to find him smiling at me.

“Only upright?”

“And with perhaps a bit less mud,” I say and he laughs, the sound deep and wonderful and inviting me into laughter with him.

“Katniss… we should…”

“Yes?” I say and shift my knees to straddle him. 

“Return you to the festival,” he whispers. 

“Must we?” I sigh and let my body turn limp. I rest my ear on his chest, where I know I will hear his heart, thumping steadily against my cheek. I close my eyes and absorb the soothing rhythm, the constancy of it. He continues caressing my hair and kissing my brow.

“I owe you that dance, although I am afraid I am not as nimble as your most recent partner.”

“I couldn’t possibly now!” I protest and glare at him. “My dress is quite ruined with mud.”

His eyes travel over me and he laughs, shakes his head with a bright and lopsided smile lifting his lips. “It is not as though it would be the first time this crowd has seen you so, and if we are to be making unfavorable habits – AH!”

Peeta shouts in distress as I smear a handful of cold mud over his face, but I have only momentarily stunned him. “You could do worse than this,” he finishes with a wicked grin and rolls us over.

“No! Peeta!” I shout but I am too late. I am too late and I am laughing as I sink into the mud, his body on top of mine, pressing me deeper into the soft cushion of the earth. I cling to his shoulders and laugh in his mud covered face hovering over mine. I am still laughing between his lips as he kisses me, his hand cradling my neck to keep my head from the filth. I am laughing still as he rises over me and gazes down at me with a wondrous light in his eyes.

“What ho! I have snared an earthen goddess!” he says as he captures my flower crown before it falls from my head, pressing it more securely in place.

“Do you not know your mythology, my love? No goddess is snared who does not wish to be so.” His smile lights my own and I cannot be angry with him, at least not for this.

“You should wear the earth more often. It suits you,” he attempts to say it seriously and utterly fails, earning another fistful of mud on his other cheek. “But I suppose a change of clothing is in order before dancing.”

“I think we need a bath, husband.”

He takes another look around us and laughs a few short notes. “Perhaps so, wife.”

He carefully and slowly leverages himself off the ground, retrieving his satchel and handing it to me before hauling me up after him, as though I am nothing but a feather, straight into his arms. I settle the satchel in the curve of my belly and twine my arms around his neck, kick my feet in the air, ridiculously giddy at the sensation of him carrying me so with one strong arm behind my back and the other beneath my thighs, the warmth of his palms radiating through mud and clothing. He takes careful steps and I must work the lever on the door.

“With all this carrying me about, you are contradicting your insistence that you needed to stay mounted,” I tease and then gasp as he falters, clinging to his neck and fearing another tumble into the mud. 

“You were saying, my love?” 

We enter the house and hurry to start the fire. Working together, we are able to heat water and quickly fill the tub. I pour in some oil scented with vetiver and help Peeta sit on the stone bench.

I can bear the silence no longer then. There is so much to be shared. As I help him remove his boots and soiled clothes, I begin to talk. It is easy and simple, an exchange that happens as smoothly as breath, sharing so much of what he missed – Primrose and my fight with her over Rory Hawthorne, our blackberry hunt with Maysilee, my discovery of Johanna –

“You are not angry with me for keeping the truth from you?” he asks as I set aside his shirt. I shake my head and motion for him to lift his hips so we can deal with his trousers.

“I understand why you did so. It must have been a terribly rough life for her.”

“Katniss,” he says and grasps my arms. I am distracted by his nudity and the need to assure myself of his well being, yet he holds me in place with his eyes. A darkness swirls in their depth and I cannot help but think of Delly’s words. That there was a darkness in his soul she could not touch. I see it now in his eyes and wonder if his time spent with another from that part of his life brought the darkness back to the surface. “It was. That world…when you step into that world, everything else disappears. All that matters, all that becomes real, is whatever you need to survive it. If you are lucky, you are allowed one dying wish, and it costs everything. And if that means…”

“Peeta,” I whisper and brush his hair back from his head. I trace the scars on his face and press my lips to their sharp fringes. I trail kisses down the damaged skin to his jaw. “You came home to me, and that is all that matters to me right now.”

“I am glad to be home,” he whispers. I remove his leg and inspect his skin. I glance up at him and he smiles.

“I would not dare incur your wrath by neglecting one of your edicts, wife.”

“You think you are safe from my wrath after you waded through a swollen river?” I mutter and continue my inspection of his body. 

“Well which is it? Are you happy to see me or angry?” he asks with a grin and I scowl at him. He endures my demands and my prodding until I am satisfied that he bears no new injuries and has been caring for his leg. 

“Why can it not be both? I am glad to see you, and I am also angry that to do so, you felt the need to act with such little regard for your welfare. I would have been as happy to see you tomorrow as I am tonight.”

Satisfied of his health, at least on the surface of his body, I motion for him to get into the tub. He sets his hands on the brim and heaves himself in, his strength evident as he lowers his body into the steaming, fragrant water and sighs, the sound content. I begin to remove my own clothing and he lifts his head from the edge of the tub to watch. Every piece of sodden wool and linen and lace until I am bare, as naked and raw as the desire I see in his eyes.

When my own clothes have joined his in a pile to be washed later, I step into the tub and carefully sit in his lap.

“Would you care to join me in my bath?” he asks, teasingly as I wriggle to find a comfortable position. The water and Peeta warm me, the feel of oils and skin slick as silk, sensual and comforting. My movements cause small waves of the water to slosh about us.

“Thank you, I would,” I tell him. He hisses and grabs my right hip, holding me still, teeth clenched. I can feel him, slipping between our bodies, rigid against my hip. I bite back a smile and decide to deal with that later. For now, there are several housekeeping matters we need dispense with. I direct him to lean his head back and he does so. “Now we can discuss a few family matters and these foolish notions you have.”

“Tell me, wife. Just what foolish notions do you refer to?”

“The ones from your letter, the day after we were engaged. The ones you just now so foolishly repeated to your brother,” I say with a quick, harsh scrub of his hair. This surprises him. His eyes open wide and he blinks at me. “You will get soap in your eyes.”

He closes them again and swallows before speaking. “I thought you hadn’t read that letter.”

“I hadn’t, at first. I only first read it this morning,” I confess and he squirms beneath me. Oh and now I am aroused as well, my belly quivering with the mounting sensation. Still, I cannot let that distract me from ensuring Peeta and I will be alright. I scrub the mud from his face and neck. Then rinse, he sputters at me but I ignore that, rinsing the soap from his hair, massaging his scalp and combing my fingers through the soaked curls to ensure they are free of both muck and suds. “You have it all wrong, you know.”

“Do I?” he asks and rubs at his eyes. “You went to that ball, asked me those questions…you wished to know Robert better–”

“Yes.”

“– and fell in love with him.”

“Wrong,” I say and he drops his hand, splashing the water. I wipe at his eyes with a drying cloth and wait for him to look at me again. “You are very persuasive, husband, but not quite persuasive enough to make me fall in love with someone else. Do you think my heart so easily swayed?”

I slide through the water to wind my arms around his neck, to ground me to his steadiness as I find the courage to voice things I never thought I would have reason to say. I pour the words into the steamy air where I cannot hide them nor take them back. 

“It was not Robert I was enamored with that night, but the very real man behind the mask. I was never in love with Robert for I never had the chance to truly know him, and even if I did, I doubt that would have been the outcome. No, it was the man in the mask who captured my heart – the man who was open with me about the complicated nature of his family, the man who found a way to console a distraught young girl, not by making her feel comfortable in standing out, but by changing the surroundings, convincing an entire ballroom to drink a wine that stained their lips red so that she might fit in.” Peeta stares at me, as though he does not quite believe me, but now that I have started, more words tumble free.

“I fell in love that night with a man who made me laugh before an entire hall of imposing portraits, who showed an immense amount of consideration for the hearts and feelings of so many around him, even those who would never give a whit for his own feelings had they known his true identity. A man who listened to and heard my story and still asked permission to see my scars, then kissed them as though they were something precious, not hideous, if only because they are a part of me I cannot separate from my person. A man who made me feel exquisite as none other had.”

He opens his mouth to protest and I place a finger over his lips to halt him.

“Please. You have such a way with words and have been able to tell me in a thousand ways. Allow me this one with no interruptions.” Slowly, he nods. I trace my finger over his lips. “I was afraid, after accepting Robert’s proposal, afraid that I had acted rashly and would come to regret it. I tried to convince myself that I would be content with a business arrangement for a marriage, and then realised I would never know one way or the other if I never knew love for myself. So yes, I intended to learn more of Robert while both of us wore masks, I even intended to kiss him, and the result was that I found out that I could not be happy with a cold arrangement. I desired something greater, something stronger, but you were the one to show me what that could be, how it could feel.”

“Robert could have done all those things that I did,” he argues, almost pathetically.

“Perhaps, although I doubt he would have thought to do half of them. In the end, it does not matter. Robert did not do those things. You did.” I take a deep breath and twist strands of his hair around my fingers. “I was angry with you, and I was hurting when I learned the truth. I was not mourning Robert’s loss but that of the man in the mask. Then I found myself married, only to fall in love all over again for such similar reasons. Who you were behind that mask is who you have been here at Everdeen. Kind, thoughtful, patient, generous, witty, and still, I was as confused as you were about that night. Could I love you both? It didn’t seem fair that I should, but now I understand. You are one and the same. My husband and my man in the mask. It has taken me months to face what I already knew.”

I stumble then, right at the finish and Peeta’s hands caress up my arms, over my shoulders to my back, drawing me closer to his chest for an embrace.

“And what is that?” he prompts, his voice a mere whisper, as though if we talk above a whisper, we may disturb the delicate, growing bonds between us.

“You really are the luckiest bastard in the world and I don’t intend to let you forget it.”

It takes him a moment and then he shakes his head with a smile, brings my lips to his. “I love you, Katniss. My pearl.”

“And I love you, Peeta. Only you,” I whisper in return, the words are kissed between us, our lips close enough to touch. Then we are kissing for real. A dozen kisses, perhaps a hundred. Soft, soft, and then wild. Ravenous.

I am uncertain how long we kiss. Only that I do not wish to stop. His lips and his hands on me only make me long for more. Endless nights and days filled with kisses such these, caresses such as those, the soft murmur of his moans answering my own. 

I keep expecting him to press for more than these kisses and caresses, yet he seems content to share only this for now, and I find myself glad of it, savoring each breathy kiss and heated touch, my body drawn to such a height of both luxurious comfort and scintillating anticipation. We might stay here always, kissing until time ends. Only, the water eventually cools enough that not even the heat of Peeta’s body is enough to combat the chills.

I shiver and he separates our lips, whispering that we need to be swift or risk illness. He shifts our bodies and begins to wash my hair for me, then my body. I relax into his touch and allow his attentions, his care of me.

“I missed you, Katniss. I could wait no longer to hold you, to assure myself that things that…invaded my dreams while I was away were not true,” he murmurs, an explanation for his reckless choice to continue towards home when nature threw obstacles to block his path back to me, and perhaps the chill in his letters.

“You as well?” I ask and blink to clear the tears forming in my eyes. Are we so fragile then, as to fall prey to the doubts of lonely beds and nights? 

His hands pause and he examines my face. “What caused your doubts? My brother?”

“He was part of it, but no matter. I have dealt with the doubts he caused. What caused yours?”

“Truthfully? The past. I was…struggling with nightmares and when your letters arrived, I suppose I thought – that is they were very…”

“Detached,” I say pathetically.

“I thought perhaps my own letters in all their vehemence might have pushed you away from me, or shown you that you did not truly feel the same way.”

“No,” I say with a shake of my head and hurry on before he can say more. “I never know how to order my words to say what I wish. Your letters were so…so beautiful, Peeta. I – well you will think me terribly fanciful but I saved every one of them, read them every day you were gone, kept them in my sketchbook. But… Anything I wrote in answer paled in comparison.”

“Well, not that last one,” he says, his voice a sudden low growl. My eyes fly up to meet his and I see desire swirling in a storm of deep blue, freckled with grey. I cannot stop my smile and shake my head. 

“Twas only a paragraph of poetry.”

“Twas enough,” he says and brings me close, to feel him again, hard and ready. Heat rises in me, making the chill of the water worse in contrast, causing more shivers. “Twas enough to give me hope that perhaps my doubts were without foundation, imagined, made worse by not being near you. ‘Twas enough to make me set up my two companions at the inn four towns up the road until it is safer to travel, and press on alone. Perhaps stubbornly and obstinately–”

“And foolishly,” I add and he smiles at me.

“Yes that, too.” His words are a balm and also a bothersome worry. But I know now that even my fears are safe in Peeta’s hands and so I ask him.

“After all that, why did you not come to me at the festival?”

“I did, and I saw you dancing with Robert and…” His words trail into the soft splash of his hands as he finishes bathing me.

“Fear won out,” I finish his sentence, a confirmation of what I already suspected. 

“I am afraid so. You appeared so happy and carefree. I did not think I could compete with that, not in the mindset I have been in for some time. At the very least, I thought I should present myself to you looking less bedraggled.” As he speaks, he caresses my face and along my jaw. As though he cannot touch me enough. 

“I would have been happier to dance with you. But would you have me sour at all times in your absence?”

“No, I wish you happy, as much as possible. ‘Twas selfish of me, and I apologise for it a hundred times over. I would ford as many rivers if it would gain me your forgiveness for my weakness, if it would mean I could hear you say these things again.”

“I would prefer you save the fording of rivers and instead kiss me again,” I whisper. He smiles and bends his head to kiss me, but a thought occurs to me then. “Where is your hat, husband?”

“I…” he pauses and looks rather chagrined. “Lost it in the river.”

I would like to yell at him again for his recklessness, but that will not gain me a kiss, so instead I chose to make light of it.

“Well. At least you have no valet. You have spared the poor man the shock of your garments,” I tease and flick my gaze towards the pile of our now sodden clothing. He laughs, the sound echoing merrily off the stone walls until he kisses me. I sink into the water and tighten my hold on him. I am breathing in short gasps when he releases me and my next words are breathless. “And your boots…we shall have to ask Delly to make you another pair.”

He pauses and lifts his head, peers at me as though seeking an answer. “They have not been much trouble?”

“Delly has not.” He grunts at this, a darkening in his eyes that is not desire. I cannot have that. “And while Robert has caused some trouble, I do not think it was meant to be malicious. I can handle whatever he metes out to me. Perhaps not at first. I needed reminding of a few things that I already knew, but in the end it is alright. He is…not happy, is he?”

“He wasn’t prepared to deal with the consequences. I don’t believe he realised how severe they would be, but I think given time to adjust, they will be alright.”

“Then you should help him.” I say and maneuver myself out of the tub. As I do, Peeta’s hand wanders up my leg, up to my core. I gasp and give him a falsely scandalised look that makes him smile. “After you lecture him half a dozen times for being such a boor.”

Peeta laughs at this and follows me from the tub, bundles me in drying clothes and then in his arms. Our lips gravitate towards one another, the gentle caresses quickly gaining heat. Only now it is the air that cools our skin and cause shivers and chattering teeth.

“We should finish this by our fire,” I whisper when we manage to cease kissing for a breath. 

He nods and rubs his hands over my arms to warm me. We finish carefully drying ourselves, deal with the mess as best we can for now. Only, we’ve nothing clean to wear. 

“Clearly, I was too distracted by your radiance to think about such mundane things as how we would get out of this room in any sort of decency,” Peeta accuses me with another brief, heated kiss. We drape the drying clothes around ourselves and one around his still wet satchel, and sneak through dark corridors, hiding along the way and listening for anyone who might stumble upon us so indecently garbed. Thankfully, all is quiet. Everyone seems to be still at the festival or fast asleep.

I am blushing from head to toe by the time we fall into our room and lock the door. But I am also giggling foolishly. Peeta drops his towels and wraps his arms around me, hauling me up against his chest to kiss me. I melt into the embrace and release my own towels to cling to him, fingers burrowing in his hair and his flesh as I reassure myself that he is truly here and not a dream I have conjured to torture myself in my lonely bed.

When he lifts his head, he smiles up at me. “Have we anything else we need discuss? There is more to this reunion I had imagined for us, if you desire it.”

I blush, and as much as I would like to order him to take me to bed and love me until the sun rises, I have more yet to tell him. I palm his cheek and give him one more soft kiss. “Not yet, husband. I have more.”

“Very well.” He sets me on my feet, then surprises me by making a content noise. He then maneuvers us towards the fire. I dress in my shift while he works at turning the glow to a cheery blaze. I hand him his nightshirt and he dons it before settling on the couch. I join him, curling into his side and tucking my feet up beneath a blanket as I prepare for the rest of what I need to tell him.

I wish I could think of a gentle way to ease into it, but I decide that being forthright is perhaps my best option.

“I asked Haymitch to conduct a search for your mother, several months ago.” Peeta’s fingers stop combing through my hair and I cautiously lift my head from his chest to gauge his reaction. “I thought…perhaps someone with a name in no way connected to the Mellark’s may have better luck.”

“Oh. Katniss you did not have to do that.”

“I wanted to, and we were fairly successful.”

“You…you found my mother?” he asks and I hate to squash the burgeoning hope in his voice.

“Not exactly,” I say and his face begins to crumble with disappointment. “We’ve managed to piece together a good deal of her life over the past fifteen years, although I think it best that perhaps our man work with yours from now on. Perhaps you have pieces we haven’t and vice versa.” Hope has returned to his eyes and now I truly feel wretched as I bite my lip and impart the most pressing part of this news. “We did find… we found… her daughter.”

“Her…daughter.” Peeta stares at me and I take his silence as invitation to explain, and so I do.

“Her name is Miranda. She is seven years of age right now, approaching her eighth birthday at the end of the month, and when that happens, the orphanage where she has resided since birth plans to hand her over to a workhouse and–”

Peeta shifts me off of him and stands. He bends over the mantel, staring into the blaze, his fingers working in an agitated motion. I am not certain what to make of his reaction and must gather my courage once again, to face the possibility that I may have been wrong about him.

“Did you know of her?”

“I had no idea,” he whispers. “If I had, I would have…but then…I don’t…” It is a lot to take in, I understand, but we haven’t time for Peeta to work through it all. We need to act.

“That is exactly what I thought you would say. So we shall need to pack our bags for Capitol.”

“Now?” he asks and turns to face me.

“Well I suppose Mr. Burbank will need a few days to settle some of the paperwork and inquiries. We could use the time to make that visit to pay our respects to the Marquis along the way. By the time we reach Capitol, it should be a matter of signing and packing her bags. Mayhap we leave in two days. Is that sufficient rest for you?”

“Paperwork? Packing her bags?”

“To assume guardianship of your sister,” I say.

“You would do that?” he whispers. “Bring her here to Everdeen and raise her as part of your family? A complete stranger? The daughter of–”

“She is already part of our family, husband. We need only make it official and permanent.” I cut him off before he can place a label on his mother that I am certain he will regret. He pulls me off of the sofa and into his arms, kissing the yelp of surprise from my throat. I am nearly crushed beneath the force of his embrace and yet I have never felt so relaxed as I do in Peeta’s arms, even under such vigorous embracing.

“I will be honest, tis not the news I was expecting. You are certain she and I share a mother?”

“Yes,” I say and he swallows. I watch his throat bob with the motion and stand on my toes to kiss beneath his jaw. 

“Who…who is her father?” his voice cracks on the question and I lean back to stare into his eyes, silently pleading with him to not make me say it. His eyes sweep closed and his jaw clenches. His hands do the same on my back. So then he knew at least that his mother was forced to sell herself to survive.

“I know it is a lot to absorb, Peeta.”

“Yes. Well, I knew she had to….afterwards …it must have been easier to fall into that form of survival after she no longer had me to worry after. Even when she did have me…I had started to suspect at least a little. There were days when she refused to tell me where she went to work. I only knew that she would invariably return with food or money on those days, more than usual.”

“Oh Peeta,” I whisper and he buries his face in my neck, holding me close as his shoulders shake.

“You said she has been in an orphanage since birth? So Miranda has never known family at all? Not even Mother?” He keeps his voice quiet but I still hear the breaks in it. The desperate need to remain strong, even as he falls to pieces inside.

“We will be Miranda’s family.”

“Luckiest bastard indeed to have such a wife as you,” he murmurs and lifts me into his arms, carrying me across the room to our bed, kissing me the entire journey, kissing me as he lays me out across the soft surface before joining me. And he mercifully does not cease kissing me for a good, long while.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

To be continued…

Your clue for chapter 22: At times, we wish to run away, to avoid what we fear. At times such as those, it helps to have someone we love. Other times we race towards what or who we love most with no regard for ourselves. Love is a verb, and also a noun. So is the word you seek this time. It is here more than once – preventing retreats and delaying reunions alike – but few obstacles, fights, and fears, be they from nature or design, can stand for long against Everlark’s love.

[clementine-elegance]

to friends who want to read again - ask a librarian!

I’ve been seeing a lot of posts going around about how young adults who were great readers in school are now out of college (or even in college) and at a loss about how to start reading again. Breaking out of YA books seems to be a challenge. I know this - I felt that same struggle too. I went a few years reading no books but I couldn’t get into nonfiction and I had no idea how to find anything else.

This isn’t a perfect solution, but I wanted to point it out:

Did you know you can ask a librarian for book recommendations?

I know that sounds a little simplistic. BUT - they are literally trained in something called “Readers Advisory” so that they can hear what you are telling them you’re interested in (topics, authors, “I liked x about this book but not y about this one,” etc.) and find books to recommend you that you will enjoy. They are trained (anyone with the LIS degree at least) not to judge you for your interests or to try to guide you toward something they deem “worthy.” They are there for you, to find you books you will enjoy. (They are also there to help you with any research questions you have, but that’s a digression.)

If the idea of talking to someone stresses you out, many libraries have forms you can fill out about what books you like and what you want to read next, and they’ll reply to you in a few days with a very thorough list of recommendations. Even if they don’t have a form specifically for Readers Advisory, most libraries have forms of digital communication. Send an email!

Will all the recommendations be perfect? No, of course not. But it might introduce you to some new books you wouldn’t have heard about otherwise. It might help you narrow down what you want to read next. It might help in that it has you think deeply about what would inspire your love for reading again. (Certainly, it couldn’t hurt?)

tl;dr: Don’t be afraid to engage your local librarian. They’re there to help you, not only in research endeavors, but in pleasure-reading endeavors as well!

[bjartarvonirraetast-blog1]

Think You're Cut Out for Doing How do I protect my furniture when moving? Take This Quiz

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The reality Regarding how Do I Secure My Household furniture when Shifting

Shifting might be unbelievably annoying which can be the reason why it's very important to keep up a checklist of all you might have on relocating working day. Will not skip only one piece because you would require that inventory checklist to ascertain what furnishings you'll be shifting to the new property, after which to use as a packing record in a while. So as to give you an entire comprehension on packing and transferring a couch, This is a guide which will allow you to pack and shift your sofa properly. Start with achieving out to family and friends and viewing while in the occasion you may get some assist. Certainly one of the advantages of choosing a furniture removalist is they're most certainly to get Earlier worked While using the types of things which you need assist with. The attainable benefit of choosing a home furniture removalist on a fixed-cost basis is you could confidently know how Considerably you will have to pay. Since you recognize the worth of excellent floor defense, let's change our focus to the assorted protective measures, and protection approaches and tips to keep all flooring in your property harm-free.

The very initially concern you ought to talk to your removalist is all about their degree of encounter. Irrespective of which type of flooring you've, it's always highly recommended to work with some type of masking to produce a protective pathway via your home. Take a very good look at the handy methods for transferring antique furniture underneath to receive a better notion about what you're in for. The quite first thing you must do is try to look for a general notion of to what extent your household furniture can be truly worth. Amongst the nicest factors about transferring a mattress is They could be utilized to assist unique merchandise in transit. Packing antique home furnishings isn't a kid's Participate in the wonderful dimensions, excess weight, and fragility of the antique pieces make them very tough to pack and go on on the nation. Loads of furniture items are quite bulky huge, heavy, and often sensitive In spite of their durable visual appearance and come to feel.