#also i wanna fuck that belmont guy. who said that

[g0ry-gh0ul]

how the fuck did i never watch castlevania until now. there has probably never been a show so up my alley ever in history.

[kachimera]

Leon, Mathias, Sara, Hector, Isaac and Dracula for the bingo <3

(@viralvava also asked me for Mathias ) *cracks knuckles*

Leon: no bingo :)

Listen he's not a bad dude, just a little insane and messed up by circumstances  (see next character) (also ppl pls remember he's a darn knight he has a body count let him be mean). Questioning on the ruthless bc while he is ready to do what's right no matter what and bc he's to be feared when he's pissed he's still a good hearted guy who will try to help others he aint in it for misery, and on family dinamics bc i dont think it's very healthy to be an orphan.

Mathias: double bingo :D

YES THIS IS THE MAN I WAS THINKING OF. MY POOR LITTLE MEOW MEOW. Why are you so fucked up. Why can you control others emotions but not your own. Why do you make your problems everyone else's problems so disasterously. I wanna dissect him and see how a person can end up like this. Also getting pissed off at god for stuff is a mood so interesting in a messed up way. And im sure his alchemist family inheritance played on this disaster too. They had to inhale mercury at some point at least.

Sara: no bingo

BEST GIRL. My bby. In life she was someone sweet and good, maybe with some issues like ppl pleasing or insecurity and frustrated over ppl taking advantage of her generosity (a mood), but overall good mental health. And then circumstances happened (see character above). She gets kidnapped, dies at the hands of her own fianceé after begging him to do it, is turned into a weapon, murder ,  learn how they've been betrayed, more murder, see Leon pass away, take care of the belmonts for generations, plenty of murder, finally kill the bastard responsible for it all, m u r d e r, kill said bastard multiple times, deal with some of her kids getting possessed. All that mixed up with general vampire madness and the sheer frustration of getting fucked over so unfairly and damm you end up messed up. She's the well meaning but deeply hurtful matriarch of the clan now. Don't let me rant abt her or i wont stop help-

Hector: bingo! (Kinda)

He's a fun guy to think abt bc, he was born "cursed", is hated or used by others and his destiny kept dragging him around. (For example, did he really have much choice in moving into Drac's castle when he was a hated child that would have been burned by fellow humans?) But he isn't an innocent little baby, he becomes powerful and prideful and commits atrocities- so, how much of his bad parts are his and how many are from him? At least until he, wether for pride or regret, decides to make a choice of his own to leave the castle and finally makes peace with humans and gets a pretty wife. And when someone (see character below) ruins his peace and his dark fate tries to drag him down again, he realizes this and overcomes it. Idk i had a point i swear. Anyways he hot

Isaac: Double bingo! (Kinda)

Problematic badass pathetic hoe 10/10. Like Hector he has a terrible fate but he instead clutches onto it and makes it his purpose. God rejected him so he finds a god in Dracula, humans were cruel to him so he makes cruelty his method. He lost Hector and then everything so he makes Hector lose everything. He's always on this fine line of being wronged and wronging others, he never fully gets what he wants, he keeps spiraling down and down and its 👌

Dracula Triple bingo combo! (Kinda but shhhh)

Ah yes the previous asshole but rip and rotten. He's had time to soak in his dark powers, turn Death from his ally into his husband confidant, assimilate vampire madness to compliment his neurosis and just become a proper bastard. And then Lisa appears and he feels love again, remembers his humanity, and has his own son (all of this with some general fucked up-ness but he legit cares). And then he sees her die at the hands of humans and just loses it. Any grip he had over the powers of chaos is just gone, he lets himself fully fall into madness and makes his suffering everyone else's suffering (like before but amplified to a thousand ) and through this he loses his son, his generals, and with each ressurection, himself. To resume: Utter fucking nuclear disaster that learned n o t h i n g and will learn n o t h i n g (until Soma).

[delightfulcrasher]

Giving the people what they want.

It’s about time I wrote some smut.

Chapter one: My screaming Nightmare.

“uhghghhg” You said groggily. You woke up in a strange room in a strange place surrounded by strange items. You rubbed your e/c eyes and looekd around. everything was gothic.

“Wait a goshington momment!” You said confused (because you were really confused) “this isn’y my room. Whereever could I be?” 

SUDDENLYY the door swing open and who else could it have been butt the one man who is mentioned and tagged at the start of this fic its...

“Oh M GEE!” You screamed into the void. LOrd Dimitrescu was at the door and he opened the door and was at the door. and also his sons were there I guess. He wore a wide brimmed hat with a black rose on his white shirt, and his sons were dressed in the gothyest clothing you can think of. 

You gasped. Shocked. You always new this day would come. Your parents had been traingin you ever sence you were little so you could defeat this evil evil. You spent countless hours training in a far away land away from your friends and family 

BUT there was one thing they didn’t know.....

.....

You had a HUGE CRUSH on HIM ! 

Could your feeling for him be true???? Or were you destined to defeat him in dangerous yet erotic battlle?>?>?

(WHat did youy guys think? Cool isn’t it! Whaus gonan happlen in teh nhext chapter? sTYA tUnES!!!!11!1)

-------

Chapter 2: Maybe this is a dream.

“I C you r are fianlly awoken.” Lord Dimitrescu spoke. His voice was smooth as butter, deep as the ocean, and cold enough to make you’re entire body shiver. “Whatever shall we do with a les miserable creature like yourelf?”

The way he talkes, the way he moves, the way his voice sounds evil, terrible, villianous. he has murdered like a lot of people but he is really hot so you guess you can forgive him.

Belmont appeared behind his father, looking rather evil. “I know whaty we should do... We should play spin...... The..... BOTTTLE..!!”! His brothers cheered along with him. Lord dimidomes eyes peek out from under his big ass fucking hat. It grew twice the size. He laughed at the idea because it was funny. 

Cassandros shook his head at the idea “lawl no I don’t wanna kiss y/n they have cooties”

You didn’t want to smooch cassandos anyway bc he is stinky but the fact he said that anyway made you feel rejected :(

You crissed crossed your arms and pouted “Cassandras you r such a baka ”

Everyone clapped. Cassandros pouted and fell out the window and died.

Daniel took out the bottle (Which he had been holding the entire time) and spin it on the floor. You crossed your fingers and every other limb imaginable. Please please please please PLEASE please plese palsesasd apelase let you smooch a vampire man on this day. 

Afrter an entire century of waiting, the bottle stopped. It was pointing at you and Dimitrescu. He laughed evilly bc he is evil but also hot. You felt your cheeks blush. Was this really happening? Were you finally going to get that kiss you always wanted?  Were you really going to throw aside everything you ever knew to get a peice of Dimitrescu’s juicy ass? yes.

You both leaned in for a kiss.

(OOOOO It’s HAppENINGGG!!!111! OXOX) 

-------

Chapter three: The I never want to wake.

In that momment there was no one esle in the room. You had lost yourself in the big hunky arms of the lod. You may have been lost but now you were found. His lips were batted with the scent of cinnonon and apple cider, deliciously sweet with a sour kick. It punched you in the mouth like a horse.  You kissed so passionately that one of the buttons oN HI SHIRT POPPED OFF (Guys trust me it’s really hot ) Then the rest of them popped off and he was SHIRTLESS.

You drew away from each other, breathless in each others arms. He looked at you like no one had ever looked at you before. with love.

“Do you want to do it?”

“Okay”

And then you did.

(Hope you Guys enjoged!!! I would write more but I gottssa go to bc it’s alheady rlly late and It’s past my bedtime 💤💤😴😴💤 Come back NEXY WEEK FOr teh lemon scene 18+ MINORS DNI 😳😳😳👉👈💦😩😩😩😩 !!!) 

[nevergenders]

set it off in las vegas on friday (jan 17, 2020)

i showed them my new tattoo which they LOVED, i gave them a trans flag that i wrote on, and generally just had an incredible time. read under the cut!

so my friend bribri (@sarcasticloser7 on twitter) forced me to go before her at vip because i was freaking out with all this hyperactive energy and i was like “noooo!!!” she was like “you should go so you stop freaking out” and i was like “yeaH PRoBabLy”

so when our friend nicole had walked away they turned to see me and both cody and maxx went “nick!!!”

maxx gave me just such a tight hug. that was fantastic. it pretty much overshadowed my memories of codys (first) hug and i only vaguely remember hugging zach because for once he gave me a two arm hug haha.

i went “do you guys wanna see my tattoo??” and they were all like “yeah!!” and i struggled for a moment to take off my jacket sleeve (as you can see in the video) but i told him it was a photo of him holding my hand during the haunting in february and that cole got his handwriting for the lettering in july and cody said “i just got goosebumps! that’s so sweet” and i didnt see it in person but maxx was smiling just such a big smile!! and cody looked just so touched he turned into this 🥺 emoji and gave me just such a CUTE hug. (video post)

i was rushed into photo position and i auickly said “you can give me bunny ears if you want” and cody did last second and it’s so cute. and i ALMOST forgot to give them mine and si’s letters but i gave that before i left and at the end of the video you can just see maxx and cody smiling SO BIG.

(group photo post)

so then we played heads up, and once cody was done with his turn he stood between me and bri and it was probably because he knew we wouldn’t act all weird about it but in my brain i was still like “HUHHH???”

anyways that was really fun and maxx ended up winning. people were fucking yelling at first though i didnt even like try to help fjdjdj also cody dropped his keys which was kinda funny

anyways when that was all done with it was hang out time, i went to maxx first because it seemed like there was the least amount of people around him. i told him how in the past year my life turned around because they built up my confidence so much and he said “well you SHOULD have confidence!” and praised my covers and said “and even your original music is really good” that was like a really great slap in the face because sometimes on-stream in my head it sound like he’s playing up how he feels about it for the sake of the crowd and trying not to sound like an asshole but he really just said that to my face excitedly with no one else listening. THAT was cool.

i talked to zach next, i had to tell him i did the killer in the mirror mashup and the lonely dance mashup, and also told him that i thought it was very sweet that he was checking up on me in july. i think he was feeling under the weather though :( right after he walked offstage he tweeted about how much he hated being sick on tour, i hope he feels better :(

and i definitely talked too much with cody but he definitely wanted to talk to me too. i told him the same thing i told maxx but put a little more emphasis on how much i didn’t have any confidence at all, to which he said “i’ve had moments like that too” and i told him now i have the most confidence i’ve had in a very very long time. and this time i had him take the selfie because i was shaking so much my photo with zach was blurry (woops!)

(selfies post)

and i dont remember exactly what was said to elicit this but as i was about to walk away i brought up the fan power award and how i wanted to cry reading the article and he said “i’m so glad we got that award out of anything else” and i said “you deserve it” and he said “thats all of us, you guys too”

anyways yeah i spent way too long talking with him bc they had been almost out of time and he had to fuckin speedrun the rest of the people in line signing things and taking selfies and right as he was leaving i told him to look out for something i was going to give during the set.

we went back outside, and i bought merch for myself and cole, and someone who didnt have their card and sent me money on mobile. damn! and then we stood outside for so long i was like “why am i here” i was tired and also tired of waiting.

point north was actually pretty good, kellin came out for one of their songs which i was NOT expecting in the slightest (cole was fucking shook, not emotionally prepared). belmont i wasn’t as big of a fan of and i kinda got bored but there were some people there that were super into it, there was a pit and a fair amount of crowdsurfers.

when set it off came on i wasn’t losing my mind as much as i usually am but wow my serotonin levels!!!!! it was INSTANTLY noticeable that they seemed so much happier than when i saw them in july. cody especially was smiling so much, he was having such a good time. and might i say no disrespect is SO much fucking fun live, the left-right thing is super fun. during killer in the mirror cody went on top of the crowd like he usually does and i realized that that would be a good time to give the flag to him (the stage was really tall and the space between the barrier and the stage made me nervous) but he was a little too far and he stood up past me so he didnt see it. so i kept it until catch me if you can, which is when i originally planned to give it to him because wow that song is becoming like my life mantra. he finally saw it once i unfolded it a little and gave me a “gimme a second” finger. so for the second verse he walked over and motioned to give it to him and i was too scared to throw it over the gap so someone else did, and he struggled to unfold it and read what it said during the song so he just waved it a bit and put it on his mic stand. and after the song he opened up the flag with zach and read it, and pointed at me and hit his chest/heart, and he walked up to the mic and said “this is beautiful, thank you.” he kissed it and put it over maxxs drumset 🥺

for the next song i almost fuckin CRIED, he was singing to me so much and gave me a little finger heart and of course the thought in my mind was “why, i don’t deserve this” but then i thought about the tattoo and the past year and i got so emotional i thought i was gonna cry!!! fuck!!!

(gifset post) (video of unfolding flag) (video of holding up flag) (photo)

so yeah basically i am a mess. stan set it off stream catch me if you can and fuckin trans rights babey

[ask-jaghatai-khan]

The BF Reacts to the Primarchs

In which @asking-ask​ gives first impressions of all the Primarchs based on art I provided!

For each Primarch I listed the legion, name, and three pieces of art, two of which were always from Aerion’s Primarch Project, and the Iconoclasts portraits. Gonna be a long post, so just click the “read more” tab.

(I) Lion El’Johnson

His name’s Lynel! That’s incredible! The art looks so different, because the first guy looks like a fuckboi, but the third guy looks like Lucius Malfoy by book seven, and then the middle looks like Soldier 76 in fantasy. So I don’t really know how I feel about that guy. I like the first one, the other two not so much.

(III) Fulgrim

(I listed by legion.)

I was gonna say, three does not come after one. Fulgrim—I like the name. Once again it goes fuckboi—I mean it looks like a Tarot card, which is neat. I love the sword, it’s zippity. He looks like if you had a baby with Samus Aran and the entire Belmont clan! Like the power armor, but it’s still very fantasy-like. And once again, he’s like an old fuck.

(IV) Perturabo

I’ve been pronouncing it like “Pervtabo”, like a pervert, so I’m sorry. Ah, it’s Reinhardt! It’s Reinhardt but with Hanzo’s face. I didn’t know this was—oh, it’s Battlefield Earth! I didn’t know this was secretly Overwatch. Yeah, I don’t really like the cable-hair, but the second one where he looks like Reinhardt and Hanzo’s lovechild I’m super into. He’s got caution signs! “Look, I’m dangerous.”

(V) Jaghatai Khan

It’s yo boiiii! He looks like he’s straight out of Big Trouble in Little China. The lightning bolt thing frustrates the hell out of me because in every picture it’s in a slightly different place. So once again, electric sword, I’m super into it. He’s got a parchment like pinned to his armor? Yeah, no, you need like Gorilla Glue or something, you can’t just thumbtack it on there, that’s not how it works. I LOVE the color scheme though, that is slick. White and gold and crimson, that is legit.

(VI) Leman Russ

First thing I thought was Lemon Brothers, or Leman Brothers, or whatever. WOAH, dude, it’s the Scotsman! God, I’m seeing a theme with these swords, they’re all very similar. He’s got a wolf on his crotch. Is that your boy in the background?

(No, that’s a Sister of Silence.)

Disappointing. Yeah, I don’t know, this guy’s kinda I don’t know. He looks like he’s from Samurai Jack.

(He’s a Viking werewolf.)

Yeah, that’s pretty neat! Oh, I see! Well, at least in all of them he’s got a wolf on his crotch, so that’s cool. Continuity.

(VII) Rogal Dorn

Yeah no, that’s just straight-up Soldier 76. Like, I can’t even comment any further because it’s just him. He’s got like the 70s porn-stache.

(Friendly muttonchops.)

Friendly muttonchops? I like porn-stache better, though. Porn-stache-chops. And what—he’s also got paper on him! I like to think that’s a grocery list and he doesn’t want to lose it, so he pins it to his armor. Like he looks down, “Oh! Right, I forgot eggs.”

(VIII) Konrad Curze

Ooh, ooh… This is like if Grima survived and wanted to wreak his revenge on fantasy and sci-fi. He’s not an attractive lookin’ fella.

(Oof! People are gonna be mad at you.)

What? He’s not! He’s greasy looking! He needs a bath. He needs a trip to Lush, he needs fucking cosmetics, and moisturizer, and detangler, and—he needs a lot of work. I am not a fan. Though I do like the bloody claws, that’s pretty neat.

(IX) Sanguinius

Oh my god, this is a straight-up lost Belmont. He’s straight-up, y’know, “BY THE POWER OF THE CHURCH, I SLAY THEE, DEMON!” kinda type deal. Look at him! Look at him, he’s so fancy! Oh my god, he’s so beautiful.

(He’s got majestic wings.)

I see that. Are those attached to his armor, or…?

(No, those are his actual wings.)

WOAH! I would party with this dude. I would go to a club with him and get drunk, he he’d probably be like—I’d be in the corner crying and he’d be giving me life advice. That’s a misleading name, though, it doesn’t sound very happy. His name should be like—uh—Lord Goldmeyer, or something like that.

(X) Ferrus Manus

He reminds me of Cable.

(He has metal hands.)

Yeah, he’s Cable. He’s just straight-up Cable, from Deadpool. Can he teleport? Can he travel through time?

(I don’t think so.)

Disappointing. Work on that, and get back to me. Uh, and then team up with Deadpool. I like him, he seems pretty chill. I would trust him to house-sit. He looks like—he looks like a dependable dude. I’m goin’ off of looks here.

(XII) Angron

Uhh, that is one angry-looking fucker. Oh, another Battlefield Earth guy! He looks VERY angry. Mm, that’s a lot of blood. I do not trust this guy to house-sit. yeah, no thanks, I’ll pass.

(XIII) Roboute Guilliman

*gasp!* He’s got a sweet bird! Birds? Bird.

(Is it a two-headed bird? It might be a two-headed bird.)

That’d be pretty neat! I would be down with that. He kinda looks like what I assume Master Chief looks like. Like he’s kinda got that generic white dude face, but it’s war-torn. Like, this dude’s seen some shit. But, I don’t know—he still—I feel like he still has hope for the world, y’know? So he’s not Soldier 76, ‘cuz he’s given up. So I think he’s like Master Chief.

(XIV) Mortarion

Oh my god, how many of these are there? This dude looks like a straight-up Ringwraith, or some sort of wraith. Or uh—Darth Sideous, or Plagueis? Which one is the Emperor?

(Sidious?)

Yeah, there we go. Yeah, he looks like Sidious. Oh, that’s a wicked scythe, though! Oh, same. We should chill, but maybe not. No.

(XV) Magnus the Red

Yo! It’s Starfire’s older brother! I mean, he’s ginger and huge! Oh, I like this guy. He’s neat! And he’s got like—cool, purple rune powers.

(He’s a wizard.)

Aw, dude. Is that like, an army of automatons, or something?

(Uh—later, yeah!)

*gasp!* I would party with this guy! I want this guy to be my best friend.

(You’re so good at guessing some of this shit.)

I know my fantasy, yo!

(XVI) Horus Lupercal

Uh, he reminds me of, um, the animated version of Dr. Freeze.

(I should have included him when he’s at, like—max evil. He looks more like the second picture.)

Yeah, he legit looks like a different skin for the Batman Animated Dr. Freeze. And because of that I don’t trust him. Lotta eyes, a lot of people just have eyes on their armor. Do they serve any purpose, or are they just, like, cool?

(Uh, I think that’s the Eye of Terra. It was like a symbol they used.)

Oh, very neat, I like it.

(XVII) Lorgar Aurelian

Lotta bald dudes. And if they’re not bald they’ve got hair to their legs. Yo—OH, he makes me think of the Elder played by Leonard Nimoy from Atlantis!

(Oh yeah, the facial tattoos.)

Yeah! That’s cool! I—I trust him. I don’t know, just based on that; based on the fact that he reminds me of Leonard Nimoy as the Elder in Atlantis. I dunno, he strikes me as a chaotic-neutral. Just because he’s got a lot of, like, scary shit, but he’s also got incense and he’s got a book. So he probably knows how to fuck you up, but he probably also doesn’t care. So, that’s what I’m gleaning from how he looks.

(XVIII) Vulkan

Yooo! This dude—I would not fuck with this dude. He’s scary lookin’. He looks like someone left him in the fryer for too long. He’s a little toasty-lookin’. Not, like, trying to harsh on his personality, I’m just sayin’ that’s what he looks like.

(Would you believe me if I told you he’s the nicest guy of all of ‘em?)

Yeah, I could see that. He’s got a bit of a Drax vibe to him. Where he’s, like, really scary looking but I bet, y’know, you just met him and he offers you lemon squares. You’re like “I didn’t even know you could make lemon squares!”, and they’re pretty good lemon squares. He probably has a cat named Snuffles, that he really loves. But he could also kick your ass, so…

(XIX) Corvus Corax

I know this name, I’ve heard this name. Ah, it’s Wolverine! He’s got—his primary weapon is his nose, right? ‘Cuz he’s got a straight-up Ocarina of Time nose.

(He’s got a beak.)

Exactly! No, that’s not a nose; that’s a beak or a weapon. I love the color scheme! Like, a lot of these dudes have gold, but, like, gold in different places, which is really cool. Also, he’s got feathers, which is neat. So I’m into that.

(XX) Alpharius/Omegon

(Or “Alpharius Omegon”)

Are they the same person, or are they twins? What the fuck—?

(They do like a “I am Spartacus” thing. He’s got a twin brother nobody knows about.)

I hope they get along. Oh, that’s cool, they look like they’d get along. I like the mirrored scar thing, do you think they did that on purpose? I like to think one of them got scarred and the other one was like “Bro, you gotta cut up your face so that we look like mirror images of each other, ‘cuz that’d be neat!” I dunno, mm— there’s something—unsettling that, I don’t know, it creeps me out a little bit. Ehh. Naw, I don’t like ‘em.

Final Thoughts

I think out of all of these, I like Vulkan, because you said he’s chill; and I like Lllorgar, because he’s, like, I dunno. There’s a vibe about him, where I’m like “Yeah, you seem like a neat dude!” Uh, who else? And I want Magnus the Red to be my BFF. I wanna chill with him on the weekends and if I have any crazy house parties he’s the first person I’m calling up, because I know everyone’s gonna get fucked up. Like, that is LEGIT. I trust him with my booze, and I trust him with anything. Um, and I’m trying to think—I don’t like the greasy guy; and I feel like Sang-Sangweenus? Sanguinius, that guy, he’s cool too. Though I don’t know, I feel like if I tried to hang out with him he’d just—I’d form a guilt complex. Like, he probably eats really well and works out and has a spice garden…

(He’s Rob Lowe?)

Exactly! So I just look at him and I’d be like “Mm, you’re a little TOO perfect.” But I trust him. No, Konrad, I don’t—he reminds me too much of the midway point when Viktor Krum turned into a shark. That makes me uncomfortable.

(So who would you say is your least favorite, or the one you’re most suspicious of?)

It’s Konrad, yeah. The other ones seem cool, and if not I feel like I’ve got bros. I just need a three-man army and I feel like I’d be safe from the ones I don’t trust. So yeah, I like ‘em, they could kick my ass!

Thanks again to @asking-ask​ for the commentary! Glad to know my BF is a filthy heretic in the making, save for Vulkan being part of his triad-squad.

[the-end-of-art]

Ended loneliness

From Mary Karr Names Names by Nina Puro at The Fix

Karr teaches in the Creative Writing Program at Syracuse University, where I once took a memoir class with her. On the first day she got in a huge spat with the program director, who came in and told her she was in the wrong classroom. They traded some choice barbs and he walked out. Then she broke character and told us to write down everything that happened—it had all been an act. The class argued long and hard about whether he was wearing pants or long shorts, and the exact wording of the final insult. Our recollections of such a recent event, as well as our personal reactions, varied wildly. The exercise demonstrated how inaccurate memoir is. Karr gave The Fix a chance to see if interview can do any better.

The Paris Review called you “surprisingly diffident when it comes to talking about [your]self.” Have meetings and therapy helped you become more comfortable with that?

Everything I wanted people to know I’ve already presented, and in some ways I’m more candid in talking about myself than I was before. When you surrender, you get used to a certain level of candor—you know, the old thing, you’re only as sick as your secrets. You develop a confidence in truth-telling. Part of my drinking was so much about trying not to feel things, to not feel how I actually felt, and the terrible thing about being so hidden is if people tell you they love you…it kinda doesn’t sink in. You always think, if you’re hiding things, How could you know who I am? You don’t know who I am, so how could you love me? Saying who I am, and trying to be as candid as possible as part of practicing the principles, has permitted me to actually connect with people for the first time in my life. It’s ended lifelong exile.

They always say God is in the truth, and I’ve ended loneliness and been able to feel connected by saying who I am and how I feel. I’m sort of comfortable to the degree to which I’m an asshole. It’s not like I’m not an asshole—people know the ways I’m an asshole and it’s within the realm of acceptable asshole-ocity. Part of my drinking and depression was having a voice in my head that was constantly criticizing everybody. I was sort of brought up that way, hypercritical, and I feel like my spiritual practice is a constant correction out of judging everybody else. But I think I’m more critical of myself than anybody, strangely enough, as marvelous as I am.

It’s generally agreed that the enormous success of The Liars' Club spurred a lot more confessional memoirs. But since then, there’s also been a trend in other media to broadcast people’s deepest secrets in a way that’s often seen as exploitive. What do you think about shows like Intervention and so on?

I think the problem with visual media like TV is that they’re reductive. They don’t show the psychological complexity, the real struggle and practice of what it is to have to give up the substance. I think Dr. Drew should be shot. I really do. That guy...small wonder that everybody who’s on 'Celebrity Drug House' or whatever it is would like to blow their fucking brains out. He seems like the most malevolent—I’m sure he means well, I’m sure he has benevolent impulses—but he seems so insincere and exploitative. And also, being told, “Oh yes, you are special because you’re a celebrity and trying to get sober”… I think those shows, especially with celebrities, are awful, and that’s why anonymity is important: Nobody should be a spokesperson. I’m not an example of anything, and the best way to learn about how to quit drinking is to spend a lot of time talking one-on-one with people who have done it.

James Frey is another famous memoirist and addict—a highly controversial one. Do you want to share your opinion of him, or should I nix that question?

No, no, go ahead. He was the guy who wanted nothing to do with AA—and look how well you turned out, you lying sack of shit! I felt sorry for that guy for a while and then when he started that thing—let’s rip off young people and exploit them—that thing he’s doing is just...really reprehensible, I don’t quite understand it.

If we can talk about your relationship with David Foster Wallace in the early ‘90s—did you get sober together?

He was in rehab and we’d met through friends; he was in rehab down the street and I lived in Belmont, Mass., which is where McLean [Hospital] is. When he got kicked out of Harvard they slam-dunked him in McLean, where I’d eventually do a happy little stint. One of the Whiting fellows said, "Can you contact him?" So I brought him a batch of brownies. I thought it was super sweet that they did that. I was about a month clean; his sobriety date was about a month after mine. So we ran into each other a lot. He was in a halfway house where I did volunteer work. I would drive people to job interviews and stuff like that; there were a lot of disabled people, people who only had one hand or whatever. Everybody there had to have a job and I drove a lot of people around. So I saw him there quite a bit, and we had a lot of mutual friends, many of whom ended up in Infinite Jest in a way I thought was…I really thought was unkind.

I remember you saying how a lot of Infinite Jest was lifted straight from meetings, despite the anonymity tradition. But some would say storytelling is always plagiarism, and maybe his book did people good; where’s the line?

Yeah, I thought it was pretty awful. Another person who does that is Augusten Burroughs. Everybody I ever wrote about, including David, I talked with in advance and said, “This is what I wanna do.” I talked to David before… I wasn’t going to use his name, then after he died, I’d talked to him before he did it and included him enough that I was gonna give him a pseudonym—which he said he didn’t care about, but nonetheless…then he was dead before the book came out. Tragically, stupidly...moron. Moron.

How much do you think his addiction or sobriety had to do with his death [by suicide in 2008]?

David had tried to kill himself three times before that, so you can’t slap that on it. I think being sober kept him alive way longer than he would have made it otherwise. But he wasn’t exactly sober by my measure: He was taking lots of anti-anxiety meds and stuff I consider chemically no different, so I don’t know exactly. I wasn’t in touch with him the last six months of his life. Such a tragic thing. And you know, I don’t know his wife but it seems like such a nasty fucking thing to do. Here’s this woman who’s been trying to take care of you and…I guess I could’ve imagined myself in that situation too easily, and I wouldn’t have been as nice about it as she was. I was lucky I wasn’t, I guess, but damn.

I think we kept each other alive to some extent, for a period of time when we were trying to quit using and it was all but impossible for each of us to do that. And I think our friendship and sobriety was important to both of us. I told him a lot of things about how he was writing. Everybody was very in awe of him because he was so much smarter than everybody. I’d been living in Cambridge where everybody was smarter than everybody, and I’d sort of decided that smart wasn’t that big of a deal. Not that it’s not a great advantage, but in his case I think it was a great disadvantage.

There’s this idea of the tortured artist, or of a link between depression and creativity—is that true and necessary? If so, how do you make meaningful art after recovery, if you’re no longer tortured?

Well, I don’t know, maybe you don’t. I’ve been sober almost 25 years and anything anyone’s ever bought from me has been written when I was sober. If I hadn’t been, I would’ve been like David, swinging from a fucking noose. That really cuts down on your creativity. [Laughs]

When I was super depressed, I wasn’t working—I was always too depressed. Hemingway did his best work when he didn’t drink, then he drank himself to death and blew his head off with a shotgun. Someone asked John Cheever, “What’d you learn from Hemingway?” and he said “I learned not to blow my head off with a shotgun.” I remember going to the Michigan poetry festival, meeting Etheridge Knight there and Robert Creeley. Creeley was so drunk—he was reading and he only had one eye, of course, and had to hold his book like two inches from his face using his one good eye. But you look at somebody like George Saunders—I think he’s the best short story writer in English alive—that’s somebody who tries very hard to live a sane, alert life.

You’re present when you’re not drinking a fifth of Jack Daniel’s every day. It’s probably better for your writing career, you know? I think being tortured as a virtue is a kind of antiquated sense of what it is to be an artist. It comes out of that Symbolist idea, back to Rimbaud and all that disordering of the senses and all of that being some exalted state. When I’ve been that way, I’ve always been less exalted than I would have liked.

So in the beginning you said you weren’t going to talk about AA. I was planning to ask whether you still go to meetings or have a sponsor. Should I nix that?

Well, I guess what I would say is, I always talk to people who are trying to stay sober and trying to have some kind of connection or community. And I spend a lot of time talking to young women with little kids who were trying to quit drinking, because when I was a young woman with a little kid and I was trying to quit drinking and a single mom, it was so hard; I was so deranged. So I feel an obligation to be of service. And there were people who helped me and talked to me and talked to my kid, who made places in their lives when I was so isolated—I want to be available to them— to any woman I have time for who is raising a kid and trying to quit drinking, I want to be available to them. So I guess I’d talk to that with that amount of a fig leaf.

I’m going to Michigan this week to talk to women at an organization that runs domestic violence shelters for women who are in violent relationships and struggling with addiction, or their partners are.

Do you think some people have addictive tendencies that both precede and outlast active use: the “addictive personality”? I’m thinking, now, about your habit of coming into class with two giant Wegmans green teas, and the gregarious ferocity with which you approach your students, and any conversation, which kinda scares people sometimes...

Oh, yeah! I would snort all the coke and kiss all the boys—if I could live on Ho-Hos, Jack Daniel’s and pharmaceutical cocaine, I would (and not blow my brains out, ‘cause that’s exactly what I’d do). I have a completely addictive personality. Diet Coke is my last—God, I know people counting days off Diet Coke; I’m such a Diet Cokehead. Now I won’t let myself buy it. I’m sorta like the girl who only gets coke from boys—at parties I let myself have a Diet Coke with lime and it’s exactly like snorting a line. If a bomb goes off, I’m getting a carton of Marlboros.

There’s a notion of your being and celebrating the pistol-packing outlaw—a very Texan lack of adherence to convention—which addicts often resemble. But in recovery, the idea of surrender, of adherence to rules, is something people have to learn. How have you managed?

I used to think of it as an adherence to rules, and the really horrible thing about quitting drinking is, I think, inside my mind I was so divided against myself. Nobody really talks about what happens to you and your level of self-confidence when you tell yourself every fucking day you’re going to drink X, and then you drink 10 times that—or you’re not going to drink at all and you drink anyway. You become very split off against yourself. So there was a part of me that would yell and scream and say, “You stupid bitch, goddamnit, you said you weren’t gonna drink and you drank anyway.” And there was this other part that was like “Fuck those people! Fuck the rules!” you know, blah blah blah…

You assume that when you quit drinking, you’re surrendering to that kind of nasty schoolmarm rule-maker. But for me getting sober has been freedom—freedom from anxiety and freedom from…my head. What has kept me sober is not that strict rule-following schoolmarm. There’s more of a loving presence that you become aware of that is I think everyone’s real, actual self—who we really are.

Blake said, “...we are put on Earth a little space / That we might learn to bear the beams of love.” And I think, quote-unquote, “bearing the beams of love” is where the freedom is, actually. Every drunk is an outlaw, and certainly every artist is. Making amends, to me, is again about freedom. I do that to be free of the past, to not be haunted. That schoolmarm part of me—that hypercritical finger-wagging part of myself that I thought was gonna keep me sober—that was is actually what helped me stay drunk. What keeps you sober is love and connection to something bigger than yourself.

When I got sober, I thought giving up was saying goodbye to all the fun and all the sparkle, and it turned out to be just the opposite. That’s when the sparkle started for me.

(https://www.thefix.com/content/mary-karr-liars-sober91684?page=all)