#and when she talked about being jewish i remembered her!!!!

[agentem]

Agatha and mentorship, Rio, and the funko reveal

More spoiler cutting. I have decided that a "funko pop spoilers" tag is necessary since the spoilers are for more than just the latest episode.

Spoiler cut!

Since now we know Teen is Billy for sure (which is what I suspected and most everyone suspected), I think I am very excited to see Agatha be his mentor. Agatha was a fun mentor to Wanda in the comics and I love Agatha on the show but she's not the old lady witch of the comics. Age is just a number and all that, but having her being the bad guy was a bit of a bummer.

I don't mind her doing bad stuff, but I wanted her to teach Wanda more than just those ruins that are only there to have Wanda use against her later.

And in the first Young Avengers book, Billy has to figure out how to do magic and shit on his own. He initially thinks he's Asgardian, but now TV Billy won't have to do that! And Agatha could help him find his Mom like in Children's Crusade.

I do think the Billy reveal will be sad for Agatha, because part of her hopes he is Nicholas. Since she thinks she's the star (presentation!) it's going to be rough for her to find out it's all about Wanda again.

But I am also worried about Teen and Rio. I did not guess that she was literally Death until the Funko Pop reveal. Billy has cheated death on some level. He was supposed to die in WandaVision and all the talk of a car accident before the events of episode 1* (see ETA4) makes me think that might have been some kind of inciting incident for Billy to go look for Agatha. Like a near death experience. (Also something happened when he was 13. Allie Ahn mentioned a bat mitzvah moment during the press tour and I got excited that Billy might actually be Jewish. But I hope I didn't mishear.)

Joe Locke did mention on the press tour that he had to shave a scar into his eyebrow, so that is there intentionally for some reason. Something cut him recently.

Anyway, I think Agatha will have to chose between Rio and Teen in some way. I know the shippers are shipping but I want to protect Billy at all costs.

ETA: Also, "do you remember why you hate me?" BECAUSE YOU ARE DEATH AND YOU TOOK MY BOY (possibly literally?).

ETA2: But I bet Rio relates to Agatha being hated by her mom and such. Agatha was just doing what she does. Death is just doing its job when people die. They are not necessarily evil.

Like Agatha even says to Jen that she left Jen alone because she respected Jen on some level. She took power from people she didn't "deserve it" per WandaVision. Others see her as a "witch killer" but I think she thinks they are better off without them.

Some bitches should die. (I bet Rio agrees.)

ETA3: Okay, so in the credits there is a newspaper mention of a near death three years previous, which would've been during WandaVision. This plays under Joe Locke's name. So there was an accident three years ago, and Agnes--during her true crime era--mentions another car accident in episode one. I got a little confused.

[lycantherous]

Went to my state capitol today and it was sooo cathartic to scream and cry and see all these lovely trans people and our friends who came to support us. Happy TDOV!

We have always been here and we will always be here!!

[heritageposts]

Harris has been a staunch supporter of Israel for years. In 2017 she addressed the American Israel Public Affairs Committee’s (AIPAC) annual conference and reminded attendees that the first resolution she co-sponsored as a senator was aimed at combating “anti-Israel bias” at the United Nations. “Let me be clear about what I believe. I stand with Israel because of our shared values, which are so fundamental to the founding of both our nations,” she told the crowd. In 2018 she gave an off-the-record speech to the organization, but eventually released her comments. In that speech she claimed that she raised money for the Jewish National Fund as a Girl Scout. “Having grown up in the Bay area, I fondly remember those Jewish National Fund boxes that we would use to collect donations to plant trees for Israel,” she told the audience. “Years later, when I visited Israel for the first time, I saw the fruits of that effort and the Israeli ingenuity that has truly made a desert bloom.”

For those unfamiliar with the Jewish National Fund (JNF), they're a Zionist organization that has been instrumental in the ethnic cleansing of Palestine.

See Stop the JNF for more information on their history, the way they operate, and their decades-long campaign of greenwashing (i.e. destroying native plants, crops, and agriculture under the banner of 'making the desert bloom').

Continuing, the Mondoweiss article goes:

“The vast majority of people understand the importance of the State of Israel,” she added later. “Both in terms of its history and its present in terms of being a source of inspiration on so many issues, which I hope we will talk about, and also what it means in terms of the values of the United States and those values that are shared values with Israel, and the importance of fighting to make sure that we protect and respect a friend, one of the best friends we could possibly have.” While running for President in 2019, Harris was praised by the lobbying group Democratic Majority for Israel (DMFI) for running to the right of Obama on the Iran deal. On the campaign trail Harris told Kat Wellman, a voter affiliated with DMFI, that she would reenter the agreement but “strengthen it” by “extending the sunset provisions, including ballistic missile testing, and also increasing oversight.” “I was very impressed with her. I thought she gave an excellent speech, she gave a very detailed, responsive answer to my question,” Wellman told a local paper after the exchange. “I’m pro-Israel, so I was I was very concerned and all about making sure we limit nuclear missiles in any country that could possibly destroy us all. I thought her answer was very good.” Harris has condemned the BDS movement and claimed that is “based on the mistaken assumption that Israel is solely to blame for the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.” However, she voted against an anti-BDS bill in 2019 citing First Amendment concerns.

For the full article, which includes Kamala's response to Israel post Al-Aqsa Flood, see Mondoweiss (July 22, 2024)

[thelonelyjew]

Pride banned Jews?!?

So it's that time of year again that I see people circulating stuff that is completely fabricated about what they imagine happened at Chicago Dyke March in 2017.

First, Dyke March is not Pride. It is not meant to be apolitical or single-issue. It is explicitly anti-imperialist, anticapitalist, and, yes, antizionist. It's not the big mainstream pride Parade that has corporate sponsors (and ads for gay tourism in Israel), it's a small radical grassroots demonstration.

Ok now that that's out of the way, they did not "ban Jews". I was there. They did not "ban Jewish symbols". They did not ask anyone to leave because of their Jewish pride flag.

What actually happened was three women who turned out to be employed by Israeli pinkwashing operation A Wider Bridge participated in the march with a rainbow flag that featured a blue star of david in the center. I remember seeing it and disliking it bc it gave me Zionist vibes but neither I nor anyone else bothered them about it.

After the march there was a cookout in the park. The women were asked to leave by a Jewish member of the Dyke March Collective after several hours of hanging out at the cookout because they were harassing other marchgoers.

Immediately publications like Forward, Tablet, JTA, as well as more mainstream publications started running stories making wild untrue claims which you can still read if you Google it because none of these were ever corrected or retracted. It's clear that these AWB agents had press releases pre-written and ready to fire as soon as they managed to provoke any reaction that they could spin into a controversy.

The photos that ran along with these headlines were also misleading. One of them showed a photo of a rainbow flag with a white star in the center. The star on the flag I saw was blue, and the shade of the star has specific political connotations. Showing a different flag with the politically significant color removed is extremely misleading. The one that was carried in the march (and which, again, wasn't banned!) looked like this:

Another banner image, this one in a New York Times article, showed a young woman with dark curly hair holding a sign that says "this is who we are". She was clearly chosen to feature because of her stereotypically Jewish features. The article implies that she is one of the supposedly banned Jews. This is false. You know how I know? Bc that was the friend I was there with that day! She does not identify as Jewish, she looks like that bc she is Italian, and she had no idea she was being photographed!

I had a hat decorated with red and black stars of David, and the following year a bunch of us wore Workers Circle sashes with Yiddish text (which uses the Hebrew alphabet) as well. No one who wasn't employed by a Zionist organization was asked to leave or even questioned about anything related to Zionism or Jewish identity.

I'm resigning myself to the fact that this is going to get dug up and passed around every year and people will believe what they want to believe, but if you hear claims that some queer group "banned Jews" or something similar, please look at the source for the information and if possible try to talk to actual Jewish people who participate in the community events being discussed. And if you hear this about Chicago Dyke March in specific, please correct people. I feel like I'm going insane when this many people are insisting that what I saw and experienced wasn't real and pointing to the barrage of misleading articles as what I should believe over my own experiences.

[slyandthefamilybook]

look dawg, the destruction of Magnus Hirschfeld's Institute was an important moment in the Holocaust, but I feel like ever since goyische tumblr learned about it it's literally all they talk about. People have just instantly latched onto it because it's something that makes them feel connected. "Those famous pictures of Nazi book burnings are them burning gay and trans research" comes off as less of recontextualizing history and more of "omg that's me! I'm famous!". The fact that it's brought up in every conversation about the Holocaust now, even when the discussion is about the specific persecution of other groups, is highly suspect. When Jews talk about the Holocaust, we don't view the victims as people like us. They are us. They're our parents and grandparents, our great- uncles and aunts. In every generation we must see ourselves as if we left Egypt

JKR is engaging in Holocaust denial, but it's a soft sort of denial. Someone told her the Nazis hated trans people, and she responded "nuh-uh" because she didn't want to believe trans people have been around for that long. It's bad, sure, but we already knew she was a shitty person. I think it's a better opportunity to discuss the process of radicalization and closed-loop ideological thinking than to shit on the internet's favorite punching bag with your new favorite factoid. Jews right now are experiencing violent antisemitism. Bomb threats, death threats, rape threats have become the norm for a lot of us, but I have yet to see that discussed with the same fervor as JKR being shitty for the gajillionth time. If you truly want to make yourself a part of the living history of the Holocaust, you have to understand how to fight for what's important. You have to learn how to protect what you love, not just destroy what you hate. It's very important not to lose the plot here

It's crucial that we remember that the book burnings were primarily about Jews. Joseph Goebbels proclaimed in Berlin "The era of extreme Jewish intellectualism is now at an end. The breakthrough of the German revolution has again cleared the way on the German path...The future German man will not just be a man of books, but a man of character." The German Student Union described book burnings as a "response to a worldwide Jewish smear campaign against Germany and an affirmation of traditional German values." Science, study, reason, progress were all seen as Jewish plots to destroy society (wonder where else we've seen that). Magnus Hirschfeld was persecuted because he was gay and his Institute was full of gay and trans people, yes. But it was also because he was a Jew, and a man of science who was pushing the boundaries of medical care for LGBT people. Just. something to think about

[maidservant-hecubus]

My father is an Ashkenazi Jew. His parents were first generation Americans. Their parents escaped the pogroms in Russia and Ukraine and came to find their American dream. They fought in wars and opened businesses and assimilated and my generation barely has a few words of Yiddish between us. My mother is as much of a WASP as it gets. American Revolutionaries and Signers and some household name civil war feature players. Not old money, but old America and undoubtedly white. I'm patrilineal. Not a Jew to a lot of Jews. Not a Jew to a lot of my Jewish family. Even though i was raised Jewish. Even though I look like my father. Even though i got enough of something in my DNA to get asked "What are you?" more often than not. More often than I'm just accepted at face value as "white". When i was little we lived in an Irish Catholic neighborhood. Like the 5-10 kids in every family sort of Irish catholic neighborhood. The kids calling me a christ killer and refusing to play with me because they heard it from their parents sort of irish catholic neighborhood. For some reason my parents tried to send me to the catholic school down the street. I lasted less than a week because i didn't understand their rituals and their language and they found out my father was a Jew and they couldn't have a christ killer in their midst. I was just sad i didn't get to wear the cute plaid skirt anymore. So i went to the public school and my well meaning shiksa mother who never converted but learned the Chanukah prayers and helped cook Seder dinners came to the school to teach the class about Chanukah. She taught them songs and all the kids got dreidels and had so much fun spinning the top for chocolate coins. It was nice to feel normal. A few weeks later a boy in a higher grade attacked me on the way to the bus and smashed my art project (we had made pig noses from solo cups to celebrate reading charlotte's web) into my face and called me a filthy jew. I didn't understand, i was more upset to lose the project i was so proud of. Other things happened. Things I wont talk about because putting them in context would doxx me. But a million reminders that i wasn't one of them. I wasn't welcome because i was Jewish. My parents divorced. My mother left. Far away so I'd only see her a handful of times growing up. And I went to live with my Dad in a city that seemed like it was overflowing with Jews. Everyone knew my holidays! In public school the teachers looked like my family and had familiar sounding names. We had the high holy days off just like christmas or easter. We sang Chanukah songs in the winter recital and nobody's mom had to come teach them to the class. Finally I belonged! My friends and cousins started planning for their b mitzvah celebrations and i asked for my own. I asked to go to hebrew school so i could be more like the people i belonged with and celebrate the things i loved about myself and them. "But you're not jewish." My father would say. This was news to me. The christ killer. The filthy jew. But a 10 year old has little power over their lives. So i didn't go. I didn't have a bat mitzva while my cousins had theirs. It was okay because i still belonged more than i ever had. But i was still jewish enough to keep the holidays and pray and fast and get sent with a box of matzo to my WASP grandmothers for easter, and have matzo packed in my lunch to eat in AP algebra in 7th grade and get asked if I'm a "Yid" by the teacher. And still to this day not know if it was endearment or insult but by then I knew even in this magical city being a Jew wasn't always safe. in highschool I tried to take hebrew lessons with a friend in a similar situation as me. She was also hungry to reconnect. I don't remember why the classes or the friendship fell through, but they did. My next "friend", a goy raised catholic from another neighborhood, liked to accuse me of being money driven when i picked up a penny on the sidewalk or tried to ask who was going to pay for the zine's she wanted to publish.

 "What are you?" I'd get asked a lot on the street by curious strangers, "Where are you from?" "Are you Italian?" Always Italian. I never really understood that, but its become code in my head for "You look like you're white but something about you is very not white and I just can't place it, so Italian seems safe and polite." I'm not here to unpack the Italian part of all that. I don't even know what I'm unpacking for myself by writing this except I've been sick for days and I'm so tired and this is all that my foggy brain can wrap itself around. Later I'm an adult and on my own and getting bloodwork done. The Nurse is a black woman and so sweet to me. She can tell I'm nervous about the needles because I've already stumbled through my apologies for my herd to find veins. So she distracts me with small talk. Where do i live? I tell her. She looks worried for me. Tells me that it used to be a nice neighborhood before white people took it over and she warns me like she's my own mother to be careful because they aren't safe. I doublecheck the skin she's putting a needle into. Whatever she sees isn't white. I love her for it. For a moment I belong there with her. She doesn't ask what I am or where i'm from, but she knows what i'm not. I'm the only one keeping the holidays with my family. We celebrate Passover because I go home to my fathers and cook the dinner and print out the Haggadah and lead the Seder to the tune of my drunk catholic stepmother eating my food and telling me i'll never be a jew. She's more of a jew than I'll ever be because she grew up in a jewish neighborhood and her friends were all jews and she married a jew and i was just playing pretend. I stopped going home for holidays and they stopped observing anything except Christmas. I marry a goy. "Is he a jew?" is the first thing my father asks and he's disappointed when i say no. He's abusive, i run. I end up living in the attic of this older old money WASP couple who need a live in house sitter. They're pillars of their church and they know someone from the WASP side of my family very well and its a funny coincidence and they think i belong there. I know from their divest from Israel bumper stickers that i don't. Then they find out I consider myself Jewish and i see the light in their eyes die and its replaced by something hard and disappointed. Now, while writing this, i can laugh about being the jew in someone's attic. But then, it was only a few months after that they started coming up with excuses for why I needed to move out. I did, their excuses never manifested into reality. I got married again. A jew this time! a Jewish medical professional liek grandma always wanted. She's a convert and her ex was a rabbinical student. I think maybe i'm home finally. She has to understand. I'm not Jewish enough for her. We don't keep holidays at home because i'm not a jew. I cry every year when pesach comes and goes and i haven't recited the plagues or eaten matzo piled high with horseradish. She insists on putting up a christmas tree. She turns abusive. I run.

I'm alone now and no longer in that magic jewish city. I'm far away and surrounded by mega churches and cows and the bagels suck and people quote the bible at me like some call and response that i don't have the cheat code for and I don't belong here at all but i'm finally finally free to light my menorah and recite the plagues and study torah with the group i found here on tumblr who love and accept me even though i'm patrilineal. Oct. 7th happened a few weeks after I moved here. I worry about my family back home and i think no one will look for Jews here among the cows and mega churches, so I can be a safe place for them to run if things get bad again. But i still don't fit in here. I don't look right. The last name I have now is common here and too white for whatever people see when they look in my face. I get interrogated about it a lot. But i learned quickly how to smile and say "have a blessed day". I hide my menorah when maintenance comes to work on my apartment. I flew home last month. Just for a visit. I've never been away from home this far or this long. And I'm the type that covers nerves and anxiety with chattiness, so at the airport i made a for-now-friend while we both waited for the plane to board. She's Puerto Rican. We talk about our lives. Our families. Her twin sister and i go by the same nickname and so we're family now. We talk about food. So much food and how much we love cooking and how important food was at home. "Are you Italian?" she asks as we're stepping through the hatch into the plane. Why always Italian? I wonder for the millionth time in my life. And I freeze up for a moment between fighting my carry-on over the gap and terror that I'm about to see the light go out behind her eyes and i'll lose this for-now friend. "No," i laugh but its not a real laugh and i see the concern in her face as we squeeze through the aisle because she can hear the apprehension in my voice, "I'm Jewish." And something strange happened because her face lit up and she smiled and said "No way?! You guys have GREAT food!"

[longleggedsocialist]

I am so fucking soft for these kids man. like sorry to their parents but they’re MY kids now 😙

[botanical-babes]

CW: political cults, Jessie Gender, if you wanna stop hearing about her then scroll on

this is about why this cancelling is not like all other cancellings :V

Someone (not vagueing, i literally just dont remember the url as i post this, u can @ urself if u wanna lol) asked, validly, why people are so upset over Jessie Gender when she has barely any following, and not someone like Hasanabi who has a much bigger following.

And I think the reason a lot of us feel betrayed by Jessie is that she WASNT a politics channel. For all the "Lefttube" cult* (we will revisit this) changed her, she used to stick mostly to stellar commentary on Star Trek and very personal trans issues. This is what I think most of us loved from her before all this -- I think the Sex in Star Trek series being abandoned for all this shit is just a tragedy, for one. SO many Jews love Star Trek. It is perhaps one of the quintessentially Jewish shows of all time. And now she stabs us in the back -- et tu, Brute?

But I think the other thing is that we've actually just witnessed someone be subsumed into a political cult and watched them post one of the most bigoted things they have ever posted, as a result. :(

For a long time, I have watched what we know as LeftTube/BreadTube/etc start to grow, and I thought it started off fine enough, a group of creators similar enough that they started to become friends, show on each others channels, and collaborate.

But lately, and I think I noticed it especially with Foreign Man, I just feel like ... when someone gets accepted into the LeftTube clique, they undergo this process of Leftist sanitization and brainwashing into talking about a really specific loop of topics in a real specific kinda way. Its hard to talk about without visual examples, because like. Pre-Breadtube Foreign Man videos feel very different to the hyper-polished post-Breadtube videos in a way that shows he had to learn how to walk and talk and look like the rest of the group.

Its to a point that if you dont do that, they do ostracize you and treat you like you're stupid, like they did to Kidology who I think deserved private guidance and not a mass public shaming like she's an idiot instead of confused and working with some bad theory. I think F.D. had a responsibility to educate her on trans issues, and he actively made the decision not to because "I wont debate the rights of trans people, that makes me a bad ally." Like no, not educating others when you're in a position to do so makes you a bad ally. That's just one example of another minor but telling issue around Lefttube and how they operate.

And ... idk, I think for me there is an aspect of mourning the loss of a person to a political cult that comes with me leaving Jessie Gender behind. I genuinely don't think she can understand her bigotry until she steps back and puts being a leftist and "on the right side of history" lower on her priority list underneath "looking at the big picture and realizing how I am impacting other people."

We need to start talking more about Leftist political cults. Because I think we are looking at a lot more of them than we currently wanna recognize. And I think the video essay sphere of Breadtube is one of em. (I dont know enough about debate bro lefties to know if that has the same problem.)

[fdelopera]

Bigoted white Karen with a large online platform produces an overly long YouTube video where she spreads lies, conspiracy theories, and slander against an ethnic minority group that has been persecuted for over 2000 years. When she is called out for her bigotry, she doubles down and produces a four-hour hit piece against this ethnic minority group, which is riddled with disinformation, mistakes, and more lies.

Then when she's called out again on this four-hour rant, she pulls the "I have a ____ friend," and she claims that she consulted with two members of the ethnic minority group that she is slandering. Like a fucking coward, this white Karen hides behind the two people she claims to have spoken to. Moreover, she refuses to see the bigotry in tokenizing the two members of this ethnic minority group who agree with her white Karen ass.

Then when this white Karen is called out even further for spreading bigoted disinformation, she pulls a James Somerton, and she starts deleting parts of her videos without apologizing for the harm she has caused. And like James Somerton, she also deletes comments from people who point out her lies.

This is a clear-cut case of a bigoted white woman with a large online following trying to slander an ethnic minority group.

.

What I am describing, of course, is Jessie Gender's recent Jew-hate diatribes on her YouTube channel, but I have written it in a way that YOU, dear reader, get to find out if you are an antisemitic bigot too.

Read the above paragraphs knowing that I am talking about Jews, and see how you react.

Do you acknowledge that Jessie Gender's videos are filled with antisemitic bigotry and disinformation? Or do you equivocate and make excuses for her, once you know that I'm talking about Jews?

.

Dear reader, I am giving you an opportunity to learn from Jessie's mistakes. The best way to combat bigotry is to do exactly the opposite of what Jessie has done. Here are five suggestions:

1) Acknowledge that you are engaging in antisemitic bigotry. Admitting your own deeply rooted prejudice against Jews can sometimes be the hardest part. The very first step in combatting bigotry is to say (and mean!) five important words: "I'm. Sorry. I. Was. Wrong."

2) Don't tokenize Jews. Don't just look for two Jews who agree with your bigoted viewpoints. Instead, actually talk to many different Jews, including many Israeli Jews, to get a nuanced perspective of the struggles that Jewish people face.

3) When Jewish people (who are not the Jews you've tokenized) tell you, "Hey, you're being a bigot," actually listen to us! Don't discount us. Strive to learn from us. Don't double down on your prejudice.

4) Combat your own egotism. If you are an egotistical asshole like Jessie, when someone tells you, "Hey, you're being a bigot, and your bigotry is putting Jewish people's lives in danger," your first response may be to say, "No I'm not! How dare you call me a bigot!" This is a knee-jerk reply, and it comes from a place of hubris. Instead of doubling down, learn how to apologize. Then do the active work to listen to Jews so that you're not contributing to the Jew-hate that we face.

Remember, the five words that an egotistical person like Jessie struggles to say are: "I'm sorry. I was wrong." Don't be like Jessie. Be better.

5) Look at the company you are keeping. Maybe you're hanging out with Leftists who have secretly been watching Neo-Nazi videos, and they've been feeding you antisemitic talking points that actually come from far-right white supremacists like David Duke and Richard Spencer. Or maybe your Leftist friends have been scraping their Jew-hate rhetoric from Protocols of the Elders of Zion, which is still used as a textbook throughout the Arab world. Or worse, maybe your Leftist friends have stolen their ideas word-for-word from Hitler's Mein Kampf.

If you spout Nazi rhetoric (and so many of you Hamasniks sound EXACTLY like Hitler), then guess what! Congratulations! You are a Jew-hating bigot!

This is a quote from Hitler's Mein Kampf, from 1925. And it could just as easily come from the mouth of a Hamasnik as it could from a Neo-Nazi today. Next year, it will be 100 years since Mein Kampf was published, and it feels like the Hamasnik movement has dragged us full circle, back to Nazi Germany:

The Jews domination in the state seems so assured that now not only can he call himself a Jew again, but he ruthlessly admits his ultimate national and political designs. A section of his race openly owns itself to be a foreign people, yet even here they lie. For while the Zionists try to make the rest of the world believe that the national consciousness of the Jew finds its satisfaction in the creation of a Palestinian state [aka a Jewish State in the British Mandate of Palestine -- 99 years ago in 1925, when Hitler published Mein Kampf, Jews in Eretz Yisrael were called Palestinians], the Jews again slyly dupe the dumb Goyim. It doesn’t even enter their heads to build up a Jewish State in Palestine [again, Palestine was the word Hitler was using for the British Mandate of Palestine, aka Eretz Yisrael] for the purpose of living there; all they want is a central organization for their international world swindle, endowed with its own sovereign rights and removed from the intervention of other states: a haven for convicted scoundrels and a university for budding crooks. - Adolf Hitler, Mein Kampf

Yo Jessie Gender! Guess what, there's a cure if you find yourself sounding like Hitler! It's called EDUCATE YOUR DAMN SELF, YOU FUCKING BIGOT.

In conclusion, if you find yourself being a Jew-hating bigot on main, just remember this: the first step in overcoming your antisemitic prejudice is ADMITTING that you are a bigot.

Use Jessie's example as a warning. When people call you out for spreading Jew-hate and putting Jewish lives around the world in danger, don't double down. Instead, begin by saying these five vital words: "I'm sorry. I was wrong."

[matan4il]

Daily update post:

Today, Israel is voting in its local elections (for mayors and city councils). ALMOST all of Israel. The original date was at the end of October 2023, for obvious reasons, the elections were postponed. There were also a lot of mayor nominees, who were summoned for reserves service due to the war, and one of the reasons why the elections were postponed more than once, was to give as many of them as possible a chance to finish their service, and participate in their own election campaign. But even so, there are still hundreds of thousands of people from evacuated communities (displaced people, internal refugees, however you wanna call them), and therefore not everyone will be voting today. For the evacuated cities and towns, the elections were postponed until November. Looking at things, it's not sure they'll be back in their homes by then either, so IDK what their elections will look like. And then of course there are the hostages. Save for two, 4 years old Ariel Bibas and his 1 years old baby brother Kfir, they all had the right to vote, and none will get to. We remember them and hurt over their absence and everything being continuously being stolen from them on this day, too. On a side note, the national supervisor of these local electional is Rayan Ghanem. And if you know Jewish last names, you know Ghanem is not one of them. I'm trying to remember a time in apartheid South Africa when a non-white was a national supervisor of elections.

Despite still pointing out that the International Court of Justice has no right to judge the case brought to it by South Africa (becaue of SA's false claims to bring this case to court), Israel has filed a report in accordance with one of the ICJ's provisional measures, showing that its actions are in compliance with all of them (like providing humanitarian aid to Gaza, and doing all it can to protect civilians).

Meanwhile, at Harvard, just 6 weeks after she was appointed to lead the task force meant to combat Jew hatred, the university's antisemitism tsar has quit her position, with reports saying that she's frustrated over her inability to implement practical measures.

Remember when I wrote about Idan Amedi, the Israeli singer and actor that most people outside our country know from his role on Fauda? He gave a really moving speech when he was released from the hospital. I've wanted to share it for a while, but couldn't find it translated well. I found this bit:

But it really doesn't cover how moving the whole speech is (it's 9 minutes long). Among other things, he also thanked medical teams, assured Israelis we have the best ones, and apologized to his soldiers who died in the same incident in which he was injured. He also mentioned that he was unrecognizable when he was rushed into the hospital, and that doctors only identified him by the note that was attacked to his hand. It turns out, he really wanted people to see what he was talking about, and to understand that by the time he gave this public speech, he was already looking much better than on the day of he was wounded. So here is the image he shared himself on his IG (just scroll quickly past it, if you feel like it is too much for you, which is an understandbale reaction):

This is 68 years old David Edri.

On October 7, he was held hostage with his wife by Hamas for hours. At a certain point, he even covered his wife Rachel with his own body, in order to protect her from the terrorists' shots. They both survived. Yesterday, we got the news that he has passed away. His family said the trauma and stress from the massacre, and the news of its scale, had aggravated his medical problems for the last couple of months, until he could no longer go on.

This is 23 years old Raz Mizrachi.

In May 2021, she was injured in a vehicular terrorist attack in Jerusalem, but survived. On Oct 7, she was attending the Nova music festival. Her last phone call was to the police, to help instruct them on where she and dozens of others were hiding from Hamas terrorists, inside a public bomb shelter. Raz was murdered shortly after that. When her mom got a copy of the call's recording, she said it was a great source of comfort to the family, to know that Raz was a fighter till the last moment.

May their memory be a blessing.

(for all of my updates and ask replies regarding Israel, click here)

[heathersdesk]

My grandfather was killed in a hit and run accident in 1978.

His mother and sister struggled with life after that. They decided to go on a trip across the United States together to get away from things for a while.

I discovered this trip when I was going through photo albums and suddenly saw a place I recognized.

The Salt Lake Temple.

They went to many places during that trip. But there was something truly special to me that, in one of the worst seasons of their lives, they ended up at the temple.

I served part of my mission at Temple Square. I was waiting for a visa to Brazil that I began to think was never coming. I had a truly horrendous time in the MTC babysitting a district of Elders who spent weeks on end bullying me and tearing down my self-esteem. I was told directly by someone, I forget who now, that I was being sent there to recover. And when I realized that the mission had no young Elders in it at all, that it was only Sisters and senior couples, I came to appreciate what that meant.

I had so many wild interactions there with so many people. Some of them were strange, like the guy who viewed the Book of Mormon as proof of alien interactions with humans. There were moments of heartbreak, like the woman who was in tears at the Christus statue who attacked us when we checked in on her. There were moments of pure delight, like when an LDS family with two young daughters came to that same Christus statue. The oldest girl, no older than 4 or 5, squealed "JESUS" and ran to the Savior's feet, little sister in tow. Whenever I hear someone mention the teaching to become as a little child, she is exactly who I think of.

There were also moments that were meant solely for me, like when I met the first Sister to ever be called to the Boston mission I had hoped to go to to wait for my visa. Boston has a large Brazilian population, many of whom are members of the Church. I had begged in prayer to be sent there and was told by other people it wouldn't happen because "Sisters don't go there." I had an entire conversation with the woman who was going to be that change. It seemed cruel to me at the time, dangling the carrot of something I wanted right in front of my face. In time, I've realized it was so I would remember that God does miracles and is aware of the desires of my heart, even if it means I don't get what I want. Someone needed to exercise enough faith to push that door open for women. I put my full weight behind it, and I can be just as proud that it opened for someone else.

But some of my favorite people I met there were people who just made me laugh. I met a Jewish convert from New York who told us his conversion story, how what drew him in was the Plan of Salvation. He summarized it in a New York accent in a voice I can still hear in my mind: "So you're a god, eventually. But can you pay RENT?!"

One of my favorite people I met was a Scottish convert named Agnes who was doing the Mormon trail across the US, beginning in New England and ending in Utah. She was a much older woman and told us all about her pilgrimage, and how she had cuddled with the oxen at the baptismal font in the Manhattan New York Temple. (I've been there. You enter into the baptistry on face level with them, or did the last time I was there.) She shared her testimony with us, and I'll never forget what she said.

She explained that the story of Joseph Smith was really hard to get her mind around. It truly is an insane set of asks: angels, gold plates, polygamy, and all the rest. She talked about how she came to accept it—not through any kind of empirical evidence or proof, but through faith and what that looked like.

For her, it was the recognition that being LDS was the best way she had ever encountered to live an excellent life. She said that the worst case scenario she could imagine is one where God would say to her, "You know that whole business with Joseph Smith was a load of crock, right? But you lived such a good life, I have to let you in anyway."

That has always stayed with me. Agnes was one of many people who came to the Square looking for something. I saw people come there looking for faith, or a fight, and truly everything in between. And it's only now that I'm older and wiser that I see something clearly now that I couldn't see then.

Agnes didn't need to come to Temple Square to find faith. She already had a tremendous amount of faith. She, and many others, were looking for conviction. I was at Temple Square long enough to learn you don't get that from a place. While a place like Temple Square can illuminate the possibilities for conviction through the lens of history, it doesn't bestow that conviction through contact or proximity alone. Conviction is made from the materials of your own life and your own choices. Your will, how firmly you place yourself into an immovable and unyielding position, is the measure of your convictions. It comes from within.

Faith is the decision to believe in what you cannot see, and what cannot be proven objectively. That never goes away. Nothing we experience in life, no place we ever visit, will create a shortcut under, over, or around that decision to believe, to trust in God. Faith, at its core, is a decision. The ability to continue making that decision over and over again, under all species of hardship and opposition, is conviction.

Where Jesus walked is nowhere near as important as how Jesus walked, and with whom. The same is true for all of us. Our walk with God might never take us anywhere near a temple because of where God has called us to go. But we are the holiest dwelling places of God on earth—not any of the buildings we've made.

Be a holy place of living faith wherever you are, whatever your circumstances may be. Worship God, no matter what places you can or cannot enter. There is more than one way to access a temple. One way is to enter a place that people invite God to dwell. The other is to become that place. There can be no separation from God where communion never ceases. It is the refuge that is unassailable by others for as long as the person wills it so. The torch within will not go out.

The temple is not special because it has some holy essence that springs forth out of nothing, to passively be absorbed by others. The temple is special because it directs people to Jesus Christ, who is the giver of healing and peace. The temple is just a building. It's Jesus Christ that is the true power behind it all, whose objective is to make you, me, and every person you know the holiest creature you've ever beheld. You are the end goal.

[queensunshinee]

Time Of Our Lives || Part 6

Part 6:

"I brought that disgusting snack with the jam you like," Art sat down in the seat next to Liana on the plane and glanced at her for a second. She had fallen asleep. He didn’t know when or how she managed it, but he knew that if the recent period had been hard for him, Liana had completely collapsed into herself. She managed to fight with him twice, apologize three times (he wouldn’t lie, he enjoyed every "sorry for being a bitch" he received, because up until a few months ago, she wouldn’t apologize at all) and she cried a lot. He knew she cried because every time he saw her in the library (the only place he managed to find her in the past month), her cheeks were puffier than usual, and her eyes were red. Now that they were traveling home for the holidays, he hoped she could rest and, if he were to be really greedy, Art hoped she would have time for him again.

Without him knowing how it happened, her head found its place on his shoulder, causing him to remember that time he was sick and woke up next to her. The first thought that crossed his mind that morning was that the only position that could bring him closer to Liana was to be physically inside Liana. His dick felt the same way when he woke up that day, quietly went to the bathroom, and then went for a run. Since then, he had occasional flashes of the image of his legs tangled with hers and his hands holding her as if she were his only grip on reality. Like now, with her head on his shoulder and her breathing heavy. He found himself sighing and closing his eyes as well.

"You're coming for Christmas, right?" Art asked as they walked toward her parents' car, carrying his bag in one hand and her suitcase in the other (despite Liana's insistence that she could carry it herself). "You know we're Jewish and we celebrate Hanukkah, right, Art?" she said, amused. Now that she had a little break, she planned to sleep so much that her face would take on the shape of her pillow. "Really, Liana Levy?" he asked, rolling his eyes. "Do you usually come to my parents thing?" "Now that you'll be there too, I'll ask my parents to stay home and watch TV." When Art was in boarding school, he didn't come home for the holidays; it was a training period, and he didn’t want to waste it. "You know that just means I'll come to you, right?" he replied, not even looking at her. Art didn’t have many friends from home. Neither did Liana. She planned to meet up with Rebecca, and Jake had sent her a message asking if she was coming for the holidays. She hadn’t replied yet. "Usually your parents put up a small menorah on the window. It's cute," she shrugged and from a distance saw her dad leaning on the car. "Look, Art." She pointed in his direction and quickened her pace, seeing Art do the same. "Three months and you're already her soldier," her dad said as he hugged her, referring to her suitcase that Art had carried. "What can I do? She has that kind of influence," Art winked playfully and hugged Liana's dad as well. They really liked each other. They always talked about sports and Stanford, sharing stories that Liana couldn’t relate to. "So, I'll see you in two days?" Art asked as her dad parked in front of his house. "Don't count on it, Donaldson," she replied, and he rolled his eyes as he walked away. "You two seem closer," her dad observed. "We're fine," she summed up, not wanting to agree but knowing he was right.

The next day, Liana called Art in the afternoon. "I knew you'd miss me," he sounded amused. "Where are you, why are you out of breath?" she asked, confused. "I went to play tennis with my dad. I'm trying not to embarrass him, and now we're resting for the third time because he's old," Art replied. "Why did you call?" he asked. "Do you want to come to a party tonight?" she asked in return. "You don't have to, but Rebecca invited me to Sean's party, and I think he's a douchebag, but Rebecca probably wants to hook up with him, and she'll probably ditch me during the evening, and I think Jake will be there, and to be honest, I'd rather stay home, but Rebecca really asked. Will you come with us?" she asked after a stream of murmurs. There was something pleading in her voice, and Art couldn't help but feel a slight tingle all over his body. It was something he couldn't pinpoint the source of, but hearing Liana beg was a sound he didn't know his ears needed.

"What's in it for me?" he tried to make the most of a situation where he had nothing to lose. "Art." Her tone was warning. "I'm serious," he retorted, even though he wasn't. "So am I. We'll pick you up at nine, dress like a normal person, please. Button-down shirt and jeans, don't come in a Stanford shirt." He could hear the sarcasm. "You know if you want something, you're not supposed to insult me, right?" he replied. "That's my love language." She said, and he didn't stop responding that he knew before she hung up.

"We're going to get drunk, right?" Liana asked him as she put a hand on a bottle of gin. "Will I have to babysit you today, Li?" he asked, amused by the situation. "No. Because you'll get drunk with me. I told you Rebecca would leave," she told him, pouring them both a tequila shot. "You're on vacation, Art. You can afford one night of alcohol. I promise to be responsible for the rest of the break. We'll only drink champagne on New Year's Eve. I promise to be good," she smiled her most convincing smile. Liana hoped it would have an effect, although Art didn't easily give in to manipulations, especially not when they were so transparent. "You'll be good?" he asked, raising the shot glass like her. "I'll be the best," she replied, and they both drank. This was going to be a long night.

Four shots in and a cup of cheap keg beer later, Art and Liana found themselves sitting outside on the synthetic grass at Sean's house. The December cold didn't affect either of them due to the amount of alcohol. "Lia, I didn't know you were here," they turned together a second after they sat down, seeing Jake. "James," Art smiled a smile Liana knew exactly what it meant; Jake didn't stand a chance. He was on the sharp tongue radar of Art Donaldson, who, under the guise of niceness, could be the most ruthless person in the world. "It's Jake," the other replied. "Can we talk?" he turned to her. "We're busy, try later, but I wouldn't count on it," the smile didn't leave Art's face while he spoke. "Liana." Jake's voice was piercing. "I have nothing to talk to you about right now, Jake, sorry. Don't ruin my night," she tried to be gentle, but they both knew he didn't deserve it. He nodded and walked away in defeat. "That was fun. Do you have any other exes to bully?" Art asked, taking another sip from the bottle they had taken with them. "Arthur!" she feigned an angry voice and lightly slapped his hand, but he quickly grabbed her hand in his. "You're supposed to be good, not violent," he said, tracing small circles on the hand he refused to let go of. "I can be both at the same time." She shrugged, snatching the bottle from him with her free hand.

"Lindsey has been eyeing you all night; you could totally go for it," she said, examining him. He glanced over at Lindsey, a blonde girl he remembered from when they were younger. Her body was well-sculpted, and the dress she wore suited her. "No, tonight it's just you and me, Li. You won't get rid of me and go to James," he said, half-humor, half-serious. He didn't want her to go to her ex. "Okay." She shrugged and laid her head on his knees without asking, looking at him with an amused look he returned. "Are you drunk?" he asked. "No, you're drunk," she stated. "Why did you break up with James?" "His name is Jake." "Why do you always evade when I ask you?" He couldn't stop looking at her. She was…his tonight. Close to him. Looking only at him. Needy as fuck. As if she only saw him from the moment they entered this house. "Because it's embarrassing…" she took another sip and choked a little. "Jesus, Li, don't drink while lying down." Art scolded and snatched the bottle from her, taking another swig. "Tell me." His finger lingered in her hair and gently brushed her cheek; he saw how she instinctively closed her eyes from the cold touch. "Tell me," he repeated, continuing to caress her face gently and moving slightly to her neck, testing the boundaries of this evening. "You'll laugh at me." She opened her eyes and looked at him. "Tell me," he said with the same firmness that made her swallow. An intonation she had never heard from him before. A voice she didn't know how to refuse. "I didn't want to sleep with him." She mumbled and tried to turn her face the other way, forgetting for a moment that Art's hand was there, and just as it had stroked before, it now made sure to stabilize her head exactly where he wanted it. With eyes on him. Eyes that pierced directly into her soul if that was possible. If it wasn't the alcohol that made her succumb to the blue eyes that stared at her. "Why would I laugh at you?" he asked. "Because it's embarrassing not to want to sleep with your boyfriend when you're 19." She really didn't want to keep looking at him when she said it, but he didn't let her escape the feeling of surrender she was experiencing right now. "I would never judge you for that, Li. More than that, I'm quite glad you didn't sleep with that loser," his hand went back to making light movements on her cheek, but the atmosphere in the air changed. "Why?" she asked quietly. "Why what?" he replied. "Why are you glad?" she slowly sat up, and Art helped her with a hand he placed on her lower back, not removing it when she sat closer than she had before. "Li…" his nose touched hers for a few seconds, and he closed his eyes. "Are you going to do that thing where you whisper sweet nothings and pretend to be nice so I'll go home with you?" she asked, feeling bold, and he smiled, his eyes still closed. "That's pointless; we both know I don't have a single nice bone in my body," he managed to find words, opening his eyes for a second to see her like he hadn't seen her before. Her cheeks were flushed like his from the alcohol and the cold, her lips half-parted, and her green eyes fixed on him. "And I'll still go home with you?" her voice was quiet and needy, if someone asked Art, he would say almost musical. "Yes, you'll still go home with me, Li." He declared. And so, with both of them half-drunk, Art and Liana's lips met. It was a kiss that knocked the air out of their lungs, built on the sexual tension they had carried for years without realizing it. Liana's hands tried to touch every part of him while Art's hands were experienced and steady on her waist. His lips moved to her neck, and she let out a sound that Art could swear was pornographic, one he didn't want anyone else to hear from her ever.

"We're leaving. Now," he declared, giving her a look that left no room for doubt. This night was just beginning.

This one is a bit longer, so I hope it's OK... No Patrick in this one, but we needed some development with Art after that last part. Hope you like it. Thanks for engaging and sending me your thoughts. Please continue to do that. And if you want me to tag you for future parts, say the word ❤️

taglist: @swetearss ganana yoitsme-04

[queerprayers]

Officially, in the western church, today isn't the Annunciation. This is Holy Monday, and the Annunciation is moved to avoid coinciding with Holy Week. I think if it were during the Triduum I would appreciate this, making space to hold both days separately. But it's Monday, and they can't stop me from thinking about Mary during Holy Week. March 25 is a traditional date of both Jesus's death and conception, as well as the Creation—a spring equinox of redemption. Holding space for all these things has always been appropriate. Birth and death coexist; Jesus's beginnings were the beginnings of his mortality. The angel announces the future, and whoever listens must live through all of it.

What did it mean for Mary to say yes to this? We laugh at the "Mary did you know?" lyrics, because we know she knew. But she also didn't have to know the details of God's plan to say yes to what every parent says yes to—witnessing. Acknowledging the bringing into the world of a frail being, perhaps giving your body to make this happen, praying that you will die before they do but knowing that is not promised. And every parent living under a violent state knows what it is to hope it's not your kid that's next (whether you're a Black parent teaching your child how to talk to cops, or a Palestinian parent hiding in rubble, or a Jewish parent under Roman occupation who's seen the crosses outside the city walls).

Do you think, at the foot of the cross, Mary thought of her response, "Let it be unto me according to your word"? After bearing that Word inside her, teaching him how to walk, waiting for God to change his mind, to reveal a ram caught in a thicket so her son wouldn't have to die after all, do you think she remembered her teenage self, magnifying the Lord? "The Almighty has done great things for me"—and to me. Great as in too big to look at all at once, bloodstained things. The power of the Most High is overshadowing her—the shadow of the cross—his flesh broken, and someone (including her perhaps) will take him down and wash him for burial.

What does it mean to hold space for that day when an angel tore into her life, breaking it open for God—during Holy Week? If we desire a feast, we should wait until Easter, I agree. But today I honor a lady of sorrows—I desire an acknowledgement of the violence of agreeing to live and love and create when it will be torn away. The story never ends there, but we must live through this week (and whatever weeks of our lives hold these things) saying yes, witnessing. Judas quit before the miracle happened—he couldn't witness death so he didn't witness the life (on this earth). Mary kept saying yes, even at the end.

We can never know everything we are saying yes to when we surrender to God. She knew in one sense, yes, but no one knows what it's like to lose a son until it happens. And no one but her knows what it's like to be the Mother of God. We already know what God wants us to do, but we don't know until it happens how much it hurts—and what the dawn will bring. What swords will pierce us, what promises will be kept.

When we say the Magnificat, we usually add a Gloria at the end—Mary did not have those words (the Trinity would not be formulated for another couple hundred years), but we have them. When we sing her song, we hold space for the ways we see God exist, and she saw those ways intimately. She held the Son and was surrounded by the Spirit, and now the Father holds her. As we live through Holy Week every year, every year she says yes. God's love continues unfolding. As it was in the beginning, is now, and will be forever. Amen.

Your assigned reading for today (should you choose to accept it) is @tomatobird-blog 's comic "Thirty Years." A blessed Holy Monday (and Annunciation) to you all.

[loulouwrites]

PROSE . ALFIE SOLOMONS

summary: alfie found comfort in her letters during his darkest moments, even if they were never meant for him warnings: angst, war, death, ptsd, a bit of politics, happy ending, unedited for now word count: 2.2k a/n: a short lil story x

Lieutenant Adam Weiss would read those letters over and over, a smile on his muddy face whenever he pulled the envelopes from his pockets, almost as if the words made him forget where he was.

The letters were creased and the envelopes were worn, mud caked the sides and gritty fingerprints decorated the edges from where he would run his hand down the pages. Some of the letters were longer than others, ranging from one page to four, front and back.

Captain Alfie Solomons watched the boy pull out a fresh letter, amazed he received so many. Delivering letters to frontline soldiers was not a priority in the war, nor should it be, men waited months for notes from their family, but somehow, Adam always received his - he must have been the luckiest lad in France.

People didn't write to Alfie.

His parents were long gone, his sisters had husbands they would rather scribble away to, and the few friends he had were scattered throughout Europe, fighting the same fight he was - one none of them quite understood.

Adam's smile felt like an assault on the captain, the grin he wore reminiscent of a time before, a time that didn't exist anymore. The lieutenant had never shared who the letters were from, he kept them tucked into his breast pocket, only pulling them out when everybody else was busied with other, more important tasks.

"Who's writing you these letters?" Alfie asked the boy, trying to stretch his legs the best he could in the cramped quarters below ground.

Adam's grin faded from his face, and he shrugged non-committally, tucking the letter away.

"Just a girl I know," he said, face bashful.

"A girl you know," Alfie nodded. He was surprised he had never met Adam before the war, they were both raised in the same area, both Jewish, of a similar age, yet their paths had never crossed. "A pretty girl?"

"Just a girl," Adam scowled, crossing his arms across his chest.

The sound of gunfire interruped whatever Alfie was about to say next.

Lieutenant Adam Weiss succumbed to injuries sustained in the battlefield two weeks before the armistice was signed. He died at the age of 24, with a hole in his head, and even more in the chest.

Alfie didn't feel much when he died, there had been so much death that he feared he had become immune to it, and he was never particularly close to the man. Yet, it didn't stop him from taking the letters from the dead man's pocket before his body was dragged away.

He had no intention of reading the letters that were now kept in his own breast pocket, he wasn't even sure why he took them in the first place, but the weight of them comforted him.

More letters arrived the day after Adam died, a small envelope addressed to him at the bottom of the pile, and Alfie took that one too, snatching it from the boy who delivered them before he could question it.

It was a lot quieter these days, men were being picked off one by one, and those that were still alive, found little to talk about. At first, they would joke about finally being away from their wives, or make lewd comments about the nurses, but now, there was nothing, it was if they couldn't remember their lives before.

Alfie opened the letter before he could stop himself, the cursive handwriting was so neat, not a word had been crossed out, suggesting the author had taken their time with every word, possibly rewriting it completely whenever she made a mistake, a showing of her care, not just for the letters, but for Adam too.

He carefully read the well wishes and pleasantries. The one page letter was not particularly engaging or poetic, but the talk of day to day life in London was comforting to Alfie in the most painful way.

His eyes led to the bottom of the page, where the writing got slightly messy, and the words were slanted more than they were in the beginning.

Revolution is in the air, and peace is on the horizon. You will be home soon, hopefully before the month draws to a close, and we will celebrate your birthday together, as we have always done.

The slaughter will end, and you will be home.

Your dearest, and only friend.

She didn't sign it, there was no need to, he supposed, the letter was not for him, it was for the boy dead on the battlefield, and he already knew her name.

Alfie scoffed as he reread her words.

The slaughter will end.

Bullshit.

The armistice was signed less than two weeks later. The girl from the letters was right, the slaughter had ended and peace had come - though the men returning were forever changed.

Alfie wondered whether word about Adam had reached her, it should have by now. He considered tracking her down and telling her himself, he was the boy's captain, after all, but he had no fight in him to search for a nameless girl in London - he was tired.

The journey to London was long, they had heard them like cattle onto boats and trains, the men silently sitting in their misery, no celebration to be had.

The time allowed Alfie to read the other letters he had been carrying. He read them in no particular order, skimming through the cursive writing, more to distract himself from the sadness filling the train carriage, than anything else.

Mr Feldman brought me flowers again, he thinks I'm his dead wife.

Your mother came over for shabbat, she cried a lot.

I still go to the bakery we used to go after school, the bread isn't as nice now that Issaac isn't there to make it.

James proposed to me - again. It is the fifth time I have declined. He doesn't understand why I have no intention to marry a ten year old.

The girl talked a lot about what was happening at home, Alfie appreciated that, other than well wishes and the odd scathing political rant, she rarely mentioned the war, the men reading letters didn't need reminding of the war, the needed to be reminded of home.

Life returned to a new normal in the years following the war. Alfie was able to forget the war better than most, maybe because the violence didn't end for him. He went from a war in France to a war in London, and he enjoyed every minute of it.

Tensions rose, men died, and Alfie survived - as it was, as it always would be.

He sat in his office a lot, when everybody had left for the day, he would pull out the stack of letters from the second drawer of his desk, and read them over again, as if he couldn't recite them word for word at his point.

He had a favourite, one that was now more creased than the others, and had more bends in the edges, read far more often than others.

I had an argument with my mother, again. I shall not bore you with the details, but I am certain the war will end soon, that the trend sweeping the East will come here and you shall return home.

We will go to Abraham's bakery the day you step off the train and eat the pineapple cake you like so much, we will then go to Finsbury Gardens and spend the rest of the day there, and we shall end the day at the pub, I haven't been allowed in without my male companion.

May you remain safe and well, and may you return home soon.

Your only and closest friend.

The girl was not a particularly poetic writer, yet Alfie was more enthralled by her prose than he ever had been by Shakespeare or Austin, because alone in the dark of his office, he could lie to himself, and believe those letters were for him.

He fiddled with the papers in his hand as he stood outside of the bakery. It had just opened, and people ushered in and out, their eyes avoiding his.

He had built quite the reputation for himself upon his return.

The bell above the door dinged when he walked in, and the lady at the counter looked away from the customer she was serving to wave at him.

He hovered behind the girl in front as she chatted to the woman, laughing and pointing to various cakes and pastries.

"Sir?" The woman waved a hand up and down to get his attention, and Alfie snapped out of whatever daze he was in, clearing his throat out of embarrassment.

"Urm...yeah," he muttered, looking down at the paper in his hands. He could recite this letter word for word, why couldn't he remember the cake now?

The baker and customer watched him as his eyes flickered to the page and back up to smile apologetically at them.

"I can help," the girl smiled at him, holding a hand out for the letter. "I'm a good reader."

She thought he couldn't fucking read.

"I can read," he defended, and she held her hands up jokingly. His eyes skimmed the words, failing to find the one he needed.

What kind of fucking cake was it?

And why did he even fucking care?

"For fuck's sake," he muttered, holding the letter out to the girl. "There's a type of cake in there, can you find it?"

She let out a small laugh as she took the paper with a smile on her face. He watched as she began to read it thoughtfully, her smile slowly dropping from her face and her eyebrows pulled together. Her head snapped up, and she held the letter up, a scowl on her face.

"Where did you get this?" Her tone wasn't something Alfie could place, a mixture between shock and confusion, and something else entirely.

He was never one to be lost for words, but he couldn't string a sentence together for the life of him, what the fuck was happening?

He must have been quiet for too long, because the girl fled the bakery, brushing his shoulder as she pushed past him, the letter still in her hand.

His favourite letter.

His body reacted quicker than his brain did, and he rushed after her, jogging to catch up with her as she stormed down the street.

"Oi," he called out when he was close enough for her to hear, "give me my fuckin' letter back."

She stopped in her tracks, spinning around to face him, pushing a hand to his chest when he was close enough to touch.

"It is not your letter," she spat. "Where did you get it?"

"The fuck are you chattin' about? You stole it from me."

"And you stole it from Adam," the girl shrieked, turning to storm away again, but Alfie was faster, grabbing her arm to stop her.

"Fuckin' hell," he smiled despite himself. "You're the girl from the letters."

"Who the fuck are you?" She cried, pulling her arm out of his grip.

"My name is Alfie Solomons," he held his arms out in defense, watching as her eyes widened at his introduction.

He really did have a reputation.

"I was Adam's captain in France," he reached down to take the letter from her hand, and she didn't put up a fight when he pulled it from her grip. "I took the letters off Adam when he died."

"Why?" She whispered, tears threatening to spill from her eyes.

"Couldn't tell ya, love," he shrugged. "Maybe because they made him very happy."

Her face scrunched up as if she were in pain at his words, and she breathed a deep breath to quell the tears in her eyes.

"They made him happy?" She breathed out, Alfie nodding in confirmation.

"It was annoying, really," he joked. "They made me happy too, even if I did steal 'em."

She huffed a laugh in response, dabbing at her eyes with her gloved hands before gesturing to letter he now held in his hands.

"Keep it," she sighed. "It was pineapple cake, by the way."

She went to turn away, but Alfie spoke before she could.

"Tell me to fuck off if you want, but would you fancy goin' to Finsbury Gardens?"

She looked at him blankly, and Alfie was certain she was going to say no, to tell him to fuck off with his letter and leave her alone.

"Okay," she nodded eventually. "But only if you take me to the pub after, I need a new male companion."

"It'd be my pleasure, love."

[quantumcartography]

Daniel and The Uninvited Guest

PALAMEDES     (As if reciting) “And her body was like the chrysolite, and her face as the appearance of lightning, and her eyes as a burning lamp: and her arms, and all downward even to the feet, like in appearance to glittering brass.”

I was writing about something else entirely when I dug into the context of this quote and it rocked my whole socks. Context for those who don’t remember it: in this scene, the Voice that Palamedes has been talking to finally reveals herself as Dulcinea. After admitting his love for her and promising to find her on the shores of the River, he asks to see her “for the first time and the last.” He then has a light shone on him and he recites this quote from Daniel 10:6. After that, she asks if she was cute and Pal responds “You’re perfect.”

I am, needless to say, obsessed with this scene.

Now, the book of Daniel is one of apocalyptic prophecy (apocalypse here meaning a truth being revealed to a person by way of a divine source.) At this point in the Bible, the Jews have been captured from Israel by the Babylonians and have been displaced into Babylonian territory. The book recounts the visions of prophet Daniel that allude to the eventual restoration of the Jewish people to their homelands under the reign of Cyrus the Great. In Daniel 10 specifically, Daniel is mourning for Israel by fasting for three weeks when he is visited by an angel who tells him that he is fighting to return him and his people to their homeland. Daniel 10:6 is a description of this angel, who in the passage isn’t called an angel but vaguely referred to as a “certain man.” Only Daniel can see this certain man but all the men around him are gripped by fear and run away and even Daniel was terrified throwing himself face down and trembling at the sight of this certain man.

As a quick aside, I learned something from the magnificent Dan McClellan, a biblical scholar who is very active on TikTok and YouTube, about angels in the Old Testament. He recently posted a video discussing this in detail but I will try and do it justice. The theory among biblical scholars is that many instances where angels are present in the Old Testament were originally instances of God themself appearing before a person. That’s why these excerpts have people seemingly talking directly to God and why these angels inspire such fear because it’s assumed the only time a person would see God is when they die.

So this quote in this context, is when Palamedes is stuck inside the body of Naberius Tern and fighting against Ianthe’s soul for control. The reason why he’s doing this is to hopefully find a safe place for the Sixth House after spending months being held by Blood of Eden as political captives. While in this fight with Ianthe, he’s helped and supported by the soul of Dulcinea who he describes looking like an angel. Not an angel in terms of beauty or grace, but as unassailably powerful, perfect and righteous as dawn's first light, a face made of precious gems that cannot be cut and a body made of brass like the finest armor. This is a form untouchable by flaw or fault.

The two narratives have clear parallels. They are stories about a people's restoration and salvation. And since this takes place in the middle of Nona the Ninth, the connotation is clear that he will live to see his people saved and returned home. And he does, he becomes Paul and they guide their people back to the Dominicus system. But this also underscores just how much he loves her. He loves Dulcinea like an angel. He loves her like a homecoming. He loves her like a vision of rapture in the wasted desert of his enemy. He loves her like the promised end of death itself. He loves her like the indelible weight that love brings on one's soul.

[planetofsnarfs]

Following are remarks Friday of the foreign minister of Poland, Radek Sikorski, at the United Nations Security Council.

* * *

I’m amazed at the tone and the content of the presentation by the Russian ambassador.

And I thought I could be useful by correcting the record. Ambassador Nebenzya has called Kyiv a client of the West. Actually, Kyiv is fighting to be independent of anybody.

He calls them a criminal Kyiv regime. In fact, Ukraine has a democratically elected government.

He calls them Nazis. Well, the president is Jewish, the defense minister is Muslim, and they have no political prisoners.

He said that Ukraine was wallowing in corruption. Well, Alexei Navalny documented how honest and full of probity his own country is.

He blamed the war on U.S. neo-colonialism. In fact, Russia was trying to exterminate Ukraine in the 19th century, again under Bolsheviks, and now it is the third attempt.

He said we are prisoners of Russophobia. “Phobia” means irrational fear. Yet, we are being threatened almost every day by the former president of Russia and Putin’s propagandists with nuclear annihilation. I put it to you that it is not irrational — when Russia threatens us, we trust them.

He said that we are denying Russia’s security interests. Not true. We only started rearming ourselves when Russia started invading her neighbors.

He even said that Poland attacked Russia during World War II. What is he talking about? It was the Soviet Union that attacked Poland together with Nazi Germany on the 17th of September 1939. They even held a joint victory parade on the 27th of September.

He says that Russia has always only beaten back aggression. Well, what were then Russian troops doing at the gates of Warsaw in August 1920? They were on a topographic excursion? The truth is that for every time Russia was invaded, she has invaded ten times.

He says that it is a perfidious proxy war by the West. My advice is – don’t fall into the Western trap. Withdraw your troops to international borders and avoid this Western plot.

He also says that there was an illegal coup in Kyiv in 2014. I was there. There was no coup. President Yanukovych murdered a hundred of his compatriots and was removed from office by a democratically elected Ukrainian parliament, including by his own party, the Party of Regions.

And finally he is saying that we the West are somehow trying to persuade that Russia can never be beaten. Well, Russia did not win the Crimean War, it didn’t win the Russo-Japanese war, it didn’t win World War I, it didn’t win the battle of Warsaw, it didn’t win in Afghanistan, and it didn’t win the Cold War.

But there’s good news. After each failure there were reforms.

Such demagoguery is unworthy of a member on a permanent basis of the Security Council. But what the ambassador has achieved is to remind us why we resisted Soviet domination and what Ukraine is resisting now.

They failed to subjugate us then. They’ll fail to subjugate Ukraine and us now.