#but like if i were still in retail or food service or we had kids……like idk how people can bear it all lmao

[pussymasterdooku]

Thank you for still wearing a mask, and an N95 at that! Stay well 🩷

🫡

[custardcrazy]

i have a Ted logan request! it’s kinda inspired by the tutor piece you wrote but instead of being Ted’s tutor she’s Deacons tutor (or babysitter) instead and she comes over to the Logan household and Ted sees her there and is immediately head over heels for her and is constantly trying to find an excuse to go to whatever room she’s in and stay there much to the annoyance of Deacon and their father on occasion

sorry if i got to specific but you’re my fav Ted Logan writer and I’m happy his requests are open!!!

young as we are

summary: you're deacon logan's new babysitter. it doesn't seem like it'll be anything too special -- until you meet his cute older brother, that is. (gn!reader)

wordcount: 3.8k

A/N: okay so I might've changed around the prompt a teensy bit, but hopefully it still fits what you wanted. i'm no good at writing slow stuff so i got kinda impatient lmao (also. i'm?? your favorite?? you have no idea how genuinely happy that makes me. i'm smiling like an idiot. thank you so much.)

You checked the note you'd written the address down on to make sure you hadn't gotten the wrong house -- okay, all good -- before ringing the doorbell. 

The house itself was pretty nice, just looking at the exterior. One of the perks of babysitting in a somewhat well-off area like this one was that you usually got paid decently for your troubles; and it wasn't nearly as bad as working retail, if the stories you'd heard from your friends were anything to go off of. And kids could be sweet, unlike food service customers. 

It was only half a minute before the door was answered by a balding middle-aged man with a stern expression. Mr. Logan, you presumed; it was probably his voice you'd heard on the phone. 

"You must be the babysitter," he stated directly, not giving you time to answer, "come in, then. I have some things I have to inform you of." He didn't wait, disappearing into the house and leaving the door ajar behind him. Feeling slightly awkward, you followed. 

Once you entered the foyer, he began speaking again. "Deacon's probably in his room right now. He has to be in bed by nine P.M., and he knows that, but I don't doubt that without me being present he'll try to stay up." Indicating some bills on the counter, he continued, "there's some money for a pizza. The number to call is on the refrigerator. Dinner should be at six." 

"Oh, and my … eldest son, Ted." If it was even possible, his tone became more snide. "He should be back in an hour or two. Don't let him bother you at all -- if he gets too annoying, just let me know when I get back later in the evening, and I'll deal with him." 

You barely got out an "uh, okay, thanks" before Mr. Logan was yelling for Deacon. 

He was maybe around twelve, you guessed. It was obvious that he was reluctant to come downstairs, but did so after a look from his father. You smiled at him, but he didn't return it; you didn't really mind. He was at that awkward age, after all. And if your instincts were correct, an overbearing father could inflict a number on any kid. 

It wasn't that you weren't familiar with strict parents -- but it was near-impossible to get entirely used to them. Being in charge of their children meant that you had to be extra careful. You couldn't trust a young kid to not tell on you if you were a little lenient when it came to bedtimes, and you couldn't trust an older kid to not try and put the fact that you were more easy-going than their parents to the test. 

Still, once Mr. Logan had left, you immediately relaxed. 

And so did Deacon, by the looks of it, because suddenly his tense demeanor all but disappeared. 

It was almost frightening how abruptly he turned his attention from his father's car pulling down the driveway to you. 

"You ever watched RoboCop?" 

He asked, with a certain bluntness only preteen boys were capable of. 

"No, I haven't." Encouragingly, you smiled again. "What's that?" 

"I have the tape," and already he was turning away, "gimmie a sec." 

You had the sneaking suspicion that his father didn't have the same enthusiasm for science fiction movies.

And you were right; even during the movie he spoke up now and then to tell you stuff about the characters or the plot. About how "RoboCop could probably take down an entire army by himself". You thought it was kind of spooky how the titular protagonist was a reanimated guy forced to follow cyborg programming to uphold "justice" in an already-corrupt city, disregarding any humanity he once had. 

… Or something like that. Deacon just found the guy "badass". 

By the time that you'd nearly reached the ending of the movie, you were invested. 

But not too invested to not look up when the front door opened, and thus you made eye contact with probably the prettiest guy you'd seen in a while. 

He froze midway through his path to the stairs. 

For a moment, both of you just looked at each other. He looked familiar. 

Oh, yeah, you'd seen him at school a couple times. Passed by him in the hallways or in the cafeteria, maybe. You hadn't really noticed him before, but maybe that was because you hadn't gotten a good look at him. Like now. 

And then Deacon took notice, coughing in an awfully non-subtle way into his fist, and you realized that maybe you shouldn't stare like a creep. 

"Uh, you must be Ted, right?" You laughed semi-awkwardly. "Hi. I'm just gonna be babysitting Deacon until your dad gets home." 

Hopefully you remembered his name correctly. From the way his father had said it, you had expected him to be some flavor of delinquent -- piercings, leather jacket, all that stuff that an uptight man like Mr. Logan would disprove of. A high school dropout who was bumming around in his dad's basement without a source of stable income. 

That couldn't be further from the truth; the Ted you were seeing now was a slightly gangly, floppy-haired boy your age who was looking at you like he'd seen an angel. 

It took him a moment, but he nodded vigorously in response to your question. 

"Yes. Yeah. I'm -- that's me." Ted glanced away, finally breaking away your gaze. "Um. What's your name? I - … I don't think we've been introduced before, dude." Even from your position on the couch, you could pick out spots of rose pink on his cheeks. Even as he focused determinedly on the ground. 

You couldn't help but be hopelessly endeared, so you gave him your name. 

He gently repeated it once, as if trying out how it felt on his tongue. "Oh. Radical." 

There was another brief moment, in which the movie still playing on the boxy television faded into the background. Then, his eyes were back on yours; they were a warm brown, you noticed. 

Apparently, Deacon had enough of his older brother interrupting his sacred movie, because he spoke up again, breaking the silence. "Ted, don't you have stuff to do?" 

You wanted to reprimand Deacon for his less-than-polite tone, but didn't have the chance, because Ted responded first.

"Oh." Seemingly snapping back to reality, he glanced away. "Yeah. Sorry 'bout that." 

Before you could tell him that you were going to order food later, he'd bounded up the stairs, taking them two at a time. You heard the far-off shutting of a door; and then a little later, muffled music that had a lot of distorted electric guitar and drums. 

Deacon scoffed to himself, but settled further into the couch cushions. 

You didn't see Ted again that night. He didn't even come downstairs to snatch a slice of pepperoni pizza, and just remained in his room. Maybe he didn't want to bother his little brother anymore, you thought, trying your hardest not to feel disappointed; even if you'd barely had any sort of conversation with him, there was something … Something very magnetic. 

Mr. Logan was back at around eleven, and by that time you were seated by the television once more. Alone, because you'd miraculously managed to get Deacon to go to bed. 

"I'm guessing everything went fine," remarked Mr. Logan, taking off his cap. You were beginning to get used to his clipped tone, and shut off the terrible sitcom you'd been killing time with. 

"Yeah, I left the change for the food on the counter." 

He pulled out his wallet, counting out crisp bills. 

"Did Ted give you any trouble?" 

Taking the money, you made sure it was the correct amount -- why'd you even bother, a man like Mr. Logan must've been specific about everything. "No, not at all. He barely said anything to me, actually." 

He only gave you a noncommittal hum in response to that, not even looking in your direction as he headed for the counter; probably to make sure you weren't stealing any of the change. "Well, good night." 

It wasn't a thank you -- not even close, but you'd take it. You'd been paid, after all.  "Good night." 

Ted's face upon seeing you still was fresh in your mind as you made your way home. And during the next several days that passed. It wasn't surprising, really. Nobody had ever looked at you like that; nobody had ever looked in awe of you on sight. At least, not anybody that had really caught your attention. 

Eventually, Mr. Logan called again. Apparently he had another work thing to do -- not that you were listening closely when he mentioned it. Your heart jumped at another opportunity to see Ted; it was a little embarrassing, really. You weren't some boy-crazed lunatic, pining after a guy you barely knew. 

Well, pining was a strong word. But you did pay extra attention when walking around at school, trying to catch a glimpse of him on your way to your classes. 

(You didn't.) 

This time, your pulse picked up when you walked up to the house. You even hesitated before you rang the doorbell again. But when you did, you heard some general commotion from within the house before Deacon answered the door, looking a little annoyed. 

"Hi," he said, "Dad's getting ready or whatever." 

He stepped aside to let you in. "I thought Ted was gonna answer the door. But he ran off as soon as he heard the doorbell." Sighing, he flopped down on the couch. "Lazy ass." 

As if on cue, Mr. Logan entered the living room, fixing his hat. You idly wondered if he wore it to hide the fact that he basically lacked all of his hair except for on the sides and back. 

"Deacon, watch your language." 

"Sorry." Even though his voice was muffled into the cushions, he didn't sound apologetic in the slightest. 

Mr. Logan turned his attention to you. "You don't need a refresher on anything, right." It sounded more like an order than a question, but you chose to look past it. At least he had offered to jog your memory if needed. The bare minimum was nice sometimes. 

"Yeah, I'll be fine." 

He gave you a curt nod. It wasn't until you heard the garage door shutting behind his car that Deacon sat bolt upright, suddenly energized. 

You looked at him expectantly. 

"Let's watch Ghostbusters," he declared. "Dad thinks it's stupid." 

And so, with little fanfare, you were basically doing the same thing as last time. But instead of dystopia, the setting was mildly less disturbing this time. And the main protagonists were human and likable. No offense to cyborg cops, but he didn't offer much in the way of personality -- so nobody could blame you. 

You were sure you'd seen this movie before, but the memory was vague enough that most of the events were new to you. However, even though you were focused on watching the film, there was something else on the back of your mind. An underlying antsiness; and you had a good idea why. 

Said antsiness was confirmed when, about half an hour into the movie, you heard footsteps coming down the stairs. It took all of your willpower not to look, but you knew who it was. 

It was only until he breached your peripheral vision that you allowed yourself to smile. 

"Hey, Ted." 

Today, he was wearing all loose clothes -- a baggy tee shirt with BLACK SABBATH printed on it in slightly distorted purple font, and what looked like sleep shorts. All in all, it made him look very soft. Like he was planning to do nothing but lay in bed for the entire day. Even his hair was kind of mussed up, a curl or two (or three) sticking out from the rest. 

He returned your smile tenfold with a near-blinding grin. "Hey." 

Deacon, unlike you, didn't have to hide anything. 

"Are you just gonna stand there and stare at the babysitter?" 

Delightfully, Ted flushed, hand flying up to fiddle with his hair. "Uh. No. I was just wondering if I could -- " he hesitated, before continuing, "if I could watch the movie too, y'know. I think Ghostbusters is a totally exceptional example of cinema." You didn't catch the way Deacon narrowed his eyes at his older brother. 

"Okay. Just don't interrupt too much." 

" 'Course." 

You were mildly startled when Ted sat down in the middle of you and Deacon -- you'd expected him to sit on the other side, but apparently that wasn't the case. The younger Logan let out an audible sigh and scooted further away. 

True to his word, Ted didn't speak up for the majority of the movie. But you were aware of his presence in a way that was almost comparable; since you were mere inches apart. He didn't sit still, and adjusted his position every so often, but you had the feeling that was the norm since Deacon didn't mention it. 

However, it seemed by the near-ending Ted reached his limit on not making at least one comment. 

"Dude. I forgot how impressive the special effects are," he mused in his best attempt at a hushed tone. "Must've taken them ages to do this stuff." 

"Yeah," you agreed, glancing over, "it's pretty cool. Slimer really gives me the creeps." 

Ted opened his mouth to respond, but shut up when a loud "shhh!" came from Deacon's general direction. 

For a moment, you and him just looked at each other. Then, not able to stifle it in time, you snorted; he lapsed into a fit of giggles, and as a result of that so did you. It wasn't really your fault -- his laugh was very contagious, even muffled like this. 

Somehow, you managed to get through the rest of the movie without much more incident. Even if your heart lurched every time Ted's arm or leg accidentally brushed up against yours with the way he was fidgeting. 

By the time it was over, it was around six, and so you called to order a pizza. Ted didn't retreat back upstairs, much to Deacon's disappointment, and pretty much hovered around you as you all waited for dinner to arrive. Not in a weird way, not at all -- he just resembled a puppy trying to get attention, really. 

"What'd you think of the movie?" He asked, just after you'd gotten off the phone with the pizza place. 

"It was pretty good," you hummed, putting down the receiver. "A couple moments were slow, but overall I enjoyed it. What's not to like about some guys capturing ghosts and defeating otherworldly entities?" 

"An excellent way to phrase it," grinned Ted, "and I agree most wholeheartedly. The ghost-buster dudes are impossible not to root for." 

You chatted a little more about it with him; his way of talking was a bit unique, but somehow you found it just as attractive as everything else. Sadly, your conversation was cut short by the doorbell. As soon as you'd taken a single step in the direction of the door -- 

" -- I'll get that!" declared Ted, with an enthusiasm that was a little frightening, already moving to grab the pizza. 

"Hey, wait, there's money on the counter!" 

"... Oh." 

Backtracking, he grabbed the cash and resumed his course to the door, covering the distance with long strides. 

It wasn't long before the food was gone; and you unceremoniously stuffed the ripped-apart cardboard box into the recycling bin like last time, hoping Mr. Logan wouldn't take issue with how you'd basically just jammed it in. After Deacon had wolfed down maybe three slices, he'd disappeared somewhere. Probably to his room -- you  reminded him to be in bed in time, lest Mr. Logan stop letting you babysit, and he'd only replied with a dull "okay". 

You were practically alone with Ted now. 

"So, uh." He broke the silence as soon as you returned to the living room. "... Wanna go upstairs? There's not much to do down here 'sides watching more movies." 

"I don't see why not," you said without thinking. 

For a second, he looked caught off-guard just as much as you were, (seriously, what) but recovered quickly. "Cool. C'mon, dude." 

Beaming, he motioned to you, and you were helpless to do anything but follow. 

His room was a bit messy, but you would've found it strange if it wasn't. Posters were all over the walls, Metallica and Van Halen and other assorted bands and movies. In the corner was a shelf filled to the brim with various memorabilia; action figures, guitar picks, markers and books that looked kind of dusty. His laundry bin was overflowing a little, but at least it was confined to another corner. Everything was just so Ted and that was probably the best way to describe it. 

He made his way over to the window, opening it just a crack. "Let's just keep the window open so we can hear Dad pulling in the driveway. His car is super loud -- I think he'd go ballistic if you were hanging out with me." 

You knew he was right, but it still struck a minor chord on your heartstrings -- which you attempted to move past as fast as possible. "Oh, yeah. Good thinking." 

At your compliment, he was all smiles again. 

You felt yourself melt a little, and sat on the bed before your knees gave out or something. 

Before long, you were both sprawled out on the carpet playing a serious game of Uno. For a guy who you were learning wasn't the sharpest crayon in the box, he was pretty good at making you question your own abilities; either that or he was just extremely, ridiculously lucky. He did have an awful poker face, after all. 

He snickered every time he drew a plus four or plus two card, and blanched whenever he didn't have a playable card. Which was cute, but also pretty advantageous for you. 

After a frustratingly long time of going back and forth; of him denying you every single time you dared call Uno, you finally won. 

"Dude!" Ted exclaimed, throwing down his hand as if deeply and truly offended, but you could see that he was grinning again. "That was totally 'cause I let my guard down." 

"I don't know," you teased, "or maybe it was because of my great and unbeatable card-game skills." 

He hung his head in mock-shame. "You're right. I suck." 

You were conflicted between bullying him a little more or comforting him to lessen the blow of your victory, but before you could decide, you both heard the tell-tale sound of tires crunching on the pavement and the whir of the garage door opening. Ted scrambled over to the window, peeking through the small opening he'd left earlier. 

"He's back," he announced, turning back to face you. 

"Okay," you said, getting to your feet and making sure you hadn't dropped anything. "See you later, Ted." 

" 'Bye!" He called after you.

Thankfully, you managed to make it down to the living room, jump onto the couch, and fumble for the remote just in time to turn on the television a good minute before Mr. Logan entered. During that brief time, you felt strangely like you were a spy, a double-agent -- that if you were caught fraternizing with the enemy, you'd be given grave consequences. 

It was hilarious, you had to admit. 

Mr. Logan didn't ask you about Ted this time, just cutting right to the chase and taking out his wallet.

"Is the change on the counter again?" 

"Yeah," you answered, giving him a "thanks" as he handed you a couple bills. You marveled again at how clean they were -- it almost felt criminal to stuff them in your pocket, but what else could you do? 

Once more, Mr. Logan turned away, going for the counter. "Good night." If he was as disinterested as he sounded, it was no wonder why he didn't try to make small talk with you at all. And you were grateful for it; you were sure that it'd just be awkward and nothing else. You rushed a little to leave. 

But just as your hand turned the doorknob, you were stopped in your tracks by a shout. 

"Wait!" 

Apparently, you and Mr. Logan were both equally shocked, because he also whipped around mid-action. 

In Ted's hasty descent down the stairs, he nearly tripped over himself, but regained what little composure he'd been holding onto, and jogged over to you. Either he didn't notice his father standing there, looking utterly baffled; or he just didn't care. In his hands he was holding a cassette tape. 

He held it out to you, still catching his breath. The color in his cheeks could be attributed to his rush downstairs, but you had a sneaking suspicion that wasn't entirely the case. "Here. Sorry. I was gonna give it to you earlier," bashfulness showed clearly in his expression, "but I forgot." 

It was only a second before you realized that you'd have to exit the situation to avoid any questions from his father -- whose eyes were darting between the two of you in an extremely worrying manner. So you took it from him, even whilst having absolutely no idea what it was. 

"Thanks." 

And with that, you were out the door. 

--

The second you got home, you got a good look at the tape. 

On the outside, written in an untidy scrawl in black Sharpie, was your answer. It was a mixtape. How much time had he spent making this for you? Your mind conjured up an image of him sitting by the record player you'd seen in his room, painstakingly selecting his favorite songs to record. 

Flipping it over, you realized there was a scrap of paper taped to it -- a note. 

You hardly had to think about the question hastily written on it with a bright pink marker, with little stars doodled around the edges. 

It was the only thing that was running through your mind for the rest of the night. They were agonizing, the few days that passed before you finally received a call from Mr. Logan again. It was probably the only time ever that you were glad to hear his voice. 

Deacon was a little disappointed when you told him to wait a minute to watch Raiders of the Lost Ark.

"Don't start loudly making out or anything," he said, sulking as you quickly ascended the stairs. You wanted to scold him for the sake of preserving your own dignity, but you had more pressing matters to focus on at the moment.

"So," Ted began sheepishly, after you entered his room. "You got my note, right?" 

"I listened to the tape, too," you answered near-breathlessly. "Yes. I'd love to spend more time with you, Ted." You smiled broadly. "You're really sweet, you know that?" 

He went bright red in response. 

And then ducked behind his bangs. 

It took him a little while to speak, but you were patient. 

" … thanks, dude. I'm really glad," he finally murmured. "I spent ages making that tape, but it wasn't until I was gonna give it to you that I realized that. Like. Just hanging out like this wasn't gonna be enough. At all."

Right now, the main emotion your brain was registering was giddiness. 

"I'm really glad, too."

[munson-blurbs]

hi!!! i want to send in a request for the meet-cute blurbs!

i would like to be paired with steve! im very outgoing, i love to laugh, and i try to be nice to everyone. some interest/fun facts, i work at ulta beauty as a sales girl (so i love makeup and meeting people) and i love to read (especially autobiographies and spiritual self help books). lastly, my pronouns are she/her and i guess one more thing about me is i always have my hair and makeup done!!

thank you!!! 💕💕💕

You meet Steve while he's struggling to find foundation for Robin!

CW: endearingly awkward Steve, Reader is a bit flirty WC: 606 Divider credit to @hellfire--cult

Working in retail required you to find joy in the simple things. Helping someone find a lipstick shade that made them feel confident and beautiful. A day without any customers complaining about the products you had in stock (as though you were in charge of placing orders). When your boss was in a good mood and treated the employees to coffee from the food court.

Today’s little slice of entertainment was watching a guy stumble through the aisles in search of foundation, nearly knocking over a display of lipgloss in the process.    

“Fuckin’...shit…” he mumbled, brushing the sleeves of his denim jacket as though he could shed his embarrassment. “Fuckin’ Robin…always her goddamn errand boy.”

You stood there, lips tucked into your mouth to stifle your laughter, as he held up two bottles with similar shades. He examined them thoroughly, bringing them up to his eyes and squinting. “What the hell’s the difference…nah, they have to be the same.” He placed one back on the shelf and picked up another, his chest rising and falling as he took a deep breath to summon his patience. “Wait, hold on, is this another one?”

Okay. Time to put this man out of his misery.

“Can I help you with something?”

Your voice startled him from his thoughts. One bottle slipped from his grip, and he caught it mid-air before it could shatter all over the tile floor. His cheeks now splotched pink, he let out an embarrassed laugh.

“Stealthy. Like a ninja.” 

You nodded, your own smile actually genuine rather than the one you plastered on for ‘quality customer service.’ Gesturing to the bottles, you asked, “Do you need help choosing a shade?” 

“Wha–oh, yeah. But they’re not for me. I don’t wear makeup. Except for this one time when I was a kid and my cousin put some on me and made me pretend to be a princess at a tea party.” He cleared his throat and shook his head, a lock of light-brown hair grazing along his forehead. “My friend–who is a girl, but not a girlfriend, like we’re platonic with a capital P–she has a date tonight and asked me to get this for her. But I clearly have no idea what I’m doing.”

You inched closer, enough to smell the musky cologne he sported. “Did she tell you what shade to get?”

“Yeah, it was, uh, the Clinic brand?” He wrinkled his nose. “And she wrote down the number…”

He fished into his pocket and pulled out a crumpled slip of paper, and you saw Clinique 02 hastily scrawled on it.

“We keep the Clinique products over here.” You motioned him towards the next shelf and plucked the correct shade from its spot. “I believe this is what you want.”

“You’re a lifesaver,” he said with an exhale as he took the bottle from your hand. His fingertips brushed yours, and this time, you almost dropped the merchandise. 

You shrugged, acting like that electric spark didn’t pass between you. “Just doing my job.”

“Right. Yeah.” He scratched at the back of his neck. “Well, could I still buy you an ice cream from Scoops Ahoy as a thank you?”

“I can’t turn down free ice cream from a cute guy,” you said. “My shift ends at seven, if you wanna swing by then?”

His face turned an even deeper red. “I can do seven.” He started towards the register, then made an about-face. “I’m Steve, by the way. Steve Harrington.”

You let your gaze linger on the moles on his neck for a moment before you responded.

“Nice to meet you, Steve Harrington.” 

--

[max--phillips]

Okay, I feel like you'll understand so. Apologies for this rant.

It genuinely surprises me how much people don't read fucking signs. Signs that are right on the front door they had to walk through, in plain sight. A giant ass WE ARE CLOSED UNTIL (THIS DATE) sign on top of our regular closed sign means nothing? Like what???

Or do they just ignore them because they can see 2 people are inside the place of business, like that automatically makes us open?

Even on regular days we get people coming in before we're open, again with a closed sign front and center, while we are cleaning. Like, I'm mopping floors here, can you wait until we actually open please?

I was literally just talking to my coworker about this earlier today. That’s the one huge thing I learned working retail and food service and general customer service (which I guess I’m technically still in but to less of an extent) is that you can make a sign as big and hard to miss as you possibly can, and people will still either miss it or just refuse to read it.

When I worked in a hotel kitchen in early 2017 we had a big ol plaque on the wall that told people what our breakfast buffet hours were and I would still get people coming up to me as I was tearing down the buffet asking me what time we closed. And that was 10 minutes ago, bud. If you read the signs or listened to the front desk staff you would know this. Same with the hours thing. The number of times I had people knocking on the doors when I worked at FedEx while I was up and doing opening tasks was incredible. We open! At 8!!!!!! I will unlock the doors at 8!!!! Fuck outta here!

Thankfully I don’t have to deal with that now although if people would read the legally binding contracts they were signing with us that would be amazing. “Why do I have to pay for this over the summer? My kid isn’t in school and isn’t using the instrument.” Well you see, the contract you signed is for 36 continuous months, not just while school is in session. It’s not my fault you didn’t read the damn thing before signing the agreement.

On a similar note I once had a lady get mad we didn’t get in contact with her sooner when she was past due and we finally sent her the final notices that we were ending the agreement and requesting the property back, and I explained to her we had sent letters, emails, and left voicemails and she goes, like it was the most obvious thing in the world, “I don’t listen to voicemails.” And I said, “well, that’s the primary way we communicate, followed by physical letters and then email.” I was like ???????? Hello?

[lillcarrionbird]

you're right that I didn't consider outside the US but that doesn't mean you're not a freak for having a "vendetta" against servers. if you hate them so much don't eat out. are they asking you personally for money? I don't think they're entitled for doing their job as expected. you're continuing to talk as if they're below you. you think they're a burden when they're serving your food and daring to talk to you like humans talk to each other? I can tell you personally I've only ever worked front-facing jobs where I have to talk to customers, and whether it's a job where I get tipped or not, I often genuinely enjoy talking to people. it's hard to believe you've worked a shit retail job if you genuinely hate others working shit minimum wage jobs.

"iF yOu hATe sErVers DOnT eAt oUT"

Do you fucking hear yourself? I cannot express just how much I'm rolling my eyes.

I have seen servers throw a fit because people didn't tip them and I had a server come back to the table to to ask why we tipped less than 18% (we had tipped 12%, which is still fucking generous considering we were 3 minimum wage retail workers with very little disposable income! And this person has the gall to shame us for not giving them a bigger tip???!). So yeah, I do find this behavior extremely entitled.

I don't think servers themselves are a burden, but I DO think tipping is an extreme burden on poor people. Especially in a place where servers make the SAME minimum wage as everyone else. And now, more and more places are adding tip options. The barista puts a muffin in a bag and the machine pops up asking for a tip? Say it with me kids, creating a culture where you shame poor people into subsidizing wages of other poor people is a problem.

Literally in the original comment (that apparently you only read half of before getting enraged enough to direct message me?), I even said I tip and I am polite to servers. But apparently not being enthused about chit-chatting with strangers, and disagreeing with the fact that I, a poor person, am pressured into giving them extra money for doing the basic requirements of any service job, is somehow thinking they are below me?

And until I see servers starting a campaign to extend tipping to every single minimum wage service industry I'm going to continue on with my "vendetta" 🙄

[captain-daryn]

I wanted to share a story, but my story telling skills are terrible so bear with me lol. I was at work tonight, and me and my coworkers were all hanging around waiting for the store to close in five minutes so we could go home. I heard a loud older man's voice call down to us from the other end of the aisle, "Can some help?!"

Oh boy, here goes a grumpy boomer I thought to myself.

Turns out he was purchasing a new vacuum for his wife and the one he wanted to get was an online-only item. He was frustrated and thought he had wasted a drive down because we didn't have it in store.

I do some digging, nope, none of our other stores have it either. So I put it into our ordering system and it says it won't be here until the 15th at the soonest (two weeks from now). Great. He's not happy but he says he will live with it if he has to. It's like 5 minutes after we are closed now.

Before I confirm everything, he says he wanted to open a new credit card through us. No biggie, I get credit for doing so, and it only takes a few minutes.

We finish the sign up, it's now like 10 minutes after we closed. it's New Year's Day, I had like 5 hours of sleep at most in the last 24 hours at this point, I wanna go home, but I'm putting on my customer service act and smiling and being polite for him.

I go grab his credit card paper work and I'm able to surprise him with a coupon for $100 off his purchase (the coupon comes with every new credit card opened, but the amount off varies based on the purchase amount). And I'll be honest I forgot that the coupon was a thing bc I was so dead tired, so it was a nice surprise for me too.

Not to mention he is also a veteran, and we offer a 10% discount at my store for vets, which automatically applied to his purchase when I put in his info. So, at the end of the day, he got a $600 vacuum for like $400 after tax. So he was happy.

As the paperwork printed, I realized the delivery was actually bumped up to the 4th! So it's actually going to get here in like 3 days instead of 14!

At the end of the interaction though, he asked to see a manager, and I thought oh no I must have done something wrong.

Call my manager, wait for a minute, no luck. I find my other manager and she came out to speak with him.

"I have a complaint id like to inform you about. She did a *fantastic* job tonight. Ran right over to help me...." and basically told the manager about our interaction.

Since we were now closed though, I offered to walk him up to the entrance to make sure he got out okay. He told me how even with a full time job with his degree back in the day, he still had to work a part time job at JC Penny's call center in order to afford caring for his 4 kids and wife. He said in the 6 years he worked there, only 10 people had ever taken the chance to call back and let a manager know they appreciated his help. So now he makes sure to always tell a manager when he has had a great experience anywhere, because he knows how much it means to the worker at the end of the day.

By the time he was out the door, it was about 25ish minutes after we closed, but I didn't mind because I knew I had done something good for an older gentleman, and he in return did something good for me.

Idk if there's a moral to this story, but it made me feel good that he wanted to pass that along. I think we take for granted the help people are able to give us day-to-day. A little gratitude really goes a long way, especially in jobs like retail or food. And I think some patience from everybody is appreciated.

So maybe take an extra minute, and thank the person who just helped you. You might turn their shitty long day into a pretty good evening.

[itakesurveyssss]

5000 Question Survey Part 3

151. What is louder and more annoying: 200 adults talking or one four-year-old screaming?

Adults. I mean I have kids and it’s more when they’re fighting each other that it’s the problem. Big group of adults though the noise is just chaos.

152. Do you believe the stories about planes, boats and people mysteriously disappearing into the Bermuda triangle?

I believe they’ve gone missing but not necessarily from ominous reasons. Likely just cqpsized or had bad weather. I do keep an open mind though for sure.

153. Who are you the most jealous of?

I don’t really know. I just think I’m more jealous of feelings people have like not feeling stressed or having feelings of joy, rather than what I want that they have.

154. What is the happiest way you can start your day?

With some nice food.

155. Do you ever have moments where you feel like everything is all right in the world?

No, not really unless on morphine or something.

156. Who thinks that you are offensive?

I don’t know if anyone thinks I’m offensive as I’m pretty nice as a person. I’d only guess people I’ve got into arguments online with would think that.

157. If you had to teach a class in something, what would you be able to teach people?

Psychology I think would be my best topic.

158. Have you ever had a spiritual experience (an experience that cannot be explained by science)?

I’ve had things happen I couldn’t explain yeah.

159. Do you believe that this experience was truly mystical or do you think there is some scientific explanation for it, only you don't know what it is?

I’m not sure I just keep an open mind.

160. Do you get offended easily?

Not in general no. By criticism from those I care about I’m very easily offended but by strangers or rude humour and stuff like that it’s very hard to offend me. M

161. Would you still love and stay with your signifigant other if he or she had to have a breast or testicle removed?

Of course

162. Do you believe in fate or free will?

Free will. Certain things are easier and more naturally occur, but they can be changed.

163. Do you believe that only boring people get bored?

Nope, ADHD can tell you otherwise 🤣

164. Can life change or are we all stuck in vain?

It can change at least in little ways.

165. What changes are you afraid of?

Anything that will leave me vulnerable.

166. Are you a day person or nocturnal?

Nocturnal.

167. What one CD could you listen to for an entire week (no mixed CD���s, it must be an album)?

Maroon .5 maybe?

168. Which is worse, working in retail, food service, or an office?

They are all pretty monotonous which I’d dislike. Detail maybe due to rude customers?

169. What's the coolest job you ever had?

Only volunteered so…

170. What is one central idea that your thoughts seem to come back to?

What gives people joy. Creativity.

171. Have you ever wanted to be an actor/tress?

Definitely! If I didn’t have a sight problem I’d have gone into that industry no trouble!

172. If you had the power to control one person and make this person do anything you wanted for a whole day, who would you pick and what would they do?

I wouldn’t - I don’t work that way.

173. What star sign are you and what is your sign like?

Aquarius. Friendly, eccentric, deep thinker.

174. Did the Blair Witch Project scare you?

The jumpscares did.

175. Are you in constant fear of death?

Not constant but it’s a reoccurring fear during anxiety and depressive episodes.

176. Does fear of death keep you from building a life?

No

177. Do you like all your movies to be in wide-screen?

I guess.

178. Are you a fan of any comic books?

I don’t really read comic books - I’d rather watch the movies attached to them.

179. At what age did you attend your first funeral?

2 I think? My uncles and my grandads were both in that year. About 11 first I remember clearly though.

180. What do you smell like (lotion, cologne, sweat)?

A bit sweaty now but nothing major.

181. What are your greatest sources for wisdom?

I think my own experience, mixed with common sense and the learning from others mistakes or observations.

182. When you were little, where did your parents tell you babies come from?

I don’t remember them ever specifying tbh.

183. What is your favorite band?

Waaaay too many to choose from.

184. What's the best cheesy 80's song?

Again just so many but I love cheesy music.

185. What's the best kind of movie to see on a date?

Depends on the two people going on the date really. Maybe a mystery? Horror can be dicey for some, romance isn’t for everyone (Imostly hate it unless it’s a subplot) and comedy is very subjective.

186. Do you like to sit in the front, middle or back of the Movie Theater?

Middle usually.

187. Have you ever been inside an abandoned building?

Yeah, but on a tour never trespassing - I’ve watched way too many horror movies for that.

188. Under what circumstances would you agree to work for free?

Volunteering for a good cause like helping the sick or vulnerable children.

189. Candles or strobe lights?

I prefer candles but the others safer so…

190. Do you think the Lord of the Rings movies are true to the books or did Hollywood change the story too much?

Well they had to cut a lot out because of time and to focus on action scenes. The movies were long enough as is so something had to give there.

191. When you see a stranger on the street does your first reaction lean towards thinking of this person as a potential friend or as a potential threat?

Neither really. I’ll chat to strangers but I’ll never see them again so they aren’t really friends. Unless someone is acting shady or I’m alone in a dark rough area then I don’t assume someone wishes me harm either. I’ll likely think they’re looking to get to somewhere. I am quick to jump to more threat though if they act in any way I may find suspicious even if it’s just coincidence but as a woman with a sight problem I think it’s better to be safe than sorry.

192. Is it natural for human beings to fear and distrust each other, or is it cultural?

I think to a certain extent it’s natural especially if you don’t know the person - in cave man days this person was likely a threat and deep down we are still just mammals, albeit advanced ones. I think certain cultures are more guarded than others but this doesn’t mean they are paranoid and everyone else is trusting.

193. What do you really want to buy?

A haircut / colour change.

194. You have to choose. Would you be happier marrying someone rich for their money or living in the streets and subway tunnels with someone you love?

I would rather live in a low budget house and have no partner— love rarely ends well.

195. If someone wanted to understand you what book could they read that would help?

I actually don’t know.

196. Do you think it’s odd that Americans have freedom of religion and yet call themselves 'one nation under god'?

It’s just a term they use I think.

197. In what sense are you a minority?

I’m visually impaired so have a sight problem.

198. Are you anti social?

No, I usually love being around people and enjoy gatherings but sometimes U need to withdraw for my own mental health.

199. Do you photograph well?

Nope 🤣

200. Do you think that human beings would survivor through a nuclear winter?

No, not in the traditional ones anyway. May be different if the nuclear weapons were less radiation heavy but I don’t claim to know enough about nuclear power or bombs to say.

[itsheryana]

She Wears Many Hats: My Journey from Uncertainty to Finding My Passion

From the moment I turned 18 and stepped into adulthood, I’ve worn many hats—some by choice, others out of necessity. At times, I felt lost, unsure of who I was or what I wanted to do with my life. High school was a struggle, and not because of my own actions, but due to the mistakes of my parents that seemed to follow me like a storm cloud. No matter how hard I tried to move forward, doors would close, and my past seemed like a weight I couldn’t shake.

When I started working, I didn’t have a clear direction. My first jobs were at a pizza shop and a fast food restaurant, and to be honest, I hated every minute of it. I quickly realized that food service wasn’t for me, so I pivoted to retail—a space where I thought I could thrive. Fashion had always been something I loved, so working in clothing retail felt like a natural fit. For a while, I was happy there, bouncing between stores, including a stint at Ralph Lauren. But eventually, I knew I needed something more “grown up,” something that would challenge me in new ways.

I found myself drawn to the criminal justice field, and when the opportunity to work in corrections came up, I took it—despite being a little scared. Surprisingly, I discovered I had a knack for it. I thought I’d found my calling, something I could see myself growing into long term. But it wasn’t the inmates that made me leave; it was the toxic leadership. I couldn’t stay in an environment where the people in charge were so destructive.

After that, I shifted back into something familiar yet different: asset protection at Target. It was a perfect blend of my retail background with a touch of security. I loved it. But that chapter ended quickly when I became pregnant and we moved.

For the next six years, I wore the “stay-at-home mom” hat. While I adored being with my kids and watching them grow, it wasn’t easy. It took a toll on my mental health. I had always been someone who moved toward progress, and for the first time, I felt stuck. I was grateful for the time with my children, but I missed having something of my own, something that pushed me forward.

When we moved to New York, I knew it was time for a change. I felt drawn to either the health field or teaching but wasn’t sure how to make the transition. How do you go from retail and security to teaching kids? It felt like a long shot. But I decided to apply for a position at a high school, never really expecting a callback. To my surprise, I got one, and I was so thankful that my resume and cover letter held their own.

The interview, though—that’s a different story. I completely dropped the ball. After not working for so long, I was beyond nervous. I was convinced I wouldn’t get the job. But to my shock, I received another call, offering me the position. It was the opportunity I desperately needed, a second chance to start fresh.

Since then, I’ve been looking for ways to continue growing. I wanted to become a trainer while keeping my job at the high school, but nothing seemed to fit. Then I found an online university program where I could earn my teaching degree. I had to choose between math, English, or history. Math and I don’t get along, and I knew English would bore me to tears, so history it was!

Now, I’m studying high school history, and I’m proud of my decision. It took a lot of trial and error to get here, but every hat I’ve worn has shaped me. Each job, each challenge, each role—whether in retail, corrections, or motherhood—has brought me closer to where I am today. And while I’m still figuring things out, I finally feel like I’m moving toward something that’s truly mine.

Here’s to the journey, the hats we wear, and the lessons we learn along the way.

[scentedchildnacho]

He asked me what I did today so I told him I had coffee and I was going to go to church but it was a church is kind of always sparsely populated and they were a church through covid that was one of the most phobic and shut down so i decided to go away before staying my welcome too quickly

Then I came down to watch the modeling....which I hate being called a pervert I'm not gay and I'm never going to want to be masculine but I came down to watch the modeling thinking if I can think of positive statements and want to meet people professionally something will finally stop making me go to counter cultures I don't want to go to

Uhm the modeling for me was too fair of a statement for me to join....im suppose to want to be servile help and I don't enjoy that taste too much in food

That and none of it makes sense to me as public statements if you ask me it all wanted to go to baby showers or start having a baby

Baby baby baby baby hips baby birth butt baby strong legs baby baby baby baby baby baby

People like me do have a dry foresty pallete so that still wasn't indigenous difference like meal other then oat......tree meal...

That's me about the slander my mental condition receives....its if you would finally your hormones would regulate so I'm like if you would finally privatize and make me pay six dollars to think about her portrait

You don't put her on a pedestal and then you blame me when I'm like it's creepy to want unpaid strippers

They could stop retailing stuff and let them make money in inside clubs and it's always a huge problem

I have a credit history I do put her on a pedestal it's you you you did that beach stunt to her I consciencely object

He asked me why I don't have a job so I said I was a poor waitress and student and found out it's only certain family systems that may transition out of poor labor into status ideas.....and I personally required to do that till 62 have to be driven crazy and I don't like crazy.....and that's me about people my age that still work that way I think they join police and kill people to keep their job and I won't live that way

War gives those things and if you won't military then those things are given to who will

If you ask me a lot of jobs will be fine they read the jail manual for criminal research and they do a job and that's all they do but if people asked me to do unreformed service I take a birth control pill before let a government tell me they will murder the kid if I don't support it in whatever way I can

Then physical assault my mother endured so we could have some old house no thank you not ever

If you ask me the type of diet and health care required to support cardiac stability with reproductive consciousness to me current woman is so deprivated it has to be a constant discipline to achieve eco outcomes and so it's fine to just not want to have a pregnancy

The world is over populated....I mean it takes an international production team so I'm just like passive okay all this Asian stuff just wasn't brought here.. .

The truth is many women do have my problems and they just wanted to have the babies they to me are kind because they with a health condition at least have a child to hug and love them after all they went through so

My sister also could finally be kind instead of commanding when finally disciplined to realize she at least was select matched to Ben when you have had to understand harassment to work it out with not select match

Heyroth was not select matched

He said...........they wouldn't approve him for social security so I said Margaret thatcher is now understood as a cruel lady she just wouldn't like the public programs proposed to her so she wouldn't do anything

Marge was known for very unrepaired and decaying systems

Nothing has to be renewed if wealth won't

My life experience definitely sees the relevance of a tax because all class structures are involved in persecuting poverty and what causes poverty police.....so to me a social tax to apologize is very obvious but they don't want to be sorry so

I can't let a lot of the activity be sent home till a tax is imposed that stops allowing business to steal from disability and rule over it

Businesses around are not new structures and I don't see relevance to concept after concept in unrepaired buildings when people could go home

They create new business to replace prior and the prior keeps stalking to be with disabilities and they were told not correct that person is a human being

Im sorry but no one thinks tip concepts are correct for a human beings disability

He said he has never been anywhere his whole life a fast food chain wouldn't let him go to the rest room......so I told him that's not correct if their too much better then the street and should be allowed only private practice then they should forcibly get their business off the street and elevated

They should have to lock an elevator not a public street restroom

People like me had to go to better business reform and learn organizational process so to me it isn't neat and it's very meaningless they put a business on the street that doesn't have anything to do with street experience on a complex level so that's why I don't job that many people told to beach and I have to be a good person

So that's me about wab kinew they do have to endure a genocide they were told street is advanced practice and they act needy and still not talked to

They called them criminals so I do hope the occupation stops

Well I notice a lot of concepts act country club like so to me their country manners should go to actual private areas and stop harassing poor city people

After this much Disney do you actually know anything about what this city as a cultural center was or did a lot of animation try to regularly pornographize and slaughter

Enrique Aleman he was the first person from his family line to achieve paid status otherwise his family was always poor his family did it for generations and forcing systems civilly to stop making kids sit in feces was still called poor....he was the first it's green politically

Yes if my mother would not have afforded the house the government would have killed me of programs as a child instead of an adult and they now though are willing to try to get em young

That and I was called a mental so indigenous people did have to figure out how a community could progress and alleviate suffering so I'm not sure these cellular and microbiological possibilities were available priorly

And that's you think there was a great revolution of science and I don't.....

There isn't necessarily a treaty history that indigenous peoples thought their specialties were for white people essentially they mostly just knew maybe to stay hospitably separate

I have seen people who call themselves homeless do things to restrooms and so they punish everybody because they won't go to clinics about things that are a medical issue like massive cuts and other very inappropriate behaviour sometimes

Things like being allowed to cut oneself to me is a very wealthy arbitrary thing to do so I don't believe their homeless and just do it to give homeless people bad reputations and punished out

Otherwise I said I do see relevance here of Arabic laws to me it's just cash and if a job or street person lifts cash off me for necessities not a big deal.........but if it's credit or any type of information after noticing if I go missing there is an identity to just use for crime I don't trust anyone with any information it will all need to backstab so i don't ever carry information on me

They know they can't go down to the bloc and promise to take clients home honkey tonk and they still do it so I leave their building to realtors

After having to be homeless I don't ever want anyone ever to stalk me for personal information

I kind of think anyone would do it if they were my attackers...I think people steal what my identity could have had for a good cause so

If it was stolen for crime i could have my things in life but I think Phyllis chesler the schizophrenic is daddy and if I have my things poor children could be murdered

I support children and so they could at least send photos and tell me things they enjoy about life

Well it was never my time to be selected to be a birther and people who obtain things from someone others call a friend tend to hide that they live that way

It's okay it's better to me that there are children in the world living much better then this creepy sex trafficking place....that's at least hope the human condition stops being a murderous nothing

[etiennepaddywrites]

The Curse by Etienne Paddy: Chapter Two

Later that week, I accompanied three of my friends to St. Stephen’s village for some shopping the afternoon they arrived back at school. After a long day of retail therapy in the quaint tudor-esque shops, we settled in The Powdered Newt, the local pub, to feast and play catch-up. That being said, I did not have much of an appetite for eating or merriment in the wake of my sudden singledom.

I clocked the group of Kiltrasners across the room, with the addition of two girls. One white blonde, weapons-grade beauty was nestled under Rafael’s arm, purring into his ear, and a pixie-faced redhead was draped over Asp.

As far as I was aware, Rafael had been linked romantically with Anousheh Fatemi for the past six months or so, who was still in Iran for the break. I imagined she wouldn’t be too happy with the scene unfolding before me. I wrinkled my nose and turned away.

“Honestly, I’m gonna boke,” said Irena, delicately as ever in her thick Northern Irish accent. As I looked at her she gestured towards the group with her fork, mimicking a gagging noise. Janie and Henry, our other companions, also followed her motion.

“Isn’t Rafael seeing someone?” Janie asked, brushing her blonde hair out of her round, pink face. “Why’s Delphine Draxton clung to him like a limpet?”

I tried not to roll my eyes at Janie’s innocence in the face of such flagrant infidelity.

“Delphine Draxton’s done quite a lot of clinging to boys this year, so I’ve heard” Irena sniggered. Janie looked scandalised, where Henry scrunched his nose in distaste. “Irena, please.”

Irena often carried herself with the decorum of a streaker pelting through a funeral service.

“Where do you guys think he and Ariadne have been all this time?” Henry asked in a hushed tone, peering at us through his tight brown curls. I braced myself for Irena’s standard inappropriate comment but she remained silent, her pale blue eyes searching each of ours with raised eyebrows, waiting for our suggestions.

“Who knows— they’re Duclairs. For all we know they may have just been on a long, expensive family holiday,” Janie offered, always prepared to cast anyone the benefit of the doubt.

Irena scoffed loudly. “Don’t be a dope, Janes. They’ve obviously joined the Reapers — everyone’s been saying it.”

“You don’t know that” Janie pointed out stubbornly, her cheeks flushing. “The Duclairs basically fund the school, they can take time off whenever they want. That makes far more sense than kids joining the Reapers.”

Irena gave us a look of don’t be so sure, and I ruminated on it for a moment, my finger tracing the rim of my forgotten drink. I was inclined to agree with Janie. Rafael was only sixteen, like us, and Ariadne, his cousin, was a year older. Far too young to join the terrorist group, even if their uncle was — unofficially — at the helm of it all.

Irena shamelessly ogled the group across the room before raising an eyebrow at us. “Well if one of us could get his kit off, we’d know for sure.”

Even after years of Irena’s lewdness, we still awkwardly avoided each others’ eyes.

“You know they say they all have those marks on their chests—” she expanded with a giggle, tracing a circle over her left breast. “I, for one, would happily volunteer.”

We all sighed in weary unison and the conversation then moved on to all the boys Irena thought were ‘rides’ this year. After ten more minutes of pushing my food around my plate and listening to the various positions Irena would like to practice with a burly Longfield boy in our year, I decided to excuse myself. I wasn’t in the mood to hear about Irena’s romantic endeavours, imagined or otherwise.

“Aw Fleur, it’ll get easier,” Janie said kindly.

“Edward didn’t deserve you. He was an absolute snooze,” Irena chimed in, helping me hoop my scarf around my neck and giving it a little pat when she was done. I crinkled my nose. She’d kept that assessment quiet over the past couple of months.

I said my goodbyes and left, making my way over to a low wall opposite the building, savouring the smell of peat fire smoke as it bloomed out of the pub’s wonky old chimney. I leaned against the jagged stone, taking a minute to myself before I made the journey back up to school.

The creak of hinges drew my attention to the rickety wooden door where Rafael was shrugging on a black cloak just beyond the threshold. He slid a packet of cigarettes out of his pocket with long, thin fingers, throwing a glance over at me. I quickly looked away, embarrassed to have been caught staring.

He was obviously a complete tool, but he’d grown up to be devastatingly good-looking. The last summer holiday had been kind to him, his boyish youth having become sculpted and refined. Here he stood, willowy and toned, with ear-length hair so dark it swallowed the light, falling effortlessly in loose curls over heavy black eyebrows. It was no wonder he had a harem.

I realized then that I was staring at him and quickly moved to redirect my gaze. Not, however, before he’d noticed.

To my utter horror, he sauntered over to me. I didn’t know what to do with my face in case this was one of those situations where you think someone was waving at you, only to wave back and realize you were entirely mistaken. He stopped next to me, leaving a little room. Leaning back against the wall, he took a drag on his freshly-lit cigarette, his golden signet ring glinting in the sunlight.

“Everwood” he greeted me smoothly whilst I gawped at him, mute. “Sorry about Verner earlier. He’s become a bit of a dolt of late, hasn’t he?” His musical voice was so beautifully modulated that all I could think of was how I longed to hear him speak again. “Or a colossal twit, was it?” He chuckled as he brought his cigarette to his lips. “It was a pleasure to see a glimpse of that forked tongue of yours again. More’s the pity it’s so seldom.”

“What’s it to you? We haven’t spoken in years,” I pointed out bitterly, finally finding my voice.

“Now, now, play fair,” he chided me.

“By all means, correct me.”

“It’s been a fractious time.”

“You mean your uncle?”

“No, the weather,” he said, sliding me a contemptuous look.

Being from an elite, ancient family, any whiff that Rafael had anything to do with someone as inferior as a halfling would indeed cause an uproar.

I did understand that, but I couldn’t forgive it.

“And the change in weather means you’ve decided to acknowledge me after so long?” I snipped as I pulled my cloak tighter around me and filled my lungs with the cold, January air.

After burying our friendship in the garden of our youth, I couldn’t believe his shameless impudence in unearthing this familiarity as if things had never changed.

Standing here with him now, I could still feel the lump that’d been lodged in my throat as I’d torn up the aeditrium’s stone staircases three years ago. I���d been struggling to fend off the oncoming tears after a run-in with a group of Kiltrasners when I’d heard a voice out of nowhere.

I stopped and listened, before realising that I hadn’t actually heard anything with my ears.

It was a strange sensation, and even stranger to process the connotations of what was indisputable: Someone’s voice was in my head.

I heard the cry again and stopped, trying to discern where the voice had come from. I deliberated for a moment before closing my eyes and succumbing to the peculiar feeling. I didn’t know how, but my body just knew what to do. After a deep breath, I let my consciousness peter out of my body, rooting around for the source of this voice. I found that its shaking wrath was like breadcrumbs in the air, leading me directly to its master.

It was my first true encounter with him. We’d shared a few classes at this point but had never spoken beyond pass the book, although hisnoble lineage and pleasing face had always made him a person of note to me. Upon pinpointing his mind, I couldn’t restrain my curiosity. Working actively against my better judgement, I decided to probe.

Who’s there? GET OUT OF MY HEAD, Rafael bellowed, as soon as I’d entered, the words reverberating around his mind like a scream in a tunnel.

I recoiled in shock, before collecting myself and shouldering in once more. How did you know I was here? I asked obstinately, determined to work out how he’d identified an intruder. It would be just typical for me to discover this rare new skill only to find I was useless at it. All my other abilities had required such hard work to be considered noteworthy in this world, after all.

Because I’m not stupid.

An unseen force began to scoot me out. Nevertheless, I clung on.

Training? I asked, groping for answers — willingly surrendered, or otherwise. Training would make sense. A powerful family like the Duclairs wouldn’t risk enemies infiltrating their minds or those of their children, no matter how unlikely that would be given that telepaths were a dead breed if the media was anything to go by. Which, I supposed, it wasn’t.

The very mention of the word ‘training’ swung open a door in his mind that confirmed my theory. A hazy vision of a young Rafael next to his older brother Sacha, being instructed by a private tutor in blocking telepathic invasion. A Professor Demonstras. Rafael didn’t like him. Sacha loved to wind him up.

I flinched as the door slammed shut on Sacha’s face.

If you won’t leave, I’ll eject you, he warned, and I didn’t doubt it. I did wonder, however, how I’d managed to gain entry in the first place considering his obvious extensive coaching.

Where are you? I asked, blinking back to my own consciousness before trying a few doors around me.

In here, his voice carried through the ether, and a door materialised at the end of the corridor, embedded in the stone wall that encased the Bell Tower. I gasped, eliminating the distance with a few strides before closing my fingers around the door handle.

The exertion of mind-hopping had my head thumping and a prickle gathering in the corner of my eye. I daubed at it with my forefinger and brought my hand back before me, the tip of my finger now glistening red.

I smeared the blood on my black habit and entered the room. My mouth swung open as I glanced around in awe. The gothic windows looking over the grounds reached up to a vast ceiling adorned with cobwebs. The room itself was enormous, allowing for the bells in the room above, the mouth of each presumably the size of a small boat judging by the width and depth of the space. Not only that, the room itself was filled with forgotten oddities and an eclectic assortment of shabby furniture.

I could see the residue of magic clouding the room in the light from the window, like dust in an attic. There were boxes of trinkets thrumming with mystical properties, mounds of clothes and hundreds upon hundreds of books. It was like a hoarder’s trove.

“It’s you,” Rafael breathed in surprise. I ignored him, instead reaching to touch a little silver box on the table next to me which emitted a squeak and shot off the edge. He sneered. “Pick up your jaw, it’s only a load of old rubbish.”

I was shocked by his lack of amazement. I still harboured a childlike wonder where magic was concerned. Where everyone around me considered these incredible things par for the course, I wanted to rifle through everything, to learn more about this captivating world I was so lucky to be a part of. But a Duclair? I suppose his lack of interest wasn’t actually shocking at all.

“Are you okay?” I asked, turning my attention to him, which he promptly swatted away like a meddlesome fly.

“Why are you here?” he deflected imperiously.

I processed his words, remembering the heated call with my father in the phone room and the vicious glee on Woodrow Kilbrook’s face as he’d eaten up my humiliation and left no crumbs. I bit my lip, the degradation washing over me afresh.

Rafael’s face changed dramatically. He clearly hadn’t meant to incite a breakdown, yet here I was, eyes watering and lip a-quiver.

“I— I—” he stammered, his shoulders tumbling out of their aggressive stance as he floated awkwardly over to me. “I’m sorry.”

“False etiquette doesn’t suit you” I managed, focusing on the floor as I schooled my twitching face back to neutrality.

“I am,” he said with sincerity, stiffly putting a hand on my arm— although I imagine he’d meant to be comforting. At this age, Rafael hadn’t quite developed his intoxicating hold over women and his touch lacked the self-assuredness that would soon inform his every movement. Too soon, arguably.

We stood there for a moment, standoffishly regarding one another, both unsure of how to proceed. I was aware of the things he and his friends said about me behind my back, which made me wonder why he was bothering to feign kindness now.

“You know that’s rare?” he offered. “Your ability?”

“A magical halfling?” I snipped. “Yes, I’m painfully aware, thank you.”

There were only a handful of halflings in the entire world. According to everything known about magic and DNA, it shouldn’t be possible to have magical halflings at all— all other children born to inter-magical parents possessed no abilities whatsoever. You’d think I’d have been revered as a medical marvel, but halflings had always been scorned, even before the birth crisis. Our teeth were less sharp, our movements more sluggish, our senses less refined… We were considered a blight on the race.

Rafael frowned at me. “No, I meant the telepathy — even amongst magiceans, it’s very rare. Does anyone know you can do it?”

“No” I admitted. “I didn’t until just now.”

“That’s quite remarkable for a —”

He caught himself before he uttered the slur dancing on the tip of his tongue.

“Fleur?” Rafael asked as I snapped back to the present, breaking forth out of my reverie and back to The Powdered Newt. The wafts of cigarette smoke and the crisp chill of the day settled once more upon my senses. I nodded, inviting him to continue.

“We’re not children any more” he reiterated, giving me an icy look.

“Sorry?”

“You’re a halfling, your father a race traitor, no less—”

“We were friends,” I said, and he flinched backwards slightly, as if I’d sworn at him. The corners of my mouth began to twitch, threatening to tug downwards. “Why does any of that matter? No one ever knew!”

“We could never be friends” he asserted with a scowl, twisting that final word over his tongue like it had a bad taste.

“Oh, well thank the gods you sought me out to make that clear.”

“I just thought I’d check on you. Don’t read into it” he said brusquely, casting away his cigarette butt.

I suddenly felt a burning desire to strike him. “I don’t know why you scorned me all of a sudden. I’m just as bright as you” I snapped. “All this talk about halflings being less magical is rubbish and you knowit.”

“Even so,” he said, refusing to meet my eyes, “but facing a birth dearth? Half-br—halflings shouldn’t be allowed in magical circles— race treachery cannot be condoned. It sets a bad precedent and it won’t help the crisis.” He took a step towards me, lowering his voice. “You might be able to navigate your obvious physical drawbacks,” he said, pulling his wand out of his pocket and spinning it around his fingers with impossible speed to embellish his point, before snapping it to a stop, “but no amount of practice will ever have a magical child quicken your womb. And now, that’s what really matters.”

Anger flared in my chest. “You didn’t seem to mind me being here when we were helping each other with our homework.” I hissed. “Last I checked, my womb didn’t even come into it.”

The look of utter insult that flashed across his face was interrupted by the Kiltrasner rabble bursting out of the pub. Asp stopped to assess our proximity. “Raf, is that mule bothering you?” he called over. Rafael recoiled from me.

All I did was frown and curl my mouth, but it was enough. “What was that, Never-Would?” Asp fired at me. “Nothing smart to say today?” The lanky boy stalked over to us as Rafael slowly backed away from me towards his friends.

Hot tears began to pool in my eyes as I put my hands up to bat Asp away, but he was too quick. “Just you wait you little half-breed”hespat, grabbing my upper arm as I shrank away from him, afraid. “Once the New Order is underway we’ll be a supreme race once more. Our lands will be reclaimed and you’ll be cast out of this world where you belong,back to that Unspirited dung heap you hail from. I, for one, hope they slit your throat at some altar, like they used to. Either way, enjoy your days here, for they’re numbered.”

He shoved my arm back and I massaged where his fingers had gripped me. Each sore spot was like a button pressed, and fury began to swell within me. I wished I could slap him. I wished I could muster the courage to punch him right between the eyes. “Any success you’ve had has been 99% perspiration and don’t you forget it.” He held a finger up to my face. “True magiceans do not sweat.”

“Don’t play with your food, Vern,” Rafael lectured in a bored tone. “It’s so bloody common.”

Asp scowled, but quickly directed his vexation at me. “You should know better than to approach him. Do you need a reminder of your place here?” He spat at my feet.

“And yet you’ll have me linger” Rafael stated impatiently, turning on his heel. “Get a fucking move on.”

“Mark my words mule” Asp warned as he began to back away. “You can’t hear it now,” he raised his hand to his ear and twitched his fingers menacingly, imitating raindrops falling from the sky, “but the thunder is coming.”

I clenched my teeth, trying to govern my swimming eyes. I waited until the boys were over the hill and out of sight before I let the tears escape.

[vernalseason]

Here's why I'm so goddamn feral about The Bear.

I ran an ice cream store for about five years. No, it wasn’t fine dining, it wasn’t even a restaurant, but it was still food service. We were in a vacation town, and our place was the only ice cream store in the area, and the ice cream was GOOD. Customers used to ask me all the time if I got sick of eating it and I’d say no, and I meant it. It was reasonably fancy as ice cream goes, with some pretty out-there flavors, but mostly it was just GOOD. Super flavorful, dense but not chewy the way that some ice creams get where it feels like it’s stretching unnaturally when you pull your spoon away…

Point is, it was an ice cream shop in a tourist town, and in the summer we got killed during service every single night. Nonstop lines from 7 til 12 or 1 in the morning, no breaks. We got after-dinner crowds, after-show crowds, hordes of camp kids a busload at a time, and it might not have been fine dining but we worked HARD. We had 8, 9, 10 people on peak days all scooping, cleaning, making milkshakes (which is The Worst, in case you were curious), restocking by running down rickety definitely-not-to-code stairs to our tiny walk-in and hauling ice cream up 4 boxes at a time—because goddamn it, time was valuable and running up and down the stairs sucked and no one was going to go down multiple times when you could just grab 4 at a time and grit your teeth and shove them onto the counter upstairs feeling like you’d just benched your own body weight.

At the start of the summer, Memorial Day weekend, we were at our absolute peak. Following a truly herculean hiring effort aided by the promise of unlimited free ice cream, we had a crew of 20-odd overcaffeinated teenagers and twentysomethings who were working a truly awe-inspiring pace to kill the line. My favorite moments were, variously:

Being so busy I had to run two registers simultaneously, waiting for Square to process a transaction on one (chip card readers were murderously slow in the early days) while taking cash on the other;

Absolutely shattering every store record on a Saturday night with a skeleton crew and getting approval to order 12AM pizza on the company card, and taking a long, long hour to eat before we finally had to get around to scrubbing the calcified ice cream off the floors;

Gearing up to call for a restock on spoons, napkins, and other such necessities only to find that my assistant manager was behind me with a milk crate of those very things;

And so on.

There was about a month and a half of beautiful, well-staffed, smooth-running time before things frayed at the edges. Suddenly the factory couldn't get enough ingredients, since the company was chronically broke (turns out wholesale ice cream is a bad idea, folks; retail is where it's at), or the store walk-in broke down and we had to resort to chest freezers for storage for a month, or, most commonly, we started losing staff. I was always after the owner of the company to hire more year-round full-time staff, but there was always something more urgent for him to spend money on, like rent. So inevitably our staff would start leaving for college, and we'd be left with about half to a third of the staff we really needed to run. Which is when things started getting bad.

There are only so many doubles you can work before you start losing your grip on reality. I recall one day in August when I was somehow, improbably, the only person available to fill an entire day of shifts, and worked from 9AM pre-open to 11PM at night. The only thing that I remember is that the tips were phenomenal. But by Labor Day weekend we were down to our last seasonal staff and the entire core crew had worked at least two doubles that week and we limped into the off season with about two remaining brain cells between us.

Anyway. This post was supposed to be about The Bear.

I've never seen a show—or at least, never seen a FICTIONAL show—that so deeply understands what it means to be in food service. I watched the first episode in absolute awe of how they captured the intensity—just GOING until you get a moment to yourself in the bathroom, in the walk-in, in the office. And when you slow down, you think about how tired you are. How burnt out. How much all you really want is just to sit, maybe eat a slice of pizza, and stare into space for an hour. But then you go back out, and you get back to work.

I've also never seen a show that so accurately captures what it looks like and feels like to be a manager. Carmy losing his temper, giving in to that righteous anger in 'Review'—how DARE you not cover your station, how DARE you leave me with this mess that you created—I've been there. I'm not proud of it. I didn't punch a ticket printer, or scream in anyone's face, but I lost my cool, and that sticks with me. You don't get to take it back. You apologize (even if you were right), you patch things up, but no one ever really forgets.

But the show also does justice to one of the great joys of the service industry: getting to see people improve. One of my favorite subplots is Tina going from sabotaging Sydney to respecting her, trusting her, defending her. But mostly, it's my favorite because we see her get BETTER. She goes from just holding down her station to being a pro, from throwing things together to being careful, and thoughtful, and focused. And that moment when Tina says 'thank you, chef', and means it, really MEANS it, that's the kind of thing that gets me all teary. Because it's so much more than just 'thank you', but you'd have spend a hell of a lot longer to get it all out.

I guess if I was going to trace my rabid and, so far undiminished love of the show to a single thing, it would be the fact that it makes me feel seen. I haven't done that much reading on the people who made the show, but enough of them clearly lived this life or got close enough to it that they understand what it does to people, and what it requires of them. I loved working in food service, and sometimes I even miss it. I loved getting to make people's days, to give kids their first-ever ice cream, to feel like people were leaving in a better mood than they came in. And I met my partners through this life, all three of them, which is as exactly as wild and improbable as it sounds. But every time I look back on it fondly, I make myself remember that it was miserable too. The late nights, the early mornings, the days off cut short by delivering emergency stock or jumping in to cover a shift or just ending back up at the shop out of habit. The crushed toes and ragged wrist tendons and hoarse throats, the constant phone calls or checking sales to try and anticipate if we needed more staff. The sensation that after service, the rest of the world was dim in comparison.

I sank so much time and energy into that life, and I think the last thing I love about The Bear, the other thing that makes me tear up a little bit, is that for them it turns out alright in the end. They work through the problems, they make things run smooth, and they get the chance to build the place they dreamed about. That was always what I wanted, what I was working toward—the chance to make things better. And even in fiction, it makes me happy to see that come true.

[void-galaxy-shenanigans]

The best thing happened at work today. I wanna share, both to encourage people they can do it & to appreciate the person who did it.

So....for context we put our pronouns on our work nametag (he/they). Most people ignore it & misgender us anyway (ma’am, miss, she 😣).

This older, grey haired man (best guess is he was 40s to late 50s) noticed our pronouns. Normally people ignore it, but he didn’t.

So we had this conversation:

~

Older Gentleman: *pauses to stare at our nametag & pronouns*

Us, internally: Oh no. Please don’t say something bigoted or painfully ignorant.

Older Gentleman: “So I have teenage kids and I’m new to learning this pronoun stuff...so, ¿how does that work?” *points at our nametag* “¿What does the ‘they’ do?” (/polite, curious)

Both of us: *awkward pause*

Older Gentleman: “Sorry. You don’t have to explain and I absolutely don’t want to be disrespectful.” (/insistently genuine, gentle)

Us: *blank stare, shy smile* “It’s okay. I’d rather you ask and make the effort to be respectful.” (/srs)

Us: “Use them interchangeably. Use both, back and forth.” (/srs)

Older Gentleman: “Okay.”

Both of us: *quiet pause*

Older Gentleman: “So ¿did you use he/him before? ¿What were your original pronouns?” (/gentle & curious, fidgety like a curious little kid)

Us, after an uncomfortable pause (deciding to be honest but not say it explicitly): “I don’t use my original pronouns.” *shrug*

Older Gentleman, understanding that implies it was she/her & not asking further: “Okay.” *appreciative, apologetic smile*

Both of us: *awkward pause again*

Me, deciding I feel comfortable to explain: “I’m nonbinary - not entirely man or woman.” (/srs, tentative & hopeful)

Older Gentleman: *nods* “Okay. While I’m learning [and might forget to use they], ¿which binary pronoun is more comfortable?” (/genuine, srs, curious)

Us: *blink of surprise* “He/him.”

Older Gentleman: “¡Okay! I’ll use he.” (/genuine, srs)

~

He went on to order food very politely & patiently, & when he gestured the two people with him to order (“he’s ready, it’s your turn”; “tell him what you want”) he correctly gendered us. He didn’t demand why we changed our pronouns & didn’t say anything bigoted.

??? 🥺💚

That's the most respectful & polite way to handle something like that. And it completely made our day (/srs, genuine). We’d been at work since 6am, up since 5am, & it was 2pm (we had a 9.5hr shift), & we were exhausted & in pain (& dysphoric from getting misgendered all day). But that respectful interaction that took him maybe 5 minutes had us smiling, more energetic, & with a little bounce in our step for the rest of our shift.

Honestly I’d rather be asked by everyone how to use our pronouns correctly & how to best respect us than deal with another person who sees our pronouns, decides not to ask, & uses she/her anyway. He even asked some borderline uncomfortable questions, & I still felt safer around him overall than most of our customers.

So please, if you feel confident enough for a second, ask. Your server, the customer service employee you talk to, the retail worker, that intimidating goth person who wears spikes, we are all people worthy of respect. If you’re unsure how to use a pronoun, ask. But don’t shame someone for not using pronouns you expect &/or are already familiar with.

On that note I’m gonna keep smiling like a little kid who found a dollar (/lighthearted, poking a little fun at myself). I adore that man & hope he becomes a regular or semi regular customer. 🥰

~Nico (he/they; co-host, protector)

[sockeye-run]

Content Warning ⚠️ : drug mention, PTSD, stress and complaining

We officially sold the big car yesterday. There's a demand for used and new cars right now; dealerships have been shrinking in inventory since last summer. So a local dealership was quick to offer us our asking price, which is a godsend, honestly. But I didn't feel any relief or happiness about it yesterday. I know it's going to take a huge chunk out of our bill debt, and I'm incredibly grateful we had the resource to use as needed... But I feel bad. I feel guilty about selling a very generous gift that we only had for a year. I feel stressed that we had to downsize because we can't even afford something as simple as the gas for the big car, let alone should anything happen to it. I'm stressed that we lost a valuable vehicle, as our family is ever growing and genuinely could use the extra space and power (towing, storage, etc). And I'm anxious as fuck about the financial situation still. I've been applying for jobs regularly, and without bias; I had an interview at the most depressing Aldi store I've ever seen in my life the other day. I'm willing to work in service or retail hell to keep us balanced. But I'm honestly not content with the situation. And though selling the car brings in a significant amount of monetary relief, it feels like I've just borrowed a couple more days of uneasy peace, and that nothing has actually improved.

Last night I was feeling so upset, so I took a kpin before bed. I was tired and needed the sleep, but the anxiety and stress were making my body and mind so tense that it felt like I wasn't even lying there, but instead floating out of pure tension just over the sheets lol. I did knock out eventually, but now I'm groggy and just kind of bummed out today. I have a run that I'm planning to get to soon, and that's a nice thing to look forward to. But then it's back to the job grind, taking care of the house/husband/pups, and just trying to keep moving on. I'm out of a lot of core recipe ingredients. I'm out of my DOC (coffee lol); I have black tea, so at least my caffeine addiction is placated. My husband is just as picky as his kids and prefers foods that I don't have or don't have the ingredients to make right now... And my PTSD gives me extreme anxiety when someone close to me even comes off as upset, whoops.

My goal is to just tighten all the belts and just make it through this summer. I don't want the kids to worry or feel pressured about our financial issues. It's not their responsibility or burden to carry. Unexplainably luckily, my sister and mom have offered to help with groceries while the kids are here, so that's one fewer stressor on my mind for the next two months. Granted, they're preteen and teenaged, so they eat like rabid ship rats lol, so I'm not certain how long things will last. But they do enjoy some very cheap and easy meals like pancakes and chicken and dumplings, so that's stuff I can whip up with relatively cheap ingredients. But I'll have to keep looking for work while trying to keep everyone afloat.

It's not very helpful, also, that it seems all my husband wants to talk about or watch/listen to is bad news. I realize everything is awful right now and good news is few and far between, but every day, all day, he just wants to reiterate all the awful things happening around and to us. It's just his modus operandi for processing, I think, but it really wears me down. I KNOW how fucking terrible everything is. I KNOW how corrupt the government and the powerful corporations they shield are, despite the dire needs of the very people and economy that fund their existence. I KNOW the earth is dying and supply chains are breaking down and people are being violent all the time. Even when I try my damndest to ignore anything but good news/content, the realities seep through. And having my only constant human contact and partner constantly reiterating the awful echoes of our current realities just makes me feel so pressurized. There's no true relief to be had anywhere.

Blegh. Sorry if you read all that and are bummed out now lol. I just don't have anywhere else to put this weight. Which reminds me, I'm also supposed to be looking for a therapist right now... ugh. I hope everyone is hanging in there and doing okay right now. 💙

[paullicino]

Ten Years

Taken from my Patreon.

Ten years is a long time. It’s long enough for many things to change, but also long enough for everything to remain the same.

I remember ten years ago as if it were yesterday, as if it passed by in the blink of an eye, with light and shadow, textures and taste all as familiar as ever.

A morning after. Shocked faces. A phone call. Events barely believable, yet all too real.

Ten years ago, my then partner and I were living in a top floor flat off Tottenham High Road. It was sweltering in the summer and the downstairs neighbours played dance music at four in the morning. But the views out the back bedroom window were of valleys of rooftops, sprouting television aerials and summited in the winter by the briefest dustings of snow.

The sun was for the front of the flat. The moon shone into our bedroom.

I remember that sunlight in the afternoon, sparkling through the shifting foliage of the tall trees outside. And I remember summer most of all. August.

We had a tap. A faucet. A great, overwrought thing that our landlady was obsessed with. It was the best tap ever, she said. It was large, curved and heavy, the pharaonic headdress worn atop a newly-fitted kitchen of which she was so proud. Wasn’t it exciting that we had such a good tap?

We just wanted our bed repaired. Our home wasn’t finished when we moved in and we slept on the sofa for weeks. When the mighty tap was finally installed, it was too heavy for its fitting. It teetered. Along with poorly-mounted cupboard doors with handles that prevented other cupboards from opening, its practicality was an afterthought.

The walk up Tottenham High Road took me to the only two locations I ever really visited, the supermarket and the job centre. The supermarket provided us with affordable food (though I’d watched the price of many staples almost double over five years) and the job centre provided me, an unemployed person, the money with which to buy that food.

The job centre, which was now extra special and had been rebranded Job Centre Plus, did not provide anyone the means with which they could get a job. It spent almost all of its time providing people with unemployment benefits. Most of the thousands of Tottenham residents who poured through its doors would’ve taken a job if they could’ve found one, but the listings at the centre itself were usually out of date, irrelevant or in some other way misfiled. Most employers don’t want to list their vacancies at the Job Centre Plus because they don’t want to employ the kind of people who go there.

Out of the Job Centre Plus and the supermarket, which one do you think burned that August?

I have written before about my strongest memory of the Job Centre Plus, but here it is again. It was of an old foreign woman and her daughter trying to speak to a clerk. The old woman didn’t speak English, so her daughter was attempting to explain that the woman was looking for work and thus registering as unemployed to gain unemployment benefit. The clerk was trying to explain that the woman was too old to work and should also be on disability benefit. The daughter was trying to explain that they had tried to navigate those systems and that they were obtuse and broken. Her mother just needed money. To live.

(Ten years before, in the summer of 2001, I’d first looked at the cost of moving out. I looked at rents around my Hampshire town, at the cost of housing and at the wages I needed to earn. England was expensive, I decided. It sure cost a lot just to live.)

Everyone was trying to explain everything. The job centre mostly wanted to give people their money and get rid of them, because there were many more lined up behind.

My strongest memory of the supermarket was of the man outside with no legs. He sat there panhandling in his wheelchair almost every day of the year. Britain had just launched its latest Astute-class nuclear submarine, each of which costs over one and a half billion pounds, but it was still a country where a man with no legs had to beg outside a shop.

I thought about that man long after I left Tottenham. I think about him here, now, ten years on.

My partner went abroad to see family and I spent some of the summer restarting my career as a freelance writer. I was fortunate with the connections and opportunities that I had, none of which would ever be found at a job centre, and I spent a lot of my time writing either to find work or simply for practice. I was writing on the night my street burned.

It began before dusk and I came home to find enormous police vehicles parked outside, the sort that are mobile command headquarters. Chains of armoured riot vans surged north. I heard there’d been a protest outside the police station and that a car or two had been burned. I checked the news occasionally. It didn’t have much to add.

Police vans kept coming, though all other traffic had stopped. The roads were closed, blocked by the police, and the latest news told me that petrol bombs had been thrown and a bus set alight. The reports were sparse.

The police in England are really good at responding to riots. They turn up in great swathes, on horses, in vans, or on foot and armed with batons and shields. They have all kinds of exciting equipment to help them. A year before, they’d kettled schoolchildren protesting the huge increase in university tuition fees, surrounding and slowly crushing hundreds of them in Trafalgar Square and on Westminster Bridge. Footage emerged of them beating the shit out of kids or dragging people out of wheelchairs. Here they were now in Tottenham, ready for more.

I kept trying to find news. The police had cordoned off most of the High Road, which meant the journalists that were arriving had no ability to find what was happening inside the riot. Distant footage of fires was the best most of them could provide. As I remember it now, the BBC had one van inside of the police cordon and couldn’t broadcast out because its dish had been damaged. I also have memories of a single journalist, almost in the thick of a mob, asking rioters to give them a moment to explain why they were protesting, or wondering why on earth they might want to block a BBC camera crew who were trying to film them.

What an inane question.

I found the news I wanted. I found it via Twitter and social media. And it was terrifying.

Broadcast news had described a riot not unlike any other. But the still relatively new sphere of social media was overflowing with witness statements, photographs and the kind of low-quality video that phones captured back then. People across Tottenham were panicking as they described growing crowds on the High Road burning not only vehicles, but also shops and businesses. They were breaking into commercial properties. They were looting. They were starting more fires. This had begun half a mile away from my home and it was spreading outward. The post office burned. Landmark businesses burned. Local shops burned and, with them, the flats and homes located above.

The updates kept coming and it’s almost impossible for me now to try to describe to you not only the sheer volume of panic and distress that waterfalled down my feed, but also the sense of utter hopelessness that came with it. People beyond the High Road described not just the violence spilling into their streets, the fights and the hundreds of looters, the fires and the damage, but also how there was no one who could stop this. No emergency services responded. Their phones went unanswered or the lines were jammed.

I read update after update that echoed the same, basic fact, something which I still struggle to comprehend even now, something I’d describe as barely believable: No help was coming.

But the social media updates kept coming. Looters were turning up with empty vans and loading them up with everything they could take. Buildings were being destroyed. A whole estate was being evacuated.

The news provided by the BBC and its peers remained limp and languid, so I spent all night reading these updates, discovering more nearby shops were being gutted, or how the retail park near me was looted to the point of emptiness, and I watched as even my own view out the window became broiling crowds of countless restless and angry people. I remember one man walking off into the darkness with brand new flatscreen televisions under each arm, the police vans now long gone. The night was regularly punctuated by shouts, screams, thumps and sometimes what might have been explosions. The sirens were always distant. The helicopters came and went.

I don’t know where the police cordon had gone. It felt almost as if they had given up and let Tottenham run rampant.

The sun came up and from that back bedroom window I saw smoke rising. I hadn’t slept. The news was full of irrelevant speculation and so, at five-thirty, I put on my shoes and walked the High Road. What I saw was barely believable. Sometimes I met the stunned gazes of other people doing the same, sometimes I avoided any eye contact. I have kept a diary for a long time now and this is what I recorded (slightly edited):

“This morning at about 5:30, as the sun rose, I tried to wander through Tottenham to take some pictures. It became one of the scariest walks I've ever taken.

The atmosphere was tense and unpleasant. Columns of smoke snaked upwards and the High Road and several other streets were blocked off or packed with police vehicles, many more of which were endlessly arriving, some from as far away as Kent.

The nearby retail park was littered with debris and many of its shopfronts were smashed. Groups of people, perhaps gangs, loitered everywhere. While some areas were busy with police officers, others were neglected and patrolled by hostile looking young men.

I didn't end up taking many pictures. I kept moving. Depending upon where you walk, Tottenham looks like a cross between a blitz bomb site and the mess after a chaotic festival.

Something still feels very different. Tottenham has hardly been rosy at the best of times, but today the sunshine can't seem to dispel a strange chill in the air. I myself can't stop thinking of all the homes that burned last night. It might not be immediately obvious to many people, but above a great deal of those shops set ablaze were flats, often family homes for very poor people. Many of those who had little now have less.”

A day after those first riots hit Tottenham, they went nationwide. London wasn’t done and, for a week, many major cities in England played host to their own riots. Tottenham was totally locked down, but it was far too late. The disorder had moved elsewhere.

I remember telling a colleague I worked with that I wouldn’t be finishing something that weekend. He laughed at the news and imagined it would all blow over. He was from a much wealthier background.

Then, everyone started trying to explain everything.

The BBC caught up with events the way a great-grandparent catches up with technology, fumbling and frowning. Goodness me, they said, in their middle class, broadcast-trained voices, and they joined in with the three broad lines of discussion that emerged. One asked how this could happen, one asked why this had happened, and one was about how this would never happen again, because the law would be firmer than ever, the punishments and prosecutions authoritative and absolute. The police were ready for more. They were going to get water cannons. I imagine those work particularly well on kids and wheelchairs.

There was a lot of talk about punishment, including from the Prime Minister, who decided to stop being on holiday in Tuscany only after England’s third night of rioting. I wonder if he had imagined it would all blow over.

Sometimes there was talk involving the people of Tottenham themselves, but it was more likely to be talk about them. A lot of people in Tottenham are Black and have families that trace back to the very first Windrush immigrants of the late 1940s. One Black Labour MP said it was important to talk about their experiences in London, their economic situation and their history of treatment by the police. After all, the spark that had set these riots alight was a protest outside the police headquarters, subsequent to the suspicious shooting of Mark Duggan, a Black man, something that called to mind a similarly suspicious death of a Black woman that also precipitated Tottenham’s 1985 riots.

For some people, the discussion became about how Black people had started the riots and been the chief participants. This wasn’t reflected in anything I saw either on social media or with my own eyes, in person, on the night. But nobody was stopping to ask me what I thought or what I saw.

Not long after that first riot, my partner called me to check I was okay and to ask if those barely believable things she’d seen on the news were really as bad as they seemed. They were. I rode the bus up the High Road on my way to Wood Green, then later to Walthamstow, both of which offered me temporary job centres that took the overspill from ours, thoroughly gutted by fire and then looted of all of its copper piping. The bus crept past burned-out shops and homes. I don’t know where those people have gone.

Later that year, my partner and I discovered that our income was low enough that we were eligible for housing benefit. It took us so long to try to apply for it that we moved home before any progress was made. When I found enough work to support myself, I visited the job centre to sign off, as we called it, to close my file. I asked a woman at reception what I needed to do. “Nothing,” she said, as the line behind me wound down several stories of stairs and out into the grey autumn street. “Just stop coming. Stop coming.”

Winter came and things rustled in the walls. There was a long, tall hedge along the High Road and I would look out the window to see men using it as a urinal. I only had to live in Tottenham for around a year and a half and I have good memories from that flat, but I also remember a stifling and sad place to live, from which I was lucky to move on. Tottenham was never my home and I never had to stay there, but I certainly feel that I came to get a sense of the place.

After moving out, our ex-landlady complained that we hadn’t left the oven as clean as she would’ve liked. She hiked the rent 9% while we were staying there. She never fixed anything that broke and provided excuses instead of solutions.

I found more work. I taught games and narrative for a semester at a small institution in East London. One of the things I asked my students to consider was the stories and the experiences of people who weren’t like them. I asked them to share how often they had been stopped and randomly searched by airport security. “Not just at the airport,” one student reminded me. “On the tube. On the street.”

My life continued to improve in many ways, but I still remembered the man in the wheelchair. The BBC and many other media outlets continued to talk about poverty and race, but not always to poor people or to people who weren’t white. In 2014 I wrote On Poverty and one of the most surprising responses I repeatedly received from people was “I had no idea that it was like this.” A friend of mine tried to apply for support for chronic health problems and documented her many struggles, including being required to explain exactly how many times a week she suffered from migraines (“You said it was two or three times a week. Well, is it two, or is it three?”). The news regularly reported growing homelessness, rising use of food banks and the inevitable deaths of people who weren’t just failed by broken systems, apathy and a lack of understanding, but also simply too poor to be alive.

I feel like some of the people I knew didn’t like how I kept returning to these topics. I feel, even more, that they didn’t at all understand. I remember some of these people waiving off the Brexit referendum as it approached, certain the country wouldn’t vote to amputate itself from the European Union. I don’t think they understood and I don’t think they’d seen the unhappy England that I had, both as a child and as an adult. I think they’d only seen, and been, very comfortable people.

I think these people would call themselves open-minded, progressive and keen to make the world better. I’m sure they could explain those views. At length.

If I think of those people now, I’m quite sure they are all still very comfortable, ten years on. I also think there is still a good chance that man is sat in that wheelchair outside of that supermarket, though he could also be dead by now, again simply too poor to be alive. No longer able to watch the sun sparkle through tall trees, see roofs dusted with snow or catch the moon peeping through his bedroom window.

Such things aren’t for poor people. We still get frustrated when we give them benefits or find out they own mobile phones.

---

Ten years on, Tottenham is almost a dream, a memory where the details have faded and the edges have softened. I have moved countries, had the privilege of travelling through work, enjoyed many different creative opportunities and benefited from free healthcare that has addressed difficult, long-term health issues. I have rationed my life according to a tight budget, but I’ve never had to face the overwhelming, unending hardships of others that I’ve shared neighbourhoods and postcodes with. I cannot ignore these people because they have so often been one street away, visiting the same shop or riding the same train. They are not an abstraction, they are right there, ready to tell us all about their lives.

Ten years on, Tottenham has one of the UK’s fastest-growing rates of unemployment, the latest statistic in the region’s long history of joblessness and poverty. Many of its residents, like poor people across the country, live paycheck to paycheck, at risk of financial ruin should they experience a single upheaval. Ten years on, the most reliable predictor of success and financial stability in the UK (as in many developed countries) is now considered to be the circumstances of your birth. The idea of social mobility is more irrelevant than ever, with much of your destiny decided before you are even born. Ten years on, almost a quarter of the population of the UK lives in poverty.

Ten years on, continued austerity, government apathy and cuts to social services has meant that, yes, ten years really is enough time for everything to stay the same. Without change, the problems people face become generational, systemic. Some people tell me that the 1980s were like this for certain families, regions, populations. I didn’t know. We were doing okay. Perhaps I didn’t get it, didn’t notice it, didn’t want to think about it.

Ten years on, Mark Duggan’s family filed a civil claim against the Metropolitan Police and were awarded an undisclosed sum, after his death was officially ruled a lawful killing in 2014. Lawyers for the Duggan claim commissioned this in-depth report on the shooting, which illustrated many problems with the official police version of events.

Ten years on, the UK government is trying to curtain the right to protest. It commissioned a review that concluded that the country has no systemic racism. It wants to limit the powers of the Electoral Commission and has considered conflating the concepts of whistleblowing and leaking with spying, meaning those who leak information could be treated as criminals. It is increasingly intent on punishing those who might express dissatisfaction.

And ten years on, as we all know, wages have not risen to match the rising costs of rent, food, utilities or transport. It sure costs a lot just to live.

Finally, in 2018, the UN Special Rapporteur on Poverty and Human Rights visited the United Kingdom and did speak with many of its poor. The resulting exhaustive and damning report concluded that “statistics alone cannot capture the full picture of poverty in the United Kingdom” and that “much of the glue that has held British society together since the Second World War has been deliberately removed and replaced with a harsh and uncaring ethos.” It described harsh, ill-conceived and out-of-touch support systems devised and doubled down on by a government that not only failed to understand poverty, but that couldn’t even measure it accurately. It also predicted that these things would only get worse, and without any consideration of the effect of extraordinary events, such as a global pandemic.

The government described the report as “barely believable.”

I don’t think any help is coming.

---

There’s a question that sometimes bounces around social media and it asks people this: “What radicalised you?” As if there was some moment that changed a person’s political beliefs and rearranged their perspective on the world.

Here’s the thing. I feel like my perspective is from the floor, skewed and sore after I fell between two stools, always unable to find an identity amongst wider British culture. I grew up too comfortable, too spoiled and too well-spoken to call myself working class, but I was easily alienated by schoolfriends with multiple bathrooms and university-educated parents. My interests and my sentiments aren’t supposed to be working class, but many of my life experiences and even philosophies are. I know what it’s like to memorise Shakespeare and to explain themes in Romantic-era art, as much as I know what it’s like to fight government systems that are ostensibly supposed to help, to be unable to afford your own home, to walk into a supermarket and look at staple foods you still can’t afford. You think about Descartes and then you think about which dinner provides the cheapest way to keep your body alive.

When I was a kid I remember going to friend’s houses where they were too poor to clean the carpet, or seeing them lose a parent to lung cancer, or the time someone showed me a gun hidden in their brother’s car. As an adult I wrote to my politicians to ask them what they were doing about poverty, about education, about the cost of living. I went to protests and signed petitions and supported charities both practically and financially. I suppose I was trying to articulate some of the skills I’d learned from in some situations to articulate the experiences I’d had in others. Surely you have to do something.

I both resent and appreciate aspects of both classes and I imagine I’ll never work out who I am or what I’m supposed to call myself. But I do know there are vastly different worlds and vastly different experiences within British culture and that many continue to be overlooked even when in plain sight. And it’s what I find most frustrating.

If there was one thing I learned, if not one thing that radicalised me, it wasn’t simply that poverty never goes away, it’s that it always needs to be explained. There are always, always people who don’t get it, who don’t notice it, who don’t want to think about it or who will puzzle over it from a distance as if it were some transient mirage they can never hope to touch. Those in power will continue to make decisions about poverty that they do not experience, in spite of the fact that making financially comfortable people the authority on money is like making able-bodied people the authority on wheelchair access, like making men the authority on women’s bodies, like making white people the authority on racism.

And so, ten years on, here I am again, writing about Tottenham, about class, about poverty and about ignorance, and only from a slightly different angle. I will write about these things more, not least because I’ve already started another work on these themes, but mostly because I will always need to. I don’t imagine that, during my lifetime, the explaining will ever stop. I don’t imagine that our societies will give up on punishing people for being poor in a world where it is so often simply too expensive to be alive. And I don’t imagine I will have any more patience for people who imagine it will all blow over.

I refuse to let you middle-class your way out of this.

I don’t have any solutions to these enormous and complex problems. I don’t have exhaustive lists of who exactly to blame or where precisely everything has gone wrong. But here’s what I believe: If we don’t talk about poverty, and if we don’t listen to those caught inside of it, it will never go away, and there will be infinitely more Tottenhams.

[softwarmboy]

1. Selfie

2. What would you name your future kids?

I really like the name Damon! And Grace

3. Do you miss anyone?

Always

4. What are you looking forward to?

My name and gender marker documents going through!!! (Hopefully) my trip to London in the fall!!! My second dose of the vaccine! Seeing my little sister again! New tattoos!!

5. Is there anyone who can always make you smile?

Absolutely, I have a few close friends who can always get me smiling again

6. Is it hard for you to get over someone?

Unfortunately for me, yes, very ;-; Im a very emotional person and feel things very strongly

7. What was your life like last year?

Living on the coast, working construction, and that was about it

8. Have you ever cried because you were so annoyed

Yes 😂😂😂 mostly over math

9. Who did you last see in person

My friend Shannon!!!

10. Are you good at hiding your feelings

Yes and no, if I’m upset/irritated/sad it’ll show on my face whether I want it to or not, BUT I’m pretty good as passing it off as something else if I want. Not a whole lot of people can tell when im doing that, if anyone at all

11. Are you listening to music right now?

Of course!! Im listening to When The Darkness Comes by Colbie Caillat

12. What is something you want right now?

Food 😂😂😂

13. How do you feel right now?

Sore and tired

14. When was the last time someone of the opposite sex hugged you

Yesterday!! My friend was having a rough day and was kinda snarky with me and gave me a hug and an apology after she calmed down

15. Personality description

Full of dad jokes, puns, sass, caffeine and smart ass replies at all times 😂 very direct/straightforward, and have little to no patience for beating around the bush, in any context

16. Have you ever wanted to tell someone something but you didn’t

Oh god yeah, growing up I never told anyone anything, ever

17. Opinion on insecurities

We all have them, if you’re the kinda person who zeroes in on someone else’s, for any reason, I feel sorry for you but also have absolutely no patience or respect for you

18. Do you miss how things were a year ago?

Nooooooooo, I wasn’t very happy. I wasn’t unhappy necessarily but 🤷🏻‍♂️ still no, hard pass

19. Have you ever been to New York

Nope! It’s on my travel list tho

20. What is your favourite song at the moment

At the moment??? The Colbie Caillat song i mentioned above!

21. Age and birthday?

23, and December 16th!

22. Description of crush

No thanks 😂

23. Fear(s)

Oh man, spiders, wasps, escalators (I have no idea why, don’t ask 😂😂) and aggressive men

24. Height

5’9!

25. Role model

As cliche as it is, I mean it when I say my momma

26. Idol(s)

I don’t really??? Have any????

27. Things I hate

Mushrooms and olives 😂 but in all seriousness, people who are rude to retail/customer service employees or servers, people who don’t use turn signals or say please, thank you and excuse me, the sound of styrofoam (it’s a sensory thing for me)

28. I’ll love you if-

You’ll play video games with me or will try them or any books/music I suggest, notice the little things about me

29. Favourite film(s)

The Mortal Instruments!!!!

30. Favourite tv show(s)

Gilmore Girls, The Vampire Diaries, Supernatural, Lucifer, Stranger Things, The Witcher, Firefly

31. 3 random facts

Your feet are the same length as your forearm! A whale dick is called a dork (if I remember correctly) and I can’t think of a third

32. Are your friends mainly guys or girls?

Girls mostly! I don’t have much in common with many guys 🤷🏻‍♂️ that and I just feel more comfortable around girls

33. Something you want to learn?

Sword fighting!!!! That’d be so cool

34. Most embarrassing moment

I have so many 😂😂😂 I’m a clumsy bastard, but I’ll go with my most recent for now- I saw a cute dog hanging his head out a car window and said hi without realizing there was someone in the passenger seat with their window down 😂😂

35. Favourite subject

Anything compute related!!

36. 3 dreams you want to fulfill

Go to Italy, get married, see the northern lights!!!

37. Favourite actor/actress

Melissa McCarthy 😂😂

38. Favourite comedian(s)

John Mulaney, Taylor Tomlinson, Gabriel Iglesias, and Iliza Shlesinger!!

39. Favourite sport(s)

Hockey I guess 🤷🏻‍♂️

40. Favourite memory

Just one??? Hmmmmm….singing Party In The USA with my friends after we’d been inhaling helium 😂

41. Relationship status

Single 😂😂😭

42. Favourite book(s)

The Mortal Instruments by Cassandra Clare, The Inheritance Cycle by Christopher Paolini, The Selection by Kiera Cass, and the Nightshade trilogy by Andrea Cremer

43. Favourite song ever

Ever???? Oh man that’s a tough one, maybe Boulevard of Broken Dreams by Green Day???

44. Age you get mistaken for

17/18 😂😂😂so many of the teenagers at work don’t believe me when I say I’m in my 20’s. One of the kids in produce absolutely refused to believe I’m older than him

45. How you found out about your idol

N/A

46. What my last text message says

“I know you are”

47. Turn ons

Light nail scratches, is really all I can think of lately 🤷🏻‍♂️ I haven’t had that conversation with someone in quite some time

48. Turn offs

Being non consensually bossy, treating me like an object, daddy/mommy kinks

49. Where I want to be right now

London maybe! I’m really excited to go

50. Favourite picture of your idol

N/A

51. Starsign

Sagittarius!

52. Something I’m talented at

Teaching myself instruments! I’ve taught myself 3 so far! It’s always been something I’ve been able to pick up really quickly

53. 5 things that make me happy

Music, love in any form, snuggles, drives with my favourite people, my favourite comfort foods

54. Something that’s worrying me at the moment

My name and gender marker documents

55. Tumblr friends

God I don’t remember anyone’s URL’s anymore 😂😂 but I have a fair amount! I talk to 99% of them on other platforms now so 🤷🏻‍♂️

56. Favourite food(s)

Nachos, mashed potatoes, any sort of cheesy/creamy pasta! Grilled cheese, grilled salmon roll, and really any form of potatoes actually

57. Favourite animal(s)

Wolves are my absolute favourite

58. Description of my best friend

Curly brown (it looks brown to me 😂 I know you’ll come at me for this when you see it) hair, blue eyes, the gayest fashion sense, practical, will always tell me when I need to pull my head outta my ass 😂💚

59. Why I joined Tumblr

I wanted a safe space to explore things like mental health, transitioning and a few other things!

60. Ask me anything you want

Self explanatory, have at ‘er

[freebooter4ever]

Ref anon: I hope you can get help for that pain. Maybe a nerve is pinched? I'm really not sure about my future. I have a lot of hobbies but just work a shit customer service job. Getting motivation to do drawing at all is difficult let alone animate. Which is a great mental state to be in when my only plan for my whole life since childhood was animation. 🤷‍♀️

its tendonitis and im pretty sure the only way to get rid of it is to take a break from working which is obviously not possible so just gonna ignore it till i die i guess \o/

so yeah you struck a cord with me, this got long...

i cant help with motivation, i have too much of it. i lived with my grandparents for a year while grandpa was sick, and it was the first time they'd ever really seen me /work/ and even they were shocked. it really is constant - if i have twenty minutes and im not using it to draw its wasted time, you know? my first roommate here in LA was concerned too - she kept trying to get me to stop working and go out and back then my excuse was i didnt have a job and no money for going out, but really im just like that all the time. i try to balance it with seeing friends and social media and everyday shit like eating food, but its hard, my favorite people are the ones who will just sit and work with me lol! (or going out and working in places im not alone and quiet). i guess what im saying is...if its really your passion, is it not there all the time? i only ask because it took me a long time to realize that although i loved to analyze animation and watch it - the way i process art doesnt quite have what it takes to do that. we all love the end product, but just because the animation part is the most front facing part...doesn't mean that's necessarily where your actual passion might lie...if that makes sense? there's SO MUCH to do in the animation industry, its crazy. for me, i finally realized that all my obsessive energy revolved around character and especially faces, and i just started focusing on that. i would much rather be concepting a wide variety of characters than spending a whole year animating about one minute of a two hour movie.

that said there's also the sad reality that some people have had doors open more easily than others. i feel you about being stuck in a retail job you feel wasted in :( im sorry you are in that position. i hope you are able to make a change, but i understand just how fucking /trapped/ that can be. watching life slip by into nothingness while the tiny snatches of meaning only happen during off hours and scraped together seconds of free time. one of the biggest ironies though is that this is how a lot of original animators felt about dsn*y. i mentioned that on my road trip i stayed with the son of an animator who worked on snow wh*te - he wasnt one of the 9 old men but he was their contemporary and friend, and the animator took the job just to make money off his art. animation just wasnt his full passion and he eventually quit, moved up north, and started experimenting with helicopters and boe*ng lol. 

and in reverse of that, as i grew up with a father and a grandfather who worked for boe*ng and the US space program, ALL my open doors were flight and space related - my cousin currently works for N A S A and my other cousin for boe*ng - they took the doors but i didnt want anything to do with it. it took years for my grandpa to finally come to terms with the fact that my passion for art was as strong as his passion for airplanes. he grew up a farm boy daydreaming about flying, and had to take a circuitous route to finally get there - army, college, mechanical engineering, finally rockets. he gave my dad and me all the chances grandpa would have wanted as a kid - my dad took them - i didnt want any of it. i would much rather have had those chances that the animator got.

and then of course there are the institutionalized gates - barriers against entry for women, minorities, LGBQT, people without money...its a LOT to fight against. which is of course why we celebrate the exceptional people who DO break through those barriers and succeed despite it all. but it can be demoralizing to be on the other side of those barriers. demoralizing is too soft a word. i dont think there is a word for how much it can hurt.

some wisdom that might help: randy pa*usch's last lecture - he is a white male who definitely does not understand the race/sex 'walls', but he makes good points, and also he came at the animation industry sideways for very similar reasons - through education and research rather than the traditional job promotion route. and then someone closer to my own age/time: justin scar*ed - i dont mean his road trip videos, i mean the old vlogs from 3-6 years ago when he was 31 divorced and depressed and realizing he had to release himself from his own pressure of his music career. his quest for positivity is an interesting concept, and i sympathized with that feeling of your life taking a direction you didnt chase after but somehow ends up being the thing you were actually looking for the entire time. if you want a success story there’s always my favorite: steve aok*. he went against everything that was set up for him in life and still made it work ^_^ (of course of these three, guess who also grew up the rich kid lol). or norman re*dus who quite literally accidentally became a model and successful actor. im paraphrasing this horribly, but my impression was that as a teenager he was selling shitty cat paintings on the streets of paris - which sounds romantic but miserable at the same time - and then followed a girl to california, got a crappy job in a motorcycle shop, went to a party and yelled at some people from a balcony, landed his first stage role...and eventually created the character of daryl and finally got the chance to have his genius really shine. (sometimes i wonder though, if it was frustrating to end up being famous for acting rather than art which was arguably his true passion?)

i hope any of this helps, i am pretty exhausted lately so apologies if my sentences are incomprehensible in some parts. and you know, my DMs on here are open if you want to talk more specifically off anon <3