#even after 10 hours

[inkskinned]

the thing about art is that it was always supposed to be about us, about the human-ness of us, the impossible and beautiful reality that we (for centuries) have stood still, transfixed by music. that we can close our eyes and cry about the same book passage; the events of which aren't real and never happened. theatre in shakespeare's time was as real as it is now; we all laugh at the same cue (pursued by bear), separated hundreds of years apart.

three years ago my housemates were jamming outdoors, just messing around with their instruments, mostly just making noise. our neighbors - shy, cautious, a little sheepish - sat down and started playing. i don't really know how it happened; i was somehow in charge of dancing, barefoot and laughing - but i looked up, and our yard was full of people. kids stacked on the shoulders of parents. old couples holding hands. someone had brought sidewalk chalk; our front walk became a riot of color. someone ran in with a flute and played the most astounding solo i've ever heard in my life, upright and wiggling, skipping as she did so. she only paused because the violin player was kicking his heels up and she was laughing too hard to continue.

two weeks ago my friend and i met in the basement of her apartment complex so she could work out a piece of choreography. we have a language barrier - i'm not as good at ASL as i'd like to be (i'm still learning!) so we communicate mostly through the notes app and this strange secret language of dancers - we have the same movement vocabulary. the two of us cracking jokes at each other, giggling. there were kids in the basement too, who had been playing soccer until we took up the far corner of the room. one by one they made their slow way over like feral cats - they laid down, belly-flat against the floor, just watching. my friend and i were not in tutus - we were in slouchy shirts and leggings and socks. nothing fancy. but when i asked the kids would you like to dance too? they were immediately on their feet and spinning. i love when people dance with abandon, the wild and leggy fervor of childhood. i think it is gorgeous.

their adults showed up eventually, and a few of them said hey, let's not bother the nice ladies. but they weren't bothering us, they were just having fun - so. a few of the adults started dancing awkwardly along, and then most of the adults. someone brought down a better sound system. someone opened a watermelon and started handing out slices. it was 8 PM on a tuesday and nothing about that day was particularly special; we might as well party.

one time i hosted a free "paint along party" and about 20 adults worked quietly while i taught them how to paint nessie. one time i taught community dance classes and so many people showed up we had to move the whole thing outside. we used chairs and coatracks to balance. one time i showed up to a random band playing in a random location, and the whole thing got packed so quickly we had to open every door and window in the place.

i don't think i can tell you how much people want to be making art and engaging with art. they want to, desperately. so many people would be stunning artists, but they are lied to and told from a very young age that art only matters if it is planned, purposeful, beautiful. that if you have an idea, you need to be able to express it perfectly. this is not true. you don't get only 1 chance to communicate. you can spend a lifetime trying to display exactly 1 thing you can never quite language. you can just express the "!!??!!!"-ing-ness of being alive; that is something none of us really have a full grasp on creating. and even when we can't make what we want - god, it feels fucking good to try. and even just enjoying other artists - art inherently rewards the act of participating.

i wasn't raised wealthy. whenever i make a post about art, someone inevitably says something along the lines of well some of us aren't that lucky. i am not lucky; i am dedicated. i have a chronic condition, my hands are constantly in pain. i am not neurotypical, nor was i raised safe. i worked 5-7 jobs while some of these memories happened. i chose art because it mattered to me more than anything on this fucking planet - i would work 80 hours a week just so i could afford to write in 3 of them.

and i am still telling you - if you are called to make art, you are called to the part of you that is human. you do not have to be good at it. you do not have to have enormous amounts of privilege. you can just... give yourself permission. you can just say i'm going to make something now and then - go out and make it. raquel it won't be good though that is okay, i don't make good things every time either. besides. who decides what good even is?

you weren't called to make something because you wanted it to be good, you were called to make something because it is a basic instinct. you were taught to judge its worth and over-value perfection. you are doing something impossible. a god's ability: from nothing springs creation.

a few months ago i found a piece of sidewalk chalk and started drawing. within an hour i had somehow collected a small classroom of young children. their adults often brought their own chalk. i looked up and about fifteen families had joined me from around the block. we drew scrangly unicorns and messed up flowers and one girl asked me to draw charizard. i am not good at drawing. i basically drew an orb with wings. you would have thought i drew her the mona lisa. she dragged her mother over and pointed and said look! look what she drew for me and, in the moment, i admit i flinched (sorry, i don't -). but the mother just grinned at me. he's beautiful. and then she sat down and started drawing.

someone took a picture of it. it was in the local newspaper. the summary underneath said joyful and spontaneous artwork from local artists springs up in public gallery. in the picture, a little girl covered in chalk dust has her head thrown back, delighted. laughing.

[puppetmaster13u]

Prompt 292

“Oh I am blaming all of this on you T,” one of the beings in the summoning circle groans, burying their corpse-pale head in clawed hands as their white hair flickered. 

“Me? Excuse me, I wasn’t the one to accept the summoning!” another being protested, hood hiding most of their face save for molten-gold eyes and glittering runes or code on dark blue skin. “I was trying to figure out how to convince PK to change our schedule to include more sleeping, so don’t look at me, look at S!” 

“Well I didn’t accept it,” the only girl-sounding one scoffed, her crown of thorns seeming to writhe and bloom in her black hair for a moment. She crossed her arms, narrowing green eyes just a few shades darker than the white-haired one. “Maybe talk to whoever decided to summon us?” 

All of the sudden the cultists and heroes were being peered down at by a trio of… honestly whatever they were, because they didn’t seem to be the “Infinite King” the cult had been attempting to summon. Actually, they kind-of-maybe looked like kids… Which probably meant their parents or caretakers wouldn’t be too pleased. 

[cemeterything]

love how every phone call with my dad is like negotiating a peace treaty between two warring nations

[ravetillyoucry]

finally got around to doing that illustration I wanted to do from TAOLAW by @fireflywritesgt :D

Huzzah!

[collaredkittyboy]

Need time off from work to focus on my career as a pretty boy on the internet

[anna-scribbles]

regained my 12 year old swag(read an entire new percy jackson book in one sitting)

[fbwzoo]

There were 4 humans in the room. Where did 4 of the 5 upstairs big kids need to be?

On mom, of course.

(Emma is barely visible, just next to my hand on the left, behind Addy)

I have never felt more like Daine from Tamora Pierce's Tortall books.

[yasmeensh]

This is what I have been working on this week. A4 paper in gouache. It's a rather difficult medium to work with. I do like the consistency, and the matte finish. But I found it hard to make the colours come out bright (I suppose gouache is like that?). I used coloured pencils and what is supposed to be oil pastels (it was straight up chalk lol). I think it could still use more work, but I fear I would just ruin it if I work any further. Overall, I'm happy with the result! Next up will be acrylics! Progress shots under the cut:

[llitchilitchi]

setting off for a long journey

[iwritenarrativesandstuff]

really wish my one friend would quit flirting with me. and trying to goad me into hanging out more. and assigning us fictional characters that are oh-so-coincidently either couples or with romantic tension. and then interrupting our gameplay to ask me repeatedly if I think they’re “like us” (which they rarely are…). and matching my icon on discord without asking (again, usually by insinuating a couple connection). and giving me random things I do not want and did not ask to receive (and then forcing me to take them???).

[thatonegayship]

I loved the cowboy comic so much that I wrote a oneshot for it. https://archiveofourown.org/works/50934235 🥺 your art is BEYOND amazing, ty for the food

INCREDIBLE!!!!!

[opera-ghost]

it's honestly amazing how love never dies, in its most recent iteration with the US tour, did so much to improve upon the original london production

the sets look beautiful, the music still goes hard, the lyrics were reworked, and they had an extremely talented cast with great chemistry

and despite it all, it still managed to be one of the worst things i've ever seen. absolutely nothing can save that dumpster fire, and i think that's beautiful

[redundantz]

i messed up Astarions quest the other week and I wanted to cry....TT_TT i didn't realize i messed it up so it was really surprising when he yelled at me.

[palms-upturned]

.

[opalsiren]

one thing i really struggle with when it comes to my chronic illness and disability is reading. i used to rip through 100 page academic articles like it was nothing, now getting through a paragraph without my brain short circuiting from brain fog is a challenge. it probably doesn't help that i don't read a lot of fiction and tend to read nonfiction texts about sociocultural issues, so i'm hardly leafing through beach reads that are easy to keep up with lol.

that said, when my pain is especially bad even a few sentences of relatively readable text just evacuates my brain as soon as it enters. it's hard not to feel 'stupid' sometimes, especially when it's difficult to keep up with the news beyond headlines and skim-reading articles without getting the full context. yes i could listen to news radio or podcasts, but often my pain is so severe my brain just tunes out after a few minutes and refuses to tune back in for anything except maybe scrolling on my phone or listening to music.

anyway i don't really have a snappy conclusion for this other than to say that if you also find reading or just digesting information challenging, you are not stupid. most people take their cognition for granted, but when you're struggling with brain fog, memory and concentration issues, and overwhelming fatigue, you just don't have that luxury. still, at least we're not alone.

[da-proti-toku-grem]

how do you know the difference between a huge anxiety attack and a panic attack?