#favorite past time is putting current fixation in my favorite childhood media

[tatretot]

*ham-hamifies your desert duo* :3c *ham-hamifies your jizzie* :3c *ham-hamifies your imp & skizz* :3c

[magic-is-something-we-create]

Writeblr Reintro (Two!)

Hi! I'm Pax (he/him), and I've been on writeblr for two years now! This little reintro thing has become a bit of an annual tradition, so I figured I'd keep it going :D

The basics about me:

I'm an adult, queer, and neurodivergent

My favorite genres to both read and write are Fantasy (preferably High and/or Epic), SciFi, and Horror. The only genre I don't vibe with is romance (but I do like to hype up that of fellow writers!)

My current fixations include Stardew Valley, Minecraft, The NoSleep Podcast, and Not Another D&D Podcast

I have just recently gotten myself out of a reading slump! Now, I'm working my way through She's Come Undone by Wally Lamb to connect with my mom's favorite book <3

As for tumblr things:

I do digital art, and take commissions through Ko-Fi on occasion! Relevant information is linked in my pinned post. I've drawn plenty of people's OCs in the past, and I'd love to draw yours, too!

As for my writing:

WIPs! I have several of them!

My main WIP is called The Millennium Saga. It's a High Fantasy series planned to have between 4 and 7 installments; book one (Firebreathers) is finishing up with its first round of beta readers, and I'm about a third of the way through drafting book two (Echoseers)!

A socially anxious and PTSD-ridden revolutionary gets dragged into working with the very king they rebelled against--a.k.a. the Chosen One, who supposedly saved the world 1000 years ago and has since become Eternal, alongside his former lover and the woman who gave the two the idea in the first place. But supposedly is used with good reason, and with the help of their melodramatic and vain boyfriend, the son of a banished noble descended from one of those very Eternals, and their found family forged in friendship and fear, they might just save the world for real this time.

The rest of the blurbs will be behind the cut, since there's three of them and I don't want to absolutely wreck your dashes. But if you'd like to hear more about a Dark Fantasy crime syndicate, an Urban Fantasy road trip thriller, and a clusterfuck of a Space Opera, you should click through!

And, of course, tell me about your own WIPs! Introduce yourself! Make some funny references in the tags that I may or may not understand! I will enjoy all of the above :D

Whispers is a Tragic Dark Fantasy standalone novel set in the same world as TMS (called the Ehlverse!), but in a slightly different time and very different place.

Three unlucky lackeys are summoned north by the evil sorceress leader of a criminal ring that specializes in bastardizing the idea of a "life debt". And though escape is something one cannot do for long when running from the Shadow of Fowden, freedom is a tempting thing for those only recently bound. So when she offers it in exchange for their aid in terrorizing their culture's paragons of morality, they agree, even though they suspect she's lying. What other chance will they get? One of those paragons is still in mourning, though, almost twenty years after her childhood fell to ruin. She's not about to let this entity calling herself a Shadow ruin even more. And she's not about to hold her punches for the henchmen, because the hope of her people comes first. She'll swear it on her sister's grave.

Deity Complex is an Urban Fantasy Thriller standalone set in an alternate reality where everyone has a little touch of mundane magic.

A teenage car accident survivor desperately attempts to evade the government seeking to use them as a weapon of war by driving the loneliest, most winding backroads in America on repeat. At least doing this gives them some much-needed headspace... but that mostly ends up occupied with the struggle to not to become a cryptid sighting meme on social media. Because of course. What that headspace should be put towards, though, is coming to terms with the fact that they have an ancient deity of death, plague, and war hitching along for the ride in their brain. Like, the entity that created those very concepts. Wild, huh? But, you know, it's apparently not the rarest thing, this pocket of the brain called a Deity Complex. Which honestly? They're a bit pissed about not being told that. They had a whole breakdown about being weird, and for what? For a random girl they meet on the road to tell them she has a god of obsession in her head. That's what, apparently.

The Lost is a Space Opera that could either become a Webcomic or a novel of its own, set in a nebula lacking humans entirely (and yes, that means an all-original-alien cast. character design, my alleged passion, tries to destroy me yet again).

When the shapeshifting eldritch gladiator known only as the Champion refuses to fight the teenage fairy who was unwillingly thrown into the arena to die on screen, the coliseum goes into an affronted uproar. During that meltdown, while the audience that feeds on bloodshed froths at the mouth, an attending assassin with malfunctioning psychic implants ruins the show further by ignoring her target in favor of breaking the child combatant out--and warily accepts help from the Champion themself to the same end. Upon their escape, though, they find that a domestic terrorist-turned-janitor has ended up as an accidental stowaway, and may or may not be an unwitting point of further surveillance by their captors. They find common ground, though, in this breach of privacy, trust, and autonomy, and team up to destroy the Space Hollywood™ trauma-porn industry, one oligarch's corpse at a time.

[softestsaddestbitch]

December TC Challenge

stole this from @elder-edda (sorry for creeping! just, given the usual demographic of the tc community I was excited to find another 20-smthg)

1) what color is your tc’s hair?

He has just, simple brown hair but he’s starting to go grey which, no lie, is 100% doing it for me.

2) is your tc married?

Yes? He doesn’t wear a ring and I believe she kept her last name which makes me think it’s more of a civil partnership since they’ve been together since the early 2000s at least. But he also will refer to her as “my wife” and was telling me once that they waited until “after they got married” before moving in together.

3) if yes, do you care? would you do something with them regardless of their marriage?

I know these questions are general but I do take offense at the idea of being a homewrecker/other woman. I’ve met his wife, she’s really nice.

4) what’s your worst memory with your tc?

I put my foot in my mouth SO OFTEN. Good lord. Especially my last semester at that school? He was acting weird and I had just realized after fucking ... four years?? that I romantically liked him. So I kept bringing up my weird age fixation and other bs bc I have adhd and am possibly autistic?? and can’t read a room to save my life.

5) what’s your best memory with your tc?

One year we had a really bad snowstorm, so bad in fact that I had my first-ever snow day. The college that I used to go to has four campuses across as many cities, and C has to drive in twice a week to my (old) town from his. Now, morning classes had been canceled but afternoon classes had been given the go-ahead. C, who does not check his emails until he arrives at campus, evidently did not get this message until he was already in town and therefore didn’t have a morning class, but did have an afternoon class. On this day I had a late morning class that had been reinstated, but my prof didn’t get that memo so I also was on campus but didn’t have a class. So I went to visit his office, which I had been doing throughout the semester (I didn’t have a class with him at the time) and we just ... hung out for like 2 hours. It was so nice and one of the anecdotes he told me still haunts me lol.

sidenote: at the time, I hadn’t yet realized that I liked him, but I still went out of my way to visit him. Damn I was a dumbass.

6) does anyone in your school know how you feel?

ish? I told a classmate but in a “haha joking” kinda way. And a friend who went to that school knows. No one at my current school knows.

7) does your tc know how you feel?

I think he might? might have a lil inkling which would explain why he started acting so weird my last semester. Or at the very least was told/realized how bad it could look that he was getting so chummy w/ a student.

8) do you think there’s any chance your tc reciprocates your feelings?

He and his wife have been together for around 20 years now. No. No, I don’t think so. Maybe in an alternate universe.

9) are you getting your tc a christmas present? if so, what is it?

I have in the past! Specifically like, a tin of cookies lol. I’ve also given him an actual present when I left. I do intend to send him a Christmas card every year but not this year because ... you know ... the apocalypse.

10) have you ever flirted with your tc?

Flirtation inherently has intent. So, no. How he interpreted our interactions I don’t know.

11) how long have you had a crush on them? what began it all?

SO! TIMELINE!

I was at my old school from September 2014-April 2019, I had C for the first time in September 2015. Like I mentioned above, I did not realize I had a crush on him until literally the middle of my final exam of my class with him December 2018, so I’ve only consciously had a crush for about two years now. However, as I also mentioned, I went out of my way to stop by his office, even when I didn’t have a class with him. And my relationship with/feelings towards him are complicated so I’m not going to say I did so solely because I like him, but I would put it maybe closer to somewhere in 2017. You don’t plan your schedule around someone you don’t feel strong feelings for.

12) do you believe you’ll get over them shortly after you stop taking their class/have the chance to spend time with them?

As of today, it has been been exactly a year and a half since I last him in person. In the time since, I have cried over missing him, routinely gone back to keep up with his current research projects, and made his picture a part of my home screen. I almost exclusively listen to the playlist I made for him -  so much so my Spotify Wrapped is pretty much that playlist with a few extras.

13) what kind of grades do you get in their class?

Haaaaaa pre-supension I was failing his classes. My first semester back I got .... a mid/high 70? and I finished my last class with him with an A+ and the essay I had written for his class had the highest grade between the two classes so..

14) does your tc ever do any tiny, little things that you adore?

When he puts a hand in his pocket and leans against the wall. When he tucks his hair behind his ear because he keeps falling in his face (he has long hair, a little past his shoulders). When he can’t stop himself from googling something even if its in the middle of class. How you can ask him anything at any time. The way he would chuckle at my jokes. How his handwriting hasn’t improved in decades. How easily he brushes off toxic masculinity. His candidness and willingness to share little anecdotes. The way he used to always smile whenever he saw me. That he goes home everyday to have lunch with his wife.

15) are you their favorite student?

I was! And it was obvious to other students that we had a friendly, casual relationship too. For a time, if his other students had questions about him they would ask me, and I usually had the answer. I didn’t matter in the long run, but I was. 

16) do you two share any tastes? movies, books, music, etc.

He’s a legal historian, I’m a baby legal/political historian. We also like the same historical cooking youtube channel.

17) is your teacher religious?

I doubt he would say he’s religious, but I feel like we have a similar relationship to religion which is to say no formal association, but had profound effects on our childhoods and subsequently, presumably, how we view things as adults.

18) do you masturbate to them?

Yes.

19) do you communicate with them outside of school?

I sent him a meme once. And asked about the socialist uprising scandal he was apart of. I also almost emailed him while at a museum exhibition with my history friend. These are all through email.

20) do you have any tc songs or songs you relate to your tc? what are they?

SO my number one song this year was “You are the Reason” by Calum Scott because, you guessed it, of him. But also:

I Lost a Friend - Finneas When You’re Ready - Shawn Mendes You Are in Love - Taylor Swift Break My Heart Right - James

& given the season, especially w/ what transpired last year, Last Christmas by Wham!

21) what’s your favorite thing your tc has said/memory you have with them?

One time he kinda trailed off in the middle of lecture after stating that he thought of xyz a particular way which contrasted one of the popular schools of thought, and the way he plainly said, “well, yeah, which I guess ... is I’m arguing it” almost like he was semi-surprised with himself has always stuck with me. 

But also, in addition the memory I shared earlier, we spent an hour and a half talking about grad school and what to expect and how to get there. 

22) do you plan to continue a relationship with them after you leave school?

I trid, I really did. But he doesn’t “socialize with students part or present” so I can’t exactly see him. But I did get some academic-related from him at the beginning of the year.

23) how will you deal during the summer? will you see him/her?

He’s a hermit who used my last vacation before I moved to go on all the vacations he had to postpone because he was working on his last book. And this past summer ... Covid. This question is obviously directed at high school students, but in general, he lives in the back of head always, and when I’m in my hometown for the summer my heart aches because theres a none-zero chance I’ll see him, but I know I won’t.

24) does your tc support gay rights?

Yes. He’s never been put in a position that I know of where he had to outright condemn homophobia, but in one of his classes, he actively made the choice to make the very first reading of the semester about how women in ancient times had more agency than assumed, and also how the woman in the case study was a lesbian.

25) what class do you have with them? And what period? Do you have them every day?

History classes. I won’t get into specifics because it’s kind of an eclectic mix and I’m paranoid someone from the area could come across this. But I had him twice a week every semester that I had him. Again this kind of question is more so applicable to high school students, not so much university students.

26) have you ever drifted out during a lecture thinking about them and missed information?

No. In his classes he is too enthralling, and I’m a good student otherwise.

27) have you stalked them online? what did you find out?

In theory. He’s a fifty-year-old history professor whose reaction to a description of the big lipped/tiny face filter on snapchat was “that sounds disgusting.” The man doesn’t have social media, and if he does those privacy settings are on so students can’t find him he thinks he’s very professional. I do visit his mini-bio section on the college website fairly often tho.

28) have you ever run into them outside of schools? what happened?

I did once. He introduced me to his wife, who said “oh you’re E! C has talked about you” and it apparently he had done so positively, and blew my mind because this was back when I was failing classes and also, as a person, I don’t believe that people think about me when I’m not there. They gave me a restaurant recommendation and afterwards his wife surprised me a they were leaving the restaurant because ... we had listened to them, and they also went there for lunch that day.

29) has your tc ever spoken of teacher-student relationships? what did they say?

It had recently come out that it had been found out that another professor had been in a relationship with a student and he’s the one that brought it up before class one day (with all of us not just me). He didn’t say anything for or against it, just that it was generally discouraged, but that most schools did have policies in place to handle the situation.

30) do you regret telling anyone about your tc? if you’ve kept it a secret, why have you done so?

Absolutely not. I can’t tell my best friends because they’d do nothing but give me shit for it and it would call every time I mention him into question. But the friends that I have told ... its been so freeing, and like a weight has been lifted from my heart. One friend in particular I unloaded on her all my emotional shit pertaining to him this past summer and she was so understanding it legit since then I’ve been less distraught when thinking about him. It still hurts, but it feels less like I’m suffocating now.

[dulcecarpediem-blog]

People killin’, people dyin’

For a 2017 “millenial”, I tend to be pretty anti-social media compared to my peers. I think of myself as “beyond the days” of feeling like I have to post my feelings on Facebook, but every now and then I get the urge to post. 

Then my anxiety takes over and I’m worried of either saying too much, or being too cliche, or being judged by my friends and coworkers even though I claim to not care about people judging me. And then I just lie on the DELETE button until every letter is erased and I take a deep breath as I realize I’ve now just wasted 40 minutes constructing a well-thought-out status, only to completely demolish it. And then I get anxiety because I feel like I’m missing out on this era that I really don’t want to be a part of, but it’s the “norm” and do people think I’m weird for not partaking in this craziness?

Anyway, I digress.

I can’t help but have an urge to post during times like these. But I often don’t know what to say. So I process for a few days. I take in everything else while remaining absent to the social media world. And then, days later, I am ready to express so many feelings. But again fear the rejection or judgement, so I tend to find one of my favorite songs to summarize my thoughts.

“Where Is The Love” has become one of those songs that out of my 30 posts a year, probably accounts for 5 annually. I first heard the song when I was in 7th grade in a Catholic Elementary School. In our biweekly music class, we typically sang church hymns, old John Denver songs, or musical numbers. Once a month, we got to read and sing from a cool current magazine that always featured a new song. I’ll never forget singing “Where Is The Love” with my classmates. Unknowingly only understanding a minimal amount of the deepness behind the lyrics at the time, but nonetheless feeling the emotion behind the music. I became re-obsessed back in 2015 after a tragedy and played it until even my dog became sick of it. I wish I could tell you the exact tragedy that sparked this fascination. I remember it being the height or beginning of Black Lives Matter. I live in the Chicago suburbs and had just started working in a culturally diverse school and was just feeling and experiencing so many new and different things for the first time. I remember a bombing or shooting had occurred and my boyfriend at the time fixated on it for weeks. People were (and still are) being shot and killed daily. I was interested but as soon as I’d try to understand, I’d feel sick. Not human. No longer living for what I thought was the purpose of life anymore. It was like I was still holding on to that childhood innocence but also came to terms with the fact that this wasn’t just “a part of growing up”, but that the world was changing. and fast. I couldn’t escape it. I refused to subscribe to cable TV at the time because I refused to watch the news. Not because I wanted to live in denial, but because I fucking LOATHE the media. They are 90% of the problem and are only puppeteers for the puppeteers. It’s all bullshit. But then I felt ignorant. So I would try to catch up online, or via word of mouth, and found myself still not understanding.  I empathized with people I felt like I had no business empathizing with. I just wanted to spread love and attempted to in every opportunity I had. But I didn’t know what to say to any side of any argument. I don’t understand the government. I don’t understand society. I don’t understand war or politics. I don’t even understand religion anymore. I remember feeling this way for some time, but this was the first time in my life 

I played this song on the piano, came up with my own melody for the raps, listened to hundreds of covers on YouTube, and then finally sat down and rewrote it myself. I was hoping to one day get a friend to sing it with me and put it on YouTube. (Again, I am a 25 year old that can barely even navigate YouTube. The last video I uploaded was when I was about 17 for a Spanish class project.) But I felt like I really found something. A modernized version of the song. Line for line, aligned. But with a (at the time) 2015 take on it.

Can you imagine how elated I was when I heard the remake last September? Since then, I’ve posted it for the majority of times when I was empathizing with our nation, hurting and feeling every feeling of anger and sadness and confusion, but just couldn’t find the words to say it all.

Over a year ago, I somehow lost all of the notes in my phone. (Again- for the third time- have the technological skills of my 77 year old grandmother. Scratch that. Sorry Grandma, you’re actually better than me at all of this. I didn’t mean it. See you at Christmas. :* ) But I just now somehow synced my phone to an old email and crossed my fingers to find this note. From July 1, 2015...still applicable today, here is my rendition.

Where Is The Love?

What’s going on with the world, mother?

Everyone’s living like we don’t share the same planet with each other.

I think everyone secretly thrives off another’s pain,

Like we only live this life for our own gain.

We are so concerned with our neighbor’s hate,

That we can’t see past our own problems- our own sad fate.

We seek to demonstrate ignorance and intentionally isolate.

But if you only have love for people who are exactly just like you,

Then you’ll never even try to treat others who,

Could help you understand the world from a different point of view,

You’ll never walk a mile in someone else’s shoes.

And this only leads us back to only wanting and craving the bad news.

Everyone seems to have lost their minds,

How the fuck is war and hatred perceived as a “compromise”?

You have to find love within yourself,

Take a book or a bottle off the highest shelf-

Whatever calms your down or eases your mind.

And realize we are all only here

For such a short time.

But there are men taking their neighbors lives,

For the sake of the safety for their own children and wives.

We all bleed red, yet nameless and countless children go unfed.

Do you not hear their cries?

Can we all not spare a dime?

We are all from the same stardust.

Why do you think you need to outshine

Those who need a little extra time

To work things out, so that they can one day join the sun in lighting the world since the beginning of time.

Dear God, Abba, Buddah, Mother Mary, or Mother Earth, Whomever you may be,

Won’t you please come down and save humanity?

SOS- We surrender. Please send help from above.

Because this place has got me questioning,

Where is the love?

We need less Face books and more books in our face,

God grant us the strength to trade our hate in for grace.

Trade in your despair for a heart that is fair,

Take a look in the mirror and ask yourself- Do I really care?

If so, step up.

Put your iPhones down.

We only got a short amount of time before this world stops spinning round.