#god bless the ten of you who consistently give a shit tbh

[charmingpplincardigans]

Hokay! I am here to ramble more than anyone ever wanted in answer to @z-bot​, but like, I just love talking about poetry even though I have no idea what I’m doing, okay??? Okay! (Cut for your pleasure.)

Bonus Question I just made up: do you have any poems "in progress"? How do you usually approach poetry: do you write one and let it simmer, or does it all come out at once, or does it vary?

Yes! I do have poems in progress. I always have poems in progress. It’s very rare that any writing comes to me all at once. Sometimes this means that I’ll actively tinker with one over the course of several days or weeks. But also, sometimes it just means that I’m looking at something two years ago me thought was probably fine but which current me cannot abide. At this point it’s just like, as long as I’m a human in progress I will probably have poems in progress because, for better or worse, poetry is my pressure valve and the pillow I scream into when I don’t know how to pull a feeling out of myself any other way. (And when that fails I move on to the collaging.)

And it does vary but these days I mostly poem the way I collage, which is to say that I riffle through myself looking at all the different images or feelings or memories at my disposal and then mix and match them until I come away with something that more or less says what I’m trying to say. Poetry often feels like a puzzle to me in the way prose does not, because of how precise I feel I have to be about it.

Poetry does not give me the luxury of space, of corners to fill or walls to spill over. Poetry demands my attention and my patience. Poetry knows what it wants to be, even when I don’t know yet, and I just gotta keep chiseling at it until I hit angel, you know?

The first draft of any poem starts with a set of words or a tightness in my chest or a feeling of restlessness I can’t shake. I let that sit in me until I feel like I’m gonna choke. Then I get out my phone or my journal and go to work. The notes app on my phone is predominantly filled with poems in differing states of completion and lists of ideas for poems or chapbooks. In the beginning they are usually just stream of consciousness blocks of text that look like this: 

The game I’m playing with myself in draft one is called Oh God Oh God What Is This Feeling And How Do I Make It Make Sense? This works for both negative and positive feelings since I, a dummy, have been alive for more than three decades and still do not quite understand how it’s possible to feel things this intensely without passing out in self-preservation.

The trajectory of this one is pretty straight forward. More straightforward than usual tbh. The first bit of it is actually the bit that was playing in my brain on a loop for an hour before I sat up to tap it out, which is not always the case, but that night I was dealing with the very concrete fact of what it feels like to have yet another a panic attack and that thought spiral there is just the thought spiral I go on whenever that happens. Just curled up in bed obsessively thinking about how I’m gonna die.

at night in the quiet dark I can’t escape the beating of my heart, at night in the quiet dark I can’t escape the beating of my heart, at night in the quiet dark I can’t escape--

So it’s about a panic attack, fine, but there is very obviously more than one level of thing happening here and honestly, it wasn’t a thing I was going to admit to myself until I got to the end there. Because the not so subtle tilt of the poem idea is:

I am in pain -> the pain will end -> the pain will end or I will -> one day I will end -> oh god oh god there are so many things I have to get done before then -> oh hey there are things I meant to get done before she met her end -> oh.

And that last bit was the thing that, for me anyway, elevated my every day emotional vomit to something I could craft a sort of apology around, and it was that apology that felt important enough to me to find a way to properly say it. So I metaphorically popped my unpoppable knuckles and got to work. (I have never been able to crack my knuckles. I am both intrigued and horrified when other people do it.)

The second draft is a god awful mess. If I’m working longhand in a journal I will read through the brain dump to identify and underline any phrases or words that I think are particularly useful or pretty or precise. Then I rewrite those phrases on the next page in list form and go to work knitting them together into something that feels right. I can do this part ten or more times if I’m feeling particularly useless about it, but I find that if I do it more than three times then the whole thing starts to feel overwrought and I step away from it to think until I find a better way in to the feeling. That could happen the next day, or it could take a year.

There are just some things you don’t understand about yourself until you’ve done the work and earned the right to know them and that goes double for poems. Sometimes. It depends. But sometimes.

In this particular case the second draft was where I settled on a repetitive stanza opener because I realized that the repetition of the situation was integral to getting me to the epiphany at the end. Third middle of the night panic attack in two weeks and feeling like no not this again. The words themselves which I was thinking to myself like there was no difference between mindfulness and self-destruction. The fact that my own death has become a worn out thought to me because I think about it so very much. The person I’m never going to stop missing and the way I mentally flog myself over all of it.

There was also the feeling I wanted to capture of how all of this always makes me feel pulled and pulled until I’m translucent taffy, so:

Night stretches thin and all I am aware of...

Night stretches thin and all I can think...

Night stretches thin and all of this is to say...

The third draft (or the hundredth, I don’t know, we’ll pretend like this one was easy, it more or less was in this case) is where I get to play with form and function. I’ll have been flirting with stanzas and enjambment through every version I rewrite, but this is the stage where I can get serious about it because this is the stage where I’m familiar enough with the content to begin to know what it wants. The poem and I go from vous to tu, more or less.

For me this is the most fun part, just like it is in prose, because this is where I start letting myself really feel the possibility of the whole thing. There’s nothing I love more than a heady feeling of The Possible.

After that it’s just polishing the draft until I can read it while pretending someone else wrote it and try to discern whether I actually like it or if I’m just over-invested in the idea of it. I change a word here and there. I fiddle with commas. I decide whether I can live with it. This one I could live with, which you know because it’s been posted to the this blog. In my notes app it looks like this:

There are a great deal many more poems tucked about it my life that I can’t live with. Most of them will probably never see the light of computer screen or day. And I mean, anyone can look at what I do post or the ones that have been published and decide for themselves whether any of it is any good at all. It’s possible I’m just deluding myself or that I’m narcissistic and vain, but it’s also possible that sometimes I do alright. I’d like to believe the latter is true even if the former is also true.

This all...feels like a lot, which is something I think about all the time. I wonder if I’m just torturing it all for no reason. I wonder if anything I write will ever feel grounded to me in the way all of my favorite poems do. The work of my favorite poets often feels effortless in a way. Not like they’re effortless to create or enjoy, but like they belong effortlessly in the world. Then again, I don’t really feel like my physical existence belongs effortlessly in the world, so perhaps expecting that of my words is a tall ask for the time being.

I just have no idea what I’m doing, you know? I don’t feel like a poet, which is a literal argument I’ve had with friends. There was an intervention and everything. I feel like I’m doing this wrong, or doing it the hard way, and that nothing I can make this way will ever feel true in the way the words of other people feel true for me. All I know is that sometimes I just have to say this stuff “out loud” and most of the time all I want from my life is to have left something beautiful behind and sometimes I feel like I’ve said a thing that will become lovely under the eyes of a person who could see themselves in it.

So I just keep taking my feelings out of my chest and turning them over under better light in an effort to stumble my way into understanding what it means to be anything at all. And you all keep having to scroll past it and ignore the twinge of secondhand embarrassment. Lucky you!

[goldenscript]

Who Are Your Favorite People On Tumblr? They Can Be Friends And Writers. And Why Do You Love Them So?

gosh, i have so many faves on here that i’m so proud to call my friend. i’m sorry if i’ve forgotten anyone though. i can be a bit scatter-brained, like just because i don’t mention someone that doesn’t mean that i don’t love them! just wanted to make that clarification.

edit: i’ve had this in my drafts for ten years so i’m sorry for making the person who asked wait so damn long jskhfkjshf

✗@jungnoir ; i love her for so many reasons, and i don’t think anyone’s a stranger to seeing her on my blog or how much i gush about her, but i swear to you man, she is my ride or die! we go waaaay back, and it still blows my mind that we didn’t get to consistently talking until 2016 over bts and monsta x and this wild world of kpop that we’ve fallen so deeply into now. i’m truly grateful for her always being there for me when i need someone or when i have a meme to share, for being patient with me and having necessary discussions whenever we have a disagreement (which isn’t often), and for being her. she’s really like starlight to me. that brightness in my life especially when it gets hella dark and dreary at night. i love you!!!!!

✗ @boosoonhao ; gosh, it truly amazes me that we’re still friends. i mean that in the best way possible because you are truly incredible to me. even when we forget to respond to mass messages from previous conversations or we go silent for some time, we always manage to fall back into conversation with one another and it’s like no time has passed at all. plus, you’re a huge inspiration to me, and i feel like you’ve inspired a lot of my current writing as of late, and that makes me very happy and grateful. seriously, aj, i love you and i am so thankful to know you.

✗ @wonhopes ; dude, being able to talk to her about anything whether that’s who i’d bang in all my asexual-ness or whatever dumb stuff is happening in my life. ngl, whenever i’m feeling petty, i just talk to her and it feels so damn good to share our hatred of certain people or things happening in the world. she’s just so freaking funny too. i could have the shittiest day and when i get hella messages from her about kihyun or wonho or some petty shit that happened at her work, i’ll just laugh and feel better because then i can just focus on the fact that she’s being a disloyal hoe (when isn’t she a disloyal hoe is a better question tho?). she’s great. 10/10 gal that wonho would bang.      

✗ @taesthetes ; i have so many reasons to love, cat. she’s literally the definition of kindness and all things good in this world. being able to get her snaps and read her messages always makes me smile, and gosh, her humor is the best. 10/10 sarcasm. it’s amazing to me how we came together by that sweet anon who i’m always hoping is doing well, and i just want cat to know that i am very grateful for our friendship because sometimes tumblr can be irksome to me, but seeing her messages or even interacting with her own followers brings a smile to my face. tbh, she inspires me to be kinder, and i’m really grateful to her for that.

✗ @tendershepherd ; there are so many things to love about shep tbh. i think one of the biggest things is that it’s so easy for us to talk about literally anything?? i can’t even remember how we started talking, i just remember us talking and somehow we’re here still talking and i feel even closer to her than before. whether it’s about writing or just weights i need off my shoulders or just sending her a good, ol’ dose of yoonkook, i love that i can hit her up and we’ll have a conversation right then and there. she’s also a fantastic writer who deserves more recognition than she gets and i want her to know that i’ll always be down to read whatever she has cooking up because i know for a fact that it’ll be good - she’s an inspiration to me… thank you.

✗ @cupofteaguk ; GOD, where do i even begin????? this girl is the sweetest, most charming girl ever!!!! i specifically remember gathering enough courage to talk to her about “hopeless hearts” and somehow we wound up talking?? i was on goddamn cloud nine, especially after reading her work and falling more in love with her and all the softness she brought me. i think one of the biggest things i love and appreciate most about traci is how comfortable i feel talking to her about school, writing, and dumb boys that i don’t think i’ll ever forget LOL. freely talking to her about these things just… gives me a lot of comfort and i hope she knows how much i appreciate her for it.

✗ @ixiia ; damn, where do i begin with meeks? she’s one of my biggest enablers on this damn website, who will not hesitate to send me those damn side eyes emoji followed be a “do it,” before proceeding to ask me to spill the tea on whatever idea’s going through my head. i love that. i love her. she’s hella fun to talk to and that kinda person i easily click with. she always hypes me up and she feeds me with all the drama from her damn kids. gotta love ‘em though (especially saint…. but you didn’t hear that from me!!!).

✗ @gentleknj ; MY MOONBEAM. THE KINDEST, MOST LOVING GAL I KNOW. WHO I HAVE HAD THE PLEASURE OF TALKING TO AND GETTING TO KNOW. goodness gracious, i don’t even think it’s been that long since we started talking and yet??? she has undoubtedly become one of my favorite people on here to talk to. we can talk imaginary dates with our men, horror movies, and just about life in general and i just?? i love that. i love being able to get to know someone and to just vibe with them, and it’s exactly that with her.

✗ @kihyussy ; this……girl…….. once told me she would eat sand for me. can you BELIEVE???? i was both in awe and baffled, but oh so touched because ria is literally a fucking angel to me, and i am so happy that we started talking and continue to talk. she’s funny, hot, sweet, and so fucking talented with her writing. i know it’s been a minute since she posted but i swear to god she has some masterpieces cooking in that creative brain of hers.

✗ @lilchims ; wowie, i know it’s been a minute since we’ve last talked but i swear to you i’ve never met someone i’ve vibed with as well as i’ve vibed with this girl. she’s so fun to hang with and just so goddamn chill like i really do thank whoever’s out there writing my story for letting us talk that one late ass night because it’s really been a blessing to me. thank you for existing and for just being such a down ass chick. ily!!!!!!!!!

and i can’t forget,

✗ @-happytbh- ; honestly, faye, i’m so grateful for you. every time i receive a snap from you, it’s like my own moment of happiness just to forget whatever else is happening because you always have something exciting to share! you’re really sweet and i’m just so happy that we’re friends, okay? you’re always thinking of me when you see stitch things, you drew me a beautiful painting, and you even sent me some wonderful goodies in that package you sent! i hope that the universe only treats you kindly, because you of all people deserve that.

[sujus-girl]

Disclaimer: This is just for fun, so please don’t take it too seriously. This is not an official profile or anything like that!

A GUIDE TO PENTAGON

I actually had a lot of fun making my guide to JBJ, so I was like?? What other group do I love that doesn’t get the attention they deserve? …. PENTAGON

Are y’all ready to cringe? To sigh? To question what is going on with these children? Then, without further ado, I present to you: Pentagon: My Shitty Guide to 10 Toddlers

Group Name: Pentagon

First appeared on a show called Pentagon Maker, which was called a survival show, but SPOILER ALERT: Cube decided to do the right thing and debuted all 10 members together

If I’m going to be 100% honest, I still dk where to find the full episodes, but there are a ton of clips on youtube, and, honestly, I was satisfied with just watching those

ALL OF THEM HAVE REALLY GOOD VISUALS? LIKE, I SAY THIS WITH EVERY GROUP, BUT SERIOUSLY, PENTAGON HAS SOME A+++ VISUALS

Beware because they’re very. Very. very. Loud

The fandom name is universe and i just think that’s so cute OKAY?

Ofiicial Music Videos: Gorilla, Can You Feel It, Critical Beauty, Pretty Pretty, Run Away, Like This, Violet

Personal Favorite Non-Title Tracks: Thank You, Beautiful, You Are, Spectacular, and Lose yourself

Aight, we have ten members to go through this time, so BUCKLE UP, MY FRIENDS

Members:

Jo Jinho

The oldest member of pentagon

Vvv smol baby. Is only 5’6”

Is scared very easily lmfao

May be smol but has A HELLA SET OF LUNGS

High note king that leaves almost everyone shook

Used to be in SM the Ballad, but left and became a trainee again under cube entertainment

Had trained for EIGHT FRICKIN YEARS, DO NOT SLEEP ON MY BOI

I guess he gave vocal lessons to cube trainees like Yoo Seonho (someone pls KINDLY let me know if i’m wrong)

Drops a bunch of covers and spoils Universe with his voice, thx boo

Usually gets paired with hongseok for stuff?? Idk

Has a room by himself in the dorms, lucky boi

ALSO A MUSICAL THEATER ACTOR?? ALL SHOOK UP REALLY HAD US ALL SHOOK UP

Videos to Watch: (1) (2) (3)

Lee HwiTaek (Hui)

The leader of this mess

Got pretty popular after the song Never was released, then continue to leave people quaking after Energetic was released

Is an A+ Singer and Producer, we love a talented man

Is vvvv scared of everything and also has a lot of tears (we love a man in touch with his emotions)

A former JYP trainee

Got7’s JB said that one time, Got7’s Mark got into a fight with him, Hui, and B.A.P.’s Youngjae and Day6’s Brian had to translate the argument LOL

Also in a subunit called Triple H that consists of him, E’Dawn and Hyuna

Also has a room to himself

HONEY SOCKS

Has a fanboy named Yoo Seonho that loves him vvv much, and they even went to vietnam together

also appeared on this variety show called hyena’s on the keys and flaunted his composing SKILZ

Videos to Watch: (1) (2) (3)

Yang Hongseok

A former YG trainee

Was on the show that created iKon, and it was…. Oof

He was new at the time, so it was kinda awkward and tense, but it got better

Is obsessed with working out, and has the abs of a greek god as a result

Reads books in his free time, and enjoys studying foreign languages

He moved around when he was younger, so he can speak Mandarin and English (we love an intelligent man)

Apparently the mom?? Cooks and cleans for the babies in the dorm

Shares a room with E’Dawn

Also really likes Iron Man… and Jinho

The members say he’s the worst at dancing in the group LOL

It’s okay though, cause he’s vvv talented in other aspects

Videos to Watch: (1) (2) (3)

Kim HyoJung (E’Dawn)

“I have no fear” not even two seconds later *HIGH PITCH SCREAMING*

Can reach an octave i didn’t think human possible

A little weird, but that’s okay!

Is also in Triple H with Hui and Hyuna

Hongseok’s roommate

Is really good at dancing, wow

Kinda looks tired 24/7, but we’re pretty sure that’s just his face. Like you know how some people have resting bitch face? E’Dawn has resting tired face.

TATTOOS!

Sry, i just really like tattoos, lol

But yeah! E’Dawn has multiple tattoos! Since it’s like 1 in the morning and I’m kinda tired, I’m not gonna try and think of all of them, but they should all show up if you just google e’dawn tattoos lol sorry

Videos to Watch: (1) (2) (3)

Go Shinwon

Has trouble keeping his clothes on apparently

Like for real, just casually pulled his pants down and took his shirt off multiple times in pentagon maker

Is scared of animals because one time because… um…. let’s just say that there was an unfortunate incident with his pet hamster when he was in like middle school... yeah

Was eliminated during Pentagon maker, but four remaining members broke into cube late at night and put up posters saying they wanted pentagon to debut as ten

Gets mad real easily

Has broad shoulders… Like real broad. Edawn and yanan fell asleep on his shoulders and they were comfortable

Shares a room with Kino

Also really likes Mcdonalds?? Like, this boy put on a burger hat and ate a mcdonalds burger.

Really hates bugs LOL

Videos to Watch: (1) (2) (3)

Yeo Changgu (Yeo One)

Has a visual that a lot of foreigners seem to really like? That’s just something I noticed, I know it’s not the general consensus

Is also an actor, he appeared in a webdrama called Spark and was the main actor for a historical drama not too long ago

Shares a room with yanan

Is yanan’s biggest fan

Has a laugh that can revive wilting flowers tbh

Talks a lot too

Sucks at table tennis

He and hui put ducktape on their legs and ripped it off

GIVE HIM MORE LINES PLS

Videos to Watch: (1) (2) (3)

Yan An

“MADE IN CHINA!”

“Annyeong chingudel”

He’s from Shanghai

Hella model vibes, amirite or amirite

He injured himself when preparing for the Ceremony album, and he had to sit out and everyone was vvv sad and vvv worried

Got better and is back, and more random than ever

Sometimes says things that are real funny, even if he doesn’t intend for it to be

“What are you talking about, this is plastic”

“You… You’re in big trouble!”

“Korean name is Yanan. Chinese name is Yanan. English Name? Yanan.”

Also once called Jinho a foreigner, even tho Jinho is Korean and they were in Korea?

May be tol and handsome, but he’s really just a big toddler

Scared of roller coasters

Roommates with yeo one who loves him v much (yeo one has the right idea, y’all)

Videos to Watch: (1) (2) (3)

Adachi Yuto

“YUTODA”

A japanese prince

AN ATHLETE! Played baseball and used to do soccer

A former JYP trainee

Good friends with Yuto (U) from ONF because they both used to be JYP trainees and also NCT’s Yuta

Shares a room with Wooseok and will laugh at anything he says

Milk couple

Can’t eat spicy food for shit

Hella tall

Also appeared predebut at ISAC 2015 for futsall

A bby that is afraid of many things. Especially the dark. On pentagon maker, the crew turned off the lights and he real cutely went “pd-nim~” and i almost cried it was so cute

“What’s your favorite ice cream flavor?” “Ice cream.”

Says he can’t do aegyo, but he hella cute already, so it’s okay

Also once danced shirtless and i almost sued, you a child Boi (i say as I am younger than him)

Videos to Watch: (1) (2) (3)

Kang Hyunggu (Kino)

A whole cutie

I legit that he was my age or younger cause he was just so adorable

Only 4 days younger than yuto and 4 days older than wooseok, but he a whole baby

They did a vlive for wooseok, yuto, and kino’s birthdays and when they were getting into teams, hongseok was chosen to be in kino’s team but he said it so emotionlessly that kino got all pouty LOL

A dancing king

“I was going to go easy on you, but you called me Hyunggu”

Has a lot of friends in k-pop, he vvv popular

Shares a room with shinwon

A laugh that motivates me to be a better person

Saved the entire world by eating watermelon in front of cameras BLESS

“Get it Kino Beauty”

Proceeded to destroy yanan’s face with makeup RIP

Makes funny faces that i sometimes screenshot and send to my friends at 2 in the morning

ALSOALSOALSO, he had this little dance solo in Critical Beauty and I was LIVING for it

Videos to Watch: (1) (2) (3)

Jung Wooseok

The baby of the group

HELLA TOL??? LIKE WTF, IF YOU LOOK AT PHOTOS OF JINHO AND WOOSEOK STANDING NEXT TO EACH OTHER HE LOOKS LIKE A FREAKING GIRAFFE

He was sleeping backstage once and yuto put a chocopie in front of his mouth and he sleepily tried to eat it and i was :((((( he was so cute

Really likes yuto, they’re usually paired together for stuff. Like dorms

Really likes anime, legend has it that if you play samurai heart at exactly 1:23 AM, wooseok will appear behind you and sing along

Imitates an opera singer and achieves an octave that i would imagine isn’t humanly possible for someone with a voice as deep as his

Has a fanboy names Lai Guanlin from wanna one, and he will not let anyone forget about his precious Wooseok

Once did an eating broadcast with super spicy food and accidentally got some in his eye and the rest of pentagon thought it was the funniest thing ever RIP

Videos to Watch: (1) (2) (3)

That was a journey! We’re almost done, though!

Videos Of Pentagon to Watch! Weekly Idol with Victon and Momoland! (X) This crack (?) series that I live for (X) The VLive that was all sorts of mess (X) Triple H Weekly Idol (only Hui and E’Dawn) (X) This clip from Pentagon Maker that was all sorts of mess, even with only 4 members (X) Hui, Wooseok, and E’Dawn trying to cook (X) This other VLive that was all sorts of mess (X) Pentagon Heyo TV (Mafia Game Cut) (X)

AND THERE YOU HAVE IT! A VERY SHORT, SHITTY GUIDE TO PENTAGON! I hope this helps anyone wanting to get into Pentagon, or even just makes an Universe smile! Now go and bask in the glory that is Pentagon’s craziness! Bye!

[ghosty-schnibibit]

first taz liveblog of 2019! woohoo! ^u^

i’ve missed taz so much omg, i’m very hyped for this lunar interlude. also i'm doing this liveblog without the use of my mouse because windows ten hates me and keeps doing this to me after system updates, so if any of the formatting is wonky that’s why :///

god i nearly forgot how much shit went down in the last arc, god i've gotta relisten to it at some point

ron "the white" tattersalad

that's so good omg

it's still so weird that they're still calling it lunar interlude since there's no moonbase, idk why but it feels off to me

that means the next hunt could potentially be near valentines... give me the wlw content griffin, blease

aww yikes, nearly forgot about that, poor old car :(

whistles the autoguy

duck's lies just have the power to grant life lol

clint ilu omg

"that's a pretty wack way to meet somebody" god bless you griffin

ned you're a worse liar than duck

it's jesus's car

is ned going to get a minivan???

griffin i know nothing about cars why must you do this to me

transformers: cryptids in disguise

WHAT THE FUCK NED

crepes by monica

clint's stealing justin's naming random kepler citizens steeze lol

god i love these boys

oh fuck that is so good

do you mean the pine guard clint?

that sounds sick as fuck

oooooh good move, that's good

termineder

wouldn't that counteract the surveillance though?

"his name's plural, right?" idk griffin, what's in your heart

“enchilada adventures” loving this

COMMIT GRIFFIN, COMMIT TO YOUR NEED FOR BRITISH MEN TO MURDER YOUR DAD

aww :(

griffin you slid from the kravitz voice into the klaarg voice, why

yes, describe how hot he is clint, 

YES, I LOVE THE ACCENT, BRING IT BACK

jesus ned, jump right into it there, yikesa mikesa

"life has a funny way, as alanis would say" i love boyd already

who??? there are so many npcs in this game, i need a flowchart

... griffin is that sloane and hurley’s tree

that's a word for it lmao

OH MY GOD ITS MAMA, OH FUCKING SHIT

whoop, on to aubrey

i'm trying to remember what janelle looks like and i keep picturing the goat soothsayer from kung fu panda 2, idk why

oh dang, ned didn't have to roll at any point during his scene :0

aubrey is so sweet, i love her so much

oh no... oh no, this is going to make me cry i can already tell

"i'm fine with that" travis please, give me the girlfriends

aubrey my baby i love you whaaat

this is going a hell of a lot better than i thought it would

oh no, vincent's going to be upset :(

griffin how much of this season is based off atlantis: the lost empire, that was my favorite movie growing up and this is so similar

aubrey my precious baby

... who is the entity then?

"pine guard chronicler" wait, thacker???

well that's... not that reassuring

is aubrey the entity????? holy shit holy shit holy shit

more confirmation that aubrey's pendant is part of the crystal... that makes me wonder if the crystal barclay had in the first arc and the one indrid has are reclaimed pieces of it

jesus fuck this is extremely dark 0_0

okay wait one fucking minute... vincent was extremely adamant that aubrey not touch the crystal when the guard first came to sylvain, did he know something like this would happen? i have so many questions

"this is not your world to save" holy fuck i'm gonna cry

yeeee! can't wait to see my magic boy in graphic novel format!!! :D

the spooky violins are back

does this mean leo was the guitar dude? oh snap :0

duck what the hell

justin this is so good, bless you for this

this is so very good holy hell, god this is some good worldbuilding omg

GRIFFIN YOU DO NOT GET TO USE THE PHRASE "SHE'S JUST GONE" WHILE USING SUCH A BARRY-ADJACENT VOICE, I JUST BROKE OUT IN A COLD SWEAT WAITING FOR JUSTIN TO SAY "WHO" 

i cannot wait to see this drawn omg

oh ewww, duck why :(

wait so is duck completely powerless now? is he not the chosen anymore??? holy shit how is this going to affect his class typing?????

if i were duck i'd be reassured knowing i wasn’t the only one tbh

holy fuck this is terrifying

good damn i love duck

holy fuck leo!!!

aww duck baby :(((

oh jeez, that's not great

"okay, we're fucked" aww, have faith in our boy leo :(

oh snap, this is amazing omg

... so duck is princess peach now basically

duck the helper boy! :D

he is going to get so much experience omg

oh my god what

this is so weird omg

... oh fuck, duck no longer has chosen resurrection plot armor, oh i'm so worried for my boy 

yay, the heathcliff music!

awwww :3

travis is consistent at least lmao

WHAT, WHY

oh sweet :0

damn that's a good idea considering how fucked up ned got last arc

oh shit, that's cool as hell

oops lmao

duck just needs any help he can get

don’t be mean to heathcliff!!! :(

"at least i can wear that to work" mood

in conclusion: i am extremely worried for my no-longer-chosen son and have a ton of theories about stuff that are pretty dang dark! this is fine :))) 

[zaggitz]

My Top Ten Video Games of 2018

Well, here were are again, my friends. After the non stop roller coaster thrillride of VIDEO GAMES 2017, can 2018 live up to the hype??? I’m gonna go ahead and say no right off the bat, but while every single week wasn’t filled with a new incredible genre defining experience like last year, we still had some genuine certified bangers in the mix, many of which I think will remain important to me as the years go by. It should be noted this is the first year since 2014 where a Trails game hasn’t hit the market, so for the first time ever since I started writing these lists, a Trails game will not reign victorious at the end. Scandalous! Impossible!! Shit year tbh, but we’ll get by.

Outside of games this year is maybe the best year of my entire life?? I got out of a years long slump, started an actual genuine career path, and then somehow managed to fenegle falling in love into the whole mix. These lists have always come from some greater sense of yearning to reach out and communicating how I feel about things I love to anyone who will listen, but right now all I can think of is about how happy and lucky I am for my life to have taken the turns it did this year. 2019 is gonna have to try real hard to break my stride.

If you’d like to read my previous rambly lists, here they are:

2015

2016

2017

Anyway without further ado, here’s ten games that aren’t Trails of Cold Steel 3(WHEN??):

10. Thronebreaker: The Witcher Tales

This one is only at the bottom of the list because I didn’t have time to finish it. I loved getting to jump into the world of the witcher again. The world is dark and gritty and the choice are morally grey and the writing is impeccable and gwent is even more fun to play as a main mechanic than it was in the Witcher 3 as a minigame. I can’t wait to dive back into this one come the new year.

9. Radiant Historia: Perfect Chronology

One of the most well written and executed time-travel-based JRPGs I’ve ever played. It’s a story about trying to fix mistakes, about different perspectives trying to understand each other instead of fighting over differences.

It’s got an overall theme of realizing how important you can be to the world around you despite seeming insignificant that really resonated with me, an amazing cast of characters and it also just happens?? To be really fun to play??

8. The House in Fata Morgana: A Requiem for Innocence

That I didn’t play the first game the year it came out is a damn crime, this series of gothic tragedies has such special, meaningful and important themes of redemption and sacrifice and finding the people who will survive the world with you no matter what. It tackles mental illness, lgbt topics with an immense amount of respect and tells some of the most heart wrenchingly real and gutting stories, but it all culminates in the most viscerally satisfying way.

This sequel delves into one of the most unspoken parts of the original while also offering promising and hopeful glimpses into the future. It’s absolutely a must play if you in anyway liked the original.

7. Wandersong

Now here’s one that came absolutely out of nowhere. This game just oozes joy out of every pore. You play as a dandy bard who can only interact with the world via music trying to save it from being destroyed. Heavy themes of pacifism and the internal struggle of doing your best when you know for a fact your best won’t be good enough cover this thing like sprinkles on the most delicious and colorful donut.

Another thing I love is how every single chapter of this game plays differently, one will be a pirate adventure where you steer a ship with pirate shanties, the other will be a Majora's Mask still town sim, it goes on like this, and it never once gets boring. This game will make you smile the biggest smile from start to finish.

6. God of War

Remember Kratos?? He’s back, in open world action-RPG form. I sort of grew up with the original GoW trilogy and am of the opinion that they aged about as well as I did(which is fuckin not gracefully, teenager me was a fuckin mess). God of War is out of its edgy teenager phase now, and just barely squeaking out of its holier than thou college student phase into a game that actually has a few things to say, fun characters, an amazing world, and a paternal relationship that is kind of actually a joy to watch unfold despite everyone making fun of the game for it.

This game is like twice, maybe three times as long as the original trilogy which hilariously kind of makes those games feel like a prologue to this one. I suppose the real ironic thing is they kind of are?? They were shallow angry games with nothing to say but their existence created a character that, under the right light, under THIS light, could actually be extremely compelling and fun to watch grow alongside his boy. This series went from one I was glad to see gone to one I can’t wait to get more of.

5. Yakuza 6: The Song of Life/Yakuza Kiwami 2

It’s absolutely insane that Yakuza is popular now. I got into this series 10 years ago and at the time every single new yakuza release was a blessing and a curse; blessed because holy shit they actually put out a new Yakuza game and cursed because oh god it sold like shit and they probably won’t localize the next one why did they localize the zombie spin-off it almost killed the series nooooo don’t localize that give us the samurai games instead.

So anyway, this year I finally finished my journey playing through all 7 mainline Yakuza games. The journey of Kiryu Kazuma has come to an end and I have seen every step he’s taken. Yakuza 6 itself had kind of a really rough new engine that Kiwami 2 ended up refining, and from a gameplay perspective these games are basically the same, for the most part(Kiwami 2 is just better). Neither of these games come close to touching the masterful highs of Yakuza 0 but from a story perspective I think the respect and love this series has for its protagonist is unmatched, and while I was sad to see him go, I will never forget that big good crime boy and his whacky antics.

Ganbare, Kiryu-san...sayonara!!!!

4. The Messenger

This game fucking rules, I really don’t know how to do it justice, I played it on a whim and fell in love with it for the time it took me to beat it in a way that I haven’t done with a game in a long time. The gameplay is fluid and fun, the writing is charming and legit hilarious at times and the soundtrack, oh baby the soundtrack, if this wasn’t a year where Celeste came out this game would win every single award for OST of the year, I would fight anyone who disagreed.

The main gimmick of this game once you reach the halfway point is being able to shift between the 8 bit past and the 16 bit future, and every time you do the music will warp to fit those aesthetics and the game does this so freaking seamlessly, it’s amazing. The final level in particular meshed the music so well with the narrative that I was like fist pumping the whole way through the final sequence of the game.

It rules extremely hard, play it. Yes, you, you reading this right now, play this game so these people will make more for me. Please?

3. La-Mulana 2: The 0th Body, The 9th Spirit

Chalk this one up for game of 2018 I most can’t wait to replay and do a bunch of quick runs of. The original La Mulana is one of my favorite games of all time and this sequel delivers more of all the stuff I love while streamlining a lot of the more obscure and obtuse solutions. The music, the bosses, the world, all of the best things about the first game were all just as on point in this one.

The game evokes a sense of mystery you can only really achieve in a sequel to a game like the original La Mulana by constantly making you question the lore you already knew from the original. This all culminates in a sidequest that for a game as inscrutable as opaque as LM2, I still ended up getting really really emotionally invested in.

I don’t think there will ever be a La Mulana 3, and if that’s the case I’ll be able to leave this series happy, these two games complete each other in such a huge way, and will remain some of my favorites for years to come.

2. Celeste

I swear to god, this game was my Game of the Year for 9 whole months. I have never in my life played a game with this much precision perfect game design. This is maybe the tightest most consistent feeling platformer of all time. It’s like basically perfect on a gameplay level. That it meshes it’s gameplay with it’s themes so well is what truly makes it stand out and transforms it into not only a viscerally satisfying, tough but fair game, but an emotionally resonant masterpiece that will stick with me for years to come.

Celeste is a game about climbing a mountain. Celeste is a game about overcoming depression and anxiety and learning to cope and better yourself. These things are not interchangeable, the challenges you face as a player in this game all tie in perfectly to the main character, Madeline’s struggle to just fight through her self doubt and self loathing. It’s an extremely real tale, despite how fantastical the visuals are. It’s a game about fighting and screaming and clawing at that fucking Mountain to give you a way to have your heart again, and it’s absolutely wonderful.

The game is difficult, but every personal triumph accompanies one in game, and it lets you truly feel the feelings the game is trying to evoke alongside it. This is the kind of game that only comes once or twice a decade. I’d be extremely surprised to see anything hit this level any time soon.

1. Dragon Quest XI: Echoes of an Elusive Age

This is the gold standard for all JRPGs now as far as I'm concerned. There are series that go deeper, that go harder, that go all the way in with their music but no game out there exists that is so confidently just the classic all encompassing idea of a JRPG like this one. This game is pure comfort food, it knows exactly what it is and what it is is a fun heartwarming and charming classic JRPG “chosen one gets the cool sword and fights the dark lord” tale and damn it if it hasn’t been a while since we had just a good one of those.

Haha, just kidding.

A third of the way through, this game takes a dramatic shift and flips everything on its head in a way that hasn’t been really seen or executed this well since FF6. Suddenly the comfortable is taken away, the world is scary, bleak, and the themes you missed, that were simmering in the background since the start of the game start to boil over to the surface. The world is darker but the people in it are warmer, they hold themselves together until the day comes, and the game will find ways to make you cry you would never expect from a series this traditional. These themes all culminate in a super satisfying finale that, while not entirely happy, at least leaves the world in a better place than it was before, with it’s people that much closer.

Now what if I just didn’t write any of that and told you why I really love the game.

Credits roll, and the post game, that is to say, the final third of the game, begins. What if the shift never came, how would the world be different? How would these characters acrs resolved? Who would live? Who would die instead? What does this happening mean to the world? What does this new future hold?

In one simple moment, you answer all of those questions, and Dragon Quest XI becomes a prequel to Dragon Quest III (which was a prequel to DQ1 but that’s less important).

All of a sudden this entire series has lore, everything is connected in a way it had never been for 30 years, and it fits so seamlessly and perfectly that it could only have happened in a series like Dragon Quest, which has had the same writer across all 11 games. As a fan who had played all the available english games this was such an insane rewarding moment. I struggle to really compare it to anything else outside of maybe like…

Oh shit.

OH SHIT.

Outside of goddamn Trails.

Ya’ll know what that means right?

That’s right, Trails wins game of the year once again. STILL THE KING BABYYYYYYYYYYYYYYY

[amorremanet]

2, 10, 42, 47

asks for fanfic writers

well, no. 10 and no. 42 are over here, but!

2. things that motivate you

* The stereotype that autistic spectrum people are only good for STEM-related things. Like, for all of the folks on the spectrum who are good at STEM things, that’s great and I wish them all the best — but I suck at math and I can’t do anything science-related without turning it into, “how can I make a sociopolitical sci-fi critique out of this” or, “but do gay aliens believe in me,” so nah, I’m gonna pass on doing anything STEM-y.

I’d much rather give a big middle finger to everyone who has this ridiculous notion that autistic spectrum people are completely and utterly uncreative, and that we are only ever good for STEM things, and I’d like to do it by being successful in my chosen creative pursuits, please and thank you.

* Tangentially? Temple fucking Grandin. I don’t actually have any problems with her, herself — but I have a lot of problems with how allistic people hold her up as The One True Way To Be A Successful Person Who “Suffers From” Autism™ and how about fuck that, no. I want to be a successful autistic writer who is nothing like Temple Grandin, apart from both of us being white autistic women/dfab people who are going to be identified and treated as women by other people irl regardless of any wibbly wobbly messy gender feels on our part.

* Talking with people about my projects. On one hand, it’s a way of getting feelings kind of like validation. On the other, and way more importantly for me? I love getting feedback from people, or hearing the questions they come up with — like, on NYE, my aunt and I chatted back and forth about my novel while playing a weird card game with one of my cousins, and Aunt Kelly asked some questions that got me to put a few ideas I’ve been playing with into words more concretely, which was super-helpful — and I get a lot of motivation to work from getting jazzed up about things through talking with people.

* Totally a petty thing, but? Getting cranky with JK Rowling over all of the Good Ally Cookies she doesn’t actually deserve to claim, or all of the characters of hers who Deserved Better (lol, uh. today, my therapist learned that I get Upset about Percy Weasley very easily and about my longstanding hate-on for his parents, and bless her heart, when I went, “uh, I just over-identify with Percy Weasley a lot and there’s a good deal of projection going on here but I also don’t think I’m wrong,” she kinda smiled and nodded and went, “I can tell :)” — she’s great, I love her)

or how, even ignoring all of the #Problematic things about her body of work in the Potterverse, there’s SO MUCH GOOD SHIT in the HP series but she’s so clearly invested in the plot as she envisions it and the story she wants to tell for Harry, to the exclusion of all else, that she ends up completely short-changing basically every other character who is not named Severus Snape or Hermione Granger (most of the time, but not 100% of the time)

Like, I’ve said it before and I will say it until everyone is completely sick of me saying it, then I will continue saying it anyway: JKR views all of her characters — barring Harry, and sometimes Snape and Hermione — as plot devices more than she views them as characters.

She’s a bit better about some of them (Remus, Sirius but not as much as Remus, Ron and Luna but not as much as they deserve, Neville and Draco but not in the ways that they deserve)

but she’s really bullshit about most of them (this is not a complete list, but: Cho; Ginny; Cedric; Tonks; Fleur; Albus, Aberforth, and Ariana; Voldemort — not in that I need her to be sympathetic toward him but ffs, some 101-level consistency in his characterization would be nice; Kingsley; Percy; Wormtail; James; Lily;

Lockhart — “I’m not bitter about JKR’s ableism and victim-blaming with regard to Gildylocks,” I say bitterly, with a bitter expression, while hanging up informational posters about how bitter I am; Andromeda and Ted — deserved better, this is not a question or a debate, I want to say that it’s not even an opinion, but tbh, I know that it is, so hmph; Regulus; Barty Crouch Jr. because he is my Favorite and I can’t make this list without mentioning him;

Bellatrix — again, I don’t need her to sympathize with Bellatrix because how about no? but Bellatrix Black Lestrange is one of the shittiest villains I’ve ever read, in terms of HOW she was written, and I think a lot of the flaws in how JKR wrote her could have been remedied if she actually did anything to make Bellatrix a fully realized character, which would’ve made her a more effective and meaningful villain, and not a shrieking Saturday morning cartoon caricature;

Molly and Arthur — I’m not going into full detail about why I hate them today, you lot can just go read my tag on the subject if you want to know, and I don’t think that JKR’s “plot device first, people second” method of characterization is the only problem? But I think it’s a major contributing factor to The Problem Of Molly And Arthur, because she presents them as this image of Idyllic Domestic Perfection even when their actions and the internal fabric of the Weasley Family, don’t support that claim, and it sucks)

—basically, JK Rowling motivates me by fucking up a lot, because she was one of my idols as a kid and as a teenager, and she was a relevant and immediate source of inspiration because Oh My God You Can So Too Write Novels For A Living And Make A Difference In People’s Lives, and I’m not exaggerating when I say that she saved my life a few times, albeit mostly in indirect fashions…… but she fucks up a lot, and this is motivating for me because it makes me want to do better than her.

It’s not even exclusive to HP fic, either. Like, she’s one of my biggest sources of motivation to work on my novel and put thought and love and heart into making it the best that it can be — because I want to do better than her and even if I never have her kind of money (which lol, never gonna happen), I still want to beat her at something. Once I earn it, I will happily accept beating her at artistic integrity and commitment.

Is it petty? Yes, definitely. But hey, man, fish gotta swim, dogs gotta eat, and sometimes, I gotta think about my issues with JK Rowling to remember that I need to do better than her and motivate myself to do the work

* You know those, “do it for her/him” memes based on that one thing from The Simpsons that people make with their fave characters and/or celebs? Yeah, I kind of want to make one for myself with Oscar Wilde. Because there’s a lot about him that wasn’t ever perfect (he was a white guy in Victorian England, even accounting for his Anglo-Irishness, so…… yeah), and there are several points on which I don’t agree with him (like, for example: if you are such a shit to your wife that your boyfriend, who is so completely up his own ass that it’s a miracle he hasn’t found a way to Narnia, notices and calls you out on it? I’m kinda thinking that you might want to reassess how you treat people and stop being like that, bub)

—but I also want to be a fabulous gay Slytherclaw social satirist who uses that #aesthetic and the popular tropes of the day to do my own thing and redefine outside the box, and hey, if I ever get a, “wit and wisdom of…” book published with some of my coolest quotables in it? That would be an awesome bonus.

* “Okay, but seriously: how obvious can I be that Yael and Elizabeth are a big, ‘fuck you’ to Marvel about all of their queerbaiting with Charles and Erik before I can get sued for it? Because while Yael and Elizabeth are still characters in their own right, their original inspiration was, ‘hey, what if I flipped the bird to Marvel about all of their fucking queerbaiting with Charles and Erik, and did it with extra lesbians? that’s be pretty fucking cool,’ and I don’t want to be sued, but I also don’t want for my point to be missed here”

—or more generally, “I can’t die before I finish my novel, I have a lot of people to piss off and call on their crap through the magic of the written word *makes a sparkly rainbow with my hands like Spongebob going, ‘imaginaaaaaaaation!!! :D’*”

* So, there’s this one bit in Dry, Augusten Burroughs’ memoir about the early parts of his struggle with alcoholism and addiction. In his rehab, one of their assignments for group therapy is to write letters to people in their lives and feel their feelings about these relationships. He writes to Pighead, his best friend/“it’s complicated,” who is HIV-positive.

Reading the letter at group, Augusten finds himself crying, then shares the whole tangled-up backstory that he and Pighead have together, from how they first met on a phone-sex line, to how Augusten fell hard in love with him, to how they were friends with benefits and then he told Pighead that he was in love with him and Pighead plays the, “I love you but I’m not in love with you” card (that is verbatim what he says in the book, and the way Burroughs reads it in the audiobook kills me every single time), so Augusten dates other guys and tries to fall out of love with Pighead, only for Pighead to come see him first when his HIV test comes back positive and realize that he’s In Love with Augusten only, “after he became diagnosed with a fatal disease”

—which gives us the great line, “Part of me felt deep compassion. And another part felt like, You fucker.”

(Which is seriously one of my top ten lines in all literature, ever. tbh, it’s probably top five, but the top ten list would be hard enough to come up with to begin with, and I’d have to parcel things out into Poetry, Prose [possibly split into Fiction and Nonfiction, at that], and Dramatic Writing just to get it down to ten things on each list, and? It’s just a perfect line, oh my god)

At the end of it, Augusten has a moment with Kavi, another one of the patients at his rehab, who is addicted to cocaine and sex. Kavi tells him about how he left his lover who was HIV-positive after his diagnosis, so that he wouldn’t be the person getting left for once, and about how he feels like cocaine never leaves him. And we get: “Suddenly, I want to drink.… I don’t want to drink in a jovial ‘Highballs for everybody!’ way. I want to drink to the point where I could undergo major knee surgery and not feel so much as a pinch.”

I just.

There is so much about this section of the book that fucks me up so hard, but in ways that I love so much — and there’s a lot that I love about it for a lot of reasons, but like?

Speaking entirely with my writer hat on right now?

That part is just immaculately written. Every word is perfectly chosen, and they are strung together just right. Burroughs chooses the exact right images and scenes to characterize his and Pighead’s developing relationship, and his moment with Kavi, and it’s just

This part of the book makes me remember why I write. Because I have been reading and rereading this book since high school — I have had my battered up and taped together paperback copy with the yellowing pages since Easter 2005 — and this part STILL fucks me up, every. single. time. The audiobook version of it still fucks me up every. single. time.

Back in high school when I first read it, it hit me so hard because I had a habit of falling in love with girls who were straight and/or just did not like me back (and it would get worse, because the girl I was in love with who dared me to write D*rarry just to see if I could? Would go on to put me in the position of being her Girl Friday while I got to watch her love everybody but me, and praise the creative work of everybody but me, and go on about how two of her other friends were totally brilliant and misunderstood creative geniuses because they were incomprehensible and it was totally bourgeois for me to want to write to be understood but it was okay she knows I’m ~mainstream like that, but then still call on me — which made the whole Augusten/Pighead thing hurt so much more for me because I was kind of her, “I love you, but I’m not In Love with you”)

(I will say this about that relationship: I didn’t handle it well, either. I was petty and jealous, and waaaay more damagingly? I hadn’t yet grasped the idea that you sometimes have to just let people be messed up at you about the shit they’re going though without trying to fix everything for them, especially when there’s nothing that you can actually do to fix it. In retrospect, it’s kind of hilarious that I loaned her a copy of Perks of Being A Wallflower that I never saw again, because the whole idea that you can’t just constantly put someone else’s needs before your own and call it love, and the related concept that doing this is actually kind of a form of selfishness, in a way?

………yeah, that was VERY relevant to how I handled that relationship, and she rightfully called me on a lot of shit related to those ideas, and I spent a lot of time having an unfair chip on my shoulder because I was jealous on one hand, and indignant about how her other friends got to be Real Artists™ because their shit was incomprehensible but I got to be a Poser Artist™ because I wanted to be understood and not just fap around with some neo-Dadaist nonsense — and as seen here, I still do have a chip on my shoulder about Dadaist anything, but in fairness, I’d have that with or without any of this story because Dada is the worst — and I’m not saying that I was totally pure or innocent in anything here.

But at the time, I cried a lot over Augusten/Pighead feels because I felt that whole, “I love you but I’m not in love with you” situation and trying to fall out of love with someone only to crumble when they needed you and resent them for needing you but hate yourself for resenting them — I felt all of that so hard.)

My appreciation for this part of the book has evolved and changed over time, and it’s deepened — as I’ve learned more about LGBTIQ history, I’ve come to appreciate the context of the story more and gain more of a sense of reverence for the LGBTIQ people who came before me and actually fought through the early days of the HIV/AIDS epidemic, and it has changed how I read this part of the book more than anything else (c.f., my passive-aggressive addition of the REST of the quote to one post of the, ‘deep compassion vs. you fucker’ part because I was really annoyed with a bunch of straight people who were reblogging it without the full context and acting like they actually had any idea what it’s like to be gay and in a situation like Augusten is with Pighead here) — and I just

The biggest thing about this part of the book that’s made it stick around for me? is that no matter how I’ve appreciated it at any point, and no matter which parts of it have been the most important to me at any given moment, and no matter WHY it’s fucked me up — it’s still fucked me up so hard every. singled. fucking. time…… but in a way that has always made me feel a lot less alone in the world

It’s sort of similar to something that one of my fiction profs in undergrad once said about creating characters: we were talking, in one of our biweekly one-on-ones, about a story I’d brought in with one of my more off-putting characters (his name is Emerson, he’s an abrasive little shit who does a lot of very fucked up things and was kind of influenced by the Kurt/Karofsky plot back in season two of Glee because that was happening on TV at the time and I had a lot of feelings about it that I didn’t have any other way to deal with because I didn’t want to write Glee fic about all of it. He was more similar to Karofsky than Kurt)

I was convinced that everyone would hate him (not least because he an asshole to basically all of the other characters and assaulted the guy he had a crush on while he was high). Instead, he was actually really popular and one of my classmates, who I admired because her writing was so lyrical and confident and she was a great person, said that she found herself identifying with him, especially during some of his worst moments in that draft. While I was boggling about this, Professor Lucy said that one of the reasons why Emerson went over so gangbusters in workshop was that, instead of going the route of creating a tabula rasa character like Stephenie Meyer wrote Bella Swan to be, I’d given him so many clearly defined character traits and behaviors

According to Professor Lucy, the specificity is what makes it easier for people to identify with characters and feel for them, because it makes them more fully realized. (The, “according to” is just for the sake of attribution because this is a point that I’ve taken to heart and that I do totally agree with Professor Lucy about.) And I feel that a lot with the Augusten/Pighead part of the book because it’s so specific and it’s so grounded and it’s so REAL

And that’s a huge part of why it’s always gotten to me emotionally, and why it’s stuck with me after all this time, and why it’s consistently made me feel less alone and irreparably freakishly weird

Anyway, this got way longer than I intended to get, but the ability to affect someone so deeply with your work — that’s a responsibility that I take very seriously when it comes to writing, with regard to all different aspects of how you can possibly do this with the written word — and this part of Dry is such a source of motivation for me because it’s such a great example, for me, of How To Do An Emotionally Affecting Writer Thingy Well

I use technical language like this because I am such a Serious Business Writer, oh yes I am

47. how many unfinished ideas/stories are you working on at the same time?

I usually don’t count, because it’s usually a lot and not all of them are really guaranteed to ever be properly finished, oops.