#i hate her ending in an alt universe with ten two SO BAD i feel like it actively shits on her in favor or the ship
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I know every modern dw showrunner shills their favorite doctor and also companion but there’s something about the way that RTD does it that I cannot abide
#doctor who#moffat like the companions are special girls! the most special! and i was a wreck when we saw amy at the end of 11s regeneration#but like that made sense for me!#RTD: the doctor loves rose THE MOST OF ANYONEE and also we are bringing David tennant back AGAIN just because i love him#i hated Donna’s ending so bad but I’m also pissed about the uwu rewrite he did#and as special as all those special girls are not one of them gets shilled as much as rose Tyler#i hate her ending in an alt universe with ten two SO BAD i feel like it actively shits on her in favor or the ship
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Mandoctober Day 16: Tatooine
ALT TITLE: Stardust, The Force and one big beautiful mess
A/N: at first I wanted to continue the sandcrawler scavenger reader I did (which I will do eventually with or without Mandoctober to guide me) but I went through some personal stuff so I more or less wanted to base this around family and where your roots are from rather than Tatooine itself, which in its essence is that one scene with Luke skywalker standing outside his home with the twin suns and later on down the line, his final resting place along with his twin sister Leia.
Someone dear to me passed away almost ten years ago now. The anniversary is the day Season two comes out. Which is essentially why I’m so committed to this fandom now. But I also wanted to write something just to get the remaining grief out of my system.
Mum, this one is for you.
Ni kar’tayli gar darasuum Buir.
Poe Dameron x reader, Nameless!Mother (or Mother Figure) x Din Djarin
(FOR CLARIFICATION DIN DJARIN IS THE READER’S FATHER IN THIS ONE)
also somehow I wrote 5K in two hours none stop...am I Alexander Hamilton?
It had been so long since I had been home. It hurt to think of the place where I came from. Hatred had leaked into my very belief system, my culture...even my family.
I felt like they hated me for leaving... but I was scared that they’d never miss me. That I had only been a ghost in their lives. There for 18 years and then poof! I was gone.
My father, Din Djarin, the Mandalorian saved my mother from slavery when she was quite young. Around my age to be precise. He had no idea at the time because she had been living with an Ugnaught named Kuill. That’s why my middle name is Kuill. I owe that fateful Ugnaught my existence for freeing my own mother from slavery when she was barely even a woman.
She had nowhere else to go...and instead of keeping her grounded and sheltered away from the rest of the world. He let her live.
Growing up you hear stories of people dying all around you, neighbours, friends and yes, even pets. It hurts so much you can’t even comprehend it. You become numb and barren to the pains of the world.
It feels like you don’t care anymore.
It got to a point where I was making things up in my head out of anger. How I would’ve handled things differently, what I wanted to do with my life, where I wanted to go.
But my father had only one strict rule.
Once we set down roots...we can never leave.
I never questioned it after the first time he told me why.
My mother...on the day I decided to leave, knew that something was wrong.
Lately I had been restless, agitated and easy to anger.
At first she thought I had fallen pregnant. Something that had made us both laugh at the time. It was a hollow memory to me now. I had no idea if she was dead or alive.
It hurt. The unknown. Death, life. It didn’t matter.
What mattered was the fight to live. To help others thrive.
You were raised to be everything the First Order was against.
So of course you wanted to join the resistance at the first chance you got.
---
“NO.”
“But-”
“No means no! Do you have any idea what your mother and I went through to bring you this life, so you could live in the peace that the universe scarcely gives? Do you have any idea how lucky you are?!”
“That’s exactly why I have to go! Don’t you understand that! I love living here. But some people aren’t as lucky. You know that more than anyone in this village buir. Mum knows it too.”
It went deadly quiet for a moment.
“I did not bring you this life...risked everything with my culture, my creed, just so you could selfishly throw it away...I don’t want you to die like my parents did Ad’ika.”
I didn’t say it then but...that was another reason you needed to go. To make your ancestors and those Mandalorians who came before your father proud.
It was the one time Din Djarin had let his guard down.
You crept away into the night, leaving only a kiss on your little (in size) brother’s brow and a note next to your mother’s tools.
It was the best way you could’ve said goodbye.
“I am one with the force and the force is with me...This is the way.”
---
Two whole weeks later I found yourself on a planet that was the polar opposite of what I was used to. So much technology that I didn’t know the names of, ships, speeders, weapons and people.
It was strange how seeing so many people made you euphoric at the time. I was only a rookie, and I had never left home before. Of course I was nervous.
There was so much to learn! Keeping up with the resistance is what scared you, what if they threw you out? You had trained under your mother’s mechanical know how just to get here but what if-
“Djarin! Y/N!”
“HERE!” You hadn’t realised how loud you had been until all the people turned to look at you funny. Whispers and giggles followed. Maker, this was embarrassing.
“Good to know you’re here. I’m Poe Dameron by the way. Noticed you weren’t paying attention. You nervous?” Making eye contact with the most gorgeous man you had ever seen was the last thing you had expected. He was a hot shot pilot apparently. You heard a girl giggle behind your head as she winked at him. Oh, give me a break.
“...A little.”
“Okay well don’t be. You recruited for a reason and according to where you’ve been registered you’re the best mechanic we’ve seen in a long while. Which is why you’ve been assigned to my X-Wing.”
Jealousy dripped in ugly green buckets. You were quite fond of the colour, with it being the colour of your little brother’s skin. But...it hurt nonetheless.
“Yes sir.” You whimpered pathetically.
You were doing this for them. Not for some pilot you had only just met. Well...him too.
---
Crashing into General Leia Organa with heaps of your paperwork was not how you planned your first day ending.
“Kriffing Bantha fodder! Why don’t you watch where you’re-Oh my god you’re Princess Leia.”
To say you had been absolutely obsessed with her when you were younger was an understatement.
She reminded you of your mother in so many ways it hurt to look at her.
Which is why you were so confused when she touched your cheek only to find yourself crying at just the sight of her.
---
“So...you left on bad terms with not only your father, but your family in general. Even if your mother never found out?”
“I’m worried that it’ll put a strain on my parents relationship with each other more than anything...I can’t contact them or write. It’s too risky.”
“Your father taught you well.”
“Wait...you know who my father is?”
“Many people have heard of the Mandalorian that killed Moff Gideon with the dark saber. Some have speculated that it was a myth...now I can see that it wasn’t since you are living proof of what Mandalorians can create.”
“My mother was never a Mandalorian. She was a Mechanic through and through...she just happened to be thrown into motherhood twice along the way.” you joked bitterly.
Your parents had told you the tales of Moff Gideon. It was a fairytale that had been shrouded in mystery. Something you weren’t expecting to hear from the two people you admired the most.
“I love my family. That’s all Mandalorians care about. Their clan and their people as a whole. I’ve neglected that part of myself for far too long. We had to hide to be safe. It made me angry. I told my dad I was going to leave the night before I did. He said no...I went anyway. It doesn’t matter what he thinks...not right now. I have to put what matters to me in this universe first.”
“Hmm...you sound a lot like a young jedi knight i used to know.”
“Are you talking about Master Luke Skywalker?” You were getting excited now.
“No...one of his students he took for a very brief period. You see the child was the same species as Master Yoda but he was already fifty years old. A relationship where a padawan is already older than their teacher? That...now that is strange.” Leia giggled to herself.
Everytime you glanced at her all you could see were fragments of your own mother. You understood why everyone here adored her. Why she was in command whilst others who thought they deserved it, weren’t.
She was a mother through and through. Whether to her own child or not, you knew she didn’t realise this one fact alone.
“You remind me of my buir. She has many similar features...not the same just, similar.”
“I’m honoured you think of me that way Djarin. But I believe that there is an anxious pilot waiting for you in the hangar.”
“Kriff! Thank you for the Caff General. It's a lot different to what I’m used to but it’s a welcome change.” Getting this out in one breath you bowed somewhat awkwardly before running out of the canteen.
---
“Y’know you’re strange right?”
“Kriff!” Banging your head on the bottom of Poe’s X-Wing was not how you wanted this to pan out.
“You’re annoying, did you know that?”
Watching his face was like observing a painting, depending on your interpretation and the angle the motions you saw were just-
“Mesh’la.”
“What...is that some weird curse word or somethin’?”
“Uh! No, I mean, yes! I mean...maybe.” scratching the back of your neck, you attempted to soothe the bump that was forming there. That was going to be a little ray of sunshine to wake up to tomorrow morning.
“Hey, let me take a look at that.” Turning around somewhat hesitantly. You let Poe take a look at your ‘wound’.
“Yikes, looks like a lot of blood.”
“What!”
“I’m kidding. It was a joke to get you less stressed out...obviously it didn’t work.”
“Sorry...I’m just anxious, I guess.”
“Wanna talk about it? My X-wing is in great shape right now by the way, my old mech checked her out before you shipped in. He was a great guy but...he was one of a handful we lost.”
“I’m sorry for your loss.”
“Hey it’s okay. Death is a part of life, unfortunately I learnt that at a tender young age.”
“What happened? ...if you don’t mind me asking that is.”
“...My mother, she was a pilot just like me. She fought for what she believed in and yet, she died anyway. It hurts but...I fight because of what my parents did.”
“No way! Me too! My parents took a back seat compared to what the resistance did back in the day but my Dad was a total badass and my mum...well, my mum was a slave.”
The look of shock you saw on Poe’s face was something you mistook for awkwardness.
“I’m sorry if I overstepped Captain Dameron.”
“Nah, you did the complete opposite actually...we’re gonna spend a lot of time together for god knows how long so it’s good that we get the emotional baggage out of the way first.”
The smile he gave you made your knees turn to jelly.
You didn’t know then how taken Poe already was with you, He thought you were cute, but he underestimated how much of a badass you really were. The knowledge of your parents though...he tucked that away for safe keeping right next to the ring that sat against his heart.
Little did he know then how much emotional baggage you really had...
---
-3 YEARS LATER-
“DJARIN WE NEED YOU IN MEDICAL STAT!”
“DON’T YELL AT ME LIKE I’M ONE OF YOUR NURSES MCLAGGEN! I CAN HANDLE IT!”
“I KNOW THAT, THAT’S WHY WE NEED YOU!”
Although you admired your crew mates sometimes you wanted to rip off their kriffin’ heads.
Everyone was stressed lately. All three of the golden trio had vanished, out of sight, out of mind. And to make matters worse, Leia was just as worried as you were.
“Commander Djarin!”
“Poe!” Running to your best friend in the whole freaking universe, you wrapped him in the biggest hug you could muster. You had been so worried about him.
“I missed you! I was so worried...I didn’t know what to think…��� Shame and guilt crept into your very being as Poe stood before you, he was carrying a very solemn aura. Something bad had just happened. You could feel it all around you now. People were sobbing in the courtyard.
Everyone was upset...but that could only mean-
“No...No, don’t you dare tell me she’s gone.”
“Y/N I’m sorry.” Poe was a mess, just like you.
He held you in his arms as you screamed in agony until nightfall.
---
“I’m never gonna be good enough for this. Not like she was.”
Hearing Poe go through the worst thing he had ever faced once again broke your heart tenfold. More than yours was breaking already.
“Poe Dameron, you listen to me and listen well okay?”
Every part of his being was hyper focused on you as you said these next words, it’s like you were commanding them into his brain.
“Leia loved you. She may have never said it out loud but she said it in the ways any mother would. She was the mother of the resistance sure but she had a real soft spot for you after everything with...Ben.”
Comparing Poe to Kylo Ren was a painful business but everything about grief was painful, it made you focus on the good and the bad.
“Family is more than blood. That’s what my father’s creed taught me. I will never forget it as long as I live. When this is all over and he’s not going to put a knife through my chest just for leaving I’ll introduce you. Hell, I’d drag you back to my home planet right now if i could...you would love it.”
“I’m sure I would...Mesh’la.”
“...What did you just call me?”
“I got that right didn’t I? It’s not an insult, it’s a compliment? I thought it meant beautiful I was just guessing off interpretation I didn’t read any mmph-”
You had cut him off by slamming your lips onto his. Sure, it was inappropriate to make out in front of both your mother figure’s corpse but...you knew by now that many times she had told you to tell him how you truly felt when it came to war?
It was now or never.
She had that with Han Solo and in the blink of an eye he had left.
But Poe? Poe had been your constant throughout all of this, he loved you in ways you could only imagine and you loved him. Even if the kiss ended up not meaning anything...you knew you would never regret it as long as you live.
“Ni kar’tayli gar darasuum Poe Dameron.”
“WHA- what, um, ahem, does uh, that mean?” You had flustered him, you felt pride in your very soul for doing that.
But Damn if his tousled hair didn’t like so fine? Maybe it was the fact you had just clawed your fingers through it like the world was ending...but in a way it kind of was.
“I will keep you in my heart forever...that’s the Mandalorian way of saying I love you Poe Dameron.”
“Oh...MANDO’A!”
You leapt back at this, not the reaction you were hoping for. But it was so ardently Poe you couldn’t help the grin on your face.
“What about it?”
“That’s your culture! Your language! That’s why you told me your father is such a bad-...ass”
“There a reason you’re just saying ‘ass’ to yourself, General?”
“Oh bantha fodder...I’m gonna have to ask for your father’s blessing to marry you by talking to a Mandalorian?”
An audible gasp snapped him out of his stupor.
“You...you were gonna propose?”
“Of course.”
The painting had returned. The painting you kept in your heart and sang to every day. The one you comforted when he had nightmares, no matter how close to your body he was, you knew by that point your friendship was long gone.
You had never put a label on it...but in a way, you had always been each other’s ‘one’.
And now...He was asking you to be his riduur?
“Leia convinced me. She said if I didn’t buckle up and saw what was right in front of me throughout this whole war. I would've killed myself over my love for you.” Confirming that he was in fact, in love with you, was a breath of fresh air.
Even if the jungle you had been camped out in for months on end had changed your temperament you couldn’t help the tears welling up in not just your eyes but Poe’s as well.
“Y/N Kuill Djarin. I love you so damn much it hurts to leave you every time I ran to that hangar. I knew everytime I left it could’ve been the last time and it scared me. Because who was I going to be if I never found my forever girl? My mom told me that much before she passed…”
Shara Bey’s ring. The fact that he had carried the ring of his deceased mother around for years on end just to be close to her made your heart simultaneously sing and cry.
Not only because the ring was now yours to keep.
But so was the man who gave it to you.
That night, before the final battle, your hearts beat as one.
---
You had won.
Everyone had celebrated, you both drank so much that when you woke up in bed together the next day, despite the crippling twin headaches, all the two of you could do was laugh.
“I mean...if we think about logically it was only a matter of time before one of us pounced on the other?” You offered into the awkward harmony you had both fallen into.
“Yeah but I just really wanna know...I didn’t hurt you right?”
You had never told him, but Poe knew just by the way you had gotten up to get some water, despite the fact he was ready for round two almost instantly due to how the sheets bunched and fell from your figure, that you were a virgin.
But just from the simple process of illumination of what little you had told him of your life before the Resistance or BP he liked to call it (before Poe), you preferred BB (before Beeps), he knew you had never been in a relationship. Not properly anyway.
Not with him.
In a way the thought of being your first filled him with joy...but every time he had imagined it he had expected to be a gentleman, rose petals, lilies, gods, any flowers he could’ve found in that blasted rainforest would’ve been perfect!
What he didn’t understand was how the drink had addled his brain so drastically that he had just pounced like a feral animal on his precious girl. He wanted to take your innocence on your wedding night (Your engagement hadn’t yet been announced to the Resistance as you both wanted to wait for the onslaught of weddings to die down before the wedding of the century was even announced so in a way, your relationship as fiance’s technically still didn't exist).
And yet...you realised something during the haze and the blur of everything Poe and you last night.
You had made a new home here, a life for yourself...and it was good.
You had done exactly what your parents did and more.
So of course you were emotional. I mean, you two hadn’t even used protection!
Although...you didn’t share this with Poe the thought of a little version of you and him growing within you? It set your heart on fire. So when you kissed him with the passion of a thousand thunderstorms, you didn’t hesitate to return the favour of last night...and then some.
---
Shuffling into the cantina had never felt so awkward in all of your three years here. You were 21 years of age now. People hooked up all the time and it’s not like you broadcasted your virginity to anyone here.
That was until the green bundle of joy himself practically flew into your arms.
“Ad’ika?!” Your exclamation panicked Poe, his hand immediately going to your waist as he inspected the creature wrapped around your neck. BB8 whirled in Ad’ika’s wake, circling the figure of 8’s around the both of you.
“What, they did?” Ad’ika looked up at you like you had grown three heads. Sure, he looked like a kid. But he was now roughly 90 years old. He was a fully grown child now. You still blushed like a little girl apparently as he continuously giggled into your neck.
“Not important right now buddy. Where are our buirs?” You muttered tearfully. Today had turned into a whole other kind of day.
“C’MON GUYS HURRY UP I’VE NEVER SEEN A REAL LIFE MANDALORIAN BEFORE!!” Seeing friends of yours running past only to be met with the vision of your buirs brought you the relief that no bacta patch (or in this one specific case casual sex???) could ever give.
Your mother was vision as always and Poe confirmed it.
“Y/N...I knew the day I first met you that you were beautiful but the fact that your mother looks almost exactly like you right now scares me.”
“Poe, whatever you do don’t say anything inappropriate around my Da, he won’t appreciate it, at all.”
Even though you were smiling like crazy, Poe knew you were being deadly serious. You didn’t want anything to ruin today.
Besides, there was only one reason your buirs were wearing their armor once more. Your father was wearing all of his Mandalorian armor, scuffed and slightly dusty with age (he had clearly left in a hurry) but your mother was wearing her long forgotten robes. Once she was planning on giving to you one day. You realised she looks a lot like Rey right now.
The dark saber she carried at her side confirmed it.
But her eyes meeting yours from across the room as she spotted her daughter reunited with your son, caused both you and Poe to tear up once more as she grabbed her Riduur’s hand.
“Excuse us.” Polite as always, she waited for no one as she made her way to you and only you as she almost tripped over poor Beeps in the process.
“Hi.”
“Hey.”
You both laughed a similar laugh that any one around would recognise. It was like Leia had come home but you all knew she was gone...she was never truly gone. She lived on through each and everything the resistance had touched.
Including you...and Poe.
Din and your mother.
Ad’ika...and Luke Skywalker.
Your mother the day she killed Moff Gideon with a light saber that she did not know she had the untaught skills to possess.
It was like strings were tangling and wrapping and strangling…
Except it was beautiful.
“We missed you so much Ad’ika.”
Looking into the eyes of your buir, his scarred and worn face now riddled with crow’s feet from the happiness you had placed there.
It was home.
---
Drums beating. Heart pounding. Numerous friends and family to you and to Poe squabbling over what hairstyle you would wear.
Today was the big day. Surprisingly you had announced it a week ago.
After everything that had happened, when your father showed up, Poe asked right on the spot if he could marry you. Not caring that he had to prove himself in the trials of Mandalore.
In his heart he had become one with your clan. He had become a son in your father’s eyes, another foundling that had just found his way here.
“I know men aren’t technically allowed to be in the chamber, but I just had to meet my future daughter-in-law before the big day.” Your breath catching in your throat, your eyes met those of a man you recognised.
Although you had never met it’s like you had a scrapbook in your mind or all the stories, all the little details of what Poe’s Dad looked like.
He was more handsome than you originally thought, but that was a given seeing as it was the exact same as when you met Poe himself.
“Nervous?”
“Surprisingly...not at all.”
“Poe...wanted me to give you this.”
A glance of the ring gave you a flicker of a moment of self-doubt. He would never have his own Dad break things off...would he?
“Don’t worry. It’s a family thing you know, for father’s to give away their daughter’s. I asked your mother but I had no idea that she was from the tribe of many mothers.” Giggling to yourself at that line, you realised where you had got your spirit from.
Leia was here with her own family today, you could feel it in your bones.
“It’s sweet of you to ask at all when we have never even properly met.”
“Ah, you’re wrong there, in a way we have. Poe told me so much about you I began to cry before the wedding even started. Good thing he told me at the bachelor party.”
Raising an incredulous brow at him, you wondered a silent question.
“It was just me and him for most of the night before drinks with his friends. Don’t worry, Poe’s not that kind of man.” Smiling to yourself, you knew he was right. You also knew this meant Poe had a terrible influence of friends. You loved them all. Of course Poe asked Finn to be his best man and you asked Rey to be your maid of honour.
They wanted everything to be perfect.
Although a week made everyone go a bit stir crazy. Someone even came up with the rule that as long as we were all staying on this damn jungle planet. We might as well have a week in between each one to plan.
You can’t remember how many bridezillas had attacked you over Poe Dameron in your dreams.
In reality everyone was happy for you, in their minds, if they thought about it you were the perfect match for Poe in each and every way.
Wait ‘til they found out how short the actual ceremony was.
“Anyway, Shara, god's rest her soul, would’ve given you this if she were here, but I’m here to tell the tale so I’m giving it to you to wear on the chain she gave him when he was little.”
Feeling tears well up in sympathy for the father and son duo, you couldn’t help but ask.
“I’m getting married so I need to know. How did you ever learn to cope with the pain of losing someone that close to you?”
“Simple...I didn’t. Poe was angry for years. Not just at the world but at the system. It’s why he felt he had no choice but to become a spice runner. The system wouldn’t let him win and he was exhausted from the guilt and the grief. I couldn’t bring myself to reprimand him.”
Remembering something your mother said to you long ago...you knew you had to tell your future father in law something that had been on the backburner for the last few days of preparation.
“There’s one small detail in all of this that you should know Kes.”
“What’s that…”
“...I’m pregnant.”
“Goodness! How? Wait no, I know how what I meant was when?”
“About a month ago now?” It was before my parents' surprise visit and Poe dropped the bomb on everyone that he intended to marry me.
“Let me guess, he asked for your Dad’s blessing?”
“Well...yeah.”
“Think of them as an early wedding present.”
“Thanks. Although at least this means I can get out of consummating the marriage.” Laughing nervously, Kes was about to say something else when the door creaked open once more.
“...Wow.”
“Hi Dad.”
“Um..sorry but I’m guessing your Poe’s father Kes?”
“Yeah, Heard a lot 'bout you and your daughter over the years.”
Smiling to yourself, you let them chat as your Mother crept from behind your father’s ceremonial cape (It had a red inner lining and fur lining the top, don’t ask) She looked just as radiant as you did.
“My daughter.”
“Hi Mum.”
“Did none of your friends fix up your hair?”
“We couldn’t decide on a style…”
Sadly you knew your time to prepare was drawing to a close, you needed to be as ready as you were when repairing the X-Wings.
“How about...I do your hair like my mother did for me?”
Tearing up at the mention of your grandmother, god's rest her soul, you wished she were here to see this.
“Please.” ---
Poe was nervous. No doubt. Finn was panicking and Rey wasn’t helping with all the screaming and waving around the chairs and tables she was doing by abusing the force just to get things done quickly.
Today...was a mess.
But it was the best kind of mess.
Jokingly, Finn had put a bow tie made for large Loth Cat’s around Beep’s neck. Poe had agreed that he had never looked so dapper. What they didn’t expect was your Dad’s distaste for droids and his dry humor.
Poe knew why though, so he didn’t get angry or throw a fit like the first time you met BB8 and was scared to shit.
It was strange that you had never met a proper droid before that day.
And wow, now he was marrying you. Time flew, so quickly.
To break the ice Poe had asked Din the story behind Ad’ika. In a quick attempt to get to his daughter before the ceremony took place, people filing in as he talked and avidly listening, he told the story of how he had come across the beauty that was/is your mother, how he met Ad’ika, how he had saved his life. Why Poe had discovered the secret tattoo of a mudhorn on your back. One that you had received from your Auntie Cara Dune you added fondly.
Who he would be meeting for the first time today.
The jungle had never looked so beautiful. You had both decided that the wedding would take place around dusk on the last night of summer, when it was not too humid and yet hot enough that the ceremonial wear had to be adapted to the heat.
Din had graciously warned Poe about Mandolorian traditional wedding dresses and how your mother had worked night and day to make your dress perfect. Poe quickly learned that your mother was a jack of all trades.
This was his family now. Forever and always.
A crescendo began as the miscellaneous Mandalorians dotted around the room beat the traditional drums to a high and demanding tune, light glinting off their multi-coloured helms dancing in the setting sunlight. With the Fur pressing against Poe’s throat he had jokingly said he looked like a king.
When Din answered back saying since he was a clan leader he technically was choked on his own spit.
Her fiance, the love of his life, had been a princess in disguise this whole freaking time.
It stuck in the back of his mind as the music grew too demanding, but as gasps filled the room he couldn’t help looking up.
Your mother was walking you down the aisle, your dresses looking not so similar yet similar enough that anyone and everyone knew you were one and the same, yet different.
But you, Gods above, you.
You looked like a princess.
Beskar cladded your upper arms, two feathers decorated your hair, matching braids flowing down your neck as your squeezed your mother’s arm in excitement upon spotting your future Riduur.
You had both made it out alive. And happy.
Not everyone had been so lucky, but you were doing this for them. To keep their memory alive.
And as Poe attempted to make love to you that night and you jokingly told him that traditionally you can’t touch the bride for another week if she has already fallen pregnant.
Let’s just say he got a matching bruise on his head from the first time you met.
Yeah, it was a mess.
But you were both finally home.
#the mandalorian#the mandalorian x reader#the mandalorian fanfic#Din DAD Djarin strikes back#Poe Dameron x reader#FINALLY!#Father!Din Djarin x reader#Dad!Din Djarin x reader#FEELS TRAIN PPL COMING THROUGH#I'm having a rough week so here#baby yoda#baby yoda fanfic#the ad'ika chronicles#baby yoda fanfiction#nameless!mother#nameless!mother figure#Leia Organa x reader#platonical Leia Organa x reader#platonical star wars fanfic#din djarin x reader#din djarin fanfic#din djarin fanfiction#din djarin x reader fanfic#din djarin x gender neutral reader#din djarin x fem!reader#din djarin x masc!reader#Pronoun never heard of 'em#HERE WE GO#star wars#star wars fanfic
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It took three and a half months, but I’ve finished my Doctor Who Rewatch.
It’s time to talk about seasons 10, 11, overall wrapup thoughts and some best/worst lists. Very long post below.
I started doing this back at the end of August as more of a joke when I was going back and cleaning the terrible cringe stuff off the first few months of my blog, then ended up taking that project from when I started the blog in May, 2011 until late 2016. I realized that I had too much going on IRL right now to revisit my life at the end of 2016 when things took a sharp turn the wrong way, so I haven’t picked that back up again. I still might at some point.
After the start of the nostalgia tour I:
Cried about Doomsday
Still hated the Manhattan episodes but renewed my love for one of my favorite characters of all time.
Reflected about Martha Jones and being an overly-zealous defender of a fictional character
Cried a lot over meeting and losing River Song in the span of an hour and a half.
Made my way through Season 4 and found myself still mostly loving the show.
Finished Season 4 and was starting to tire of Ten but knew I had more content to get through.
Didn’t post again til I was done with Amy and Rory. Loved Amy, Rory and River even more, especially Rory.
Watched an episode I remembered I didn’t like just because of the guest actors. Only marginally helped the episode.
Disliked the second half of season 7 even more than I used to. Felt meh about Clara.
Warmed to Clara more in seasons 8 and 9. Still, was ready to see her go. Loved Twelve, though the first half of season 8 continued to be rough. Adored the Husbands of River Song for the 6th+ time.
Took a brief moment to love Bill.
Full disclosure on the rewatch: I skipped most of Fear Her except the first and last few minutes, and actually haven’t gotten back to Waters of Mars or the one 11 Christmas Special with the kids who’s father dies. I may or may not pick those up in the next week or two.
So tonight I finished rewatching all of Thirteen’s episodes and wanted to talk a bit more about Bill, and then a lot about Thirteen, and some general thoughts about the whole rewatch.
Bill Potts is too good for this world. I remembered loving her during her season but was blown away on the rewatch with how much I loved her, and almost all of her season. Her energy, her story, her smile, it’s infectious. It’s infuriating that so many people didn’t watch Bill because wow she deserved a lot more attention that I feel like she got, and also I feel like the show itself turned a real corner that season. Season 9, yes, definitely better than 8 and 7.5. But It’s like Moffat or the writers in general kinda grocked into several important things and made the show more progressive and less cringe?
There wasn’t an episode I thought was bad, even the more filler episodes like the one in space with the air being a commodity was tense and fun. I’m not sure I’d skip a single episode.
And then Bill, I think, ends up getting an even shittier deal than Martha in her season. Left alone for ten years in a shithole mopping up floors, only to be turned into a cyberman and get left extremely traumatized, and sacrifice herself. A very good story. A very sad and frustrating ending. Except that she does get to “transform” and travel the universe with Heather.
Maybe she did eventually go back home and finish living her life from not long after she left in the TARDIS the last time -- it’s entirely possible. The Memory-Bill in Twice Upon a Time (the Twelve & One crossover) remembered traveling with Heather, which means her memory was taken from some point AFTER. So maybe she got to be an ethereal being for a long time, and then eventually went home to Earth. Or maybe she’s still out there traveling the stars with Heather. Either way, she deserves a good life, and a good ending, even if we never know the true ending.
Twelve -- I love him. Again, he had a really rough start but Capaldi is an amazing actor and he owned the role. I don’t think it’s actually possible to rank my favorite doctors from the new Who era, they’re all different, all great. And Missy -- such an amazing villain. Paired with Simms-Master was so, extremely fun, but even on her own, I think she’s now my favorite incarnation of The Master. (I’ve only seen a few episodes of Old-Who with Delgado, and I really love Delgado’s Master as well.)
Nardole was also a fun addition to the season. I know technically he was considered a full companion and enjoyed him when he was there, but tbh, to me it was all about Bill.
But hey, when Twelve left, it was a good time for him to go -- I really think three seasons is the sweet spot for length of a Doctor. I was so ready for Thirteen and The Fam.
I remembered loving Thirteen when her episodes were airing and, I was right to. Jodie Whittaker is so good -- I never doubt for a second that she’s The Doctor. The show one again feels very different with a new doctor / companions / showrunner. I honestly loved the lack of Doctor-Angst in the season. Thirteen is so much more brightness and sunshine and I think it was a good way to swing the Doctor after Twelve. I also liked that there were a few comments about changing genders, a little bit of frustration from noticing how people treated her differently, but it was neither an earthshattering thing that made EVERYTHING DIFFERENT nor was it a non-event. I really think they handled it well.
I will say that I think some of the critics were right, that the season itself could have used a bit more of an arc. Not a heavy arc, like seasons five and six had, but a bit more than Tim Shaw showing up in the first and last episodes of the season. It looks like next season is going to have that.
The arc that was there though really came from Graham and Ryan’s grief about Grace and their relationship growing. Honestly, I remember when we learned that one of the new companions was going to be a 60-ish year old dude I wasn’t looking forward to that at all, but honestly, I love Graham. He’s an actual good guy, he loves deeply, he’s allowed to show his emotions, he handles things WELL. He’s not perfect but also I felt like they wrote his character so well, he wasn’t an arrogant guy expecting everyone to follow his orders, he cares deeply for Ryan and even had some great scenes with Yaz.
Ryan and Yaz are both also just so fantastic. I loved getting to spend time with Yaz’s family both current and past. I actually learned a little history in the episode that took place in Pakistan (and loved having a benevolent alien storyline there, love that episode so much). I also loved that they allowed Ryan to show grief and sadness, and vulnerability too.
I was definitely feeling the 13/Yaz vibes on the rewatch, and although I wouldn’t say I’d be upset if they did end up doing a Ryan/Yaz storyline, I also wouldn’t be upset if they didn’t do any romance storylines at all. I didn’t miss it this season, and 13/Yaz seemed more likely than anything.
I also loved that they took on racism in a couple of big ways this series. I felt like the only big swing-and-miss episode was Ker-Blam! where they were so close to really hammering down a good message in the episode and then it felt like Jeff Bezos himself came in and rewrote the last 10 minutes.
TBH there were a couple of episodes that I had COMPLETELY forgotten about, especially the one with Chris North and the big spiders. Like while I was watching it I had a vague memory of seeing it before, but not up until then. I’d also forgotten about the New Year’s episode last year with Ryan’s dad. I only remembered to watch it because after the final episode I was like “Wait, wasn’t Ryan’s dad supposed to be in this season?” and so I went to hunt for the episode.
SO... that’s it. I was actually a little shocked last night when I finished up the New Year’s episode and realized... I was DONE. I made it back through eleven seasons and... it was worth it.
Some final thoughts... and I’m just picking a few things out here off the top of my head, I wasn’t keeping a list all the way through so I’m sure I’m going to think of other things after hitting Post, but here we go.
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COMPANION RANKINGS: God Tier: Martha Jones
Faves: Bill Potts, Rory Williams, River Song
I love you so much: Donna Noble, Amy Pond, The Fam (All together!), Jack Harkness, Mickey Smith, Wilfred Mott
Very very Good: Rose Tyler, Nardole
I Still Like You: Clara Oswald
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FAVE SEASON: I mean, it’s still gonna be Martha’s season with an honorable mention of the second half of 4.
If you take Martha Jones out of the equation, it’d probably be either 6 through 7.0, or Bill’s season.
LEAST FAVORITE: The second half of 7, for sure, and the first half of 8 is kinda rough. It’d be easy to say season 1, as well, but I don’t think that’s entirely fair, as I think the age of the show really shows there and there was a lot of getting-on-their feet they had to do. There’s still a lot of good there, you just have to look for it harder.
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Favorite Specials:
The Husbands of River Song, #1 favorite no question
The Day of the Doctor a close second.
Honorable mention to the Night of The Doctor for the canonical return of Eight. Seriously, the first time I saw that it may have been the single most joyous moment of New Who for me.
Least Favorite:
I mean, I haven’t rewatched two of them yet since I remember not liking them.
Also Voyage of the Damned was just even worse than I remembered it.
I Cried The Hardest:
Amy and Rory’s leaving in The Angels Take Manhattan
River’s death in the Library
The end of Doomsday
Danny’s death
The end of Vincent and the Doctor
Prem’s death in Demons of the Punjab, maybe the only single-episode character death that hit me that hard.
Happiest Tears:
Martha leaves the Doctor
The group in the TARDIS towing Earth home in Journey’s End
Twelve and River get 24 years together
Ryan calls Graham “Grandad”
Jackie and Alt-Pete meet/”reunite”
Heather shows up and... “saves” Bill, they go off on adventures.
Best Twists:
John Simms Return at the end of season ten.
YANA is the Master
Oswin is actually a Dalek
Heaven is run by Missy, and the Cybermen. (Damn I really love twists concerning the Master don’t I?)
Bill discovers she IS a Cyberman
Loudest cheers:
Mickey showing up in Doomsday
Martha laughs at the Master
Rory’s speech at the beginning of A Good Man Goes to War
The Doctor punches a racist who insulted Bill
Best dramatic moments:
Jack and the Doctor talk about Rose in Utopia
Twelve takes several billion years to punch through a wall
Just This Once, Everybody Lives!
Turn Left
The Doctor says goodbye Idris in The Doctor’s Wife
Missy and the Master’s mutually assured destruction.
Biggest Laughs for a good reason:
The entire poison scene in the Unicorn and the Wasp
Basically everything about the Doctor attempting to be normal in The Lodger.
Right, putting Hitler in the Cupboard.
Doctor, when I’m on a date, do not put the Pope in my bedroom.
Biggest Cringe:
Penis-head half-human Dalek
Concrete blowjobs
Anytime a lady slapped/hit a guy not in self-defense
Old goblin Ten / Jesus Ten in Last of the Time Lords
Most of The End of Time part 1
Eleven forces a kiss on Jenny in The Crimson Horror (THAT deserved the slap.)
There’s a lot of things I could point out in season 1 but I’m grading season 1 on a curve.
Favorite non-companion recurring characters:
Danny Pink
Brian Williams
Jackie Tyler
Worst Villians:
“Love And Monsters”
“Fear Her”
The eye-crud sleep monster with Twelve
I kinda wanna say the Daleks are so overdone it’s hard to get excited about them anymore, though I did kinda like what they did in “Resolution” (13′s New Years episode last year.)
OK I honestly don’t know if I want to put “A sentient universe who is in the form of a large frog and just wants a BFF” in best or worst but I feel it belongs SOMEWHERE.
Best Villians:
Missy
Whatever the fuck that thing is in Midnight
House
Got a Raw Deal award:
Adam (Seriously, he was told nothing and did nothing wrong via what he’d been told?!
Donna
Bill (Seriously, TEN YEARS SCRUBBING FLOORS? only to not be saved by 2 hours and then turned into a cyberman and killed again?)
Most Bothersome Lack of Continuity:
The rules for meeting yourself / interfering in the past.
Uh so who was the Not-Danny astronaut in “Listen” anyway?
Most Improved on a Rewatch:
The Fires of Pompeii because... ten and twelve? It used to be one of my least favorite eps of season 4.
the Daleks in Manahattan episodes I guess just because I liked them more this time though they’re still not great.
Seeing all of River’s timeline in such a short period of time
Gotta say I enjoyed Planet of the Dead a normal amount when before I used to really dislike it.
Best Premiere of a Doctor: The Eleventh Hour Roughest Premiere of a Doctor: Deep Breath, since I’m grading season 1 on a curve. Best Exit of a Doctor: Honestly? I’m gonna give this one to Nine. He sacrificed himself to save Rose, and he died too soon. It seemed a fitting end, if too quick.
Roughest Exit of a Doctor: I’m going to go with Eleven here. It came at the end of what I felt was the worst period of New Who. The episode itself was... I kind of felt like it was overwraught and didn’t pack quite the same punch as the other three. Say what you will about the “I Don’t Wanna Go” line with Ten and Twelve needing to be convinced to regenerate at all. Matt Smith did the best with what he was given, but he wasn’t given much in the entire last run of his episodes after having some of the BEST episodes the previous two and a half seasons.
Best Premiere of a Major Companion: Honestly? Still gotta go with The Eleventh Hour, for both Amy and Rory and the great way they were both set up and the mysteries of the season.
Worst Premiere of a Major Companion: If you don’t count Asylum of the Daleks (which I thought was great) as Clara’s premiere, then it was definitely Clara’s “The Bells of Saint John”. No contest. I don’t think ANY of the rest of them were done poorly, TBH. I guess I’d have to go with “Rose”, because the Autons themselves are pretty meh and the plastic wasn’t great.
Best (Main) Exit of a Major Companion: This one is more difficult. Doomsday deserves a nod. Martha Jones walked the world and ended on her own terms. Journey’s End saw the end of an entire era of companions we loved. River showed up and died on the same day, but her final appearance is one of my favorite episodes ever. The Angles Take Manhattan was SO GOOD. But The Doctor Falls was exciting and tense and tragic. Hell, even Clara’s final episodes were great.
Honestly, this shouldn’t even be a question. I can’t choose. I can’t think of a single one I didn’t love.
Anyway, thanks for reading this, if you got this far! Know what? Doctor Who is still a great show, even if it’s not an obsession anymore. I can see myself doing this rewatch again in a few years, and I’m super looking forward to the next season starting in a couple of weeks!
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Life Story Part 52 (it’s been too long)
And so, after leaving my old life behind for a new school in Moscow, being that I for the first time in my life was taken away from my repetitive, abusive and small system that I had always known, I found myself at odds with myself in a way I had never really had to be before. Leaving Kendrick behind, though it might have been born from some kind of strange illusion that Kendrick alone was my only problem and that leaving that town would automatically boost me into stardom the likes of which those who had always known me could never have possibly imagined. This turned out not to be the case. But it still did me unimaginable good and is the reason I am able to write and conduct myself. Honestly, having left Kendrick when I did, having met the very specifically trained teachers that I was introduced to might have been one of the few things that kept me alive as long as I have been. It's most definitely the reason I am here, able to write about my life as I am.
I was busy getting on with my new life, but that doesn't mean that for one single instance, Zack wasn't still somewhere in my thoughts, and it might have been one of those tiny facets that helped me struggle through my new life in the Moscow alt. School. I still thought about Zack everyday, every morning I woke up to get ready for school and every night as I waited to sleep. In the night Kendrick air, I could sometimes hear the screeching of the wheels of a car so dilapidated it was a wonder it even drove. And I knew in my heart of hearts, it was Zack, at least half the time. And every time I looked up at the blue sky, I had this almost eerie imagine in my mind imprinted of looking up at him from the curb in front of the school parking lot, the trees in the backdrop an impossible golden orange, the sky a profoundly deep baby blue, and his eyes peering down at me. They say that feelings fade with time. Instead, it almost seemed as though the feelings I had had in my early teens only became more and more in depth the more that I grew. And it wasn't going away. I loved Zack still. I imagined he was partying with his friends, and surely by that time had more or less forgotten about me – while I was in class trying to get the gist of a new form of thinking that was exploding everything I knew and forcing me to face myself in a way that separated me from my lower middle class, upper lower class roots. It was very painful for me – it certainly didn't bring the best out at me at times, an in many ways to feel separated from myself, even more so than it separated me from everyone I had ever held dear.
And in that lonely sadness, I guess some spiritual desperateness sank in, and I tried my very best to reach out to him psychically some how in secret. And though I never saw Zack, I almost felt like he knew. There had to be some reason for us meeting in life. What had happened had not been ordinary. The fall of 2003 had been – looking back from 2005 almost supernatural in nature. Nobody knew that I was still in love with Zack. I guess for most people, something like that just couldn't make sense with how their emotional make up existed in the world, and I have always been one to sentimentalize everything to death. It was so born from my innermost mind, in the places that precede formed thoughts. I always felt that he received my brainwaves, at least subconsciously. I really believed that we had made a meaningful connection, like an eternal bond that could not be broken. I felt like he thought of me too. I don't know if that was truly my psychic knowing, or if it was simply something I made up to make life seem more meaningful. But that is how it was then.
Sarah used to work for this couple that lived up in the hills. Their names were Matt and Greg – a gay couple (controversial to the small town of Kendrick) that worked for the university and have nice jobs and a bit of land they lived on. Sarah's mother often times did work for them, and Sarah occasionally went up there as well to make extra money -often to pay for our gas, which I feel she ended up paying for more than I did. There was one day that I went up there to work with Sarah, and it was to be my first real day of hard work. This isn't to say that I hadn't been a hard worker up to that point or that I had not been given tasks that were challenging for me. Work for me was more commonly me standing in place, suffering in slow motion for no pay. And I had always been one to shirk physical labor – not so much out of laziness, but a feeling of defiance at being forced into things. Also, I had never been paid before. The work I had done over the years had always been my father using me as free labor, and there never seemed to be much of a connection for me between getting paid and doing stuff. It was something I had never entertained before really. Sarah told me that she was going to do some work up there that needed done and they needed a second hand. And they promised 10$ an hour, and I had never even been paid 3$. W got paid to carry these ten foot boards from a pile out in their driveway, all the way to this barn that was down the way, and then we needed to nicely stack them perfectly – which took us eight hours, and I nearly fell to pieces.
I made 80$ doing it, which of course I wasted – as I had rarely ever had that much money on me and didn't quite understand that charms of holding onto money and desperately wanted to spend it. You don't know how to be rich until you've had money. I distinctly recall that Matt and Greg's home was beautiful, and they were both – though fairly introverted, very nice as well. The inside of their house was rustic and old and new at the same time in this really tasteful way that demonstrated class. There was a lot of unconventional aspects of their house – rooms that you had to use a ladder to get to, there was a spiral staircase. Perfect light came in through the windows in some rooms that was an artists dream – you can't beat natural light. It was a very pleasant home – even though it was out in the middle of nowhere.
And then one day, I received a visit from an old friend, someone I never thought I would see again. I was sitting at my computer, minding my own business when I heard a knock at the door. There was a blonde girl standing there – who looked familiar and didn't at the same time, with another girl I didn't recognize. It was Rachelle, my childhood friend who moved away when I was in fourth or fifth grade – after which everything went to hell for me. She had come to visit with er mother in a very rare trip up north. The other girl was a friend of hers from Twin Falls. They had made a rare trip up here to see some people, and she had decided to knock on the old door to see if I still lived in the same home. I was sort of in shock, and I think in this really weird way, sort of defensive – which does sound rather odd, but it had been painful to lose her as a friend. It had certainly been one of the first major kicks in the teeth life had dished out to me in my early life. In my young mind, I had had to make her not exist anymore. It was the only way for me to carry on and start anew. And her standing at the doorway was the reminder that Rachelle was every bit alive and dynamic as she ever had been – we had simply been forcibly removed from each other's lives and we had on our own taken drastically different paths. It might too have been because I knew I had been the one who had stopped writing her. Rachelle had actually written me a few times in the first year or two of her move, and it had been I who had not responded to her letters, which must have hurt her feelings... And I had built walls around that discomfort. So for Rachelle to simply exist in real life after seven years was emotionally confusing for me and caused me to probably seem really dull and closed off.
I ended up traveling to the park with her and her friend. For the most part, it was a little awkward for me. I was clearly a much different person. I was very alternative, I liked The White Stripes a whole lot. Rachelle was very chatty, but mostly about how excited she was to be joining the cheerleading team, and how she had done some bad things, but was now getting her life back on track. She liked what was on the radio, she thought the guys in boy bands were attractive. She loved partying. She had recently lost her virginity, and like most young girls when they lose their virginity, it was mostly all that she wanted to talk about. I could tell her about the poetry of my unrequited love, but it was somehow so far removed from her exploits even though it was also on the topic of romance that it didn't seem proper to mention it. There are a lot of girls in school who, if you haven't slept with someone or intend to very soon, the feelings just don't seem that interesting in and of themselves, or relevant. And that was the sort of girl Rachelle was. And with everything that had happened with me all the years, I found it was difficult to relate to her. She'd partied a lot. I had spent most of my time secluded in my bedroom, hiding - contemplating. It was strange dynamic. And at one time, we had been nearly identical. If I had been older of course, I could have breached that border fairly easy, as I now have a sort of understanding that Paris Hilton and Quasi Moto have more in common deep down than one might think. But those terms of understanding didn't occur to me till a bit later on in life.
It ultimately ended as a brief and empty hello and a brief and empty goodbye. And of course, as I mentioned a while ago, Rachelle died on her 21st birthday of an Oxycontin overdose.
There were some things that disappointed me about my new school; it bothered me that nobody hated me – I was emotionally ill equipped to handle being assumed an equal to the degree that it seemed to border on mental illness for me and I longed in many ways for the times in which I stood before a classroom full of conservative right wing cowboys, basic small-town cheerleaders and a few methheads sprinkled in – all of whom hated me and gave me strength and a sense of purpose for that very reason. I needed to be hated. It's kind of how I came to be a person. It was the fish tank water that I was acclimated to, however unhealthy. To have people who looked you in the eye, who complimented your t-shirt, who listened to what you were saying it was all too much. I had never experienced such cognitive dissonance before in my life with who I thought myself to be versus how I was being treated, and I reacted like an insane child. It didn't show too much, but at times it did, and if anything kept me back from doing my best, this was probably my number one reason. I instinctively needed to be hated. It was also quite hard that I would have to read in front of my new classmates and actually do my work while I was in class rather than slack off as I had been for the last six or seven years. I had social anxiety to the extreme – to the point it almost caused me to pass out, and the only cure for it is if I knew others hated me – which would instantly both energize me and pacify me. It was a major culture shock for me not to be the weird one anymore. I had troubles not taking it as some kind of insult that people didn't regard me in some way as being the most despisible edgy one in the room anymore.
But I also was the work itself and how one came to prove anything that really got to me. I was those first three months of school, unable to conceptualize the meaning of a thesis. I understood the point nor the technique of it. I was sixteen and had no idea what anyone needed to prove anything for. I had always believed in whatever I felt was right. The idea of questioning one's sources of their beliefs was honestly something that nobody had ever suggested to me, and I emotionally apposed the very idea of proving your point with logic. Of course, to a degree we all use logic and the scientific method in life to ascertain information on a practical level, often without realizing that we are doing it. But to me, you killed art when you had to explain why things were the way they were. I was deeply offended at the idea of proving a thesis and I felt like the teachers in the alternative school were at war with who I was as an individual.
And maybe from a realistic standpoint one could argue that a person really doesn't need to be able to conceptualize and prove a thesis to get by in life. Most of our human ancestors didn't need to understand how to build a belief system grounded in reality. They relied on their perceptions and instincts. And in those perceptions and instincts, it can be argued that they were privvy to great truths. And much can be said for the beauty that is to be harnessed from the imagination of human beings, though it also is very much a matter of opinion, since that same form of thinking was what brought about religions and any excuse in the book to be all too cruel to one another. And I still don't meet many people who really truly want to be right in life for the sake of truth seeking. Most of the people I know who aren't very logical in their approach in life, want to be right so they can feel powerful or validated. It's also very discomforting and ego bruising. When you take a step into the world of logic, your perceptions are faulty and you are no longer the center of the universe.. It's a way of living that is very much rooted in personal experiences. This was literally all I knew. I don't think I ever applied logic to my beliefs. Silently, be I right or be I wrong, I was always basing all of my life decisions, my identity, my means of maneuvering through life only on gut instinct and assumptions alone. If I turned to someone else, I took what they said as if it were gospel, and I had only ever really done that with Zack. I was right because I was right. I didn't want to be made small by a world in which my ideas needed to be challenged.
However, I will still argue that personal experiences, feelings and gut instincts are not worthless in academia as some might argue. They are the source of what we even conceptualize and maybe still the first place we should look to when we are sorting out the intricate building blocks of ideas. As twelve years have passed since my time in the alternative school, I now don't see logic and emotion as being at odds with one another as I once did. Understanding music theory doesn't make someone a worse musician, nor do those it make those who don't understand music theory bad musicians. The perceptions of the common, dull and uneducated are not worthless. Their feelings and output has some value to the whole. I do not wish to cast aside the characters in my life who made me who I was up till the age of sixteen or what they taught me. But at the age of sixteen, I was forced to take an uncomfortable step outside of myself, and this step back was a turning point in my life that set me aside from the rest of my family. For many if not most young people around the age I was then, drugs and sex are the life changers. For me, it was actually learning to ask questions and to find answers which ended up taking me on a very philosophical path.
So, for this reason, my first major paper was a dismal disaster, and the second one was only a little better. We didn't get little multiple choice papers for homework. We really were only given three or four assignments for an entire semester, and those assignments had to be done well. They didn't accept D's. I had sometimes in life gotten by as a D student, and they had a system where D was not acceptable. You got 75% or higher, or you failed. It was as simple as that. I couldn't also just not do the work. If you didn't do the work, you would probably fail, and they would kick you out of school for it. So I knew I had to try. We had to go back over what we had done and assess our own work for weeks. We had to spend real time researching. And of course, I was so insecure with challenging my own assumptions and being made to feel wrong and all the insecurity and feelings of worthlessness and powerlessness that came with that that it was quite unpleasant for me at first, and made me panic emotionally and react quite rudely towards my teachers, who patiently put up with my ignorant retorts to their sensible attempts to gently adjust me to a world that I for the first time in my life, had to actually try at and put forth participation in.
My first essay was so dumb. It was basically, based on what Zack had told me, that freemasons ran the planet. I didn't know why I believed it, other than Zack had said it. I didn't even have the understanding to break it down to world economics, governments, war, media. I had no way of breaking down this argument because I didn't know how, but emotionally it was personal for me, since I wanted to hold onto everything Zack had once told me as being golden and pure and all-truthful. Why would I break a gift from someone I revered so much?
This was where I first came head to head with Mike, my teacher. These classes of his that we took I soon learned were more than your conventional classroom lessons. This school was low-key dedicated to reprogramming lower class kids, often from bad homes into actually being able to articulate their own thoughts and feelings and to make decisions that were complex and helped us escape our own destiny's. His goal was to take poor kids with little hope – such as myself, and turn us all into far more than what the public school curriculum wanted of us. He wanted to train us to excede the kids in public schools and actually ready us for college level work. So our essays and lessons were modeled after second or third year college courses in a university. Mike was a very rare sort of person in this way. I must have been a painful student to have. I made things really hard. I knew I was being manipulated and of course I fought back. But I owe him a lot – he was right and I was indeed wrong.
Mike also didn't much like or care for our parents – with the exception of a small handful in the room. He made it known, but was really crafty and close with us about how and why he felt that way. And for most of us, him and his wife Jenni, the school counselor who we signed up for the school in the first place with, they really were far more like parents. He seemed to study us and understand us like most teachers and parents never did. And he was able to work with each of us on an individual basis to help us become the most we could be. His intentions, I am more or less positive of, were to intentionally meant to systematically brainwash us against our alcoholic, selfish, overworked, lower class, methed out, emotionally crippled aged bitter crazy parents. So we could not only not only feel divorced from our troubled upbringings, but we could also become different people than they were. I think, in his own way, he wanted to rebuild society – though I am sure he knew it would not be enough. He went about this whole thing in a way that was very under the radar. We all learned to trust Mike and Jenni more than our families. Mike, Jenni, Mary Kay and the rest knew all of our personal lives. They knew more about us than our parents did. Soon, the school itself seemed more like home for me than home did – so even though I fought back against the school, the school became were I lived psychologically. I actually felt safer at school than I did anywhere else. Added to that, was I never was home anymore except at night to sleep and put my make up on in the morning, so I rarely saw my father or even my siblings. On weekends I spent all my time up at Sarah's house, and often times I just slept there instead. I was rapidly becoming a different person, or maybe it wasn't so much that I was becoming a different person, but I was molding into the person I had the potential of becoming.
I had of course, no way to prove that freemasons ran the planet, and by planet, what did I even mean? I spent an entire month looking at conspiracy theory websites, quoting them as fact, and siting no sources. They contradicted one another. They were often times written by anonymous unstable communists, or anonymous unstable right-wingers. I didn't even know how to make a real distinction. Often these articles didn't even have an author. They put Alex Jones himself to shame. We would sometimes be taken to this library that was part of the university. I think it held the title of the biggest library in the state of Idaho. It was many stories tall, and the stories themselves seemed enormous. You could easily spend a lifetime in there. It might have been one of the best places I had ever been to. Even in this library, I only found a few books that were about freemasons, and all of them were very difficult reads, often times talking about the different chapters of freemasons. What's more, I grew to learn that many of the old people in the town of Kendrick were masons. I knew them well, and there was no way that any of them held any malice or even enough understanding of society to have any real influence in it. In the end, I had a twenty page essay written about nothingness. My sentences didn't even flow very nicely. Out of all the students in that class, I seemed the most doomed to failure.
Perhaps, had I picked very specific ways of presenting the issues I seemed to think I believed in, and I had pulled them apart piece by piece and only picked one avenue that was provable, I might have had better luck instead of taking on the whole world. Heck even if freemasons did run the whole planet (they don't), it would have been impossible for me to make the case with the limitations that I had. The paper I ended up slaving over and handing in was worthless. And over the course of a grueling month, 120hours spent on this paper, a part of me was defeated. I fought with Mike the whole way. It took hours of one on one time of him sitting down with me, asking me questions, breaking down my mental frame of mind just to try to understand me enough to know how to communicate with me, and I fought him for most of it – because it hurt my pride to admit that I didn't know things. I wanted to prove to Mike that I was really somehow above the rest of the classmates – me, the conspiracy theorist – the one with her eyes wide open and the rest living in complete ignorance. They were prisoners of their own ignorance, and I some kind of truth teller. It really was something.
My second paper was on something almost as bad, but a little better. After the first month of writing and research, I wanted to pick something I actually cared about. The whole freemason thing, trying to research and find proof of the impossible had made me realize instinctively that believing in the conspiracy theory was something I did because Zack had wanted me to believe in it, and also because it fulfilled some kind of void in my own feelings. It represented that I did instinctively understand that there were things wrong with society. And as much as I didn't understand this on the first day of school, history was indeed very important. Mike gave me a C, even though we both kind of knew I had turned in a D- paper at the very best. The paper was absolutely ungradeable. He gave me the C because he knew I had problems at this point, and I think even the act of me finishing an assignment was such a jump from whatever I was used to, that he had to see it as a major improvement from who I had been when I first walked into their school. He didn't want to fail me before I had a chance to improve on what I had learned. The first paper was more of a lesson in life than it was a lesson of academics.
My second paper's thesis was about grunge music – again, something I cared about but indirectly related to Zack, only in the fact that he had always gone for being Kurt Cobain's twin. I wanted to point out that bands like Nickelback, Three Doors Down and such somehow took elements of grunge and somehow made it plastic and turned it into some kind of cliché product that sounded terrible. I focused mainly on how much I didn't like these bands. What I might have been trying to get at, though I lacked the knowledge or understanding on those terms, was to demonstrate the folly of how movements form and how they become their own worst enemies. I might have been making a case against capitalism, and against consumerism. I might have wanted to demonstrate or point out that integrity in art makes the end product better. But how could I prove any of that without actually having a philosophical opinion of Aesthetics that I could demonstrate and prove? Stand behind the fact that a band like Creed still does suck to me, how does one demonstrate that something factually sucks outside of their own perceptions of it. How can you possibly know if something is externally 'good' or not? I was an objectivist because I didn't know how to question myself. I just believed that when something felt good, or seemed good, it was good.
So then, I spent another month writing another enormous paper. I had thought that sifting through old music magazines, old articles about the bands I liked from the early 90's would be enjoyable, but it turns out, I hated writing about music. Who knew, since I love writing and I loved music, and I still write about it to a limited degree. But a lot of writing on art, film and music is pure hype and has no baring or meaning whatsoever. It could do little to prove my objective theory that what sounded good was good. As much as I hate Creed, how could I even really demonstrate what I was trying to say. I think the idea truly came to me to write about grunge from a place where I just wanted to talk about how awesome Mudhoney was. Because that was really all there was to it. I wanted to make my case.
I think if I wrote this paper today, I could have made some very valid points by pointing out how modern music is sold, advertised, how it is written, who decides what will be a hit. It is almost political and economic in a way. I could have taken it to the study of aesthetics itself and argued some kind of point. But I wouldn't have the egotism it took to think it was worth my time these days. I don't care if you like Creed. People can like whatever they want, and what doesn't speak to one person can mean an awful lot to another. I am not some kind of musical taste genius who has the right to go about trashing others tastes. Yes, I still have some opinions, but I grow everyday. There isn't too many days that roll by where I don't find something about my previous understanding that wasn't incomplete or incorrect in some way, and that's a good thing – not a bad thing. I really was just trying to prove how special I was for my interests here. It was coming from a far more legitimate place than the whole freemason thing came from, but it still was egotistical and lame. And spending this second month looking at a paper I was so tired of writing I could barely tolerate it, made me take the much needed step down from my pedestal. Mike gave me a C+ on this paper, and it probably was a C+ this time. I had gone through the grueling task of citing my sources, and being thorough in a few small points I tried to make, as limited in understanding as those points actually were.
On a side note, Mike also hated that kind of music so that helped. Though he had never really been into grunge. Mike was all about English punk music from the late 70's and early 80's. His favorite bands were The Jam and Billy Bragg.
I sort of hated Mike for the first month in a half. He had a way of getting inside your head. He was always ridiculously passionate about teaching us, ridiculously thorough in explaining or answering our questions, and he seemed very dedicated and relentless. I wasn't really allowed to escape being reprogrammed and nothing like this had ever happened before. As for Sarah, she struggled through it as well, but she was a lot more clear minded when it came to picking topics that weren't over the top egotistical that wouldn't destroy her mental framework. She ended up writing about atheism, which is a lot easier to examine, read about and write about than what I picked was. She didn't come head to head with Mike like I did. It wasn't that I ever yelled at Mike. I just tried to be obscure, was sarcastic when he asked questions. I would just shake my head no at him. I would likely be embarrassed if I had a visual of my proud ignorance and reactionary emotional response to everything he tried to help me with.
Many of the other students had been going to school at the alternative school for years, and working through these essays was something they were capable of doing. Many of these kids I would have assumed were somehow inferior to me in some way, they had drug issues, their were a few pregnant girls in the mix. Their lives were rough. Some of them were emancipated or had mental health problems. I had problems too, but I had this way of dealing with it that was almost like I was somehow perfect and other people were less than me. It had come upon me slowly growing up. It wasn't that I was not humbled often, or a kind person. I was. But I had learned some bad habits of believing myself to be superior – half of it based on Zack telling me I was special. In reality, my fragile baseless sense of superiority probably made me more fragile than the rest of these students.
These young girls and boys I went to class with were ten times tougher than me, more emotionally balanced – and had had it rougher than me in many ways. Even if their problems were ongoing and made their lives difficult, even if they had criminal records and babies at home who they didn't know who the fathers were, they were much more balanced than I was. They knew their own faults and worked on them everyday. They said what the felt and their was a sense of honesty and care that they put towards one another. I was far more lost then them, and after awhile, I came to realize this for what it was. And most of them understood what it meant to prove their point with evidence. They also struggled with Mike at some point, but they figured it out. And Mike had taught a lot of them how to care. They often chose to write about problems related to the criminal justice system, healthcare, the environment, the war on drugs – the kinds of things that impact the poor the most, but somehow seem to be the least understood by the poor and those who are most effected by it. Things I knew very little about. I had struggled, but instead of facing what had happened, I had somehow been taken in by a fantasy land around the time that I had met Zack. I was actually put to shame by these warrior like other girls, and Mike was creating informed citizens out of these so called leftovers of society.
He also didn't let us treat each other badly. Nobody was ever rude to me for that entire year. There were no situations where I was sexually harassed. I was given space. People were good natured towards me. I didn't have a lot in common with these students. Many of them were into the Grateful Dead and third wave ska. I just wasn't. By nature, I tend to be a little bit more exacting and darker by nature. But they were all nice to me. The few who didn't seem to be able to know how to be kind left within three weeks. As soon as he saw one young guy say something rude to another girl, he looked that boy straight in the eye during class, told him to take his things and leave. He didn't give warnings. You either respected one another or you left. There was even a time when one of the stranger girls in the class who seemed to have emotional outbursts every four seconds, who came from an abusive environment and seemed to want attention often wrote an essay about how much she loved her grandfather. She started crying in class as she read it, and due to the highly emotional nature of this essay, many people in the class – though they said nothing and didn't react openly, seemed taken aback and nervous by her essay. It probably made a few of them make microexpressions of distaste. You can feel that very clearly in a room of people. Mike didn't let this pass. I never knew a teacher who jumped at this. He explained what we had done, and he warned us all that he could tell that we had judged her and laughed at her and made her feel anxious and small. We didn't need to say anything. We had done it with our eyes.
Lastly, I struggled with my diet. Over the summer, I had been free to starve, to control everything I ate and did. I had managed to lose fifteen pounds even with the mysterious health problems of being unable to lose weight like most people. Spending all this time in class prevented me from getting the exercise I needed. I craved sugar so much it made me shake. And there was always free cake in the kitchen. So I ended up eating too much cake. I probably needed the calories. I spent money on ice cream. If I didn't eat the adequate amount of sugar, I found I would feel frantic and mentally unstable. I needed all the focus I could get to focus on my essays. And so, I started gaining weight again. At times, I would become frustrated and angry. I envied how thin Sarah always managed to stay. It seemed unfair. I felt ugly, and not being able to do the dieting and exercise I needed.
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My Top 100 Favorite Albums of All Time (Part 5: 20 - 11)
20. Hand. Cannot. Erase. – Steven Wilson (2015)
For his fourth solo release, Steven Wilson took inspiration from the real-life story of Joyce Carol Vincent, a young woman who passed away in her London flat in December 2003 and remained undiscovered for more than two years, even despite having family and friends, and having left her television on at the time of her passing. The album follows the story of a fictional woman heavily based on Vincent, ending with her abrupt disappearance. With a stylistic nod to prog pioneers like Rush and Yes, as well as the powerful guest vocals of Israeli singer Ninet Tayeb, Hand. Cannot. Erase. serves as a poignant examination of the isolation and alienation of modern urban life.
Prime cuts: "Home Invasion / Regret #9", "Routine"
19. Absolution – Muse (2003)
Bolstered by the success of the lead single "Time Is Running Out", Absolution is the album that first gained Muse major mainstream recognition as a band to watch. There aren't many hints of their later excessive, over-the-top tendencies here— though "Butterflies & Hurricanes" does contain a piano section which aptly demonstrates Muse's appreciation of classical music. Instead, this is one of Muse's more low-key and easy-to-listen efforts, demonstrating the prowess of a band that could be content with crafting hauntingly beautiful melodies ("Sing for Absolution", "Blackout", or "Ruled by Secrecy" all come to mind), or simply shredding (as on "Stockholm Syndrome"). Sometimes, less is more, and simplicity is just better.
Prime cuts: "Stockholm Syndrome", "Butterflies & Hurricanes"
18. Core – Stone Temple Pilots (1992)
At the beginning of their musical career, Stone Temple Pilots was another in a lengthy list of bands that benefitted from the exposure afforded them by the Seattle grunge explosion in the early 1990s. They spent years dogged by accusations of sounding a bit too much like Pearl Jam, before they eventually managed to develop a more distinctive voice that distanced themselves from anyone else. That isn't to say that their early material is bad, though; on the contrary, their first album, Core, is hands down my favorite of theirs. I don't think of it as derivative, either; rather, I appreciate it for what it is. Like most of the alt-rock at the time, there is a dim, dingy feeling about it— but it's all channeled through a sunny production, reflective of their San Diego roots. There's more California here than Washington. That makes for an album which is oddly upbeat about being grungy, which I find rather appealing.
Prime cuts: "Plush", "Wicked Garden"
17. The Downward Spiral – Nine Inch Nails (1994)
There is no album that encapsulates my high school years quite like The Downward Spiral. Which probably says something terrible about me, because— with all due respect to Trent Reznor, but let's be honest here— this is a seriously fucked up album. This album is what it sounds like to slowly be driven into the ground, day by day, until you are ground down into little more than a cold, numb machine made of rotting meat, just begging for the sweet release of death. This album is how it sounds to gradually become an automaton, going through all the motions, but truthfully no longer giving a fuck. This is nihilism incarnate. And I've been on that brink myself, more times than I can count, driven by a sense of alienation from the hostile outside world, and it never gets any easier. But at least through the rough patches, I've had The Downward Spiral to reflect my turmoil. When I first encountered this album, I immediately adopted "Heresy" as my personal anthem— a song that expressed perfectly to my repressive Bible Belt surroundings just how I felt about their precious 'Good Book'. I buried all my vulnerabilities and my pain beneath a mechanical visage, as modeled in "The Becoming", and I grew a thicker skin. I gravitated to this album, and (at least in my head) eventually embodied this album, specifically out of spite; I recognized it as everything the religious conservatives hate about our culture, and I had no greater desire at the time than to piss off a world that had rejected me. I'm happy to report growing out of that phase of my life, for the most part. I still have occasional episodes where I stare longingly into the abyss, and ponder jumping in. But the power this album has had, to take the chaotic tempest of negative emotions inside of me and give them form, is awesome. Ironically, I think this album has actually prevented me from following through on several occasions, just by allowing me to work through my angst and get all of that built-up poison out of my system in a constructive way. Now that's power.
Prime cuts: "Closer", "Hurt"
16. Altered State – Tesseract (2013)
Following the departure of lead singer Dan Tompkins, Tesseract went through a period of searching for the right person to replace him, beginning with Elliot Coleman's short-lived turn at the microphone, but ultimately settling on Ashe O'Hara. Perhaps it was kismet that it was during O'Hara's time in Tesseract that Altered State was recorded, as the new voice also heralded a new direction. O'Hara's silken voice was obviously best suited for clean vocals; all of Tompkins' guttural screaming went right out the window. That made emulating peers like Periphery essentially impossible, which also provided the band with an opportunity to reinvent themselves, tighten their sound, and be more adventurous (such as on the track "Of Reality: Calabi-Yau", where they underscore their blend of palm-muted heavy metal with the extremely unexpected wail of a saxophone, and actually pull it off). Consisting of four multi-song suites (Of Matter, Of Mind, Of Reality, and Of Energy), the album also contains extremely dense metaphysical lyrical material to match its heightened musicality. In combination, all of these new circumstances result in Altered State being nothing short of a miraculous metamorphosis for the band— Tesseract in a literal altered state.
Prime cuts: "Of Matter: Proxy", "Of Mind: Nocturne"
15. Mer de Noms – A Perfect Circle (2000)
Mer de Noms is a cryptic album, in the same way that Tool albums generally are. Furthermore, this is the only album of A Perfect Circle's where I really feel there's an apt comparison, if not in sound, then in attitude. Setting aside the music for a moment— can we talk about how much I geeked out over the band actually inventing their own arcane-looking alphabet to use in their liner notes? I was a nerdy teenager at the time I obtained this album, and being a lover of puzzles, naturally I decrypted it and then adopted it for my own use for encoding secret messages in my notebooks. But, I digress. What makes the music so interesting here, after listening to Tool for so long, is Maynard's voice being channeled into music with a completely different energy. Tool is logical, cerebral, and quite masculine; APC is much more of an emotional experience. That goes even for the harder-edged songs like "Judith", where Maynard's cry of "Fuck your God!" is intended less as a slight toward religion in general than as a frustrated outburst from a person who had watched his devout mother paralyzed in an accident when he was a child, and who was astounded that such a trial did not cause her to lose her faith. With nearly all of the song titles being names (hence the album's title, which translates to "sea of names" in French), much of the puzzle presented by this album comes from familiarity with the eponymous subjects; some are Biblical or legendary, while others are somehow personal connections to the band. But regardless of how much the listener may know about the myth of Orestes, the music is still a reward unto itself.
Prime cuts: "Judith", "Orestes"
14. Ten – Pearl Jam (1991)
You know how certain songs are attached to memories or sensations so strongly, that you can't hear them without replaying those other associations in your head? Pearl Jam's Ten is like that for me. Yes, the entire album. It's an album that makes me feel the cool, crisp autumns of northern Georgia where I grew up, and see the leaves turning, and smell the hickory smoke of roadside boiled peanut vendors. It's an album that I see in dark reddish colors— maroon, sienna, burgundy. When I listen to "Black", I remember staying home from school for two weeks in 2001 due to a bad case of pneumonia, and the flannel blankets, and spending my daytime watching old episodes of SNL from the early 90s. When I listen to "Garden", I remember quiet, rainy nights in my on-campus apartment during my first year of college, just sitting in the dark after my roommates had gone to bed, drinking a cold glass of milk while watching the rain dance and glitter in the outside light with the windows narrowly slatted. When I listen to "Jeremy"— well, of course, that song makes me remember how terribly I was bullied all through middle school and ninth grade, and how reliant I was on that song to help me through one of the most miserable times of my life. (Seriously. This is another album I credit with literally keeping me alive.) I know none of this is concrete or tangible to anyone else but me, but… this is something that frustrates me about lists like this when music journalists write them. By the nature of their publication, they can't focus on the intangible impressions they get, because they're supposed to write about universally-appreciable things. In this case… I can't do that. Everyone already knows it's a goddamned brilliant album. But these impressions, and the way they make me feel— they're so strong here that they're basically half of the album's appeal to me, as far as I'm concerned. This is just an album that I've known so long, that it is deeply ingrained in me.
Prime cuts: "Jeremy", "Alive"
13. Master of Puppets – Metallica (1986)
I was introduced to Metallica (and heavy metal itself) in ninth grade by a classmate of mine named John. On one fateful extended class field trip to Mentone, Alabama, for a trust-building workshop, John lent me his copy of Master of Puppets to listen to during leisure time. I didn't know it at the time, as I sat on my cot in that cabin in the forest and listened to my Discman, but there was absolutely no better album to initiate me to metal. It was revelatory. Up to that time, I was still finding my taste. I had never heard music so hard-edged, or drumbeats so fast, or guitarwork so intricate before. And 8-minute songs? Being a prog rock fan who now routinely listens to songs two to three times that length, it's funny to think about in retrospect, but when I was that age, my attention span wasn't used to anything longer than 5 minutes. I was used to the stuff being played on the radio at the time— stuff like Smash Mouth and Sugar Ray. It should be a testament to how much of an earthshaking experience it was for me, that I still even remember the trip to Mentone (which was otherwise pretty forgettable, honestly). When I got back to Georgia, one of the first things I did was buy my own copy. There are eight songs here, and not a single weak one among them. Lars Ulrich's drums are on point. Kirk Hammett's guitar is on point. The lyrics, and James Hetfield's vocals, are on point. To this day, I still get goosebumps listening to the opening of "Damage Inc.", or the instrumental "Orion" as it slows down into a more laidback tune, led by the incomparable bass grooves of the late Cliff Burton. And in addition to being technically impressive, it was a cathartic album, too; this was the album that first allowed me to tap into my inner adolescent rage, and to release it. "Fuck it all and fucking no regrets", as they say. Wherever you are, John… thanks.
Prime cuts: "Master of Puppets", "Battery"
12. Superunknown – Soundgarden (1994)
It's sad for me to write this now, still only a few months out from Chris Cornell's passing. He was a hero to me when I was a teenager, and this was my first encounter with his music. First I got into Nirvana, then Pearl Jam, and then gradually I got into Soundgarden and Alice in Chains. Out of all the releases between the four of them, Superunknown is and probably always will be my personal favorite, even over Nevermind and Ten. The combination of Cornell's unearthly voice and Kim Thayil's guitar stirred something inside me that the others just couldn't quite reach. Maybe it's because, at the time, Soundgarden had been together longer than the other three bands, and they were able to reap the rewards of knowing and playing with each other for a longer time. Whatever the reason, it just felt (and still feels) to me like one of the most musically mature albums to come out of the whole grunge scene. And the sad thing is, I think a lot of people pay attention to it because of "Black Hole Sun" being such a gargantuan hit, and undersell the rest of the album. There are lesser known songs here, like the title track, or "Fresh Tendrils", or "Like Suicide", that are absolute sparkling gems. To listen to those songs, and to know now that the moment has passed, and that chemistry can never be truly replicated again with Cornell gone… it's really disheartening. But at least they left behind one hell of a masterpiece.
Prime cuts: "Black Hole Sun", "Superunknown"
11. The Dark Side of the Moon – Pink Floyd (1973)
Did you really expect me to leave this one off my list? Pink Floyd has been showing up on my list with a fair amount of frequency, and I saved the best one for last. I mean, it's almost ridiculous how clichéd it is to talk about this album as an example of a musical tour de force. It's practically to the point where I can just say the words "great album", and this will be one of the ones that people automatically think about. And as I sit here writing, trying to come up with something to say to rationalize my choice, I realize— there's probably no other album in my life which has served more as a soundtrack to the truly awesome moments. I've painted to this album, and felt the invigorating high of inspiration. I've synched it up with The Wizard of Oz, not once, but twice. I've played it while taking a breathtaking car ride through Badlands National Park in South Dakota. I've listened to it while watching a total solar eclipse. There's no other album that fits these kinds of experiences as well. It's an album that compresses time with its mellow nature, and causes 42 minutes to disappear so rapidly you can scarcely understand where they've gone. It's an album that simultaneously makes you feel insignificant, as a tiny human in a grand cosmos billions of lightyears and aeons large, and important, as someone fortunate enough to bear witness to the splendor of the universe. In short, about as close to perfection as an album can aspire to be.
Prime cuts: "Money", "Time"
At last, we’re down to the final 10. Which ones made the cut? Find out the first half tomorrow, with Part 6, featuring #10 - #6!
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The Friday Rant: Has The World Lost Its Mind?
TorontoRealtyBlog
Folks, it’s been a while.
Maybe I’m mellowing as I get closer to obtaining true “middle-aged” status.
Or maybe I simply reached a point where nothing in the world of real estate fazes me anymore.
But here’s something new: there are buyers in the market that didn’t know the price of real estate could fluctuate, and now they’re upset.
This is the p-e-r-f-e-c-t time for me to revive a classic TRB feature, The Friday Rant…
I don’t understand the world today.
And while I know that sounds like something an old man says, I just really, truly seem to have lost touch with the world around me.
The Prime Minister of Canada. Wow. This guy!
Interrupts a young speaker at a town hall meeting, who had the audacity to say “mankind,” to tell her that “we,” whoever we are, prefer to use the term “people-kind,” since it’s more inclusive.
The pendulum has swung so far one way, that it’s about to break through the other side of the universe on the way back.
Sorry, but I don’t like Mr. Trudeau. I think he’s of below-average intelligence, his low self-esteem, ego, and desire to be admired is at the forefront of every decision he makes on behalf of 33,000,000 people, and he has no experience, or ability, to lead.
This is a microcosm of where we’ve gone as a society, and while some think this is steering us in a better direction for peoplekind, I think it’s making us feeble, weak, and eventually we’ll all be incapable of self-care.
The public school systems have done away with “enriched” programs, such as the enriched English programs I took throughout high school that helped make me the writer I am today, so that “everybody can get an equal opportunity.” So in the race to the bottom that has become public education, we’d now rather have a so-called “level playing field,” than ever see an advanced child flourish.
We don’t keep score in children’s sports games anymore. Somebody might get upset to learn that in sports, as in life, there are winners and losers.
Cue the “December Seasonal Concert.”
Change the lyrics to “O Canada,” because it’s one of the worst things plaguing our country today.
Have we ever become softer as a society?
Many of you are already disagreeing, so I won’t go on, with countless more examples, and perhaps better ones, of where our municipal, provincial, and federal leaders have taken us.
But I fear it’s this “guidance” that has brought us to a point where most people in society today refuse to take any responsibility of their actions, especially when those actions are misguided, uninformed, or have consequence of any sort.
As it pertains to real estate, I’m seeing this more and more.
And how could it not transpire, with what we have inflicted upon ourselves?
Recall the story of the “Museum FLTS” condominium project in Toronto, which was cancelled back in November.
The newspapers picked up the story, and made martyrs of these poor souls who entered into legally-binding contracts with a developer who then exercised his right to terminate the project. I wrote about it on my blog, and I was extra nice:
Another Pre-Construction Condo, Cancelled. Who Is To Blame?
And despite being told by many that I was too nice, I still received hate mail from people who bought into the project – many of them who were obviously well-versed enough in contract law to not spend the $3,000 on a lawyer that might have educated them on the pros and cons of the stack of paper that was thrust upon them by a salesperson, representing the developer.
Oh, the heat I took! Wow!
I try to take the high road folks, I do. And it took every ounce of strength I had not to share with you the self-pitying, naive, wishful-thinking emails I received from buyers into the project, who read my blog, and took issue.
You wouldn’t believe it, if you tried.
But as bad as that example of “not taking responsibility for your actions” truly was, I think we reached a new low point.
Some of you pointed this out last week, so I know I already have your ear.
“What did the neighbours pay? Whitby homebuyers just found out the answer: a lot less”
This story first appeared on the CBC website on January 24th, and to attempt to read it without shaking your head at least once is a fool’s errand.
The very first paragraph tells you all you need to know:
Planned homes in a new Whitby subdivision are on sale for up to $90,000 less than similar homes in the same development were a year ago.
Right.
Sooooo……….what’s the story?
A person who can tell time, tie their shoe, and breathe in-and-out, could probably ascertain that the price of real estate, believe it or not, can fluctuate.
Prices go up, prices go down.
Like the stock market, or spot gold. Bonds, or treasury bills. Corn futures, or Bitcoin…
But the story here, folks, is that some of the buyers who purchased real estate last year, and who saw the value decrease, are, well, upset.
“It’s painful,” Astrid Poei said in an interview. (from the article)
That’s fair. Nobody is expecting this person not feel the sting of an on-paper loss, for a property not built, which in effect, doesn’t really mean anything.
“There are no building materials on site, there is no foundation poured, so I don’t understand how we are paying more than someone who bought a couple of weeks ago.” (from the article)
Here’s where things go off the rails a little bit.
The idea of there being “no building materials on site,” and “no foundation poured,” simply goes back to inexperience, and naivety. It’s pre-construction; delays are automatic. I’m not going to belabour this point.
But then somehow attaching the fact that the project hasn’t started building yet to the idea that “we’re paying more than somebody who bought a couple of weeks ago,” doesn’t make sense to me.
What’s the issue here?
That somebody who bought a couple of weeks ago paid less?
God help us, folks.
This is what we’ve done to ourselves, as a society.
By removing scores from children’s soccer games, automatically passing high school students who receive failing grades, and electing left-wing governments that promise everything to everyone, we’ve allowed people to believe that they can’t fail.
Failure is a reality in life.
And when you buy real estate, you should know that the price can go up, or down.
Again, from the article: “To come back a year later and see the same house that we bought is now $90,000 cheaper, that’s not cool,” Thompson, 52, said in an interview.
Not cool.
Is that an economic or legal phrase?
Imagine that, folks. The audacity of a developer to sell properties for prices, as they see fit.
The irony is, if the properties were selling for more money, these people wouldn’t be complaining.
But then what about the second-phase of buyers? Could they complain?
What if somebody said, “To come back a year later, and see the same house that this guy bought only 12 months ago is now $90,000 more, that’s not cool.” Would we accept that?
And now, the kicker:
“…Poei and Thompson, who are not looking forward to meeting their Phase 2 neighbours, knowing they paid tens of thousands of dollars less for the same homes.”
Ain’t it the truth, folks?
I remember once when my best-friend of 22 years bought a set of Callaway irons for $750, for which I had paid $1,000 the previous year. So I did what any normal person would do under those circumstances: I kicked his dog, and then never talked to that motherf*cker again…
I know, I know, I’ve said too much.
But guess what?
I’m far from finished…
The Toronto Star also picked up this story, for some odd reason, since I really don’t think it qualifies as news.
“Price drop crushes pre-construction home buyers’ dreams”
Important point here – I’m not faulting the writer. I think she’s awesome, I’ve done a ton of stories with her, and as I’ve learned over the years – sometimes, the story picks you.
But it’s the quotes in here that really get me.
And even worse than the CBC article – this one shows not only the absolute disillusionment of the buyer, but also the complete and utter lack of qualification!
Mariam Boni was among the buyers caught up in Toronto’s scorching property market last January. She says she got an email from Mattamy when the first phase of the development was released. On the appointed date, she waited three hours in line to get a ticket to return to the sales centre the following day.
When she went back, there were only two lots still available and Boni ended up spending $899,000, plus additional money for upgrades, exceeding her target price of $500,000 to $600,000.
Although she owns a home already, she said Queen’s Common would be a better place to raise her son.
Wow.
A lot going on here…
So first, we have a woman that stood in line to get a ticket to buy a home. Can you say, “mania?” I hear Bitcoin came down from $20,000, btw…
Second, she spent $900,000, with a budget of $500,000 – $600,000.
And last but not least, she already owns a home. This was a second property, and while she was probably going to sell the first one, it doesn’t remove the speculative nature of the adventure.
The woman added:
“I have a 3-year-old. I’m thinking about his future, I’m thinking this is a good investment. It’s going to go up in price, I’m going to do something nice for my child.”
Exactly!
You thought it was a good investment. You thought it would go up in price.
You thought.
That’s it.
That’s all you need to know.
There’s no guarantee, nor should there be. If the prices went up, as you thought, would the developer come back to you and cry foul? Would Mattamy Homes go to the Toronto Star to describe the hurt and anguish they feel about selling properties that went up in price, when all the while, they could have held them and made more money?
The developer offered this explanation, which is like explaining to a child how boys and girls are different:
“When (the market) is moving upwards, we obviously raise our prices and when it’s moving downwards, in order to continue to sell and to build and complete the communities, we have to lower our prices to a price point the market will bear.”
Yes, when the market goes up, prices go up. When the market goes down, prices go down. What’s that, Marigold? It’s half-past four?
I honestly can’t believe these stories went to print.
Our imaginations could run wild with the analogies. In fact, some of last week’s readers already beat me to it.
So tell me I’m wrong, folks.
Tell me that these stories were newsworthy.
Tell me that the buyers in these articles have a legitimate beef.
Tell me that peoplekind should be able to buy real estate with absolutely no fear of the price dropping, but with the full expectation that the price will rise.
But do so in the comments below, because I have to leave; I need to go find something sweet. This blog has left me really goddam salty…
The post The Friday Rant: Has The World Lost Its Mind? appeared first on Toronto Real Estate Property Sales & Investments | Toronto Realty Blog by David Fleming.
Originated from http://ift.tt/2nNRXsU
0 notes
Text
The Friday Rant: Has The World Lost Its Mind?
TorontoRealtyBlog
Folks, it’s been a while.
Maybe I’m mellowing as I get closer to obtaining true “middle-aged” status.
Or maybe I simply reached a point where nothing in the world of real estate fazes me anymore.
But here’s something new: there are buyers in the market that didn’t know the price of real estate could fluctuate, and now they’re upset.
This is the p-e-r-f-e-c-t time for me to revive a classic TRB feature, The Friday Rant…
I don’t understand the world today.
And while I know that sounds like something an old man says, I just really, truly seem to have lost touch with the world around me.
The Prime Minister of Canada. Wow. This guy!
Interrupts a young speaker at a town hall meeting, who had the audacity to say “mankind,” to tell her that “we,” whoever we are, prefer to use the term “people-kind,” since it’s more inclusive.
The pendulum has swung so far one way, that it’s about to break through the other side of the universe on the way back.
Sorry, but I don’t like Mr. Trudeau. I think he’s of below-average intelligence, his low self-esteem, ego, and desire to be admired is at the forefront of every decision he makes on behalf of 33,000,000 people, and he has no experience, or ability, to lead.
This is a microcosm of where we’ve gone as a society, and while some think this is steering us in a better direction for peoplekind, I think it’s making us feeble, weak, and eventually we’ll all be incapable of self-care.
The public school systems have done away with “enriched” programs, such as the enriched English programs I took throughout high school that helped make me the writer I am today, so that “everybody can get an equal opportunity.” So in the race to the bottom that has become public education, we’d now rather have a so-called “level playing field,” than ever see an advanced child flourish.
We don’t keep score in children’s sports games anymore. Somebody might get upset to learn that in sports, as in life, there are winners and losers.
Cue the “December Seasonal Concert.”
Change the lyrics to “O Canada,” because it’s one of the worst things plaguing our country today.
Have we ever become softer as a society?
Many of you are already disagreeing, so I won’t go on, with countless more examples, and perhaps better ones, of where our municipal, provincial, and federal leaders have taken us.
But I fear it’s this “guidance” that has brought us to a point where most people in society today refuse to take any responsibility of their actions, especially when those actions are misguided, uninformed, or have consequence of any sort.
As it pertains to real estate, I’m seeing this more and more.
And how could it not transpire, with what we have inflicted upon ourselves?
Recall the story of the “Museum FLTS” condominium project in Toronto, which was cancelled back in November.
The newspapers picked up the story, and made martyrs of these poor souls who entered into legally-binding contracts with a developer who then exercised his right to terminate the project. I wrote about it on my blog, and I was extra nice:
Another Pre-Construction Condo, Cancelled. Who Is To Blame?
And despite being told by many that I was too nice, I still received hate mail from people who bought into the project – many of them who were obviously well-versed enough in contract law to not spend the $3,000 on a lawyer that might have educated them on the pros and cons of the stack of paper that was thrust upon them by a salesperson, representing the developer.
Oh, the heat I took! Wow!
I try to take the high road folks, I do. And it took every ounce of strength I had not to share with you the self-pitying, naive, wishful-thinking emails I received from buyers into the project, who read my blog, and took issue.
You wouldn’t believe it, if you tried.
But as bad as that example of “not taking responsibility for your actions” truly was, I think we reached a new low point.
Some of you pointed this out last week, so I know I already have your ear.
“What did the neighbours pay? Whitby homebuyers just found out the answer: a lot less”
This story first appeared on the CBC website on January 24th, and to attempt to read it without shaking your head at least once is a fool’s errand.
The very first paragraph tells you all you need to know:
Planned homes in a new Whitby subdivision are on sale for up to $90,000 less than similar homes in the same development were a year ago.
Right.
Sooooo……….what’s the story?
A person who can tell time, tie their shoe, and breathe in-and-out, could probably ascertain that the price of real estate, believe it or not, can fluctuate.
Prices go up, prices go down.
Like the stock market, or spot gold. Bonds, or treasury bills. Corn futures, or Bitcoin…
But the story here, folks, is that some of the buyers who purchased real estate last year, and who saw the value decrease, are, well, upset.
“It’s painful,” Astrid Poei said in an interview. (from the article)
That’s fair. Nobody is expecting this person not feel the sting of an on-paper loss, for a property not built, which in effect, doesn’t really mean anything.
“There are no building materials on site, there is no foundation poured, so I don’t understand how we are paying more than someone who bought a couple of weeks ago.” (from the article)
Here’s where things go off the rails a little bit.
The idea of there being “no building materials on site,” and “no foundation poured,” simply goes back to inexperience, and naivety. It’s pre-construction; delays are automatic. I’m not going to belabour this point.
But then somehow attaching the fact that the project hasn’t started building yet to the idea that “we’re paying more than somebody who bought a couple of weeks ago,” doesn’t make sense to me.
What’s the issue here?
That somebody who bought a couple of weeks ago paid less?
God help us, folks.
This is what we’ve done to ourselves, as a society.
By removing scores from children’s soccer games, automatically passing high school students who receive failing grades, and electing left-wing governments that promise everything to everyone, we’ve allowed people to believe that they can’t fail.
Failure is a reality in life.
And when you buy real estate, you should know that the price can go up, or down.
Again, from the article: “To come back a year later and see the same house that we bought is now $90,000 cheaper, that’s not cool,” Thompson, 52, said in an interview.
Not cool.
Is that an economic or legal phrase?
Imagine that, folks. The audacity of a developer to sell properties for prices, as they see fit.
The irony is, if the properties were selling for more money, these people wouldn’t be complaining.
But then what about the second-phase of buyers? Could they complain?
What if somebody said, “To come back a year later, and see the same house that this guy bought only 12 months ago is now $90,000 more, that’s not cool.” Would we accept that?
And now, the kicker:
“…Poei and Thompson, who are not looking forward to meeting their Phase 2 neighbours, knowing they paid tens of thousands of dollars less for the same homes.”
Ain’t it the truth, folks?
I remember once when my best-friend of 22 years bought a set of Callaway irons for $750, for which I had paid $1,000 the previous year. So I did what any normal person would do under those circumstances: I kicked his dog, and then never talked to that motherf*cker again…
I know, I know, I’ve said too much.
But guess what?
I’m far from finished…
The Toronto Star also picked up this story, for some odd reason, since I really don’t think it qualifies as news.
“Price drop crushes pre-construction home buyers’ dreams”
Important point here – I’m not faulting the writer. I think she’s awesome, I’ve done a ton of stories with her, and as I’ve learned over the years – sometimes, the story picks you.
But it’s the quotes in here that really get me.
And even worse than the CBC article – this one shows not only the absolute disillusionment of the buyer, but also the complete and utter lack of qualification!
Mariam Boni was among the buyers caught up in Toronto’s scorching property market last January. She says she got an email from Mattamy when the first phase of the development was released. On the appointed date, she waited three hours in line to get a ticket to return to the sales centre the following day.
When she went back, there were only two lots still available and Boni ended up spending $899,000, plus additional money for upgrades, exceeding her target price of $500,000 to $600,000.
Although she owns a home already, she said Queen’s Common would be a better place to raise her son.
Wow.
A lot going on here…
So first, we have a woman that stood in line to get a ticket to buy a home. Can you say, “mania?” I hear Bitcoin came down from $20,000, btw…
Second, she spent $900,000, with a budget of $500,000 – $600,000.
And last but not least, she already owns a home. This was a second property, and while she was probably going to sell the first one, it doesn’t remove the speculative nature of the adventure.
The woman added:
“I have a 3-year-old. I’m thinking about his future, I’m thinking this is a good investment. It’s going to go up in price, I’m going to do something nice for my child.”
Exactly!
You thought it was a good investment. You thought it would go up in price.
You thought.
That’s it.
That’s all you need to know.
There’s no guarantee, nor should there be. If the prices went up, as you thought, would the developer come back to you and cry foul? Would Mattamy Homes go to the Toronto Star to describe the hurt and anguish they feel about selling properties that went up in price, when all the while, they could have held them and made more money?
The developer offered this explanation, which is like explaining to a child how boys and girls are different:
“When (the market) is moving upwards, we obviously raise our prices and when it’s moving downwards, in order to continue to sell and to build and complete the communities, we have to lower our prices to a price point the market will bear.”
Yes, when the market goes up, prices go up. When the market goes down, prices go down. What’s that, Marigold? It’s half-past four?
I honestly can’t believe these stories went to print.
Our imaginations could run wild with the analogies. In fact, some of last week’s readers already beat me to it.
So tell me I’m wrong, folks.
Tell me that these stories were newsworthy.
Tell me that the buyers in these articles have a legitimate beef.
Tell me that peoplekind should be able to buy real estate with absolutely no fear of the price dropping, but with the full expectation that the price will rise.
But do so in the comments below, because I have to leave; I need to go find something sweet. This blog has left me really goddam salty…
The post The Friday Rant: Has The World Lost Its Mind? appeared first on Toronto Real Estate Property Sales & Investments | Toronto Realty Blog by David Fleming.
Originated from http://ift.tt/2nNRXsU
0 notes