#i wanna use the word hegemonic though

[crowaes]

i didnt get too much into academic theory when talking about slow damage but theres a pretty large section of the sweet pool review where i go into horror as a method of revealing social anxieties and the social function of horror. particularly- how sweet pools parasites and the categories of osu and mesu both critique and take on elements of misogyny within society. its the kind of thing i regularly do for college and i think is a super obvious examination. but i feel literally insane writing for youtube because theres so much extra stuff i have to contextualize here

[oodlenoodleroodle]

I want to add some things as a cultural heritage professional, sorry about the long post.

I use that word (cultural heritage) because that is the more specific term for what this post is talking about under the broader term culture (like, nobody here is talking about company culture for example, which is a different thing though still culture).

Cultural heritage has two forms, tangible and intangible.

Tangible cultural heritage is stuff like heirlooms mentioned above. This is the stuff that museums collect. For example the Liberty Bell is white American tangible cultural heritage. So if you wanna start figuring out what is considered* cultural heritage around where you live, you can visit either your nearest local history museum or some kind of a national history museum and see what they have. Or explore their online materials if visiting is not possible.

* Considered by who? Who makes the decisions? Who collected the objects and why did they want those ones instead of some other ones? White American culture has regional differences too, and you see it most clearly with how Civil War is treated as heritage.

(Art is also part of cultural heritage; natural history museums collect natural heritage, and the natural heritage of the location we live in influences both tangible and intangible cultural heritage a lot!)

.

Intangible cultural heritage is the stuff that only exists when people do them, and most of what ms-demeanor listed counts. This stuff cannot be preserved in a museum, it can only be passed along or it will cease to exist. Sometimes the results of intangible cultural heritage become tangible, like, making clothes is intangible cultural heritage but the clothes that get made are tangible cultural heritage.

Basically culture is about how people do things. As humans we need shelter from the elements, we need food and drink, we need relationships with other people, we need entertainment for our huge brains, etc. But different cultures solve those problems differently. What is normal bread like for you? It's different for you in America than what I think of as normal bread as a white Finnish person living in Finland.

Compare and contrast is actually a helpful way to figure out what is your culture's way of solving problems. You can look at the way things are done in a different culture and then look at how you do that thing. In China and Japan people use chopsticks as eating utensils; in your culture you use a fork and knife. Just because forks aren't unique to white American culture doesn't mean they aren't part of it. All cultures are a mix of unique and shared elements.

Last term, and this is the marxist in me talking:

Hegemony. Marxists refer to liberalism as the hegemony in political life but the idea of hegemony also applies to culture. If you know that little story about fish that don't know what water is, that's hegemony. You have been taught by the society you live in that something is so normal and so take-it-for-granted that you don't need to even think about it. It's invisible. You didn't agree to this setup, no one did, it just happened. And it's not good for anyone. Having one group's way of doing things be the norm is harmful to both that group and to everyone else.

But something interesting is happening right now about this: climate change is forcing people to do things differently, and it is threatening the hegemony. And thats when it becomes visible. How central is eating meat to white American/Finnish hegemonic culture? You find out fast and loud when you refuse to eat meat around people who want to uphold the hegemony. All the proposed solutions to climate change that would require people to change how we do things are in essence asking people to change their culture. Some people are more open to this change, and some people are less open, some people are outright threatened by the very notion.

'White Americans don't have any culture, they're just [normal/boring/generic/empty]. 'Culture' is when you're quaint and exotic and have interesting ethnic foods and holidays." is such a grating bit of nonsense to have somehow become progressive commonsense in a lot of places.

[fatehbaz]

hi i was wondering if youd read/recommend the book animal geographies? i was thinking about reading it off a friends recommendation but they normally dont read much on ecology so. i figured you might have a more discerning eye.

thanks no matter what, i really appreciate the excerpts you post on your blog a lot

Hi. Thank you for the kind words and support.

Wanna preface my response by saying that I never want to place too much value/attention on academia, physical books, formalities, institutions, European/US knowledge systems and their hegemonic “classifying imaginations”. In other words, it’s cool to be careful to not to place too much emphasis on texts/books, especially when we’re specifically reading about animal autonomy and critical/radical perspectives on human-animal entanglements in colonialism/imperialism/extractivism. But there are some good books. I’ve read Animal Geographies. Pretty good for the time that it was published, which was 1998. But there has just been such an enormous amount of new thinking/writing that has happened, especially since 2010-ish (in the past 10 years or so), featuring more focus on animal agency/autonomy and featuring newer, non-white, non-Western, anti-colonial perspectives and better holistic and/or interdisciplinary inclusion of other disciplines (human geographies, imperial histories, etc.) that it now seems introductory or dated.

It’s an anthology. A similar, newer anthology I’d recommend would be something like

-- Animal Places: Lively Cartographies of Human-Animal Relations (2018, edited by Bull, Holmberg, and Asberg).

-- Critical Animal Geographies: Politics, intersections and hierarchies in a multispecies world (2017, edited by Kathryn Gillespie and Rosemary-Claire Collard)

-- Affect, Space and Animals (2017, edited by Jopi Nyman and Noraa Schuurman)

-- Shared Lives of Humans and Animals: Animal Agency in the Global North (2019, edited by Tuomas Rasenan and Taina Syrjamaa)

-- Historical Animal Geographies (2018, edited by Sharon Wilcox and Stephanie Rutherford)

(I prefer to cite/learn from diverse sources. Unfortunately, all of these anthologies are from the same "human-animal studies" publishing series, but still.)

I like anthologies because sometimes we/readers don’t have time/attention for a full-length investigation/book and sometimes it’s nice to get snippets, like a sampler platter, of various threads of new thinking, especially since a lot of the language in “critical animal studies” disk horse is so new.

-------

Not to knock A.G. though. Animal Geographies would probably be included in a list of “classics” of the genre, along with Crosby’s Ecological Imperialism (1986), Harriet Ritvo’s The Animal Estate: The English and Other Creatures in the Victorian Age (1987, though I also love her other related book, The Platypus and the Mermaid and Other Figments of the Classifying Imagination); Virginia Anderson’s Creatures of Empire: How Domestic Animals Transformed Early America (2004); and Breeds of Empire: The ‘Invention’ of the Horse in Southeast Asia and Southern Africa 1500-1950 (published in 2007 by Bankoff and Swart, who explicitly criticize the eurocentric focus of “animal studies” and environmental history disciplines). There is a whole array of these kinds of animal studies books/articles that focus specifically on Victorian British/US manipulation of animals and taxonomy, race, geography, colonialism, etc.

But by around 2010, anti-colonial and non-Euro-American stuff got far more attention in formal publishing, and the agency/autonomy of animals as actors and living beings got much more attention also. Some of these “new classics” include Kathryn Yusoff’s work; Gorgeous Beasts: Animal Bodies in Historical Perspective (an anthology from 2012); Anna Tsing’s The Mushroom at the End of the World (2015); Centering Animals in Latin American History (an anthology from 2017); and Mikhail’s work like Nature and Empire (2011), The Animal in Ottoman Egypt (2016), and Under Osman’s Tree (2017).

After 2017-ish or so, studies on animal autonomy, animals as agents, animals in imperial/colonial context, etc. have flooded bibliographies. Some of the publishers which promote a lot of this kind of work: University of Arizona Press, University of North Carolina Press, UC Press, and Routledge.

Hope this helps. :)

[clonehub]

I read some of your more recent posts on the topic, and wanted to ask: what do the terms "proship" and "antiship" mean to you? Half the discourse is from what these two mean, as like every nebulous internet term, multiple definitions exist. "We're trying to prevent the return of all the censorship that targeted queer circles in the name of "the children!" or "We're trying to make people aware fiction does affect reality via one's subconscious bias!" Just wanna prevent any future misunderstanding

in general anon, a "pro ship" is someone who allows any and all kinds of ships in the name of personal enjoyment and "it's fiction it's not real". the censorship thing is secondary because they'd know that most of the censorship that goes on today is from a government or other hegemonic system against an oppressed class, i.e. racial equality groups, gender equality groups, queerness or other things being taken out of media, etc. so like being called a freak on twitter (and with a notable lack of actual action against the proshipper) is not censorship.

An "anti" is a bit more broad as a term cause simply not liking a ship can get one labeled an anti. There's no limit, maximum or minimum, to the number of ships one opposes that'll get them labeled an "anti" by a proship. So back before these words existed, me being only aware of Rexsoka as a ship and being against that would have gotten me labeled an anti. Someone could be pro every ship in the world but Rexsoka and still be labeled an "anti". I dont use anti and I dont label myself one.

Proships do jump to censorship/thinly veiled "freedom of speech!" arguments when they encounter anything they deem "anti behavior", although that censorship comes in the form of (perhaps) finnpoe not being canon and poe being forced into a weird romantic history with that lady in tros. Shipping what is, by definition, a pedophilic relationship does not combat censorship.

antis are too broad and varied as a group to really pin down a set philosophy other than "stop jacking it to things that are pedohphilic and/or straight up bigotry". Proships insist its not any of those because it's fiction (which? lol). I use the following logic:

- You could ship Finn and Poe. That is a gay couple. The word "Gay" might not exist in star wars, but it applies despite finnpoe being fictional.

- you could ship finnrey. That is a hetereosexual interracial couple. The above is also an interracial couple. Nobody denies that the characters are different ethnicities despite star wars not being real.

- you could ship Yoda and Jar Jar. Nobody denies that that's interspecies and also an age gap. In fact, proships will tag all of the above with the relevant tag (gay, agegap, etc)

- God forbid you use this logic to point out that a ship is pedophilic. They jump from its just fiction to "that doesn't make me a bad person because i'd never act on it" (even though we know that actions are not the only determiners of being a good person, and also like closet fucked up people exist and socially they are shunned)

Sorry to turn this into an essay anon, but I really have no patience for them and this started out as a mostly neutral "definition" on what proship and anti mean.

[neshabeingchildish]

Poly Wanna? Ch.3

A/N: Anonymous Guest - If you’d like to have a chat about these things, say it with your chest, and I’ll say my part. We’ll have an exchange. If you want to use the space set aside for reviews without identification or giving me the opportunity to reply to you personally, then I have to give you the two cents here and everyone has to be subjected to it. It’s an M rating story, so I’ll presume you have your big girl panties on and can take a reply and for anyone else around, in case they have some confusion about my stand on these things, this applies to all.

I just want to remind everybody that this is free labor and if you want somebody to do anything on your timetable, you oughtta go ahead and fund them. You don’t? Cool. Take wtf they’re willing to give you. Or leave it. None of us have to be here. If you’re here because you would love to read a story that I am currently writing, I’d love for you to stick around and will give you the best story that my skills have to offer, free of charge and therefore not obliged to demands. If you’re here to be an executive producer with a production schedule, you made a wrong turn at the intersection of Fuck You and Pay Me. Thanks for your time. I understand if ours together has come to an end. Read what brings you what you want to see and feel, and I’ll write what brings me that WHEN I write it! 

I will abandon this and delete it before turning over authority on what happens here to anybody, or subjecting myself to being treated like a content mule. Juneteenth happened, Sis. You don’t have no slaves here. In the immortal words of my mama, and many-a-Black-mamas, “I’m not one of your lil’ friends.” You better approach me like you got some sense if you trying to ASK ME to do something for my consideration. Peace and many blessings. And now, my update…

@adorkable-blackgirl  @chenoahchantel @cactus-con @up-the-tube @riebellion  @itsyaapollochild@oof–musicals @lesbian-so-what @woahjusttakeiteasy-man @meadowstryingtobepretty @imma-sensitive-btch @okaygal21 @midernacht @divinereign4ever @xoxoemille

A Very Henry Morning

Henry generally woke up in just enough time to blend some juice and watch the sunrise over Swellview, the city that he fought everyday to protect. It was a lasting ritual, from whenever he was with Charlotte. She would always get up super early for yoga and meditation, blend them some juice, then, he’d get up and watch the sun rise with her. The first time, she tapped him to wake him and said, “Sorry to wake you, but you’ve gotta see this.” He quickly rushed out of bed, wondering if a Swellview emergency was underway. This was more important! She went to the balcony of their apartment, cute body clad in her yoga gear and just stared at the rising sun, in awe. “It’s like whenever the day starts anew, not only is it another chance to get things a little more right, but she really brings the day in, in style.” Charlotte was smiling as the morning got gradually brighter and staring at the lifebringing star until it became too bright to behold. Henry was looking at her.

He wanted to ask her if she really thought that was worth waking him up this early, knowing that he went to sleep late at night after crime fighting, but just the way she drank it all in and the way it became a little brighter and a little warmer as he drank her in… Instead, he’d said, “Tomorrow, wake me up earlier! We almost missed it,” and gave her a kiss on her cheek. Presently, he had been doing this without her now for 6 years. “She really brings the day in, in style,” he would say out loud to himself, every time. For years, he did it hoping that Charlotte was somewhere out there, doing the same and that for that moment in time, they were connected again. He would imagine her in whatever her current form had been from (cyberstalking her) and he would recall the way that she looked whenever they first did this.

When he was with Jasper, he didn’t share that moment with him. It seemed unfair to Charlotte, even though even being involved with Jasper was another betrayal of sorts, the sunrise was holy. It was set apart. It was a part of he and Char that was too big, too bright for anybody, even her to ever be able to take away from him… and he was too selfish to share it with anybody else, even Jasper.

Now, his internal clock was set to make the juice and go to the terrace. He watched the sunrise and then, and only then was he willing to begin his day. Henry usually finished off his juice before the sun rose fully and put the glass into the wash when he came back in. He grabbed his watering pot and went to water all of his plants that needed it and simply check in with the ones that didn’t. “The sunrise was beautiful today. Forecast is that she might scorch you if I let you outside, but I’ll definitely let her in, so she can kiss you all on your little faces,” he said. He himself kissed flowers. He himself touched them lovingly, talked to them, asked nothing more of them than for them to be healthy and flourish, but sometimes shared his life with them. Henry had a therapist, but he knew whenever he spoke to his therapist that he was speaking to a therapist and he, as a therapist sometimes worried about whether he was handling his own therapy properly, or if his fears got into the way of his needs. Speaking with his plants helped him to figure out when he was being unreasonable, irrational, or counterproductive. Because, the way that he spoke with them was like one would a child that they love with their whole heart, explaining things for them to understand, and being honest and realistic, but protecting them from one’s own problems. Accountability mattered when you spoke with someone you loved. You would honestly do whatever you could to make sure that they don’t see you differently and make the declarations to better yourself to them. He did that with his plants, then shared the genuine portions that he walked away with for therapy. They kept him honest.

He kept a 3 foot garden statue of Blodeuwedd in his home and had various depictions of her flowers form in artwork all over the place, along with other deities, myths, legends associated with flowers. He’d keep statues nearby the plants to “protect them,” in that way that a dad looks underneath the bed and in the closet for monsters. He’d collected Flora, Khloris, Hegemone, among others but, Blodeuwedd was his favorite, for some reason. Unless you counted Dionysus! Now, one thing about that guy was that he was known mostly for his partying, yeah? Wine, fertility, ritual madness… People generally thought orgies and drunkenness… which… make no mistake, Henry was not opposed to and would even call himself a fan, but Dionysus was also, among these other fun things, god of the grape harvest… He was a god of fruitfulness and vegetation! Henry felt like it was unfair to simply see him as a wild hedonist when he was to thank for fertility and cultivation. Henry was pro-fair… And maybe, just maybe identified with the demigod, just a little bit. 

Folk rarely saw the portion of Henry that loved as hard as he did when he experienced the sun saying good morning to all of nature and made his first moves of her arrival an offering to those who could not live without her. Now, let’s not get ahead of ourselves, Henry Hart is no mystic. He doesn’t worship the sun, the plants, or any of the gods and goddess spread around his home for the aesthetics. But, whenever he spent time with these plants, whenever he gave love to his flowers, he believed in something greater than himself, and that was all of the faith that he needed to go out and protect this world everyday.

People were fine, or whatever… but also they were human. They were the threats to nature, to the earth, the environment, and all that the sun shone on everyday. Mister Feelgood never had to fight an animal. It was always people that did the evil that required his life’s work to exist. Many moons ago, he had fought a bear, but since then wondered if other steps might have been taken. Captain Man was not one to really do the sensible thing in a fight scenario. 

As he got older, Henry tried to figure out ways to best avoid a fight. He was fast approaching 30, probably would reach it before he knew it, and he was in great shape - the best shape of his life, but he also knew that this vessel expiration date. He wasn’t Captain Man. He wasn’t indestructible, and some of his peers were already discussing that the warranties on their knees had lapsed. A few years ago, he might have replied, “RIP to them, but I’m different.” But, he was showing signs of power failure, himself. He became sore more easily than he did as Kid Danger, well, since the early days, at least. He was sore all of the time from ages 13-15. He thought it would never stop. That his body would ache for the rest of his life. 

By 16, he was accustomed to his hypermotility, trained to perfection in its usage and skilled beyond his wildest thoughts in fighting technique. He didn’t have a single pain for almost 2 years. Then, Rick Twitler stripped him of that. The soreness increased, as he spent more energy to get used to things, but he adjusted pretty quickly and became just as trained and skilled with his normal Henry body. It worked out for him for years, in and out of that outfit. But, by 25, he started getting a little more tired than usual. 

He worked on his diet and regulated his energy levels better. Within another year, he started feeling like he needed more sleep at night. He began a vitamin regimen and looked into some natural remedies for fatigue and sleep deprivation. Now, even his libido was changing. Pre-Charlotte Henry kissed strangers, made out with hot villains, hooked up with any cute flavor that would give him the time of day. That seemed to be normal teenage behavior, in his mind. Post-Charlotte Henry was a little more reserved for a while. He’d had this life changing relationship, failed at it, and wanted to proceed with either extreme self destruction, or instant carnal gratification. There was no in between. He either was a hermit, or a hoe, for months after they broke up, and only tried to moderate that whenever he began seeing Jasper.

Unfortunately for Jasper, Post-Charlotte Henry was still suffering when he picked up what they had, so… while he was truly trying, he still had the tendency to accelerate from hubby to harlot goals in a heartbeat. Unfortunately for Jasper, Henry had not yet gotten to the point where he could honestly and objectively take a look at his own fuckery and see where he messed up and he certainly wasn’t about tackling sorting through his own heartbreak so that he wouldn’t become one of those hurt people who hurt people. Unfortunately for Henry, Jasper was a keeper, and he was still so heartbroken that he lost the one keeper that he could acknowledge back then, that he lost ANOTHER. How the fuck did you throw away two keepers, you egotistical, emotionally stunted, self-centered, sex crazed… He stopped himself. Speak about your mistakes in the same way that you would speak to a friend about theirs. When you have no friends that you can think of, though… Speak to yourself like you would speak to the lost ones. To Charlotte. To Jasper…

He grabbed his hygiene bag - it was like a tactical control bag, but full of his facial and skin care, dental products, and his cleansing and fragrance supplies. The bag was full of things that he used on a daily basis, and also his weekly and monthly care. Henry took care of himself. His hair, skin, and teeth were always a priority that he was sure rubbed off from Char, too. Hell, they were together the first 4 years after graduation. Those were formative years for him. He used to wash his face and body with the same damn soap, his face with his hands and his body with a loofah that he always kept until it fell apart. He used to brush his teeth within 40 seconds. His hair took the most time of everything he did and all he ever did was wash it with a shampoo and conditioner 2 in 1… and if he ran out, the same damn soap he washed his face and body with!

Charlotte got him into separate cleaners and applicators. Like, whenever he washed his face, he didn’t even do so in the shower, because he had an entire process to make sure his face was well cared for and the shower wash wouldn’t be timed right for it. Usually, he did wipe his face in the shower, because of washing his hair and the water and steam, but he didn’t really wash it until he did his face after the shower. The shower itself, he would  wash his hair, let conditioner set in it and then wash his body, some of his parts had different cloths, ALL of the cloths went into the laundry when he finished washing up. He always moisturized his damp skin, and put on his deodorant before his facial routine, which was kind of extensive, but had him looking better at 27 than he had at 17, meanwhile… not to say that Jasper looked bad, but… He definitely hadn’t aged as well as Henry and Char had and perhaps she’d help him, like she helped Henry. 

Her influence had helped him become the casanova that he dreamed himself to be when he was younger. Though lately, his desire had been limited. He didn’t even get off on the thrill of the chase anymore. He was super focused on this television project, so he thought maybe that might be affecting things. He wondered and worried if throughout recording that he might have to play up his sexual conquests so that his life would look more like it had looked for the past few years, or if the show would simply redefine him, or worse, make him look like he was faking for TV, since he didn’t seem to want to go on any dates at the moment. He always went on dates. People knew that. If he wasn’t on a date, he was at a party and he was coming home with somebody’s date.

He had family game night at his parents’ neighbors’ house a couple of weeks before and whenever they were playing word association games. Someone said Henry, and every member of his family said one of the following list: Slut, sex, and STD. He didn’t want to say who said what but at the same time that he told Piper, “I have never once had an STD. I’m a sex therapist for crying out loud!” his mother was asking his father, “Why would you say SEX?” And his “I’m a sex therapist for crying out loud!” Conveniently replied to both Piper and his mom. But… he was still a little embarrassed. Nobody said gardening or flowers. Nobody said therapist. Nobody said even the word that he had been to them for 27 years, 21 for Piper - son, brother, dude who lived with us? He sighed. That was worse than that time that one of Piper’s friends referred to him, not even as Piper’s promiscuous brother… “What was the point of the adjective?” he’d asked.

He wasn’t embarrassed so much as hurt, a little bit. Because all throughout his adolescence, nobody knew him outside of being a friend to hometown faves. Charlotte Page, the smartest girl in town. Jasper Dunlop, a hero and an activist against unjust laws. Ray Manchester, the longest running most handsome man in Swellview. Piper “the Queen of Harts,” child commercial actress and self made public figure/influencer. And someone actually told him, “Honestly, I don’t think anybody would care how many chicks you banged if you weren’t Piper Hart’s brother. You’re a sex therapist and probably a sex addict and you have a sister who began the Holdin’ Out for a Hero chastity challenge.”

Little did that person know, that challenge got Mister Feelgood as much ass as Henry Hart. But, now, for some reason, he couldn’t even think about doing that. He wasn’t sure what was wrong with him until today’s shower. Up until then, he just presumed he was getting old and tired of it. Like, dating was exhausting sometimes and parties seemed louder than they used to. Sex? Still awesome. That could never change, but… whenever he had the chance for any, he would prefer to pass. 

He had a date the night that he asked Jasper to speak with him about the venture. “I wanna ask Charlotte, as well, but I still have no access to her,” Henry said, casually. There wasn’t a hint of sadness in his voice or even in his heart at that moment, because it had been nearly seven years and Charlotte being out of the loop and out of his life was commonplace, now.

“Does it pay, because I can probably get her to entertain the thought, if it does?” Jasper asked.

“Who are you talking about?” Henry heard a voice ask in the close background… Like real close… like.. Either hovering right over Jasper’s shoulder, or sitting in his lap close.

“Shhh. You,” Jasper said. Like… their voices seemed to be coming from the same place.

“Don’t you SHHH me!” She snapped and it was right in Henry’s ear! Like she was holding the phone. Even with her being loud and angry in his ear, this was one of the sweetest sounds Henry had heard in years. Her actual voice. She sounded different, older, but pretty much the same. Her language and tone definitely brought back memories. All he had was old footage of her at different times. This was more than he bargained for whenever he called Jasper’s phone. He didn’t even know that they were in communication with each other and they sounded… so close…

She and Jasper were fussing and sounded like tussling, probably Jasper trying to move the phone away as he softly said, “Henry’s asking me about meeting up with him at the old spot about some business.”

“Oh,” she said, and then her voice faded into the background saying, “Well, yeah, I’d talk to Henry for money, I guess.”

Jasper whispered something to her that Henry couldn’t hear, then it sounded like he kissed her? Then it sounded like she giggled. Henry… felt… so odd in that moment. Jasper returned to the call and said, “Sorry. Charlotte knocked me off of the bed,” he laughed.

“The bed?” Henry repeated, halfway in a daze, halfway like he didn’t understand the word or phrase the bed was what you said about your bed. Was he and Charlotte in this bed together?

“Yeah,” Jasper seemed to read his mind. “You.. haven’t seen any of my posts tagging her?”

“No, she has me blocked on everything.”

“Yeah, but I don’t.”

“She actually went into the programs and made them to where Schwoz can’t hack her, so I’m sure she’s got a way for me to not even be able to see her through someone else’s feed.”

“Oh… well…” Jasper laughed a little bit uncomfortably. He had thought that Henry knew, but he could tell that he was just putting it together, “We’re a couple now!” He cheered. “It’s still new, but… yeah..”

Henry wasn’t quite sure which of the multitude of emotions would wind up taking over for the night, but in that moment while he let a silent tear fall, he cleared his throat, put on his happiest voice and said, “That’s awesome for both of you! You two deserve people like each other. Bring her along to the brownstone for the meeting, then. That’ll be good..” After he hung up, he cancelled his date. He didn’t want to put his mixture of emotions on anyone else tonight. That night, he opened a bottle of wine that he was saving for some special occasion or another… He never really had special occasions, so mostly wine that he saved for special occasions either remained right where they were, or rarely, there were nights like that night, where the occasion was that he found out the love of his life and the person he regretted hurting the most were together… and he didn’t know which one of them was which, even as he contemplated that fact. Both of them were, in their own ways, the love of his life. Charlotte had been his first love. Jasper had been his second chance. He didn’t fully grasp either of their importance until their presences were snatched away. Neither of them are that foolish. They’ll recognize what they have in each other and it will last forever. His lost ones. The ones that got away. They’ll have a great love. A beautiful love. A strong love. And… he might not ever be able to witness it, if he can’t charm Charlotte into putting up with him, but maybe worse, he’ll be able to and have access to her, then he’ll see it take place and mourn from the outside that they had (what they deserved) without him. He drank the entire bottle and fell asleep on the daybed on the terrace. He hadn’t felt sexual since then.

But, after he met up with Charlotte and Jasper, something happened. He grabbed his hygiene bag, like we covered before, he went to prep and recalled how Charlotte helped him step his game up, then he was thinking about when they used to share showers. She liked that. Sharing showers and stories in the steam, washing each other’s backs and each other’s hair, kissing, touching, oiling each other up to nourish the skin… everything else. 

He wondered as he was washing off if she was doing that with Jasper now… Making him hotter, cleaner, flawless, while engaging in conversations that bring them closer together and just being sexy AF in the process. If they were in the shower, kissing, touching… everything else and before he knew it, he definitely was feeling sexual again. His libido had not failed him after all. It was the shower, so he made quick work of handling his business and moving along. However, when he got out of the shower, and prepared to do his face, he saw that he looked refreshed. He looked happy again. He at least looked like he was himself, again. So… Maybe he wouldn’t be on any dates any time soon, but fantasizing about Charlotte and Jasper wasn’t harming anyone and seemed to help him a lot this morning. So, that was what he would do, if he needed that.