#if anyone needs some aggressive strawberry plants i have hundreds

[balkanradfem]

The garden cleanup

I've decided to tackle the stuff thats immediately important first! Since the kale is in its peak, I'm cleaning that up, not that it seems bothered, but it's nice to have something visibly thriving in the garden.

Things are already looking better, and this just took 15 minutes!

While I was carefully pulling the weeds up, I discovered something unexpected; onions. I have tried to grow onions from seed this year, and a few of them made it to the garden, then one day I couldn't find them anymore, and I concluded they failed or got eaten by slugs. But the reality was that I forgot where I planted them and they got overgrown by grass. Three have survived!

They made these small bulbs that you're supposed to plant in order to get big onion heads, but since they're supposed to be planted in the fall, and it's fall now, I'm just gonna leave them in, hopefully they turn into big onions by summer. I won't harvest these because I hope they could grow to seed and then give me more onion seeds. Onion seeds lose germination rate fast so I need new ones.

Next thing is this leek! I could harvest and eat it, but I would prefer to let it grow another year, and then it could give me lots of leek seeds, which I need by now, my seeds are old and losing germination rate.

This one was easy too, it took me 5 minutes to get it clean.

Now I want to tackle the strawberries; this specific spot on the picture was supposed to feature monthly strawberries, or 'magic strawberries' which is a variety that will grow strawberries every month. But the problem is, I planted them next to my 'normal strawberries', and the normal ones are much more aggressive and clone themselves rapidly, so they started suffocating my magic strawberries. I wasn't paying attention, I just assumed things are fine.

I can recognize the magic strawberries by the fact that they're almost always in bloom! So I pulled out the weeds, and all strawberry plants that don't have little flowers, and I ended up – with just three plants.

But that's okay! These three if left in clean soil, will let out shoots and clone themselves, I just need to make sure the normal strawberries don't suffocate them. Look at them trying to make strawberries in october, bless!

Onto the normal strawberries!

So the problem with weeding strawberries is that you incredibly easily pull out the strawberries together with the weeds; their root system is so shallow and barely holding onto the ground, they get pulled up if you accidentally pull on one single leaf. And they come out with full root system and everything. But, if you've pulled out a strawberry plant with a root, that's actually how you transplant strawberries. So you can go 'this was totally on purpose, I meant to move that one over there' and you put it over there, and have it all figured out. But often you don't even transplant it because strawberries are so aggressive you constantly have to pull them out of the garden. It was one of my big shocks just how much time I would spend pulling strawberry plants out of the ground!

This is, in my opinion, enough strawberry plants for the entire bed; after the winter there's going to be 50 plants in there, they're gonna clone themselves and crowd the place, heaven can't stop them. And its to their own detriment! Strawberry bushes that are far apart produce bigger strawberries because they can get more nutrients from the ground!

At this point it's been two hours, I've started feeling tired, all of my pain is acting up, and do I need to burn myself out on this fine day? No. This can be done in little increments whenever, since there's very little daytime, the weeds won't grow fast, I don't need to worry about my work getting undone until April. I managed to find some parsley, which I have no clue how it got there, since I didn't plant it in that spot, I found some little potatoes that can be great seed potatoes in the spring, and the garden is looking more maintained, even with just a few hours of work.

[birdwonder]

Could I get life with the Bucci gang + Trish headcannons from after they defeated Diavolo? Like what do they do after they have freedom to do whatever they want now? Everyone lives AU of course because I miss my children 😔

|| i am a tumblr n00b who can not find a way to directly link my rules into my bio but i don’t take part 5 requests juuust yet. BUT. i have been wanting to write for part 5 so i’ll probably make an exception for you, lovely anon, and do some headcanons/fics i’m able to do in the future, until i’ve finished Golden wind ~! also - you hit my feels man.

 i made them s/o related bc i’m so used to them that i didn’t realise that the request wasn’t specified for that :,) 

Bucci Gang | Happy Ending Headcanons 

Bruno Bucciarati 

- God, he wants nothing more than to finally have some peace and quiet. Remaining in the mafia isn’t even the least of his concerns, instead he wants to know what you want. Whether you joined him on his journey to take down Diavolo or not didn’t matter as he knew that either way, the stress of him dying and you being tangled up in his mess would have been enough to cause premature grey hairs.

- Even if he does return to the mafia as a Capo, he wants a vacation, just perhaps not somewhere in Italy. With Giorno’s new status, and his own being fairly high ranking, he has the funds to take you somewhere away from any gangs and drama. His first idea would be a holiday island so the two of you can relax on the beach and feel the cool water from the pool washing away all the anxieties you once had; a couple spa day would not be out of the question.

- A change in scenery such as a cold country wouldn’t be too bad either, though he feels like the preparation for that would be a little harder as he doesn’t own many winter clothes.

- During the holiday, the two of you would spend every evening in a 5-star restaurant, dining in front of the sunset with joy in your hearts. On your final night of your stay, Bruno seems to be the happiest he’s ever been the whole trip and you can only assume that the effects of taking a break had finally worked on him. “It’s so nice to see you smiling, amore,” you tell him, resting your hand over his own on the clothed table.

- “It’s all thanks to you, [F/N],” Bruno softly explains, standing up while taking your hand into his own, glancing at the slowly falling sun. “I feel like I’ve been through Hell and back, and yet every moment with you so far has been Heaven.” Your heart melts at his words, eyes softening when he turns to look at you. “I’ve risked everything ever since my father died, and it’s made me realise how short life can truly be…”

- You can only gasp when he lowers himself to a single knee, one hand intertwined with your’s and another holding a small, velvet box with a ring fit for you. “I want to cherish every day, hour and second with you, amore. Will you marry me?”

- Whether you say yes or no, he respects your decision and makes it his goal to enjoy ever last day with you in a beautiful house. He still works alongside Giorno and his gang, but never once steps into a fight or situation without you and both of your safeties in mind.

Leone Abbachio

- He needs a drink, and bad. Yet, you stop him and instead force him into your arms on a couch and hold him until you’re crying tears of joy that it’s all over and even he’s close to shedding one or two; his face buried into the top of your head and muttering that he’s so grateful he hasn’t lost you.

- From there, his need to live for something or someone changes. His goal is no longer to be on hand and knee for an authority, but to be with you.

- His loyalty to Bucciarati remains, especially when they had been through so much together, yet much like his friend, he takes things easier. Leone’s mood is not as bitter as it once was and he softens every time he comes home from work to see you waiting for him or you return from your own occupation - both of you ready for some serious intimacy.

- If you’re apart of the mafia, he might pressure you to leave and live easy with his support, but he knows that you’d have to be pretty hard-headed to join the Passione, so leaving won’t be easy.

- After a year or so since the Diavolo incident he’d really want to settle down. Officially, the two of you would be living together by now but the house is just too quiet, which says a lot for such a silent, kept to himself man. During dinner one day, his cheeks are flushed red and he can’t even bring himself to eat or look at you. Worried that you’ve done something wrong, you ask what was causing this mood and the response of “I want children,” makes your fork drop to the floor.

- It’s entirely up to you if you both have children but if you do want to start a family, he’ll be overjoyed. He wants to commit to you and a rugrat or more. After all the shit he’s been through, having the ideal happy family dream is everything he could want. Also, he’d be an incredible father and husband. Nothing comes before his family, not even a mission. 

Pannacotta Fugo

- oh shit oh fuck he’s lost. what does he do?

- There’s a good chance he hasn’t announced his love for you yet, so that’s probably the first thing on his to-do list. He knows he shouldn’t wait for life to take it’s course anymore and that he knows to be with you. Sooo, with pure fear, he pulls you aside and yells out that he loves you and starts to ramble that it’s ok if you don’t feel the same. You shut him up with a kiss and tell him you feel the same.

- After that, he has no real plans. It’s ironic seeing as he’s a strategist who has everything planned out, but he doesn’t have much in mind. Would he stay in Passione? Maybe, maybe not. Fugo has realised that he’s missed so many opportunities when it comes to his education and that he could be using his high IQ for something good, yet he knows no where could handle his anger issues quite like Bucciarati and the others could; aside from you.

- He’s young still, so marriage and a settled life style is too early however he still wants to be with you a lot more. As awkward as they may be at first, Fugo takes you on many dates and makes sure they all end with him shyly telling you that he loves you.

- If he keeps up working with the Passione, he continues to mentor Narancia for sure. Still just as aggressively if the poor boy gets anything wrong.

- Might try to practice using Purple Haze in a way that doesn’t affect the others around him. After all, if he can’t develop himself academically in a educational field, then he wants to grow in other ways. His anger issues and reluctance to use his stand? He wants them gone, or at least manageable to a satisfactory level. Fugo knows it won’t happen quickly or maybe at all, though that doesn’t stop his efforts.

Narancia Ghirga

- He’s going to go to school, baby !!

- And you’re coming with him, whether you were already in it or not. He’s going to become smarter and at least try to experience a portion of a normal growing up experience with your’s and Fugo’s support. Both you and the strawberry man will be begged for tutoring, to which there’s no hesitation for agreeing.

- Narancia is so happy that the whole mess is over and takes you into his arms, kissing you at least hundreds of times, telling you in-between each kiss that he loves you and that he can’t wait to go back to how things were. “I (mwah) love (mwah) you (mwah) so so so (mwah) much! We’re going to (mwah) kick back and relax (mwah) and watch all our favourite movies and (mwah) eat all our favourite foods!” “Narancia, stOoOoP!”

- You don’t have a choice in the matter when it comes to sticking by him. You both are going to live free and happy, with no cares aside from homework and upcoming tests. 

- He’ll probably stay in Passione but makes time for school. It’d be a waste to not use Lil’ Bomber/Aerosmith and he wants to stay close to his gang until forever.

- Celebratory torture dance anyone?

Guido Mista 

- Both he and his sex pistols are all over you once they realise that you’re all free from the gruelling mission. His hands are under your arms and he picks you up, swinging you around with so much cheer that hearing anything but his joyous yells of, “we did it!” is impossible. At the same time, his sex pistols are crawling up your arms and towards your face, hugging your neck and face with their own mini cheers of victory. Eventually, they each place an individual kiss on your cheek while Mista plants his own right onto your lips.

- He sticks with the Passione as Giorno’s right hand man, living in the joy of being a top dog and working alongside his friends. With all that they sacrificed, he’s enjoying everything that he does.

- Much like Fugo, he feels as though he’s still too young to marry or start a family immediately. Instead, he helps set you up with your own job and visits you every lunch break to spend time together. If you’re in the mafia, he begs Giorno to let you work alongside him, which was probably the new Don’s plan from the get-go, otherwise he visits wherever you work whenever he can. If he doesn’t have the time, he’ll text you with a cute image of him at work to which you reply with your own.

- Oh, even without starting the family, Mista’s mini stands definitely act like you’re their mother. Everytime they see you it’s constant cries for food and attention, and sometimes they can only be calmed down by your affection, not even Mista can make them work well without them at least seeing you recently. Suppose that’s all apart of a stand being the true nature of a person. 

- Mista likes to spend his new raise in pay on himself and you. More rented movies, more lavish items, tons of gifts and bouquets that you insist you don’t need! 

- You guys would probably move in together just because he likes coming home to you and telling you about his day, or seeing your smile after doing nothing but stand around next to Giorno. He’ll lie at first and say it’s for the sake of controlling his sex pistols because they can’t get enough of you. 

Giorno Giovanna 

- Aw yeah, who’s head bitch now? This guy.

- He works day and night to make sure his dream becomes a true reality, not letting the opportunity that his gang members and you have given him by risking your lives by even associating with him. 

- Giorno’s head is in the game and he hits the floor running as soon as he’s the new boss, not wasting any time in claiming land and setting people straight with his new rules. 

- This leaves you a little down in the dumps. After all that, and he still wants to work… It’s only right that you grab him by the face and tell him that he deserves at least some sort of a break, preferably with you.

- Realising that he really does, and so do you, he complies by having at least a week of resting, eating fine food and doing whatever you want as money was no longer an object to him.

- Mafia or not, you’re his right hand aside from Mista and the others. He’s had a bad day or really doesn’t know what to do with all the work he has? You swoop in and relax him, telling him that it’ll be ok and suggesting ways that he could deal with things. 

- Mista jokes by saying you’re like his secretary like in those cheesy romantic movies and you come in the next day in a formal, assistant like outfit and Giorno’s heart stops. All and every ‘appointment’ for that day is cancelled.

- “I’m so proud of you Giorno, you got what you wanted.” You tell him, brushing a hand through his hair. “The love of my life and a fulfilled dream? Definitely, amore.” 

Trish Una

- She’ll probably want to stick by the you and the Bucci Gang since you all supported her so much. Plus, she wants to improve on using her stand, especially if it’s for good.

- The two of you are glad to be together and spoil yourselves rotten with a shopping trip and a long spa day or two. You spend a lot of hours hugging and comforting her as she definitely breaks down in tears after all she’s been through has caught up. Even if she tries in front of the others, she can’t hide the stress that’s been hitting a rubbery wall and waiting to break through.

- If you cry too, she’ll laugh and say “look at us. Aren’t we just the perfect mess?”

- She isn’t really sure about how or where she wants to live though she wants to see you a lot, maybe not 24/7 just yet but at least close to where you live. If you do end up living together, she’ll enjoy it all the same but will make sure she works hard or longer outside of the home so coming back to see you is a breath of fresh air. 

- Trish would want to have a committed, set life after all the bumps she’s had before. She knows who she is now, so from here on she’s going to be finding new parts of herself. From finding new hobbies and interests to doing some exploring across Italy and maybe the world, she really wants to come to terms with herself. 

[skadventuretime]

like crystal glasses, falling

hey guys! i participated in the @soulmakazine2018 with @ahshesgone and this is my entry! please see HERE for ash’s i n c r e d i b l e art; she was the best friend and inspiration for this, and i’m so thankful for her influence on this piece. 

i hope you enjoy!

“Pass the salad, wouldja?”

Forks and knives clink on Tsubaki’s finest china while everyone tucks into the mountains of food before you. It is the biannual Spartoi dinner, an event that had grown organically once the mental scars from the battle on the moon made themselves known. You started coming because you thought humans needed companionship during rough times, but you are no longer certain you know anything about them at all.

Ox is chewing with his mouth open to your left. A gob of something lands on your arm with an impact soft as a fly and just as pestilent, drawing all of your focus to that small spot near the crook of your elbow. You can almost feel the saliva eating into the fabric, sinking closer and closer to your skin and then what will you do, then how will you keep the contamination from spreading through your skin through your veins inside your mind --

“Dude, the salad. Or do you need that in writing, too?”

Black*Star’s sneer splits your focus. His right eye is a nauseating blend of pallid yellow and deep purple, and there are many more small scrapes along his chin as if he had been knocked onto the pavement. Given the jobs he takes these days, he likely had been.

You tell yourself that Ox’s spit will not actually rot you from the inside out, and pass the bowl overflowing with vegetables Tsubaki must have picked from her garden. He takes it from you and doesn’t care that his fingertips slam into yours, doesn’t care that dead skin cells from the both of you are now in free fall, becoming dust.

“Would anyone like more to drink?” Tsubaki asks from the head of the table, a carafe of red wine in hand.

“Please,” says Maka from her right, and Soul shifts beside you.

“Same here,” Kilik adds, one arm around Black*Star and the other around his wine glass.

Yours is empty. It appears your father was right about your humanity, or rather, your distance from it. Alcohol does not affect you as it does your peers, sleep has only ever been a choice, and the smile lines you see at the edges of Tsubaki’s mouth will never crease your face. You are a visitor in their world, an observer and an escort. You do not need to fit in, though you wonder why you share their feelings. Loneliness seems unbecoming for a god.

(rest under the cut, or on AO3)

“She never used to drink,” Soul mutters to himself, as if saying it out loud will shed new light on why that is.

You remain quiet. It has never been your place to judge the souls of man (Leave living to the living, Black*Star once told you, sprawled out to watch the setting sun while his face burned with the glow of it), but there is something about being an observer that leaves you empty. Perhaps like them you are still growing, and in another hundred centuries this malaise will be a hazy dream.

“So Death, got any big gigs coming up? Maybe a plague or a natural disaster we should know about?” Liz is leaning back in her chair, nails lacquered daggers, looking at you with eyes that bring you back to the cold Manhattan night you met.

“Sissy, his name isn’t Death, it’s Kid. Death the Kid,” Patti says, worry lines creasing her forehead.

“Death is what he deals in, sounds fine to me,” Liz replies. She arches a perfectly sculpted brow at you and says, “Well? What’s up and coming in the underworld?”

“He’s not an oracle,” Soul snaps, sitting up. His anger filters into you through the lowkey resonance neither of you can escape at this proximity, and you try to diffuse some calm to him. It only seems to tighten the snarling coil in his soul.

“Aww, defending your new soulmate?” Liz purrs, leaning in. The tablecloth bunches in Soul’s fist. “Thought you’d be surly forever now that you’re not attached to Maka’s hip.”

Thoughts pour into your mind as his soul ruptures into yours, he’s too angry too out of control too why did Maka leave, I was trying to be her friend, what about that night beneath the harvest moon when she put her hand on my heart that afternoon picking strawberries when she took a bite and her lips glowed like stained glass that morning she was humming in the kitchen with flour in her hair that moment when --  

You cut the thoughts with the sharpest knife your mind can muster and grab his hand. You’re okay, this is fine, you’re okay, you tell him, projecting a calm you hope he sinks into. You know he wants nothing more than to lose himself in your combined souls, feather out the edges until he no longer has to be himself. There was a time you had thought you wanted that, too, but after many tear-soaked practice sessions it became clear that you would never be Maka and he would never make you any more human.

Soul exhales through his nose. Maka is still determinedly in conversation with Tsubaki farther up the table, her face turned sharply away. Soul glances at her and then fixes Liz with a smoldering stare. “What about you, now that you don’t have the prestige of being Death’s weapon? Guess you’ll need to find a new sugar daddy.”

Kilik snorts and Black*Star grins. “Attaboy, don’t let her talk to you like that,” he says, purpled skin crinkling around his bruised eyes.

Harvar sighs and tips back in his chair until the front legs lift. “Are you both really going to be like this? We hardly have to see each other any more, does it kill you to act civil for a few hours twice a year?”

Liz snorts and starts talking to Patti about the high-rise penthouse suite she spent the night in a few weeks ago. Next to you, the tension drains out of Soul, and he slumps over his still-full plate. “I hate these things,” he mutters, moving a piece of broccoli around with the tip of his steak knife. “It’s been years since we’ve had anything to say to each other.”

“Speak for yourself,” says Black*Star in tones of mock offense. “I for one love to spend time with people who sit around judging or just plain ignoring each other.”

Maka stiffens and narrows her eyes. “You have something to say to me?” she asks, voice low and somewhat hoarse, like it was the day she requested a personal day to move away from Soul.

“Not everything’s about you, princess,” Black*Star replies. “In fact, I’d go so far as to say most things are not about you. So go on, get back to whatever little conversation you were having to avoid looking your former teammates in the face, Miss I’m-Too-Good-For-Y’all.”

“Now now, let’s be nicer to each other,” Tsubaki says with a nervous hand on her throat.

“Oh come on, we all know she’s not that great anyway,” Ox says from the other end of the table. A faint flush appears in Maka’s cheeks, and you feel the growl building in Soul’s throat echo in yours from the force of his emotion.

“Funny for you to say, Dr.-- oh wait, that’s right, you never could finish your dissertation, could you?” Maka says with a smile more suited for Medusa.

“Oh, real original, go for what has been common knowledge for over a year now; nobody cares,” Ox says, but the hand gripping his steak knife trembles.

“Yeah, get a room already, you nerds obviously need a hatefuck to clear the air,” Liz adds with a jagged smile at Soul.

“Guys, please,” Patti says, hunching over in her chair. “Stop.”

“I dunno, I think we just need to stop having these pointless get-togethers.” Everyone turns to look at Kilik, who has scooted back in his chair like he is about to leave. “What are we playing at? Nobody here actually gives a shit. We fought together when we were kids, but guess what? We were kids! We saw a lot of shit! And now we’re expected to play nice with the actors in our nightmares? No thanks.”

“Nightmares? A little dramatic, don’t you think?” Harvar says, giving his untouched wine a bored swirl.

“Yeah, well, you know, some of us saw a liiiiitle more bloodshed than others,” Black*Star says, teeth glittering. You have to quell the urge to go put a hand on his shoulder.

“Cry traumatized all you want, I’m just saying either deal with it or shut up,” Harvar replies with a shrug.

“I’m going to bring out the roast,” Tsubaki says a little too loudly, and shuffles back into the kitchen.

The reminder that they are guests in her home seems to dampen the mounting aggression. You take a bite of mashed potatoes and wonder if the act of eating is, for you, the same as throwing it away. Does the small enjoyment it brings make it worth the energy the plant used to convert sunlight to sugars, the human effort in feeding and tending the land, the water pulled from faraway aquifers, the fossil fuels burned to transport it to you, Tsubaki’s time in preparing it? You will live either way. The energy for life should not be wasted on a death god.

Tsubaki returns with a beautiful beef roast that she carves on a side table. When the platter piled high with meat comes to you, you pass it straight to Soul and tell yourself that someone worthier of it will now get to benefit.  

“Would you pass the green beans, Harvar?” Maka asks, ignoring the disgusted looks from Liz and Ox. Unease sours your stomach. You don’t remember them being this rude to each other.

“Not really in a passing mood, thanks,” he says, and takes a delicate bite of salad.

You see the old anger flash in Maka’s eyes and open your mouth to say -- something, anything to stop the imminent violence you can see unfolding as if you have choreographed it -- but then Soul stands up. He strides over and grabs the bowl of roasted green beans without acknowledging Harvar’s exaggerated scoff, and then takes the three steps to Maka.

You expect him to place the green beans down near her plate, but instead he waits. Seconds tick by as he stands at her shoulder, bowl proffered, and you don’t know what to make of the sudden stillness from Soul’s side of the bond.

Maka tilts her head back. You feel it when their eyes meet, a buzzing mosquito that has finally decided to land. “Thank you,” she says, and helps herself to a portion of green beans. Soul stands there a heartbeat longer, face full of the depth of emotion that makes you wish again that you were human, before returning the bowl and taking his seat.

Conversation resumes, but it is quieter somehow, less for show, as if seeing what had been the longest-standing partnership speak again made everyone realize that civility has always been a choice. You remember how much their teamwork had always meant to everyone, had meant to you. You frown. Perhaps Black*Star was wrong, and you have living yet to do. Perhaps that, too, is a choice.

What happened between you and Maka? you ask Soul, who is still toying with the food on his plate. It was never something you felt was your business, but now you see that your detachment from the lives of those around you was not because you were concerned about their feelings, but because you did not want to hurt when you carried their souls to the other side.

Far too much, he responds alongside images of all of you trying group resonance, Maka’s expression when she burned dinner, everyone making faces at Stein behind his back during class, Maka holding out her hand. We didn’t know how to be in love and in pain at the same time. I want to be able to talk to her again.

You look around the table at all these people you had fought and laughed and bled beside, and for the first time in almost five years think of yourself as part of the group instead of by nature separate. You have been a fool to believe you should not still care for the lives of your friends even if you will outlast them, because whether or not you're human doesn't matter when you're brave enough to try. So you sit up straighter and ask with a directness you haven’t allowed yourself in so long, “What do you all want to do with your lives?” The question is met with abrupt silence. Everyone turns to look at you with varying degrees of surprise and indifference, which you can’t really blame them for. You don’t remember the last time you addressed them all like this, as a friend instead of Lord Death. “What are you, our high school guidance counselor?” Black*Star says. “Yeah, not to be rude to the boss that hasn’t given a shit about us in however long, but why are you asking now?” adds Liz, ruffling Patty’s hair. “I want us to act like friends again,” says Tsubaki. The worry and uncertainty that had clouded her eyes before is gone, and in its place is a fiery determination you last saw before the battle on the moon. “I want to stop waking up worrying one or more of you has gone and gotten yourself killed —“ a glance at Black*Star, who is fully attentive for once “— and then I want to teach the children of Death City that they are important and loved and will never have to throw away their lives for a conflict their parents or parent’s parents started.” A tear is running down her nose by the time she stops speaking, but her voice does not waver. “I wanna become a botanist,” Patty says with conviction, wiggling out from under her sister’s hand. “I wanna document all the native flora around here and see what kinda cool stuff they might do for medicine or agriculture and whatnot.” Liz looks momentarily taken aback. “I didn’t know that.”   “You never asked,” Patty replies, and looks away. “I want to run for Congress,” Maka says, meeting everyone’s eyes. “I am disgusted about how we were the primary line of defense against kishin for so long, that others couldn’t have been trained in our stead. There must me thousands of people out there with weapon genes who don’t know how to deal with it, and I want to make sure those who are out there know they can learn to control it.”

Soul sits up next to you. “I don’t really know what I want to do,” he says, looking steadily at Maka. I only know who I want to do it with.

The vitriol from earlier in the meal fades. You see tired faces, some nostalgic, others hurting, and a few, like Harvar’s, blank.

“I don’t know what I want to do either,” Harvar says into the silence that followed Soul’s admission. “Nothing at all. What does that leave me?”

You see Kilik nodding while Liz stares at her plate, eyes empty. You are afraid of what you’ll see when you lean forward enough to catch of glimpse of Black*Star’s face, but that’s okay, because you have decided to live.

“I think that leaves you with possibility,” you say, meeting Black*Star’s eyes. “Not knowing means there is room to discover.”

Ox snorts. “Easy for you to say, Lord Death,” he says, putting his hands on the table. “But for the rest of us mortals, we can’t just up and decide to do something and have it all magically work out.”

More nods around the table. Maka is chewing her lip, looking like she has remembered something she would rather forget, and Soul has slumped in his seat again. “You’re right,” you say. "Anything people do takes time, and effort, and there are no guarantees. But it seems to me that the first choice anyone has to make is whether they are willing to try."

“Does any of it really matter though?” Kilik says, fist balled on the table. “The choosing, the decisions, any of it? What does it matter if I work for this job or that one, wear this color shirt or another? At the end of the day, we’re just slowly rotting meat.”

“I thought so, too,” you tell him. “I thought that nothing I did would matter to you, because what does a death god know of how to live? But here we are, really talking to each other for the first time in so many years. I think,” you pause to look around again and see traces of the people you had known bleeding through like sections of old photographs, “I think that will be the key for us. We were told for so long what does and doesn’t matter. Now we have to choose that for ourselves.”

There is another silence, though it is one you cannot place. Tsubaki breaks it after a minute to usher everyone into the living room for dessert and coffee, so you sit on her sofa and imagine what it would be like to see everyone smiling again.

Maka approaches you with two black coffees. “That was a lot,” she says, handing you one. “I didn’t know you had so many feelings.”

“Neither did I,” you tell her, and take a sip. It is intensely bitter.

“It sounded nice, but --” she pauses and looks around the room. You follow her lead and notice that the same small groups are gathered like pockets of the same magnetic charge. You suppose it was too naive to expect anything else.

“Change takes time,” she says, glancing briefly in Soul’s direction. “Unless you force it. But that creates its own problems.” She sighs and takes a step back. “Thanks for saying something anyway. It was a nice reminder that things don’t have to be this way.” She leaves.

You watch her walk over to Soul and place a light hand on his arm. You feel through the bond a wave of surprise and anticipation before you seal it shut in your mind. It is not your place to witness whatever comes next from such an intimate vantage. You do, however, watch the shape of them, hips squared and arms uncrossed. Perhaps something positive will come of this reunion, after all.

Soul sidles over to you once Maka is back in conversation with Tsubaki. “Well, that wasn’t so bad, I guess.”

You nod. “Was it a productive conversation?”

“I think so,” he says, and clears his throat. “She said she was sorry about how she ended things, and that she wants to talk again. She, uh.” He stuffs his hands into his pockets. “She said she still has my old bomber jacket, the one I thought I lost.”

That reminds you of how Black*Star used to take your shinigami mask every time he came to see you and wear it half on, half off until he left. You think of the power in such gestures, and allow yourself to hope.

So you and Soul enjoy some of Tsubaki’s fruit tartlets while quiet conversation hums around you. Every now and then, you catch lingering glances from one group to another, a considering stare where before there would have been outright hostility.

You take another sip of coffee. For now, it is enough.

[skywailer]

How Stars Are Born

Peeta and Katniss soulmate ficlet + angst to the max, requested by anon

They used to say the stars were sweet and giving.  That the stars loved watching humanity’s happiness so much that they kissed every soul before birth, marking their skin with the exact count of Earth days it’d take to meet their soulmate; a kind promise for a blissful future.  They even used to say, if you smiled at the stars, you might just flatter one into telling you a secret.  That a smile could win you the greatest prize of all: the whispered name of your soulmate.

Katniss isn’t one for smiling, no one cares about soulmates, and the stars don’t whisper anymore.  They scream.

They scream and they claw revenge on human souls for what they’ve done to the universe; for killing their brothers and sisters - their lovers in pursuit of greed.  For over a hundred years, Earth’s population has clambered to the top of the ladder, hands reaching for the stars and choking them- converting their wild, bright spirits into the broken, dull shape of weapons and power plants.  And for that, Earth has paid in ways it couldn’t fathom.  

For every star burned, its age is taken from the lives of humans; billions of years in debt etched into the wrists of every life.  A blissful future torn asunder.  A universal trade agreement no one signed off on, but must follow all the same.

Today, Katniss is twelve years old.  She sits in class, pencil limp on her desk as the cosmos uses its own imaginary quill on her wrist.  She watches the numbers scratch themselves onto her skin: 4381.

4381 Earth rotations.  4381 beautiful sunsets.  4381 hunts with Gale.  4381 goodnights to Prim.  4381 days until she must pay her debt to the stars.

Katniss has always excelled in mathematics, even if she isn’t paying attention to her teacher at the moment.  She knows she’ll be dead one day after her twenty-fourth birthday.

It’s shorter than some, longer than most of her class.  Long enough, she tries to tell herself.

Only one person in the room notices Katniss’s shaking fingers when she raises her hand to be excused.  Only he notices the numbers red and cruel on her pulse.

Peeta Mellark watches Katniss leave the classroom, back rigid, proper, and braids perfectly in place.  From the clenched knuckles, he knows her grasp on control will hold long enough to get her to the bathroom.

He raises his hand to be excused, too.

They say the stars are still kind and forgiving, just grieving over broken hearts.  They say if you hold someone’s hand, and wish it so, you can trade the days of your life for someone else’s.  That this is the stars’ lingering love for humanity.  Their final, bittersweet kiss.

It’s a cruel, cosmic joke.

Katniss gives her days to Prim.

She does it while Prim sleeps; her sister’s eyes flaring red and puffy, cheeks smudged and marked from crying into her pillow.  

She does it because she’s fucking angry, that’s why.  She’s quiet and seething, a churning lightening storm on the horizon, wanting to strike down on Earth even if her rage is made manifest in the heavens.  

What did she ever do to those stars anyway?  Her and Prim’s room is dark and dusty, small and poor, insignificant -like their family in the grand scheme of this nasty world.  Like her father was the day his numbers faded in a mine avalanche, a failed attempt to dig -not reach- for energy.  Everyone knew coal had long been pillaged and gone from Earth’s womb, long before suits and countries decided to look to space, not ground, for the answers.  Yet her father had tried, every day until only 1 day was left scratched on his wrist.  Yet the world’s debt was still asked from him.  And now they were asking it of Prim.

Today, Prim is twelve years old.  

Katniss holds her hand as she sleeps, finally, after wasting her birthday in absolute fear of certainty.  The certainty of that number on her dainty, pale wrist- the small, childish wrist Katniss steered through crowded streets as they walked home every day- the soft, agile wrist made for moving needles like their nurse mother- the wrist that was sprained only a month prior when Prim had gone running after her stupid, belligerent cat-

21.

21 sunrises.  21 “good morning” smiles.  21 braids, and bringing broken flowers home to frame, and falling asleep on the sofa while Katniss read to her, and soft hugs and sweet laughs and happiness and-

Katniss’s clasp on Prim tightens, her fingers nearly digging in between those little, light knuckles.  She demands the stars give her this one thing.  This one, damn thing.

2917 days is what Katniss has left.  It’ll have to do, even if it would never be long enough for her sister.  It would never be long enough for this soul.  Primrose’s soul is kind, where Katniss’s is apathetic.  Her sister is sweet and helpful to strangers, she mistrusting and cold.  Soft to hard.  Giving to taking.  Worthy to worthless.  Selfless savior to selfish survivor.  The world is filled with people like Katniss, and not enough wonders like Prim.  She thinks, maybe, the stars still love and long for people like Prim.  Maybe, with more like her, they would have never burned so hot with hatred and cruelty.  Maybe, they would see she was worth more days.  Worth all the days.  

Maybe they knew this, and were just as selfish as she, and wanted to have Prim as their own.

Katniss tells the stars to fuck off, and gives her days to Prim.

When she steps outside to breathe in the first of her last 21 nights, there is a boy.  She spots the back of him slumped on the foot of their doorstep, his blonde hair somehow softer than Prim’s in the moonlight, but his hands much rougher- wrists wider and able to bear more weight.  He’s wringing them.  He’s nervous.

He’s familiar.

Usually, Katniss keeps to herself.  She barely talks to anyone outside of her sister and Gale, hardly grunts at her own mother- though her mind is always, aggressively blaring with thoughts.  With worry.

Usually, Katniss keeps to herself, but that was before she only had 21 days left to think, to talk.

When she sits down beside him, and spots the flutter of a smile on his face, she suddenly remembers his name.  Peeta Mellark, the boy with the longest life.  At least, in her town.  Though, surely, living until the ripe age of sixty was far longer than anyone could dream to hope for.

For a long time, she despised this boy without even knowing him.  But today she realizes what a curse a long life can be.

His eyes are sad when they turn to meet hers.

“Your sister, Primrose, she comes to the bakery every Saturday.  She mentioned today was her birthday, and didn’t come in, so I was worried-”

“She’s fine,” Katniss says rather curtly, defensively.  She loathes the sound of pity, but she likes the sound of his voice.  

“She’ll be fine,” Katniss adjusts and tries to be gentle, realizes with unnecessary dread that she’s just not good at it.

Peeta’s face is kind, like Prim’s, but hardened at the cheekbones.  They seem to turn to mush with her reassurance, crude as it was.  “Good,” is all he says, relief melting his broad shoulders from mountains to hills.  And Katniss is suddenly, strangely greedy to know why he cares so much, what he’s really thinking about, why he’s here.

Then there is a pastel orange box between them, firm hands placing it down with a gentleness that doesn’t compute with Katniss’s sharp senses.  The box is missing the stamp of his family’s bakery.  A birthday cake; half dark chocolate with blueberries, half butter-cake with strawberries, Katniss knows without needing to open.  It’s the same cake she’s found on her doorstep twice every year for the last four years.  She knew it was him, but never said anything.  

She’s not good with words.

But tonight she says “thank you,” though the words come out strangled and awkward.  Because it’s the last year she’ll get to taste her side of the cake.

When she reaches for the box, he doesn’t mention the sudden change on her wrist or the nail marks around that damn, miniscule number.  

Peeta says “you’re welcome” as she stands up and walks away, and Katniss watches him from behind stifling curtains.  He lingers on that lonely doorstep- as though he has so much more he wants to tell her.  When Peeta stands up, Katniss takes a pathetic step back into the shadows, ridiculously afraid and eager for him to knock on the door.  Instead, his footsteps recede into the night.  

He’s good with words.  Just not tonight.

They say stars are always born in pairs, when soulmates meet in the sky.  

A star hasn’t been born in over a century.  They just keep dying.

Prim is upset, and won’t talk to her.  Neither will Gale.  On the other hand, her mom seems to have regained some color to her cheeks, and Peeta Mellark finds excuses to be near.

Day 20 is spent in the forest, where Katniss just fits in better.  Animals don’t speak much, which makes them perfect companions.  Gale brought food over, so she finds no need to hunt, and a squirrel is more than ready to rub in her face how little it cares that she’s there.  It scurries under the bridge of her knees and makes off with a blueberry- right off the top of her cake slice.

“I thought you didn’t like to share,” a sweet breeze brushes against her right cheek and she looks up to see Peeta standing a short distance away.  He looks hesitant to approach, even though, somehow, he fits right in- more than she ever did.  She is a hunter, and her place amongst the trees is as a predator; necessary, but perhaps not always welcomed.  He, on the other hand, appears rooted to the ground like a flower; not exactly necessary, but beloved.  The soil hugs his feet, and the leaves caress him wherever they touch.

It’s obvious why the universe wants him around a little longer.

“I don’t,” she says, but it’s not as monotonous or hostile as usual; it’s nearly playful.  Peeta gets a glimpse of the girl he’d first seen when their wrists were bare and their tongues unknowing of the world’s bitterness.   He takes it as a small sliver of encouragement and sits down beside her.

She lets him take a few bites of the cake.  It is, technically, his anyway.

Day 19 starts rough, because Katniss wakes up to Prim gripping her arm.  Trying to give back what she doesn’t want, not if it means she can’t have her sister.

But Katniss is much more selfish and apparently the world is with her on this one, because the numbers remain the same on both their wrists.  Prim lives, Katniss won’t for long.

She ends up wandering aimlessly through town, and somehow ends up at the bakery.  Craving sweets.

Day 18, the bakery comes to her during lunch, that soft orange box presented with a less nervous smile than before.  He’s still a little jittery and knocks his knee before he sits across from her, but girls are staring- envious, and Katniss has never really paid much attention to Peeta Mellark’s charming and pretty school persona.  She didn’t really care to, but now her days are ticking down fast and she’s developed a curious interest.  Enough so that she talks to him more than she eats.

By the end of school, Katniss decides Peeta is sweeter than sugar and, even though she’s never had a sweet tooth before, she enjoys his company.  More than she should.

When he walks her home, Katniss realizes he enjoys her company a little too much, too.  His hand brushes against hers.  Instinct drives her to hide in the pockets of her jacket.  But it’s also instinct that makes her say “yes” when he asks:

“Can I walk with you to school tomorrow?”

He keeps asking every afternoon, and she keeps saying yes, even though they don’t converse much and even though both their days are numbered- hers drastically more so than his.  But Peeta is comfortable with her silence, seems to know where it comes from, and she enjoys listening to him tell her stories about the bakery, about classmates she doesn’t really know the names of, about himself- those stories she likes the most.  

By the end of the week, Katniss decides Peeta is a complete stranger, yet scarily familiar- damn near making her nostalgic for a home she’s pretty sure she’s never had.  

He’s a mix of shy and social butterfly; has a way with words that puts icing over Katniss’s blunt, and sometimes jagged speech; always knows what she means, even when she doesn’t say a thing.  She realizes with a little too much shock that he’s funny, and likes her own laughter when she’s around him; the blush on his cheeks shows he likes it, too.  And just as shockingly, Katniss forgets about the slimming number on her wrist when he’s around; she forgets they exist on his, too- on everyone.  They never bring it up but, even when it isn’t brought up, those numbers tend to dangle over everyone’s head like an ax- but never with him.

He is peace to her turmoil, and Katniss decides that’s what she needs most in her last days.

The last two weeks are split between Prim, Gale and Peeta.  The first two finally stop giving her the cold shoulder, realizing it’s a waste of time, and start hogging all her personal space; a part of her thinks they’re compensating for the absence of her mother- who shuts herself into her room, staring at the clock.  

The last, Peeta, doesn’t start off so clingy.  He noted how Katniss hid her hands, and takes his time to approach her.  They walk feet apart, then inches, then barely any space between them at all.  She talks more, though still not much, and only when a thought gets so bothersome she throws it out into the open.  Peeta is always there to catch it, and works with what she gives him.  She wants to give him more, and the thoughts are piling up in there with nowhere to go and so little time to ponder, but she’s afraid of overwhelming him- overwhelming herself, and then having to go before the feeling can settle.

They work with what little they have, and Peeta finds excuses to stay close by: coming over to drop off bread and dessert -Prim hastily inviting him in for dinner, joining her in the woods -even though he turns pale when she hunts, sitting by her at school and bringing her lunch, walking her to and from home, and on one occasion stumbling upon her in the dark.

It happens on Day 5, and Katniss’s heart is pounding; what the hell is bravery but a stupid tale in a dusty book?  She isn’t brave, like her sister keeps saying every night they go to bed.  She isn’t brave, and that’s why - when she woke from a nightmare of overwhelming nothing - she bolted and hid away amongst the trees.  She should’ve known this is where Peeta Mellark slept, amongst the dandelions and mother nature’s other beloveds.  

Quietly, he sits beside her, knows better than to touch her.  He waits as Katniss tries to breathe in more regularly, to still the panic into something more manageable.  He takes deep breaths himself, modeling calm for her, and she uses his pulse to steady her own.

“I’m scared,” she admits when her chest doesn’t feel like it’s tearing open, when her lungs aren’t being scorched by hellfire.  Katniss knows she didn’t have to say anything, that Peeta can feel everything she thinks- but she says it anyway, because there’s five days left and her brain is screaming.

“It doesn’t mean you aren’t brave.”

And at that moment, she laughs because there he goes- knowing.  And how is it that when he says it, she believes him?  She always believes what he says, takes comfort in his words and even the absence of them, and she’s suddenly so damn afraid of never hearing him again.  And she’s laughing so rambunctiously, her smile unhinged and wild, that she almost doesn’t hear the desperate whisper of a heartbroken star.

But she does, and it makes her smile even wider, and the tears finally break through.

Katniss lets Peeta hold her, neither making to move when a night mist comes- as though the stars were crying, too.  

Day 1 eases onto the horizon in hushed tones of pink and purple, with her mother and Prim at her bedside when she wakes.  It eases just as softly out, the sky the same color as those bakery boxes, with Peeta at her side.  They sit in those same rooted spots in the forest, watching the night sky between the veins of the tree canopy.

Even though its the stars doing this to her, punishing her for the crimes of others, Katniss can’t seem to muster any anger anymore.  She’s calm, the feeling of loss coming and going in slow waves.  She’s able to remain steady when they hit because of the boy sitting next to her.  The boy she wants very much to hold onto.

Katniss thinks back to the brush of his hand on hers, and curses herself for ever hiding away.

Abruptly, she seizes his hand, and instead of jumping away from her brashness, Peeta smiles and Katniss’s chest feels like it’s tearing open again.  Her lungs are on fire, but it’s nothing compared to where her skin touches his.

In the twilight of her days, she’s never felt quite so alive.  And so very afraid.  Of losing him.  Of dying.  Of whatever comes after.  Because they say there’s an after.

“Stay with me?”  She rushes it out, before time slips completely away from her.  She can feel that stupid number fading from her wrist even at that moment, when her blood is rushing louder than rapids in her ears, her heart pounding as if just after a chase- even when she feels most here, she can feel herself slipping over there.  And she knows he can’t stay with her over there, so as long as she’s here-

His fingers hook around hers, and the crushing strength of his hold makes her wonder if maybe she will see him over there.  If maybe-

“Always.”

Peeta’s eyes are dangerously shimmering, and flaring a sun’s goodbye.  

Katniss falls asleep listening to his heartbeat, pleasantly distracted from her own.

But when she wakes, it’s her heartbeat she hears.  

But why is she waking at all?

She can feel the grass prickling at the exposed skin of her hip, at her ankles.  There’s morning dew, and it’s light out with just a few stars peering down- almost guilty, the edges of her vision hazy, green with life, real.  Her hand is still holding someone’s-

“Peeta?”  

The desperate sound of it mimicks that whisper she’d heard five days ago.  For a second, she wonders if maybe he didn’t hear her- as she nearly hadn’t heard them five days ago.

Katniss sits up on her elbow and peers down at him, the most welcomed and beautiful sight; his eyes closed and smiling like his lips, the most miniscule glisten of something wet down the sides of his cheeks- morning dew; just morning dew.  He’s sleeping, so calm and perfectly fit snug in the folds of grass that his chest doesn’t even rise- so as not to bother the peace.  Just sleeping.

“Peeta?”

Just as desperate as-

Peeta Mellark.

She shakes him then, rough- knowing he won’t mind.  Of course he won’t.  But his eyes remain closed and smiling.  So peaceful, even as tears are burning down her cheeks, fear ripping at her throat.

There’s something off about her wrist, something dark and long drawn over her pulse.

And Katniss realizes why, deep down, she always tried to keep him from holding her hand.  Why he was always there, with her.  Why she can’t bear to let him go now.

16057.

16057 sunsets to remind her of him.  16057 walks home alone.  16057 pastel orange boxes she’d never receive.  16057 chances to hold his hand she’d never get.

Peeta Mellark, the boy with the longest life - the boy whose name a star whispered into her ear - is gone.  Even when he said he’d stay, always.  So she stays with him, instead.  Until Gale comes, and even then, she doesn’t really leave.

They say stars are always born in pairs, when soulmates meet in the sky.

Today, Prim is 20 years old.  She and Katniss sit in a field of dandelions, where nearly eight years before Katniss had slept beside a boy.  The few stars that are still around are out on a clear and kind night, and they look so much gentler than they did years ago.  They are much more giving to children now, but it doesn’t stop the tears from coming as two sisters say goodbye.

Katniss gives Peeta’s days to Prim.

Prim doesn’t see her sister go, not in the way she’d thought she would.  

Her eyes are to the sky, waiting as she holds her sister close even as Katniss’s strong embrace drifts and falls limp, and swears she sees two flickering lights where once there was only darkness.

Maybe what they say is true.

[filosofablogger]

Good Monday morning folks, and welcome to another week!  I hope you had a great weekend and I know you’re eager to get back to the grind today, right?  Um … right?  Hey … where are those cheerful faces and huge smiles?  Well, let’s just see if we can’t find ‘em before you have to head out the door, okay?  You should always start the week with a smile anyway.  So, grab a snack and a cuppa something and prepare to don those smiles!

Shoes, shoes, shoes

Last night I happened across a pair of … shoes. 

Actually, my daughter found them on Pinterest and showed them to me, and I tucked them away in a corner of my cobwebby mind for this post.  Now, I am not able to find a pair for sale (no no no … I do NOT wish to own a pair, but merely wanted to find out what outrageous price was being charged for them), so I have no idea what they cost, but if it’s more than a dollar, it’s too much.  Who in their right mind would wear such a hideous thing on their feet?  Turns out these “Octopus Tentacle shoes” are the creation of Filipino designer Kermit Tesoro.

Tesoro initially came into prominence through his sophisticated shoes that were used by Lady Gaga in many of her tours. He has used various mediums in his shoes such as wood, plaster, steel, leather, industrial resin, coral, and human bones and teeth, all of which have been inspired from natural environs and things found in specific environments.

“I want to translate people’s deviations into my own creations. It’s like a fashion interpretation of the biological or psychological deviation of a person. I’ve always been driven to create clothing articles based on inner conflicts or the inability to control one’s inner impulses or failure to structure one’s behavior in an orderly way.”

Take a look at some of his other creations …

That last one?  I’m not even sure where one puts one’s foot???  I shall stick with my Reeboks.

Ice cream anyone?

Remember back in the day … there were basically three flavours of ice cream:  chocolate, vanilla and strawberry.  Today, there are literally hundreds of flavours.  I don’t get ice cream often, however when I do, my favourite is Graeter’s Raspberry Chocolate Chunk, or else anybody’s Peanut Butter & Chocolate.  Sigh.  Anyway … here in the U.S., Ben and Jerry’s is usually the innovator of strange flavours, and most are a limited time experiment.  But this month, XXI ICE, a company based in Dundalk, Ireland, has the most … unique?  Different?  Yucky … flavour.  Chicken Nugget ice cream.

Mind you, I can tolerate chicken nuggets, though they aren’t my favourite thing to eat, but in ice cream???  Take a look …

I believe I will pass on this one.

Baaaa-aaaa-aaa

In the French primary school of Jules-Ferry in Crets en Belledonne at the foot of the Alps, there are 261 children and 15 sheep registered for classes.  The children will study the usual ‘three Rs’ … Reading, Writing and ‘Rithmatic, while the sheep will study the three Bs … Baaaa-ing, Bleating, and Butting.  They will all study m-ewe-sic together!

Crets en Belledonne is a small town of less than 4,000 people, and in recent years enrollment at the school has declined, prompting the government to tell the school they must cut back on the number of classes they offer.  Since the school offers only 11 classes as it is, any scaling back could pose critical problems in the quality of education. 

It was at this juncture that the parents in the town put their heads together and came up with a plan … a plan to enroll the sheep, increase the number of students, and maintain the same number of classes.  A brilliant scheme, actually, and as it happens … it actually worked!

Even the local mayor hopped on the bandwagon and officially recognized the sheep as legitimate students of the school.  Among the sheep enrolled in the school are Baa-bete and Saute-Mouton.

MUI – Mowing Under the Influence???

Here’s the question … can you be arrested and charged with a DUI for operating a riding lawnmower while ‘under the influence’ of alcohol?  Well, maybe and maybe not.  Maybe it depends on the circumstances.  But if, while drunkenly mowing your lawn, you hit a police vehicle, then rest assured that you can be charged!

Gary Wayne Anderson of Haines City, Florida, learned this lesson the hard way on a Saturday evening earlier this month.  An officer had parked his cruiser and stepped away momentarily, when he heard a loud crash and turned to see Mr. Anderson on his riding mower.  Damage to the cruiser was minimal, but Anderson volunteered the information that he was drunk!

Anderson, age 68, failed the field sobriety test, and was laughing one minute and being aggressive the next, so the officer took him to the nearest hospital, where his blood-alcohol tested more than three times the legal limit, plus they found evidence of cocaine in his blood.  He blamed the cocaine on the police, saying they planted it there.

And thus is born a new acronym:  MUI – mowing under the influence, or MWI – mowing while intoxicated.  Mr. Anderson, meanwhile, is being held in the Polk County, Florida, jail in lieu of $3,000 bond while his grass grows unfettered.

And, of course, if it’s Monday, there must be cartoons, right?

We certainly cannot wrap up Jolly Monday without our cute animal video …

Okay, folks, well … I suppose it’s time to get this week started.  I hope you all have a wonderful week, and please share those gorgeous smiles you’re wearing now with people who might be in need of one.  Love ‘n hugs from Filosofa and Jolly!

Good Monday morning folks, and welcome to another week!  I hope you had a great weekend and I know you’re eager to get back to the grind today, right? 

[etherockj]

Enjoli

I’m newly sober and dog-paddling through the booze all around me. It’s summer, and Whole Foods has planted rosé throughout the store. Rosé is great with fish! And strawberries! And vegan protein powder! (Okay, I made that last one up.) At the office, every desk near mine has a bottle of wine or liquor on it in case people are too lazy to walk the 50 feet to one of the well-stocked communal bars we’ve built on our floor. Driving home from work, I pass billboard ads for Fluffed Marshmallow Smirnoff and Iced Cake Smirnoff and not just Cinnamon, but Cinnamon Churros Smirnoff. A local pharmacy, the same one that fucks up my prescription three months in a row, installs self-service beer taps and young guys line up with their empty growlers all the way back to Eye & Ear Care.

Traveling for work, I steel myself for the company-sponsored wine tasting. Skipping it is not an option. My plan is to work the room with my soda and lime, make sure I’m seen by the five people who care about these things, and leave before things get sloppy (which they always do). Six wines and four beers are on display at the catering stand. I ask for club soda and get a blank look. Just water, then? The bartender grimaces apologetically. “I think there’s a water fountain in the lobby?” she says.

There is. But it’s broken. I mingle empty-handed for 15 minutes, fending off well-meaning offers to get me something from the bar. After the fifth, I realize I’m going to cry if one more person offers me alcohol. I leave and cry anyway. Later I order vanilla ice cream from room service to cheer myself up.

“People love this with a shot of bourbon poured over it,” the person taking my order says. “Any interest in treating yourself?”

***

That’s the summer I realize that everyone around me is tanked. But it also dawns on me that a lot of the women are super double tanked — that to be a modern, urbane woman means to be a serious drinker. This isn’t a new idea — just ask the Sex and the City girls (or the flappers). A woman with a single malt scotch is bold and discerning and might fire you from her life if you fuck with her. A woman with a PBR is a Cool Girl who will not be shamed for belching. A woman drinking MommyJuice wine is saying she’s more than the unpaid labor she gave birth to. The things women drink are signifiers for free time and self-care and conversation — you know, luxuries we can’t afford. How did you not see this before? I ask myself. You were too hammered, I answer back. That summer I see, though. I see that booze is the oil in our motors, the thing that keeps us purring when we could be making other kinds of noise.

***

One day that summer I’m wearing unwise (but cute, so cute) shoes and trip at the farmer’s market, cracking my phone, blood-staining the knees of my favorite jeans, and scraping both my palms. Naturally, I post about it on Facebook as soon as I’ve dusted myself off. Three women who don’t know I’m sober comment quickly:

“Wine. Immediately.”

“Do they sell wine there?”

“Definitely wine. And maybe new shoes.”

Have I mentioned that it’s morning when this happens? On a weekday? This isn’t one of those nightclub farmer’s markets. And the women aren’t the kind of beleaguered, downtrodden creatures you imagine drinking to get through the day. They’re pretty cool chicks, the kind people ridicule for having First World Problems. Why do they need to drink?

Well, maybe because even cool chicks are still women. And there’s no easy way to be a woman, because, as you may have noticed, there’s no acceptable way to be a woman. And if there’s no acceptable way to be the thing you are, then maybe some women drink a little. Or a lot.

***

The year before I get sober, I’m asked to be The Woman on a panel at the company where I work. (That was literally the pitch: “We need one woman.”) Three guys and me, talking to summer interns about company culture. There are two female interns in the audience, and when it’s time for questions, one says:

“I’ve heard this can be a tough place for women to succeed. Can you talk about what it’s been like for you?”

As The Woman, I assume for some reason that the question is directed at me. “If you’re tough and persistent and thick-skinned, you’ll find your way,” I say. “I have.”

I don’t say she’ll have to work around interruptions and invisibility and micro-aggressions and a scarcity of role models and a lifetime of her own conditioning. My job on this panel is to make this place sound good, so I leave some stuff out. Particularly the fact that I’m drinking at least one bottle of wine a night to dissolve the day off of me.

But she’s a woman. She probably learned to read between the lines before she could read the lines themselves. She thanks me and sits down.

“I disagree,” says the guy sitting next to me. “I think this is a great company for women.”

My jaw gently opens on its own.

The guy next to him nods. “Absolutely,” he said. “I have two women on my team and they get along great with everyone.”

Of course they do, I think but don’t say. It’s called camouflage.

Guy #1 continues. “There’s a woman on my team who had a baby last year. She went on maternity leave and came back, and she’s doing fine. We’re very supportive of moms.”

Guy #3 jumps in just to make sure we have 100% male coverage on the topic. “The thing about this place,” he says, “is it’s a meritocracy. And merit is gender-blind.” He smiles at me and I stare back. Short of hijacking this panel for my own agenda, silent balefulness is all I have to offer. But his smile wavers so I know I’ve pierced some level of smug.

The panel organizer and I fume afterward. “Those fucking fucks,” she says. “Ratfucks.”

What’s a girl to do when a bunch of dudes have just told her, in front of an audience, that she’s wrong about what it’s like to be herself? I could invite them out for coffee, one by one, and tell them how it felt, and they might really listen. I could tell the panel organizers this is why you should never have just one of us up there. I could buy myself a superhero costume and devote the rest of my life to vengeance on mansplainers everywhere.

Instead, I round up some girlfriends and we spend too much money at a hipster bar, drinking rye Manhattans and eating tapas and talking about the latest crappy, non-gender-blind things that have happened to us in meetings and on business trips and at performance review time. They toast me for taking one for the team. And when we are good and numb we Uber home, thinking Look at all we’ve earned! That bar with the twinkly lights. That miniature food. This chauffeured black car. We are tough enough to put up with being ignored and interrupted and underestimated every day and laugh it off together. We’ve made it. This is the good life. Nothing needs to change.

***

Do you remember the Enjoli perfume commercial from the 1970s? The chick who could bring home the bacon, fry it up in a pan, and never let you forget you’re a man?

I blame that bitch for a lot. For spreading the notion that women should have a career, keep house, and fuck their husbands, when the only sane thing to do is pick two and outsource the third. For making it seem glamorous. For suggesting it was going to be fun. And for the tagline she dragged around: “The 8-Hour Perfume for the 24-Hour Woman.” Just in case you thought you could get one fucking hour off the clock.

More tales of my first sober summer: I go to an afternoon showing of Magic Mike at one of those fancy theaters that serves cocktails to blunt the terrible stress of watching a movie in air-conditioned comfort. A few rows ahead of me, a group of women are drinking champagne through straws. They whoop and holler at the screen as though at an actual Chippendale’s. In the parking lot afterward, one of them says to the others: “Girl time! We have to claim our girl time.” “We’ve earned this,” another replies. And then they drive off in separate directions.

A baby shower is in progress at the nail parlor. Except for the guest of honor, everyone is drinking wine, lots of it. I wonder if the mom-to-be minds, if it feels like they’re rubbing it in. “Thank God there are places like this where we can have lady time,” a woman in a yellow dress says. She tells the mom-to-be she’s far enough along to have some wine. It seems important to her that the mom-to-be drink with them. I catch myself nodding. You, I think. Yeah, I know you. There’s always one person who can’t deal if someone isn’t drinking. At times, I was that person.

“I’m going to feel hungover by dinner,” a different woman says. “But it’s so worth it. How often do you get a chance to get away from your kids for an afternoon?”

I personally think this is an insensitive thing to say at a baby shower.

Is it really that hard, being a First World woman? Is it really so tough to have the career and the spouse and the pets and the herb garden and the core strengthening and the oh-I-just-woke-up-like-this makeup and the face injections and the Uber driver who might possibly be a rapist? Is it so hard to work ten hours for your rightful 77% of a salary, walk home past a drunk who invites you to suck his cock, and turn on the TV to hear the men who run this country talk about protecting you from abortion regret by forcing you to grow children inside your body?

I mean, what’s the big deal? Why would anyone want to soften the edges of this glorious reality?

***

I run a women’s half-marathon on a day in August when temperatures are fifteen degrees above normal. It’s a — what do you call it — a horror show. But I finish and someone puts a finisher’s medal on me. I’m soaked, chafed, limping, and still triumphant. Until they say: “The margarita tent is right over there!”

A yoga studio where I sometimes practice starts a monthly “Vinyasa & Vino” event: an hour of fast-paced yoga in a hundred-degree room, followed by a glass of an addictive, dehydrating substance (made locally!). Oh, but it’s about mindful savoring, I’m told. Well, then. Apologies for thinking it was about mindful reciprocal advertising to an overwhelmingly female audience, and om shanti.

A local kitchen shop offers a combination knife-skills and wine-tasting class — yes, wine for people who have already self-identified as being so clumsy with sharp objects that they need professional instruction.

At the waxing salon, a cut-glass decanter of tequila is at the ready for first-time Brazilian customers, which — okay, you know what, that tequila was actually pretty helpful back in the day, and far be it from me to deprive other first-timers.

But knives and booze, yoga and booze, 13 mile runs and booze? What’s next to be liquored up: CPR training? Puppy ballet class? (Not really a thing, but someone should get on it.) Is there nothing so inherently absorbing or high-stakes or pleasurable that we won’t try to alter our natural response to it? Maybe women are so busy faking it — to be more like a man at work, more like a porn star in bed, more like 30 at 50 — that we don’t trust our natural responses anymore. Maybe all that wine is an Instagram filter for our own lives, so we don’t see how sallow and cracked they’ve become.

Toward the end of summer I take a trip to Sedona and post a photo to Facebook that captures the red rocks, a stack of books, a giant cocoa smoothie, and my glossy azure toenails in one frame. It is scientifically the most vacation-y photo ever taken.

“Uh, where’s the wine?” someone wants to know.

“Yeah, this vacation seems to be missing wine,” someone else chimes in.

I go to a stationery store to buy a card for a girlfriend. I couldn’t keep it together enough to track greeting card occasions when I was drinking, so it’s been a while since I’ve visited a card shop. There are three themes in female-to-female cards: 1) being old as fuck, 2) men are from Mars, and 3) wine.

“Wine is to women as duct tape is to men…it fixes everything!”

“I make wine disappear. What’s your superpower?”

“Lord, give me coffee to change the things I can…and wine to accept the things I cannot.”

Newly sober women have a lot of wonderful qualities, but lack of judginess not one of them. I don’t just stand there mentally tsk-tsking at the cards. I actually physically shake my head at them like Mrs. Grundy. Are you sure you can’t change those things? I think. And have you stopped to think that if you need ethanol — yes, at this point in my sobriety I called wine ethanol, wasn’t I charming? — to accept them, maybe it’s because they’re unacceptable?

***

The longer I am sober, the less patience I have with being a 24-hour woman. The stranger who tells me to smile. The janitor who stares at my legs. The men on TV who want to annex my uterus. Even the other TV men, who say that abortion should be “safe, legal, and rare.” What business is it of yours whether it’s rare or not? I think.

The magazines telling me strong is the new sexy and smart is the new beautiful, as though strong and smart are just paths to hot. The Facebook memes: muscles are beautiful. No, wait: fat is beautiful. No, wait: thin is beautiful, too, as long as you don’t work for it. No, wait: All women are beautiful! As though we are toddlers who must be given exactly equal shares of princess dust, or we’ll throw a tantrum.

And then I start to get angry at women, too. Not for being born wrong, or for failing to dismantle a thousand years of patriarchy on my personal timetable. And not for enjoying a glass of wine, alone or with their girlfriends — cheers to that, if you can stop at one or two. (I could, until I couldn’t.) But for being so easily mollified by overdrinking. For thinking that the right to get as trashed as a man means anything but the right to be as useless.

“What,” says a woman I enjoy arguing with, “so they can get fucked up and we have to look after them?”

No, I tell her. We have to look after ourselves.

“That still doesn’t seem fair,” she says, not unreasonably.

But who said anything about fairness? This isn’t about what’s fair. It’s about what we can afford. And we can’t afford this. We can’t afford to pretend it’s fine that everything we do or think or wear or say yes or no to is somehow wrong. We can’t afford to act like it’s okay that “Girls can do anything!” got translated somewhere along the line into “Women must do everything.” We can’t afford to live lives we have to fool our own central nervous systems into tolerating.

We can’t afford to be 24-hour women.

I couldn’t afford to be a 24-hour woman. But it didn’t stop me from trying till it shattered me.

I am very angry with women that summer and then I’m very, very angry with myself. And I stay that way for months, trudging through my first sober Christmas and job change and flu and birthday and using that anger at every turn as a reminder to pay attention and go slow and choose things I actually want to happen. By the time summer comes back around I realize I no longer smell like 8-hour perfume.

***

That second summer, I meet my friend Mindy outside San Diego, where her adopted son is days from being born. Mindy’s dark alleys were different from mine, but she walked them all the same and walked herself out of them, too. Sometimes, talking about the recent past, we blink at each other like people struggling to readjust to sunlight after a long, bad movie. More and more it’s the new that gets our attention: my new job, her newish and happy marriage, the book I’m writing and the classes she’s taking. The things we are making happen, step by step.

We spend the weekend moving slowly and sleeping late and — hypocritically — wishing the lazy baby would hurry up already. On Sunday morning we’re reading by the deep end of the hotel pool when the shallow end starts to fill with women, a bridal party to judge by what we overhear. And we overhear a lot, because they arrive already tipsy and the pomegranate mimosas — pomegranate is a superfood! one woman keeps telling the others — just keep coming until that side of the pool seems like a Greek chorus of women who have major grievances with their bodies, faces, children, homes, jobs, and husbands but aren’t going to do anything about any of it but get loaded and sunburned in the desert heat.

I give Mindy the look that women use to say do you believe this shit? with only a slight tightening of the eyeballs. The woman on the other side of her catches the look and gives it back to me over her laptop, and then woman next to her joins in too. We engage in a brief, silent four-way exchange of dismay, irritation, and bitchiness.

Then Mindy slides her Tom Ford sunglasses back over her eyes and says, “All I can say is it’s really nice on this side of the pool.” I laugh and my heart swells against my swimsuit and I pull my shades down too, to keep my suddenly watery eyes to myself. Because it is. It is so nice on this side of the pool, where the book I’m reading is a letdown and my legs look too white and the ice has long since melted in my glass and work is hard and there’s still no good way to be a girl and I don’t know what to do with my life and I have to actually deal with all of that. I never expected to make it to this side of the pool. I can’t believe I get to be here

Written by: Kristi Coulter