#it also makes me froth at the mouth over the conversation on the river because SO MANY THINGS

[bode-leone]

thinking about booker basically admitting he's in love with andy to nile. thinking about how they specifically dont show booker and andy touching except for the post-grenade and in the goodbye scene. wondering if they ever tried to be together and it didnt work or whether it's just something that they just didnt talk about but was there the entire time.

[firefly-in-darkness]

Deception

Characters →Y/N, Steve Rogers, Jasper Sitwell, Sam Wilson

Summary → Captain America has come out of the ice and SHIELD sends you undercover to find out what he plans to do next.

Word Count → 3.8k

Warnings → 18+, Smut (Oral - fem receiving, unprotected sex - wrap it before you tap it!), Swearing, Angst.

Beta → the wonderful @princessmisery666​ - as always, my mistakes are my own.

A/N → This for @panicfob​​ 900 follower writing challenge - congrats on your milestone lovely and hope you enjoy this story! Heavily inspired by Hercules & Megara’s weak ankles conversation... You can also find the dividers @firefly-graphics​ (just a lil self promo of my side blog!).

You weren’t supposed to sleep with him. You weren’t even supposed to become his friend unless it was necessary. You were supposed to just be his neighbour and report everything back to Sitwell.

You gently unravelled his arm from over your waist, slid to the edge of the bed and fumbled around for your clothes as quietly as possible. Luck was not on your side as your attempt to not disturb the super soldier was thwarted. His body pressed against your back, his large hands glided the straps of your bra back down, the cups dragged against your nipples deliciously. 

Wet open-mouthed kisses were pressed into your shoulder, his soft lips trailed across your skin. Subconsciously, you rolled your head to the side to give him more access. His tongue slipped out and up your neck then he nibbled on your earlobe.

The moan that escaped your lips snapped you back to reality. “As much I’d love to stay. I’ve got an early start tomorrow.”

His hot breath fanned against your neck as he continued to kiss at the sensitive spot behind your ear and unclipped the bra, “Stay, you only live across the hall.”

You melted back into him, the guilt of spying on him gnawed away at your conscience. But all you wanted was to give in to the temptation, succumb to the desire that had grown in your core and pool into your panties. 

If this is the last time, then I might as well make the most of it. I know I’ve said that fifty times already, but this is the last time I spend the night with Steve Rogers. 

He pulled you back onto the mattress and laid above you, his hand cupped your cheek as he pulled you in for a kiss. Steve’s warm tongue slid along your bottom lip as his fingers stroked down your stomach, the light touch roused the pleasure at your core. You moaned against his lips and he didn’t hesitate to brush his tongue against yours before he continued the assault of kisses along your jawline.

He lifted his torso, knelt into the mattress and stared down at your half-naked body. The loss of his lips on your skin and the heated weight of his chest laying over yours had you craving his return. From the light that had to start to glow between the slats of the blind, you could just make out the lust blown icy blue eyes that watched you bite your lip. 

Steve’s fingers skimmed up your legs and then tugged down on your panties, you lifted your hips so that he could pull them away. You heard them fall to the floor, somewhere across the room, all care for leaving forgotten.

Steve parted your thighs and his head dipped to your core and his light stubble brushed against the delicate flesh. He avoided the spot you wanted most, it caused a whimper to fall from your lips. Steve smirked and huffed a laugh at your keening responses to his teasing, his warm breath fanned over your slicked pussy. Seconds later he licked a stripe up your lips, swirled around your clit and sucked at the sensitive spot. 

Your fingers curled around and gripped Steve’s sandy locks, the tug elicited a growl, the vibrations rippled across your skin and deepened your arousal, lifted your hips only to be pushed down into place by his arms wrapped around your thighs.

“Oh, Steve.” You gasped and clutched at the sheet, the pleasure flowed from your core, travelled to curl your toes and flutter your eyelids in ecstasy. 

Steve’s tongue swirled and his lips kissed your sex. You were so overwhelmed by the sensations that you hadn’t noticed one of his hands loosened their grip on your thigh until his fingers nudged at your entrance. You mewled at the combination of tongue and fingers stimulating you higher, it left you breathless in anticipation for more. 

His middle and fourth finger swirled around, lathered up the slick before he edged inside. Your back arched with pleasure from the way his fingers stretched you further and his tongue flicked at your clit. Steve’s fingers curled and stroked against a spot that caused your thighs to clench around his head, he opened them apart again and kissed the inside of your leg.

Steve watched his fingers pump in and out of you; a lopsided grin and then his bottom lip pulled between his teeth. He had you right where he wanted you, your climax edged closer and closer. It was the moment his thumb joined the attack on your pussy, he rubbed harshly against your clit, and that pushed you over the precipice of the orgasm. The euphoria washed over you; your back arched as you moaned out expletives and Steve. 

You hissed as Steve didn’t stop, the overstimulation sent you into a further orgasm, the force pushed the back of your head deeper into the pillow. Steve’s ministrations eased as you came down from the high. You slowly gathered your thoughts whilst he knelt above you, hooked his fingers into the waistband of his boxers and shoved them down his legs. His cock slapped against his abdomen; the thick length made your mouth water. 

He lowered back down, his arms caged you in and his hands cupped your cheeks. His lips crashed into yours, all tongue and teeth whilst his cock teased your entrance.

With a hook of your legs, you flipped him onto his back. His deep chuckle reverberated through you as you slid along his length and soaked him with your slick. You lifted, gripped the base of his cock and eased down onto him. Both of you gasped as he filled you in one swift motion.

As soon as it was announced that you were going to be Captain America’s babysitter the rumours began about what you had done to get the task in the first place. After the first few drop-ins to the office, you begged Sitwell to rearrange the location as you couldn’t handle the gossip or snide comments of being the teacher’s pet or giving blow jobs for missions. 

You always arrived at the pre-arranged location first, usually a coffee shop or library. You made sure to sit in a secluded part with your back to another chair or shelves. Sitwell always sat or stood behind you, asked for a quick update and then disappeared as his coffee order was called out or he found the book he required. 

The coffee shop was a small boutique; the usual off the beaten track place but the moment Sitwell stepped inside to the chime of the bell above the door, it was a different approach. 

He pulled out the chair opposite and sat down, leant back with his legs spread wide. “Spill it.”

You frowned and turned your lip up in a sneer, he attempted to intimidate you and be the man about business. It didn’t work, he’d hardly been in the field and you’d be able to take him out three times over before he knew what was happening.

You blew on the coffee and took a sip before you responded. “There’s nothing to spill. We have gotten closer, but I don’t have any insight into what he plans. In all honesty, I don’t see him as a threat and I’m not sure-.”

Sitwell raised his hand and leant forward, his harsh whisper spat through gritted teeth, “You work for me. Not the other way around. Whether he’s an active member of SHIELD, going rogue or a threat is for me to decide. You’re only here to give me information and if you can’t do that then we might have to end this mission.”

Sitwell shifted in his seat, scanned around the coffee shop and if anyone didn’t suspect him of anything, they did now. You rolled your eyes at his behaviour; you could tell he hadn’t done much undercover work in a long time. It wasn’t like Steve Rogers would be randomly roaming the back streets for this coffee shop.

At his paranoia, you glanced around the coffee shop and scanned the civilians around you; a group of teenage girls gossiped at the sofas in the window, a man put up a poster that you couldn’t read from here and a bunch of businessmen tapped away at their laptops or phones whilst dollar signs glowed in their eyes.

“I understand that sir.” You placed the mug down, lost in how much Steve had begun to mean to you. Sitwell’s accusation of Steve going rogue didn’t sit well with you. “I don’t think he’s who you think he is. He might have been a soldier back in the day, and he might have the serum in his veins but he’s honest and sweet. He just wants to get a grip on this life before starting a new one. He wouldn’t hurt anyone.”

You frowned at Sitwell; the lack of response had the hairs on the back of your neck raised. 

“Oh Y/N, you say he has no fears or weaknesses but that’s because you haven’t realised that it’s you. You are his weakness.”

Your eyes widened at his revelation and shook your head, “No, you’re wrong-”

The conversation was interrupted by the man that had put up the poster, you accepted the leaflet he offered. You glanced at it; a meeting at a community centre for war veterans. You shoved it in your handbag and looked back at Sitwell.

“Use it to your advantage.” He opened his wallet and dropped a few bills on the table then left.

Sitwell left, you stared into your coffee mug, lost in the froth that lined the rim of the ceramic. Your heart hammered against your ribcage as the weight of the consequences of how far you had taken things with Steve. You were going to break his heart. And your own.

As you wandered through the Waterfront Park and along the Potomac River, Steve recounted another tale of him getting into trouble, with Bucky at his side as always. Laughter erupted from you both and you sat on one of the benches that overlooked the serene water.

“Oh, what a day.” Steve smiled, “Thanks for coming to that art exhibition at the Kreeger.”

You knew you had to be focused, that you had to get as much from Steve as you could; to find out what he was going to do next after he got used to this new modern world. Sitwell counted on you to know whether he’d stick around or if he’d become America’s hero once more.

At that moment your phone’s ringtone interrupted the tranquillity of Steve’s company. You fumbled to get it out of your handbag and noticed the number, you glanced at Steve, “Sorry, I’ve got to take this.”

You walked away with the phone pressed close to your ear, you didn’t want the super soldier’s enhanced hearing to detect the voice on the other end; Sitwell’s unpredicted check call had you on edge.

“You know, for a secret agent, you’re doing a lousy job of staying under the radar.” Sitwell clipped, and you bit at your lip. I’m getting pulled, I just know it. “You need to find out what he plans on doing now.”

“I’ll call you when I have more information.” You sighed, glanced back at Steve with a weak smile then turned your back to him once more.

“The world is not a safe place Agent Y/L/N. If you know someone’s fear, you know them.”

“I’m on it.” You spoke through gritted teeth then hung up the phone.

You spun and walked back to the spot where Steve had remained, your voice strained. “Sorry about that. Family being a nightmare as usual.”

“Hey, no worries, we’ve all got our problems to deal with.” He smiled back at you.

This was an opportunity to open the conversation, you slid up the bench to get closer to him. “Yeah, they’re a bit controlling and even though I know they’re trying to help me make the best out of situations, I’d rather them just cut me some slack.”

“Is everything okay?” Steve’s face flushed and he rubbed at the back of his neck. “We don’t have to talk about it if you don’t want to.”

You weren’t sure he could get any more endearing than this moment, yet, you were playing him. Sure enough, he made you putty in his hands whilst he tore orgasm after orgasm from your body, but when it came to feelings and talking, well this was the arena you were champion of.

“I love my job, being a nurse is amazing and self-fulfilling. The people you help along the way but then some days are just awful, asshole attacks or,” You were bending the truth but your heart swelled at the sight of his fists clenching at the thought of you being harmed, “or there’s a major injury and there’s just nothing you can do to save them. It sucks. And then my father just wants me to get the job done, make quick decisions as if it’s not embedded into my life like it’s a separate thing.”

Steve nodded, his fingers weaved between yours, “It’s okay to feel overwhelmed Y/N. You are one person and looking after yourself is important. Be selfish if you have to.”

You shook your head; real tears began to well in your eyes. No, this is supposed to be me getting to him, how is he doing this?! You used the back of your hand to wipe away the salty dew on your cheeks.

“So does Mr Steve Rogers have any problems that need solving?” You choked on the fake laugh, hoped he didn’t notice the distress. Your body pressed against his and your hand gripped at his thigh, desperately for more information.

“Nope, I’m all good.” Steve grinned and moved off the bench towards the edge of the water. He dropped to a squat and collected a handful of pebbles.

“Wow, America’s Golden Boy is perfect.” You scoffed and rested your chin in the hand propped up on your knee.

“Thanks.” He grinned at you before he turned back and skimmed a rock across the water, but you could see he was looking much further into the distance than the drop of the pebble.

I’ve got this, I can bring the conversation back to his problems, his weaknesses or fears. I can do this, years of training alongside Natasha Romanoff will pay off. You stood beside him, grabbed a collection of pebbles to skim yourself. 

After your fifth failed attempt to get the pebble to bounce more than twice on the surface, your shoulders sagged as you watched Steve’s sprint across the water several times before it disappeared into the depths.

Your skin heated up as he stood behind you, took your wrist in his large hands and guided you with your throw. Your breath caught as his body aligned with yours, his arm moulded along your forearm. The feel of his chest pressed into your back, his fingers linked with yours, it overwhelmed all your senses.

Thoughts were clouded as your mind drifted back to what had happened earlier that morning, amongst his bedsheets; the way he’d pushed your head into the pillow and lifted your hips and lined himself up from behind before he pounded you deep into the mattress.

As you watched the pebble skim across the water, his voice dropped an octave, “Y’know, when I was a kid, I wasn’t like this. I had every ailment going, and I was a scrawny little thing. I was then given this gift, and, well, I did everything to get into the army, so why not be America’s golden boy. Right now, though, I would give anything to be exactly like everybody else.”

“You want to be normal? To be self-centred and deceitful?” You turned around and folded your arms. The guilt of your actions simmered under your skin, ready to burst free onto him in a verbal assault but you kept your composure as you began to walk along the bank once more.

Steve walked beside you, “Some people might be like that but that’s not you.”

“You don’t know me, Steve, how do you know I’m not any of those things?” You stopped; an eyebrow raised to goad him further into the debate. His silence was what you needed, “That’s what I thought.”

“Y/N listen, you are one of the most amazing people I have ever met.” Steve pulled your arms away from their hold, his fingertips ran down your forearms and hooked your hands in his. “I came out of the ice and you were the first person that cared about Steve, not Captain America. When I’m with you, I don’t feel so alone.”

You couldn’t believe the words that tumbled from his lips, your heart hammered against your chest and your fingers trembled in his grip. His words pierced through your ribs and into your lungs, breath stuttered as you tried to reply. 

“It’s better to be alone. Nobody can hurt you.” You whispered.

Steve dipped his head to yours, “I would never hurt you doll.”

Steve placed his lips to yours, a light touch compared to the others you had shared; it was delicate and held so much more than desire. You pulled away and gave Steve a beaming smile. He pulled you closer by the nape of your neck, a chaste kiss pressed to your forehead before he winked and continued the walk around the river with his hand firmly in yours.

Luckily you had dropped Steve’s hand as you turned the corner to search for your keys in your handbag because as you reached the apartment building, Jasper Sitwell stood with another agent outside the entrance. Your heart hammered at the thought of him seeing anything that looked remotely like affectionate gestures that had been made in the park.

Jasper looked straight past you, pushed his glasses back up his nose, and focused on Steve. 

“Back in a minute.” Steve wandered off with your boss, he left you in the lobby as they talked in the parking lot.

You waited, leant against the wall, and thought of what had happened between you and Steve at the waterfront. The sharp pain from earlier had become a dull ache, and as you watched them from afar, you couldn’t help the guilt that continually seeped into your chest. 

Steve was toeing the forbidden line of this becoming more than sex, potentially a relationship. He laid himself bare, put himself out there for you to accept. And, regardless of the mission ending on your own or Sitwell’s decision, you were going to hurt him.

Whilst you pretended to check your phone, another figure caught your eye. A man stood across the street, you had the sinking feeling that you recognised him and that’s when he glanced at you, then back at Steve and Jasper. Your hand darted into your handbag; fingers curled around the Glock as you watched him stroll towards Steve.

“On your left!” the man commented, you watched Steve turn slightly and grin at the man.

You released the gun and straightened up, to watch Jasper nod at the men and walk off without another glance. You returned to the men he had left, they wandered over and you recognised the stranger as the man with the leaflets in the coffee shop. If you remembered him, was it likely that he wouldn’t recognise you? 

Panic bubbled up as they got closer and you could tell that they were more than acquaintances from the laughter. Steve gestured to you, and then the stranger, but you didn’t hear a word as the blood rushed through your head and echoed around your ears.

“Y/N, you okay?” Steve’s hand gripped your arm, a concerned look etched on his features.

“Yeah sure, miles away.” You shook your head and smiled at Steve’s friend; you hope it played off as a daydream. “Sorry, Sam was it?”

The man nodded, a slight grin on his face, “So how do you both know that guy?”

“Both?” Steve frowned.

“Yeah, I recognised your friend from the coffee shop near the community centre. That guy was there too.”

“Y/N, what is he talking about?” Steve no longer held the face of adoration from earlier or the confusion from Sam’s words. Now it had morphed into realisation as to who you were and your betrayal. “You’re one of them?”

You couldn’t find the words, your heart dropped into your stomach. The tears welled in your eyes; you knew you had fucked up and you knew it was wrong to spy on him, but you couldn’t lose him. 

“We need to talk.” You stuttered. “Inside.”

The walk up the stairs remained in silence, you chanced a glance back to Steve, his face was flushed with pain and you could see it glisten in his eyes. Once you reached the corridor to your apartment, you were pushed back against the wall, Steve’s forearm against your throat.

“I can’t believe I trusted you,” Steve whispered angrily.

Sam tugged at his shoulder, “Stop it, Steve, just hear her out man.”

“Why should I? She’s been reporting to SHIELD the entire time. What else is there to know?” He glared back at him, his jaw ticking with anger and not letting go of his grip.

“Please, Steve.” You begged, “Please let me explain.”

Steve released his arm, and moved away from you, straightened out his jacket and ran his hands through his locks, “Fine. Sam stays and we do this in your apartment. I don’t trust mine to not be bugged.”

You nodded and headed to the front door, your hands trembled as you put the key in the lock and pushed it open for them to enter. You followed behind and hoped you could turn this around. That you could tell Steve what you were asked to do and how much you had withheld from Sitwell and SHIELD.

And deep down, you hoped that Steve could forgive you, not now, but maybe at some point.

the end.

[nakediconoclast]

About a certain livestock de-wormer...

Ivermectin

.

Before I even start this post, let me get the legal shit out of the way.I am not a doctor. I haven't even been to a doctor in over 5 years.I have no medical training except for maybe 100 hours of outdated first aid training when I was in the army 40 years ago and my First Sergeant needed a break from me.I am not a pharmacist, although back in the 1980s and 90s, I have dispensed dru..... Wait, I better leave that one alone.The point being, don't take my word for shit here. Do your own research. I'm going to refer to the drug as IM in this post because I don't want Google/Blogger taking my blog down or red-paging it for not toeing the party line. It is not my purpose to try to talk you into taking it any more than I'd try to talk you out of taking the vaccine if that's what you want to do. Your body, your choice.All I'm doing is making you aware of it if you haven't already checked it out, and to pass on my own experiences and thoughts. IM has been approved for use in humans, although it's more widely known as an parasitic medication for livestock.IM, sold under the brand name Stromectol among others, is a medication that is used to treat parasite infestations. In humans, this includes head lice, scabies, river blindness (onchocerciasis), strongyloidiasis, trichuriasis, ascariasis, and lymphatic filariasis. In veterinary medicine, it is used to prevent and treat heartworm and acariasis, among other indications. It can be taken by mouth or applied to the skin for external infestations.MORE Question: If it's already been proven safe for human use, why isn't there full speed ahead testing being done to see if it works for covid?Answer: Big Pharma. IM has been off patent for years and is dirt cheap. If it's found out to be effective for covid, guess who's profits are going to nosedive in that vaccine market? * Back a few weeks ago, a very good friend who shall remain nameless - fuck it, I'll out him, it was WiscoDave - initiated a conversation with me about IM and wanted to know if I had considered taking it to 1) prevent covid and 2) use it to cure covid if I were to contract it. Me, being invincible, said no, so he turned me onto a few links and pretty much left it at that.He's a sly devil - he knew I'd eventually get bored and read them. One of them concerned a study in India. As you may recall, there was a major outbreak a couple months ago and motherfuckers were dying like flies, then all of a sudden..... nothing.Why? Because they introduced IM. HERE is the link to the study in the first sentence of this paragraph.HERE is a 25 minute youtube video along the same lines. There's more out there if you take a few seconds to look them up. Okay, I read that, then I started digging and found more articles and videos on youtube, although youtube seems to be pulling a bunch of them if they even mention covid and IM.To make a long story short, I figured to give it a try. Hell, I never was shy about trying new drugs when I was younger, so it wasn't that big of a deal.My reasoning was this: While I may be invincible, my wife is not and with her health problems, she is one of those high risk people. She doesn't get out much, so about the only way she'd get it would be from me, so I needed to protect myself, but I really don't want to get vaccinated.Besides, I keep hearing about all the deaths and complications from taking the vaccines, but I've yet to hear about anybody dying from taking IM. On top of that, every day I read about fully vaccinated people being diagnosed with covid in spite of their precautions, so even if I got vaccinated, there's a good possibility that's not going to protect my wife from getting it. Wisco had also directed me to Ann Barnhardt's IM page HERE and told me to be sure that I read it - it tells you where to buy it, how to buy it, what kinds to buy (very important!) and dosage instructions. So, armed with that knowledge, I went into town to score some of this miracle drug in the liquid form. First stop was the Farmer's Co-op in town. There was none to be had and the old boy behind the counter said they can't keep it in stock for the past few months. That seemed a little weird seeing as I haven't noticed a massive influx of livestock around here lately - unless people are buying it up to use on themselves. Bubba also told me he couldn't guarantee a hold for me when it did come in, so I headed down to Tractor Supply. Once there, I couldn't find the liquid 1% solution so I asked one of the guys and immediately started getting the 3rd degree - just exactly what I did I want it for and shit like that, so I told him it was to worm a sick donkey. He went to the back to see if there was any there, but came back to tell me there was none in stock, so I asked him to order it for me. He hemmed and hawed around until the manager walked by and told him to order anything I wanted, with as much money as I've spent in that store, so he ordered a 50ml bottle for me and I got it 3-4 days later.While I'm on the subject of Tractor Supply, if you order something online from your home, YOU pay the shipping. If you have them order it for you, it ships to your address and shipping is free - something to keep in mind. Ten bucks is ten bucks. Anyways, after I got home and was re-reading Miss Ann's page, I realized I saw the 1.87% paste there at Tractor Supply, so I hustled back down there and scored a tube for about 8 bucks.Once I got it home, I figured to give it a whirl as a preventive measure, but I didn't want to use the liquid, figuring to hold off on that in case it became 'unavailable' in the future.Now Wisco had told me the paste tasted like ass, but what the fuck, I've eaten British food before. I ain't scared. Besides, this shit was apple flavored. So I took a piece of bread, squeezed out the recommended dose (I thought), put it on the bread, folded it over and wolfed it down. I got a very slight taste of bitter apple, so I shoveled in a load of Copenhagen and that was the end of that. Now, while IM in the liquid form is taken orally, it's drawn from the bottle and measured using a syringe which can be bought at Tractor Supply, livestock supply stores and even online at vet supply sites such as Chewy.com.In the liquid form and by using a little math, you can get the dosage down for your body weight pretty easily. Using the paste, the tube dispenses the doses in 50 kilogram increments for your body weight. Luckily, as I found out, it's pretty fucking hard to overdose yourself. As I was putting the tube away, I realized I had accidentally dosed myself with double the amount recommended for my weight. It's okay to round up - better a little too much than too little according to everything I had read, but damn, I really rounded up.Like I said, the shit measures out in 50 kilo increments for body weight and I did 3 clicks instead of 2. I weigh 170 pounds and took enough for a 330 pounder.I sat down and waited to die. What I got was a very slight headache and I do mean very slight - it wasn't even bad enough to require aspirin. I didn't even cop a buzz, damn it. Okay, that's my experience. Did I have any side effects? Nope.Did I get sick to my stomach? Huh-uh.Does my dick still get hard in the morning? Most of the time, but that's my age showing.Any frothing at the mouth? Only when I brush my teeth.Do my trigger fingers still work? Yes, praise the Lord.Any newfound empathy or tolerance for Biden? Fuck no.Do I have an urge to gallop in the pasture? What happens in that pasture is between me and God. Obviously, there's precautions.Ladies, you probably don't want to take it if you're pregnant or trying to get pregnant.If you're taking medication, you most definitely want to talk with your doctor first to see if there's going to be any kind of interactions. There's a website HERE that you can check, but I think I'd want to hear it from a doctor. How you word those questions is up to you, but if it was me I wouldn't ask IF I can take it, I'd let him or her know I was going to take it and what should I know. Okay, bottom line for me: Like I said earlier, I've heard of many, many cases of horrible side effects and even deaths from taking the vaccines, but I've yet to hear of anybody taking the correct dosage of IM having any adverse effects. I'm sure there's some out there, but if they were even remotely common, the FDA would be spreading those examples everywhere. Instead, they're putting out vague warnings like this HERE.Do I believe the hype about how deadly covid is for healthy people? No. But I do believe it can make you sicker than a dog, and I generally try to avoid shit like that. And again, I do have to protect my wife by protecting myself. With her health issues, death is a very real possibility. * So, if you are considering it, please go to Ann Barnhardt's page on the stuff and read it. Again, you'll find instructions on the kind to buy (they're not all the same), dosage, how to take it, and even a little video on how to use the paste.HEREIf you're concerned about the correct dosage, she addresses that as well.HERE

[celestialmazer]

The Everglades, White Sands, and Carlsbad Caverns. PHOTOGRAPHS BY RYAN MCGINLEY Brad Pitt Talks Divorce, Quitting Drinking, and Becoming a Better Man by  Michael Paterniti VIDEO

“Summer is coming and, in America, that means it’s time to hit the national parks. So we took Brad Pitt and photographer Ryan McGinley tumbling across three of them: The Everglades, White Sands, and Carlsbad Caverns. Then we sat down with Pitt at home in L.A. for a raw conversation about how to move forward after things fall apart.

Brad Pitt is making matcha green tea on a cool morning in his old Craftsman in the Hollywood Hills, where he's lived since 1994. There have been other properties in other places—including a château in France and homes in New Orleans and New York City—but this has always been his kids' “childhood home,” he says. And even though they're not here now, he's decided it's important that he is. Today the place is deeply silent, except for the snoring of his bulldog, Jacques.

Pitt wears a flannel shirt and skinny jeans that hang loose on his frame. Invisible to the eye is that sculpted bulk we've seen on film for a quarter-century. He looks like an L.A. dad on a juice cleanse, gearing up to do house projects. On the counter sit some plated goodies from Starbucks, which he doesn't touch, and some coffee, which he does. Pitt, who exudes likability, general decency, and a sense of humor (dark and a little cockeyed), says he's really gotten into making matcha lately, something a friend introduced him to. He loves the whole ritual of it. He deliberately sprinkles some green powder in a cup with a sifter, then pours in the boiling water, whisking with a bamboo brush, until the liquid is a harlequin froth. “You're gonna love this,” he says, handing me the cup.

Serenity, balance, order: That's the vibe, at least. That's what you think you're feeling in the kitchen of Brad Pitt's perfectly constructed, awesomely decorated abode. Outside, children's bikes are lined up in the rack; a blown-up dragon floatie bobs on the pool through the window. From the sideboard, with its exquisite inlay, to the vase on the mantel, the house exudes care and intention. And it carries its own stories, not just about when the Jolie-Pitts were a happy family, but also from back in the day, when Jimi Hendrix crashed here. It's said he wrote “May This Be Love” out in the grotto, with its waterfall (Waterfall / Nothing can harm me at all…). “I don't know if it's true,” says Pitt, “but a hippie came by and said he used to drop acid with Jim back there, so I run with the story.”

And yet Pitt is the first one to acknowledge that it's been chaos these past six months, during what he calls a “weird” time. In conversation, he seems absolutely locked in one moment and a little twitchy and forlorn in the next, having been put on a journey he didn't intend to make but admits was “self-inflicted.” The unfortunate worst of it surfaced in public this past September. When he was on a flight to Los Angeles aboard a private plane, there was a reported altercation between Pitt and one of his six children, 15-year-old Maddox. An anonymous phone call was made to the authorities, which triggered an FBI investigation (ultimately closed with no charges). Five days later, his wife, Angelina Jolie, filed for divorce. By then, everything in Pitt's world was in free fall. It wasn't just a public-relations crisis—there was a father suddenly deprived of his kids, a husband without wife. And here he is, alone, a 53-year-old human father/former husband smack in the middle of an unraveled life, figuring out how to mend it back together.

And yet the enterprise known as Brad Pitt inexorably carries on. In November, the movie Allied came out, starring Pitt and Marion Cotillard. At the premiere he was described as “gaunt,” and rumors of an affair with Cotillard, and an on-set encounter between her and Jolie, had been so virulent that Cotillard took to social media to deny them, underscoring her love for her own partner, with whom she was pregnant with their second child. Meanwhile, Pitt's production company, Plan B Entertainment, found itself winning an astonishing third Oscar for Best Picture, with Moonlight. (Pitt spent the Oscars ceremony at a friend's house.) This month Netflix will release Pitt's War Machine, a satire based on the incidents surrounding the firing of General Stanley McChrystal. In the film, he plays a gruff, ascetic stand-in for McChrystal, General Glen McMahon, with both big-gestured comic panache and an oblivious unknowingness that seems to be a metaphor for the entire American war effort.

But on this overcast spring morning, catching Pitt at this flexion point, I would say he seems more like one of those stripped-down Samuel Beckett characters, in a blank landscape, asking big questions of a futile world. Even the generalities he employs for protection seem metaphoric. (He mentioned his estranged wife's name only once, when referencing her Cambodia movie, First They Killed My Father, telling me, “You should see Angie's film.”) The loneliness of this new life, he said, is mitigated by Jacques, who spent most of the interview beached in a narcoleptic reverie at my feet, snoring and farting. (“Did you ever have the uncle that came over with emphysema, and had to sleep in your room when you were 6?” he says. “That's Jacques.” And then: “Come here, boy. Friends for life!”)

When I ask Pitt what gives him the most comfort these days, he says, “I get up every morning and I make a fire. When I go to bed, I make a fire, just because—it makes me feel life. I just feel life in this house.”

GQ Style: Let's go back to the start. What was it like growing up where you grew up? Brad Pitt: Well, it was Springfield, Missouri, which is a big place now, but we grew up surrounded by cornfields—which is weird because we always had canned vegetables. I never could figure that one out! Anyway, ten minutes outside of town, you start getting into forests and rivers and the Ozark Mountains. Stunning country.

Did you have a Huck Finn boyhood? Half the time. Half the time, yeah.

How so? I grew up in caves. We had a lot of caves, fantastic caverns. And we grew up First Baptist, which is the cleaner, stricter, by-the-book Christianity. Then, when I was in high school, my folks jumped to a more charismatic movement, which got into speaking in tongues and raising your hands and some goofy-ass shit.

So were you there for speaking in tongues? Yeah, come on. I'm not even an actor yet, but I know… I mean the people, I know they believe it. I know they're releasing something. God, we're complicated. We're complicated creatures.

So acting came out of what you saw in these revival meetings? Well, people act out. But as a kid, I was certainly drawn to stories—beyond the stories that we were living and knew, stories with different points of view. And I found those stories in film, especially. Different cultures and lives so foreign to mine. I think that was one of the draws that propelled me into film. I didn't know how to articulate stories. I'm certainly not a good orator, sitting here telling a story, but I could foster them in film.

I remember going to a few concerts, even though we were told rock shows are the Devil, basically. Our parents let us go, they weren't neo about it. But I realized that the reverie and the joy and exuberance, even the aggression, I was feeling at the rock show was the same thing at the revival. One is Jimmy Swaggart and one is Jerry Lee Lewis, you know? One's God and one's Devil. But it's the same thing. It felt like we were being manipulated. What was clear to me was “You don't know what you're talking about—”

And it didn't fuck you up? No, it didn't fuck me up—it just led to some eating questions at a young age.

The best actors blur into their characters, but given how well the world knows you, it seems you have a much harder time blurring these days? I have so much attached to this facade. [gestures]

But then, in War Machine, you find the little gesture that makes the Glen McMahon character ours. Like the way he runs, which is hilarious. The run to me was important because it was about the delusion of your own grandeur, not knowing what you really look like. All pencil legs, you know. Not being able to connect reality to this facade of grandeur.

The other equally distinctive characteristic is Glen's voice. Where did it come from? You know, it's a little bit of a cliché, but I just enjoyed it too much: There's, you know, of course, Patton in it. But I could not get Sterling Hayden out of my mind. I'm just fascinated with Sterling Hayden, off-camera, between films, and I couldn't escape that. There's even a little bit of Chris Farley in mannerisms. And then Kiefer Sutherland in Monsters vs. Aliens, you know, doing the cartoon voice. It just wouldn't go anywhere else; it kept coming back there.

Have you ever felt the need to be more political? I can help in other ways. I can help by getting movies out with certain messages. I've got to be moved by something—I can't fake it. I grew up with that Ozarkian mistrust of politics to begin with, so I just do better building a house for someone in New Orleans or getting certain movies to the screen that might not get made otherwise.

You're good at playing that kind of character, the one that doesn't have a truly accurate vision of himself. It makes me laugh. Any of my foibles are born from my own hubris. Always, always. Anytime. I famously step in shit—at least for me it seems pretty epic. I often wind up with a smelly foot in my mouth. I often say the wrong thing, often in the wrong place and time. Often. In my own private Idaho, it's funny as shit. I don't have that gift. I'm better speaking in some other art form. I'm trying to get better. I'm really trying to get better.

And the movie really pokes at this, too, right—America's hubris? When I get in trouble it's because of my hubris. When America gets in trouble it's because of our hubris. We think we know better, and this idea of American exceptionalism—I think we're exceptional in many ways, I do, but we can't force it on others. We shouldn't think we can. How do we show American exceptionalism? By example. It's the same as being a good father. By exemplifying our tenets and our beliefs, freedom and choice and not closing borders and being protectionists. But that's another issue. You want me to tell you something really sad? I thought this was so sad. We were looking at—let me say, a certain war film that was looking to promote itself. The European posters had the American flag in the background, and it came back from the marketing department: “Remove the flag. It's not a good sell here.” I was, like, Man, that's America. That's what we've done to our brand.

You've played characters in pain. What is pain, emotional and physical? Yeah, I'm kind of done playing those. I think it was more pain tourism. It was still an avoidance in some way. I've never heard anyone laugh bigger than an African mother who's lost nine family members. What is that? I just got R&B for the first time. R&B comes from great pain, but it's a celebration. To me, it's embracing what's left. It's that African woman being able to laugh much more boisterously than I've ever been able to.

“For me this period has been about looking at my weaknesses and failures and owning my side of the street.”

When did you have that revelation? What have you been listening to? I've been listening to a lot of Frank Ocean. I find this young man so special. Talk about getting to the raw truth. He's painfully honest. He's very, very special. I can't find a bad one.

And of great irony to me: Marvin Gaye's Here, My Dear [Gaye's touchstone album about divorce]. And that kind of sent me down a road.

Intense. But beautiful—and quite honest.... You know, I just started therapy. I love it, I love it. I went through two therapists to get to the right one.

About These Parks: To choose the locations for this summertime celebration of America’s national parks, Brad Pitt, Ryan McGinley, and GQ Style all collaborated on potential destinations. Pitt requested the lunar dunes of White Sands National Monument. Ryan McGinley had previous experience shooting in the underground labyrinths of Carlsbad Caverns National Park. And we nominated the swamps of Everglades National Park. Then we came together and covered all three over a stretch of eight days in March.

Do you think if the past six months hadn't happened you'd be in this place eventually? That it would have caught up with you? I think it would have come knocking, no matter what.

People call it a midlife crisis, but this isn't the same— No, this isn't that. I interpret a midlife crisis as a fear of growing old and fear of dying, you know, going out and buying a Lamborghini. [pause] Actually—they've been looking pretty good to me lately! [laughs]

There might be a few Lamborghinis in your future! “I do have a Ford GT,” he says quietly. [laughs] I do remember a few spots along the road where I've become absolutely tired of myself. And this is a big one. These moments have always been a huge generator for change. And I'm quite grateful for it. But me, personally, I can't remember a day since I got out of college when I wasn't boozing or had a spliff, or something. Something. And you realize that a lot of it is, um—cigarettes, you know, pacifiers. And I'm running from feelings. I'm really, really happy to be done with all of that. I mean I stopped everything except boozing when I started my family. But even this last year, you know—things I wasn't dealing with. I was boozing too much. It's just become a problem. And I'm really happy it's been half a year now, which is bittersweet, but I've got my feelings in my fingertips again. I think that's part of the human challenge: You either deny them all of your life or you answer them and evolve.

Was it hard to stop smoking pot? No. Back in my stoner days, I wanted to smoke a joint with Jack and Snoop and Willie. You know, when you're a stoner, you get these really stupid ideas. Well, I don't want to indict the others, but I haven't made it to Willie yet.

I'm sure he's out there on a bus somewhere waiting for you. How about alcohol—you don't miss it? I mean, we have a winery. I enjoy wine very, very much, but I just ran it to the ground. I had to step away for a minute. And truthfully I could drink a Russian under the table with his own vodka. I was a professional. I was good.

So how do you just drop it like that? Don't want to live that way anymore.

What do you replace it with? Cranberry juice and fizzy water. I've got the cleanest urinary tract in all of L.A., I guarantee you! But the terrible thing is I tend to run things into the ground. That's why I've got to make something so calamitous. I've got to run it off a cliff.

Do you think that's a thing? I do it with everything, yeah. I exhaust it, and then I walk away. I've always looked at things in seasons, compartmentalized them, I guess, seasons or semesters or tenures or…

Really? So, this is the season of me getting my drink on.… [laughs] Yeah, it's that stupid. “This is my Sid and Nancy season.” I remember that one when I first got out to L.A. It got titled afterwards.

So then, you stop yourself, but how do you—I don't know why this comes to mind but I think of a house—how do you renovate yourself? Yeah, you start by removing all the decor and decorations, I think. You get down to the structure. Wow, we are in some big metaphor here now.… [laughs]

Inside Brad Pitt’s GQ Style Cover Shoot

Metaphors are my life. You strip down to the foundation and break out the mortar. I don't know. For me this period has really been about looking at my weaknesses and failures and owning my side of the street. I'm an asshole when it comes to this need for justice. I don't know where it comes from, this hollow quest for justice for some perceived slight. I can drill on that for days and years. It's done me no good whatsoever. It's such a silly idea, the idea that the world is fair. And this is coming from a guy who hit the lottery, I'm well aware of that. I hit the lottery, and I still would waste my time on those hollow pursuits.

That's the thing about becoming un-numb. You have to stare down everything that matters to you. That's it! Sitting with those horrible feelings, and needing to understand them, and putting them into place. In the end, you find: I am those things I don't like. That is a part of me. I can't deny that. I have to accept that. And in fact, I have to embrace that. I need to face that and take care of that. Because by denying it, I deny myself. I am those mistakes. For me every misstep has been a step toward epiphany, understanding, some kind of joy. Yeah, the avoidance of pain is a real mistake. It's the real missing out on life. It's those very things that shape us, those very things that offer growth, that make the world a better place, oddly enough, ironically. That make us better.

Would there be art without it? Would there be any of this immense beauty that surrounds us? Yeah—immense beauty, immense beauty. And by the way: There's no love without loss. It's a package deal.

Can you describe where you've been living—like, have you been in this house since September? It was too sad to be here at first, so I went and stayed on a friend's floor, a little bungalow in Santa Monica. I crashed over here a little bit, my friend [David] Fincher lives right here. He's always going to have an open door for me, and I was doing a lot of stuff on the Westside, so I stayed at my friend's house on the floor for a month and a half—until I was out there one morning, 5:30, and this surveillance van pulls up. They don't know that I'm up behind a wall, and they pull up—and it's a long story—but it was something more than TMZ, because they got into my friend's computer. The stuff they can do these days.... So I got a little paranoid being there. I decided I had to pick up and come here.

“If I'm not creating something, putting it out there, then I'll just be creating scenarios of fiery demise in my mind.”

How are your days different now? This house was always chaotic and crazy, voices and bangs coming from everywhere, and then, as you see, there are days like this: very…very solemn. I don't know. I think everyone's creative in some way. If I'm not creating something, doing something, putting it out there, then I'll just be creating scenarios of fiery demise in my mind. You know, a horrible end. And so I've been going to a friend's sculpting studio, spending a lot of time over there. My friend [Thomas Houseago] is a serious sculptor. They've been kind. I've literally been squatting in there for a month now. I'm taking a shit on their sanctity.

So you're making stuff? Yeah, I'm making stuff. It's something I've wanted to do for ten years.

Like what? What are you working with? I'm making everything. I'm working with clay, plaster, rebar, wood. Just trying to learn the materials. You know, I surprise myself. But it's a very, very lonely occupation. There's a lot of manual labor, which is good for me right now. A lot of lugging clay around, chopping and moving and cleaning up after yourself. But I surprise myself. Yesterday I wasn't settled. I had a lotta chaotic thoughts—trying to make sense of where we are at this time—and the thing I was doing wasn't controlled and balanced and perfect. It came out chaotic. I find vernacular in what you can make, rather than giving a speech. I find voice there, that I need.

All the bad stuff: Do you use it to tell your story? It just keeps knocking. I'm 53 and I'm just getting into it. These are things I thought I was managing very well. I remember literally having this thought a year, a year and a half ago, someone was going through some scandal. Something crossed my path that was a big scandal—and I went, “Thank God I'm never going to have to be a part of one of those again.” I live my life, I have my family, I do my thing, I don't do anything illegal, I don't cross anyone's path. What's the David Foster Wallace quote? Truth will set you free, but not until it's done with you first.

Is the sculpting a Sisyphean thing: rolling the rock up the hill, action obliterating all thoughts? [Jacques interrupts, nuzzling] I know you've been lonely. I know you've been lonely....

I find it the opposite. Well, I guess so, in that there's a task at hand. You have to wrap your stuff up at night and bring order back to your chaos for the next day. I find it a great opportunity for the introspection. Now you have to be real careful not to go too far that way and get cut off in that way. I'm really good at cutting myself off, and it's been a problem. I need to be more accessible, especially to the ones I love.

When you go dark, do you retreat, disconnect? I don't know how to answer that. I certainly shield. Shield, shield, shield. Mask, escape. Now I think: That's just me.

You were talking about the Glen character in War Machine and the idea of delusion, that we have to create our own mythologies, our own stories, to explain the things we're not proud of. At a real cost to ourselves.

How do you not delude yourself? I worry about that— You don't have to worry about it. [laughs] Delusion is not going to let you go. You're going to get smacked in the face. We, as humans, construct such mousetrap mind games to get away from it all. You know, we're almost too smart for ourselves.

Okay. But if you had a slideshow of all your worst moments as a human, you wouldn't want anyone to see that slideshow. The way you've had to live for years, that slideshow has been public. But so little of it is accurate, and I avoid so much of it. I just let it go. It's always been a long-run game for me. As far as out there, I hope my intentions and work will speak for themselves. But, yes, at the same time, it is a drag to have certain things drug out in public and misconstrued. I worry about it more for my kids, being subjected to it, and their friends getting ideas from it. And of course it's not done with any kind of delicacy or insight—it's done to sell. And so you know the most sensational sells, and that's what they'll be subjected to, and that pains me. I worry more in my current situation about the slideshow my kids have. I want to make sure it's well-balanced.

“People on their deathbeds don't talk about what they obtained. They talk about their loved ones or their regrets—that seems to be the menu.”

How do you make sense of the past six months and keep going? Family first. People on their deathbeds don't talk about what they obtained or were awarded. They talk about their loved ones or their regrets—that seems to be the menu. I say that as someone who's let the work take me away. Kids are so delicate. They absorb everything. They need to have their hand held and things explained. They need to be listened to. When I get in that busy work mode, I'm not hearing. I want to be better at that.

When you begin making a family, I think you hope to create another family that is some ideal mix of the best of what you had and what you feel you didn't have— I try to put these things in front of them, hoping they'll absorb it and that it will mean something to them later. Even in this place, they won't give a shit about that little bust over there or that light. They won't give a shit about that inlay, but somewhere down the road it will mean something—I hope that it will soak in.

It's a different world, too. We know more, we're more focused on psychology. I come from a place where, you know, it's strength if we get a bruise or cut or ailment we don't discuss it, we just deal with it. We just go on. The downside of that is it's the same with our emotion. I'm personally very retarded when it comes to taking inventory of my emotions. I'm much better at covering up. I grew up with a Father-knows-best/war mentality—the father is all-powerful, super strong—instead of really knowing the man and his own self-doubt and struggles. And it's hit me smack in the face with our divorce: I gotta be more. I gotta be more for them. I have to show them. And I haven't been great at it.

Do you know, specifically, logistically when you have the kids? Yeah. We're working at that now.

It must be much harder when visitation is uncertain— It was all that for a while. I was really on my back and chained to a system when Child Services was called. And you know, after that, we've been able to work together to sort this out. We're both doing our best. I heard one lawyer say, “No one wins in court—it's just a matter of who gets hurt worse.” And it seems to be true, you spend a year just focused on building a case to prove your point and why you're right and why they're wrong, and it's just an investment in vitriolic hatred. I just refuse. And fortunately my partner in this agrees. It's just very, very jarring for the kids, to suddenly have their family ripped apart.

That's what I was going to ask— If anyone can make sense of it, we have to with great care and delicacy, building everything around that.

How do you tell your kids? Well, there's a lot to tell them because there's understanding the future, there's understanding the immediate moment and why we're at this point, and then it brings up a lot of issues from the past that we haven't talked about. So our focus is that everyone comes out stronger and better people—there is no other outcome.

“I know I'm just in the middle of this thing now—not at the beginning or at the end, just smack-dab in the middle. And I don't want to dodge any of it.”

And the fact that you guys are pointing toward that—that clearly doesn't always happen. If you ended up in court, it would be a spectacular nightmare. Spectacular. I see it everywhere. Such animosity and bitterly dedicating years to destroying each other. You'll be in court and it'll be all about affairs and it'll be everything that doesn't matter. It's just awful, it looks awful. One of my favorite movies when it came out was There Will Be Blood, and I couldn't figure out why I loved this movie, I just loved this movie, besides the obvious talent of Paul T. and, you know, Daniel Day. But the next morning I woke up, and I went, Oh, my God, this whole movie is dedicated to this man and his hatred. It's so audacious to make a movie about it, and in life I find it just so sickening. I see it happen to friends—I see where the one spouse literally can't tell their own part in it, and is still competing with the other in some way and wants to destroy them and needs vindication by destruction, and just wasting years on that hatred. I don't want to live that way.

What in the past week has given you immense joy? Can you feel that right now? It's an elusive thing. It's been a more painful week than normal—just certain things have come up—but I see joy out the window, and I can see the silhouette of palms and an expression on one of my kids' faces, a parting smile, or finding some, you know, moment of bliss with the clay. You know, it's everywhere, it's got to be found. It's the laughter of the African mother in my experience—it's got to come from the blues, to get R&B. That'll be in my book.

Are you going to write a book? No! I find writing too arduous.

But do you worry about the narrative others have written for you? What did Churchill say? History will be kind to me: I know because I'll write it myself. I don't really care about protecting the narrative. That's when I get a bit pessimistic, I get in my oh-it-all-goes-away-anyway kind of thinking. But I know the people who love me know me. And that's enough for me.

Do you remember your dreams? Yeah. A few months ago I was having frightening dreams and I'd consciously lie awake trying to ask, What can I get out of this? What can I learn from this? Those ceased. And now I have been having moments of joy, and you wake and realize it's just a dream, and I get a bit depressed for the moment. Just the moment, just glimpse moments of joy because I know I'm just in the middle of this thing now and I'm not at the beginning of it or at the end of it, just where this chapter is right now, just smack-dab in the middle. It's fucking in the middle of it and, you know, I just don't want to dodge any of it. I just want to stand there, shirt open, and take my hits and see, and see.

There's obviously incredible grief. This is like a death— Yeah.

There's a process— Yeah, I think for everyone, for the kids, for me, absolutely.

So is there an urge to try to— The first urge is to cling on.

Then? And then you've got a cliché: “If you love someone, set them free.” Now I know what it means, by feeling it. It means to love without ownership. It means expecting nothing in return. But it sounds good written. It sounds good when Sting sings it. It doesn't mean fuck-all to me until, you know—

Until you can embody it. Until you live it. That's why I never understood growing up with Christianity—don't do this, don't do that—it's all about don'ts, and I was like how the fuck do you know who you are and what works for you if you don't find out where the edge is, where's your line? You've got to step over it to know where it is.

For the photo shoot you went to three national parks in a week. It sounds like a boondoggle. What's the definition of a boondoggle?

I think of it as a sort of ridiculous adventure— Sounds very Ozarkian. Like something I should know but I don't. Yeah, it was great. Ryan [McGinley, the photographer] had us jumping in the Everglades, you know, like gators. I figured, Well, if they do it on Naked and Afraid, I can do it. But they had the old wrangler, he's got his snake pole and it's got this grabber, like something Grandma would use to pick something off the top shelf, but fine. He took a little walk-through, and if he didn't get eaten, then reportedly I wouldn't get eaten. At least that was the logic behind it all, but he said to me, “When you get to be my age, never pass up a bathroom. Never trust a fart. And never waste a boner.”

Whoa. Then White Sands? I've never seen anything like it. I mean the dunes are so sculptural and modern and simple and vast and just incredible shapes. To see them white and reflecting white—the sky's actually darker than that ground. It's an odd, beautiful place.

And then the third? We did Carlsbad Caverns. If we're going to do a celebrity shoot, let's make something, work with an artist, see what we come up with. It's always more interesting.

After all this, do you feel constrained as an actor in some ways? No, I don't really think of myself much as an actor anymore. It takes up so little of my year and my focus. Film feels like a cheap pass for me, as a way to get at those hard feelings. It doesn't work anymore, especially being a dad.

On the pie chart, what is acting? Acting would be very small slice.

Do you see yourself as having been successful? I wish I could just change my name.

Come out as a new person? Like P. Diddy. I can be Puffy now or—what is Snoop? Lion? I just felt like Brad was a misnomer, and now I just feel like fucking Brad.

What other name would you have put on yourself? Nothing. When outside success comes, the thing I've enjoyed the most is when there's a personal discovery in it. But when I find it repetitious or painfully boring, it's absolute death to me.

When you're talking, you kinda rub your thumb against your fingers a lot—it's just an observation. I don't know. I'm tactile—I'm a tactile individual. “I like to feel things up,” he said. [laughs]

Yeah, in high school he was the boy voted most likely to— To feel you up. [laughs] I don't know, I guess it's back to feeling. I think I spent a lot of time avoiding feelings and building structures, you know, around feelings. And now I have no time left for that.

When is the acting still exciting? I would say more in comedic stuff, where you're taking gambles. I can turn out the hits over and over and I just—my favorite movie is the worst-performing film of anything I've done, The Assassination of Jesse James. If I believe something is worthy, then I know it will be worthy in time to come. And there are times I get really cynical, you know. I spend a lot of time on design and even this sculpture folly I'm on, I have days when—it all ends up in the dirt anyways: What's the point? So I go through that cycle, too, you know? What's the point?

Oh man, that's a big question. I know what the point is—it's communicating, it's connecting. I believe we're all cells in one body; we're all part of the same construct. Although a few of us are cancerous. It's helping others. Yeah, we help each other, that's it.

So what's on the agenda later? I'm anxious to get to the studio. I think it was Picasso who talked about the moment of looking at the subject, and paint hitting canvas, and that is where art happens. For me I'm having a moment of getting to feel emotion at my fingertips. But to get that emotion to clay—I just haven't cracked the surface. And I don't know what's coming. Right now I know the manual labor is good for me, getting to know the expansiveness and limitations of the materials. I've got to start from the bottom, I've got to sweep my floor, I've got to wrap up my shit at night, you know?

A metaphor again. But it works. Right now I've got to hammer my own nails.

Michael Paterniti is a GQ correspondent. This is his first piece for GQ Style.

This story appears in the Summer 2017 issue of GQ Style with the title “Monumental.””

[gunnersalley]

Cannibalism In The Firearms Industry [Opinion]

In the last week my internet feeds have blown up with a couple of stories.  One in particular has me perplexed.  Not because of the news itself, nor the frustration from some that is rightfully being vented, but the outright hatred that came spewing out from so many of “us” immediately upon the release of this news towards two reputable businesses in the firearms industry.     What Happened:   Let me paraphrase the story:  Springfield Armory (SA) and Rock River Arms (RRA), two companies out of Illinois, are (were) closely involved with   the Illinois Firearms Manufacturing Association (IFMA), a pro-2A lobbying group    with high ranking members of each company even on the group’s board of directors.    SA and RRA have donated money to the IFMA to protect and work in favor of second amendment rights in Illinois.      The   IFMA   recently remained neutral instead of voting against a bill   (SB-1657)   that   passed the Illinois state senate by a 1 vote margin and  , if   signed by the Governor  , will negatively affect many small firearms dealers and their customers in the state but not so much SA or RRA themselves.         “OH, snap, let’s make a bunch of memes and boycott!”  I know, I know, fresh meat for memes, right?  Well, let’s back up a little, here.  Rock River Arms was established in 1993 and the current entity of Springfield Armory in the mid 70’s.  So, for nearly 25 and 40 years, these companies have been providing quality firearms to the industry and as large companies, surely putting plenty of their hard earned revenue into lobbying for pro-2A causes.      Despite this, as soon as there was a mistake made, social media’s keyboard commandos have taken zero time to completely denounce them and scream to the world,      “These guys are so evil!  Let’s boycott them because they must hate all gun owners and our second amendment and I hope my memes get a lot of likes and people like my page more on this awesome social media platform that I am using to spread my hastily formed opinion therefore making this platform’s owners lots of money to go fight against my 2A rights but who cares because my memes are so awesome and people are commenting with so many fist-bump emojis!  [breath]”         Wait, what?  Oh yeah, your rants and memes are making people money who actually want to destroy our industry and 2A rights.  Are you getting the point?     Facebook, Google, and YouTube = Anti-gun:   Let’s talk about this for a minute.  These days, more and more of the tech businesses whose products we use daily are taking more action regarding their anti-second amendment views.  Recently, YouTube reportedly started demonetizing channels with firearms related content.      This doesn’t affect most of us.  “No ads?  Yay!  Right?”      Well, this means that a lot of firearms related content creators whose income comes from YouTube ad revenue are in a bad place.  If this continues and there is no value in time-consuming content creation, the firearms related sector of YouTube will all but shrivel up and vanish.  “Wait, no more Demolition Ranch or FPS Russia?  This is starting to feel uncomfortable …”      I know, right!?  This is a huge push against the firearms industry.  Do we boycott YouTube vowing to never watch another YouTube video?  Could it make a difference in what YouTube is doing?  Maybe, but my guess is that right around 99.5% of us will continue to watch videos on this outwardly anti-2A business.      We are all familiar with Facebook’s strict policies about firearms.  No Ads, no sales, no giveaways … basically anything that can directly link to sales or distribution of any item from any business that sells firearms, knives, or other weapons mentioned on Facebook’s lengthy list is prohibited.     Facebook also owns Instagram, now, and the policies crossover.      “Violate” Facebook’s Gun Policy, And Get Shut Down:   Firearms related pages have to be very careful about what they do or say or post, or they run the risk of being shut down.  This happens all the time and is becoming more and more frequent.  A couple of large pages that were recently shut down were the Tactical Shit and Daily Badass pages.  I had the opportunity to chat with TJ Kirgen, owner of Tactical Shit and he said, “It was proven that we were targeted by the Facebook anti-gun algorithm.”      Really?  So Facebook, this social media platform  that we all use  has a continuously running algorithm that was developed specifically to target and squash gun related pages.            Wow, bring on the memes and boycotts, right?  Right?  Anybody?      Daily Badass’ large Instagram page was also shut down without any notice whatsoever with zero correspondence from the social media side.  Only after an uproar from some social media communities and many emails were these pages reinstated.      With all of this blatant disregard for our rights, do we still use Facebook and Instagram?  Yep.  And until the next big platform takes over social media, the same 99.5% of people will probably continue to do so.   “But without Facebook and Instagram, where would we get our memes?”  I know,  it’s a tough decision.  In 2017, memes and “likes” win.  (unfortunately)    Here is a small list of large anti-2A businesses, many of which we all use on a regular basis:     Facebook, Instagram    Youtube    Google    Levi-Strauss         Comcast    Costco    The National Football League    Cinemark, Regal, AMC, Carmike Theaters/Cinemas     The list could go on and on.      Every so often a new shady news story will surface, exposing their most recent anti-2A actions and the keyboard commandos will get frothy at the mouth about it and proclaim their disgust in whatever these businesses are doing at the time, and the memes flow like the salmon of Capistrano.     The NFL, For Example:      Remember how the NFL denied Daniel Defense an ad spot during the Superbowl?  “They did?  Oh yea, I remember all the memes.  I still have some saved in Google photos!”  I’ll bet you do, too.  But when the froth dries up, and the meme content is yesterday’s news, the commandos go back to using their oh-so convenient services and scrolling past or watching those ads that generate these companies billions, a part of which is surely spent on lobbying for laws that go against our second amendment rights, not to mention continually censoring and stomping as much gun-related content as they possibly can.  Oh, the irony.         The Benefit of the Doubt:   So back to this recent social media explosion:  Springfield Armory and Rock River Arms have since taken accountability for this mistake, apologized, and broken ties with the lobbying group that remained neutral.  Was there a huge oversight here?     Definitely.      Is there work to be done by both of them to try and reverse this?  Yes.   But should we jump to conclusions and call for a boycott and wish bankruptcy and closure upon these companies and the hundreds of people who they employ?       I hope this is an easy answer for you.  Of course not.  This isn’t Facebook, Google, or YouTube here.  This is a firearms company.  This is one of “us.”  Why are so many, so hasty to form what seems like a final, rock solid opinion on these guys who have been on our “team” for 25+ years?       I don’t blame anyone for being upset about this bill.  It could do some damage to people in Illinois.       But let’s give these firearms manufacturers a chance to fix their mistake.  Let’s not immediately try and strike down an asset to our community.  If it were Facebook or Google, I’d be singing a different tune.  Those obviously have a long track record of anti-2A views and policies.      But Springfield and Rock River?  Shouldn’t they be considered long-standing teammates?  I think I’ll give them the benefit of the doubt, and as long as they are working towards a solution to this problem, I’ll consider them on our “team.”      Honestly, the reactions to this remind me of how liberals jumped all over any shred of negative press that was released about Donald Trump’s past and current views, actions, words, and tanning preferences.  But the majority of America came together and gave him the benefit of the doubt, and despite a seemingly infinite amount of negative press he received, he won.  No, scratch that … WE won.         WE came together and recognized that this guy, regardless of his sometimes tactless way of dealing with the media, or locker room style conversations, or the way he poorly worded some of his views for the world to hear and cringe at, and despite his past interactions AND friendships AND business deals with the liberal left and some of their agendas, at the end of the day we came together and realized that this guy is on our team.  I’m proud to have voted for him, and to now call him my president.     Should We Roast Them? Or, Is It Time To Forgive?   The moral to this long, rambling story is this:  Let’s not help the liberals destroy every piece of the firearms industry that they are able.  Let’s look at this as a mistake and put our energy into helping.  Making memes and calling for a boycott and whining isn’t helping anything.  Regardless of whether or not you own or like the firearms from these companies, they are a valuable part of the industry and have been for a very long time.      Up until 2013, there were zero concealed carry permits in Illinois which is almost as bad as Commiefornia when it comes to gun laws.  Well,  some laws have actually changed, and some second amendment rights have been restored.   I’d wager that the 2 largest firearms manufacturers in the state   of IL   had a little something to do with that HUGE forward progress.    Springfield alone has donated over 1 million dollars to the NRA, which, as we all know, fights and lobbies for these changes around the country.              Being based in Illinois, SA and RRA have no choice but to work with liberal lawmakers.  They have no choice.  That’s who they’re surrounded by.     Conclusion:   I’ll repeat for you that this was a big mistake, error, oversight, whatever, on SA and RRA’s part.  People make mistakes and things DO slip through the cracks when there is not enough time in the day to see to every task and call and meeting that some business executives have on their plate.  Let’s also realize that in   every arena of   politics, cooperating and working with people who don’t always have the same views as us is often how we move forward as a nation.      If neither side cooperated with each other, there would be zero progress made.  Zero.  Let’s give these companies the benefit of the doubt that this was an honest mistake, and move forward with them, still on our team.  Let’s focus on the real enemies to our industry and put our energies into forward progress rather than fighting against each other.    As a disclosure, I do know personally a handful of the people over at Springfield Armory, and in my opinion they are some of the best people I know with a true concern for our industry and our rights as Americans.  I don’t know anybody at Rock River Arms.  Regardless of this, it just disappoints me to see how quickly this community is to cannibalize its own.  We are better than this.    *Editor’s Note: The Above was an opinion piece from a reader. What we want to know, is if, after reading this, do you feel ready to move on and if not; what would it take for Springfield Armory and Rock River Arms to earn back your trust? Let us know in the comments below.

https://www.concealedcarry.com/news/cannibalism-in-the-firearms-industry-opinion/