#it's evidence and a learning tool and a labor of love

[shakesthewizard]

Hi please explain about fabianxadaine???

Okay since you asked so nicely here's the fucking thing about Fabadaine

First, some background info

Before we dive in, you should know a couple things. For one, I'm a firm bad kid polycule truther. You could truly pitch me any pairing/grouping of those kiddos and I could find a really ineresting and/or sweet dynamic to eat the drywall about

You should also know that I'm gonna most likely remember some details during this analysis - if you spot them, please let me know by putting them in a bottle and throwing them into the ocean.

Second, some character meta

Adaine O'Shaughnessey is a girl with a lot of courage. It's sort of her defining character trait. The idea of "a wizard with an anxiety disorder" brings to mind someone pretty timid, who's afraid of speaking their mind. But from her first appearance, we see clearly that to Adaine, her disorder is pretty explicitly medical. On her first day of freshman year, she's already talking back to her horrible parents and trying to stand up for herself. Long before she gets access to medication, her disorder hinders her the way an asthma attack might; it has no bearing on her willingness to do the courageous thing.

Relatedly, Adaine thrives under adversity. Not abuse or mistreatment, mind - what I mean is that she likes it when people push back at her a little, so that she has opportunities to test her ideas and opinions against dissent. Look at her dynamic with Aelwyn in season three. Those two bicker and banter; they poke at each other, but it's how they're expressing things like concern or pride.

You could argue, probably well, that this is a product of sisterhood, and a product of their history in particular. But I think there's more to it than that. We see throughout the show that Adaine is a person who cares about exceeding; about learning and growing and achieving great things. It's classic wizard.

Adaine is the child of the wealthy and the important, and that shapes everything about her. It influences her struggles; her abandonment issues in particular. But it also shapes her goals, her values, and her attitudes. She seeks recognition for her skills and her labor, and she wants the people she loves to challenge her so that she can grow and make them proud.

Fabian Seacaster is the son of a famous man and a natural talent. His showmanship is clear and evident from the first moments we see him, and it's reflected in his character build from the start. He's a Champion Fighter, after all.

This showmanship is, frankly, a testament to Lou Wilson's masterful understanding of characters. That single trait can be picked apart to help us understand everything about him.

Fabian is a showman because he was raised as the scion of an up-and-coming house; given every tool he needed to learn his parents' skills, and to prepare him to take the Seacaster name when the time comes.

Fabian is a showman because he believes wholeheartedly in his own greatness. His whole life, he's been surrounded by tutors whose whole job it has been to mold him into the perfect son, and they were paid enough to care about doing it right.

Fabian is a showman because he knows he's earned his own arrogance; wealth or not, pampered lifestyle or not, we see him scold his fencing teacher when he goes easy on him. Fabian isn't blinded by his privilege (or at least not entirely) - he genuinely cares about being the best, and he'll give up the luxury if it means greatness.

Fabian is a showman because he's deeply anxious. Bill and Hallariel clearly love their son, but being the only child of a world-famous pirate, tasked with being their emissary to Solace for future generations, is an unbelievable amount of pressure. Fabian has to be perfect to the world outside. He can't just be good; he can't just be great; he has to be Fabian Aramais Seacaster, Son of the Famous Bill Seacaster!

Fabian is a showman because he has to figure out who he is, somehow. Who is he, outside of his father? He certainly doesn't know, but suddenly he realizes he has to know, for his own sake. So he does what any kid does when they're trying to figure out their identity - they act out.

Finally, what I understand about Fabadaine that nobody else does

Fabian Seacaster and Adaine O'Shaughnessey are the children of the wealthy; the important. They're both second generation Solesians, sent out to represent their families. They're both ambitious people who are trying to achieve great things outside the expectations of their parents. They're both proud and straightforward, prioritizing their values over social niceties.

Adaine and Fabian both carry the swords of their dead fathers.

To put it simply - Fabian and Adaine are really good foils for each other, and I dislike when their dynamic is reduced to classic highschool boyfriend/girlfriend tropes.

As an example, a number of fics I've read have Fabian pursuing Adaine, and that simply doesn't hold up. Let's be honest here - Fabian has terrible taste in women, and has a bad track record of making the more self-destructive choice whenever romance is on the table. I have no doubt he likes Adaine, but he would also know that she'd hold him accountable and challenge him when he makes stupid choices. No, Adaine is the one initiating here.

The thing that really draws me to this pair is because both of them need and want to be challenged, but each of them has a different attitude towards challenging others, and it makes for an active dynamic that can evolve in a lot of interesting ways.

You know what, check back later. I need to write fic about this.

[herbeloved82]

Art and Confessions in the Shadow of a Fireplace

Day 2 Prompt, even if late

In a windowless room the only source of light came from the lighted fireplace where aromatic woods burned for hours now, filling the air with their scent. Outside winter was awake and covering the lands with snow and ice. Its reign had begun and no one, not even the blood drinkers could ignore its power. 

However, inside, the fireplace casted its orange and red light on the most beautiful piece of art that nature ever created. On the carpet a young man on his knees, his body trapped in ropes the same color of blood and passion. 

The ropes began from the middle of his chest to create the first diamond shape. His white skin an evident contrast against their deep color. Between them his nipples were already hard and red, begging for attention that no one gave. 

Then the red lines of rope spread like ink all over his body. His arms are tied behind his back and the long lines run along his spine to wrap itself around his swan-like neck. His head is thrown back, so that long auburn curls fall on a cascade around him, like a halo. He’s a fallen angel made only for pleasure and to tempt humanity. 

His exposed throat carries fast healing marks left behind by hungry lips and sharp fangs. His half closed eyes, unfocused and veiled, are filled with lust and yet his red mouth doesn’t beg for more. He knows better than that. He knows that as long as he behaves he will have everything he craves and more. 

His breath, just barely labored, echoes like thunder in the stillness of the room, a testament of how worked up he is, but it is his hard cock, proudly standing between his parted legs, that is the center and fulcrum of all the attention behind the intricate work of ropes and skin. 

Like the rest of him his balls are caged by the firm constriction of the ropes, but the soft material didn’t touch his cock. “You look so beautiful like this.” A silky voice whispered and the young man moaned as a soft blush crept  over his cheeks. 

Such a beautiful and unexpected reaction to the simplest truth.  

“Stay still for me, Armand.” The same voice said again and this time Armand exhaled the air trapped in his lungs in a vain attempt to control himself. 

“Master.” He said between clenched teeth, fighting the need to add more, to beg. Not now, he thought. It is too soon. 

“You can stay still a little longer, my love. Can’t you?”

The man waited for a small nod of the beloved head before he went back to impress such beauty on a canvas. Even Aphrodite herself would be jealous of Armand, and he knew that. “I - I can, Master.” Armand spat the words out of his mouth like they burned. It was hard, so hard to keep focus on his position and stillness, even after centuries spent training himself to never show emotions, but when Marius was around, Armand would always lose control. He would lose himself. That was what scared him so much when they met again, to lose himself in Marius again, to lose what he had built to keep himself safe. 

Now Armand had learned that he could be his true self with Marius, he could allow himself to show vulnerability, to fall even, and Marius would be there to catch him, to shield him from everything and everyone so that he could simply be. 

“I know you can, my love. You are so good for me.” 

So good. Armand had never been good for anyone. He had been a tool, a weapon used to terrify Paris. A ruler over his coven. He had been useful sometimes. With Louis, to offer him shelter when he couldn’t be with the one he really loved. He had offered a way to rest, and Louis had grabbed it, but back he only offered a part of himself when Armand craved everything. He had been a soldier in the war against Akasha and even a Master to Daniel, but good, that he never was, not for anyone. 

Only Marius could undo him with just a word, for good really sounded like Marius was telling him he was enough. Enough to stay, enough to be loved like he craved. Armand whimpered, a loud and acute sound, and tears of blood stained the corners of his eyes with their presence. 

“Armand?” Marius called. “Is everything okay?” It was just a simple question, and yet Armand felt his voice shake with shame and rage when he answered, knowing he couldn’t lie to Marius, not in this scenario. 

“Amadeo.” He whispered. Only to say it aloud just a second later.  

Marius dropped the brush and in a moment he was near Armand, on his knees so that he could look him in the eyes. Never before he heard Armand’s safeword during a scene.  

His hands loomed over the ropes, ready to slash them to free Armand, but the moment his cold skin brushed against the central knots, Armand panicked even more and tried to scoot away from Marius. 

“Armand?” He asked again, his voice soothing even if full of worries. 

When Armand looked at him again he saw confusion in his bright eyes and bit down at the supple flesh of his lip.  Usually during scenes he wasn’t supposed to talk if not to answer Marius’ direct questions, however he didn’t know if he could use so little words now. 

“Can I talk, Master? Can we talk?” 

The worry inside Marius morphed into something else and he hardened his expression while nodding his head yes. It was clear Armand needed his Master now, he needed everything that Marius was to him. 

Armand looked at him, his eyes searching Marius’ very soul for something, anything that would tell him his lover was upset, but when he only read acceptance in his eyes, he dared to ask for one more thing. 

“I - I would like to keep the harness. I need this to be,” but then words died on his lips. He was still learning to ask for what he needed. 

“Do you need this to still be a scene, my love?” Marius wasn’t sure about this. Armand had, after all, called for his safeword and it was his duty to end the scene, however he sensed there was something more going on, and he needed to know what it was. In a leap of faith Marius decided to have faith in their relationship and in Armand knowing what he needed, so when Armand said yes, Marius agreed with a quick and yet deep nod of his head. 

Then Marius got up, re-establishing his dominating role with that simple gesture. He waited for Armand to find his balance again and glanced at the stains on his perfect skin. Armand looked able to calm down in the offered silence, but even when he stopped shuffling, he didn’t raise his eyes from the ground. 

Slowly Marius saw the tension slide away from his body as Armand sunk deeper in the right mindset. 

“Tell me what happened.” While the words were simple and they could have been spoken in any other contest, they had a deeper meaning and a demanding nature to them that would have been absent if Armand wasn’t still on his knees. 

Armand took a deep breath, even if he didn’t need it, and answered the question with all the honesty he could muster. The time of lies and misunderstanding between them was over and now only the truth had the right to stay. 

“I was never good for others. I was never enough for them to stay.” Armand admitted and there was a longing in his voice, so deep that Marius saw all over again the boy he had saved from the brothels and couldn’t remember what love was. 

“You taught me that. I thought I had learned my lesson when you didn’t come back for me.” 

The scent of blood filled Marius’ nostrils as his heart broke under the excruciating pain of the truth Armand was claiming. He didn’t need to see the red trails on Armand’s face to know he was crying.  

“But then I learned that you never stopped to watch over me even when I didn’t know, and I have told myself I hated you for that. It was easier to hate you when the only one I really hated was myself, for betraying your teaching, for accepting what Santino turned me into.” 

Marius felt the acidic taste of regrets burning his throat and mouth, like fire it exploded inside him and brought him close to tears but this wasn’t about him. This was about Armand and it was his duty to make him the whole focus of Marius’ attention. His own needs had to wait, above all when he knew he deserved this pain for his actions had been monstrous no matter why he did what he did.

“I was left behind so many times. Every time I loved, I had lost the person I needed, and I couldn’t come back to you, for you are the only one who can destroy me. Your rejection would be enough to end my life. When you realize I’m not who you want and you will walk away, you will take my life with you.” 

Blood flooded in Marius’ mouth when he bit his tongue. What good were words when it was actions that Armand needed to believe Marius would stay? And yet he wanted to throw himself at Armand’s feet, at his mercy, and tell him time and time again that he would never leave again. How could he when he himself barely survived to be separated from the one he so deeply loved? 

Armand was breathing hard through tears, trying in vain to calm himself and suppress the too many emotions he had bottled inside his soul for so long, but there wasn’t turning back now, the dem broke and his words were like a flooding river. They would purge his soul of all the pain he could never vent and finally leave him free from the burden he carried alone way too long, but in the meantime his whole body shook and Marius didn’t want anything more than to go to him and take him into his arms, where he belonged. 

“Earlier - earlier you said I was good for you, and for a moment you made me believe that I will be enough for you, that you will stay.” 

Armand’s last words echoed in the silent room and everything stilled. The pain was so deep it cut through Marius’ heart like not even claws could. It was a miasma that, like amber, trapped them in a timeless bubble of misery. 

“I will stay.” Marius said in the end, breaking the spell that subdued them. “I will always stay and I won’t ask you to believe me now, Armand, but I will show you, this, us, is forever for me.” 

For Marius had tried once already to live without him, and he wasn’t proud to admit that he failed miserably. Now he knew what his priority was, what it was always supposed to be, and he would live until his last moment honoring the second chance they were given against all odds. 

“You won’t.” Armand said, his voice just a whisper that Marius only caught because of his supernatural senses. 

“The moment you realize I’m not who you love, the moment you will understand what I did, you will leave me behind and I will be no more.” 

“What is the unforgivable sin you think you committed, what’s so monstrous in your eyes that you think I couldn’t forgive?”

Marius needed to know what was terrifying Armand. He for sure knew that Marius was well aware of his action in the centuries they were separated, and he couldn’t think about a single thing that Armand did he didn’t already forget, for forgiveness wasn’t his to give.

“I killed him. I killed the one you loved.” Armand said with resignation, like a man who knew once the truth was out, nothing would change his destiny of loneliness and annihilation. 

“Who? Who do you think I loved more than I love you?” Marius was confused. Of those he had loved no one had been dearer to his heart than Armand. Not even Pandora who he had loved tenderly for millennia, the last remaining piece of a past long gone that they had lived together. 

“Amadeo.” He spat with rage. “I killed your beloved Amadeo and in his stead only I remain.” Armand admitted at the end and then, like a puppet whose strings were cut, he fell on the ground and curled on himself. He wished the ground would open under him and swallow him whole. He couldn’t stay and see the disgust on Marius’ face, so he didn’t dare to look. 

Marius lowered himself to the ground once again, his red robe pooled around him like a lake of blood. Gently he lifted Armand from the ground and put him on his lap, then, with the ultimate care, he used his fingers to wipe away the tears from his eyes. 

“You are the most precious of all creatures to me, dear one.” He began, hands stroking every inch of his skin he could reach, giving Armand the comfort he so desperately needed, while taking comfort in the touch just as much himself. 

“There will never be another for me, but you.” He admitted aloud. He had lived longer than many and loved deeply, but now he knew his heart would always rest with the one in his arms, his one and only for as long as he lived.

Only now, when they finally found their way back to each other, Marius fully understood Seth and Fareed. Luckier than many, they knew since the beginning they could never be separated, for one was nothing without the other. 

“There is nothing to forgive, my love. You live in fear of something that doesn’t exist.” 

Armand moved in his arms, curling up again, making himself smaller and trying to hide his face in Marius’ stomach, deep into the softness of his robe. 

“How can you say this?” He muffled against the velvet, the cloth padded down his words. 

“Do you know how I always refer to you in private, when no one else is around and I think about you?” 

Armand shook his head. No, he didn’t know. He never dared to hope that Marius would think about him after they met again. He couldn’t handle the rejection or the hope. 

“I call you my Amadeo. You were always my Amadeo and always will be.” 

Armand stilled in his arms, ready to bolt. 

“Not because I discharge what you endured. I don’t belittle your pain and what you have to do to survive. I will never forgive myself for the pain you went through alone and I would never dare to deny it.” He explained. His voice was full of thousands of emotions and Marius didn’t even try to tone them down. 

“Then why?” Armand asked, unsure he really wanted to hear the truth. 

“Because for me you will always be the one I fall in love with. It doesn’t matter how much you changed, my love for you never diminished, if possible it grew stronger and deeper with the passing time.” 

“How can you say this?” 

Armand needed to know. He needed to dig and expose the truth to it bare bones, only then he would be able to trust that Marius wasn’t tricking him. 

“Because it is the truth. You are him and he’s you. You are one of the many forms my Amadeo took. You are the soldier who fought to survive, you are the painter who craves to learn, the man who needs to know and consume everything around him. You are my fledgling and Daniel’s Master. You are a friend and an advisor. You are all of this and more as Amadeo was and is, but above all, you are the man I love unconditionally.” 

This time, when Armand moved, Marius wasn’t ready for his actions, for he could never predict what his lover would do. They tumbled on the floor as Armand didn’t have his agility with his arms secured behind his back and yet he managed to push Marius so hard he was now lying on the floor, Armand awkwardly straddling him. 

“Prove it. Prove it to me.” He demanded and Marius couldn’t deny him anything, not after the words spoken between them. 

Marius turned his neck, offering him the delicate skin, beneath which his veins pulsed with blood, and when Armand bit him his whole body felt on fire and at peace at the same time. Marius didn’t hide his moans. He didn’t hide anything from Armand. 

At every sip memories unlocked for Armand, thoughts that were secrets to anyone else. Armand discovered through the blood how Marius saw him, what he thought when he was the only focus of his mind. He felt emotions that his Master never shared with anyone else, protecting Armand and the memories of their time together like they were Marius’ most precious possession. 

Everything was given to him and Armand became drunk on Marius’ blood, on the feeling of the love his lover really held for him, for blood could never lie. 

“Master.” He mumbled against Marius’ neck, the blood dripping from his sharp fangs. “Master, I need you.” It could have been the sluggish nonsense of someone inebriated out of their minds, but Marius knew better. 

This was bloodlust and need, all wrapped in his Armand’s beautiful package. It didn’t take long for Marius to tip them over, so that Armand was the one lying on the carpet, his beautiful body exposed to Marius’ hungry eyes.

Marius towered over him for a few moments, just the time to keep devouring Armand with his eyes, stunning in his harness, and to get rid of his robe before he covered Armand with his larger frame, hiding him from sight in case any jealous God was watching. 

The kiss that descended on Armand’s mouth was desperate, full of a hunger that Marius could barely contain now. Marius’ lips were demanding and allowed Armand no other choice but surrender. His mouth still tasted like Marius’ blood and he savored himself in his lover, adding more blood as sharp fangs pierced delicate skin. 

When his need to devour his lover was barely satiated, Marius helped Armand on his side, his long fingers probing against his opening, at first just brushing over his the delicate skin as his mouth kept pampering Armand’s body and shoulders with gentle kisses all over his flawless flesh. 

Slowly Marius prepared him, making sure not to cause pain with his claws. He marveled all over again as Armand’s body relaxed under him. 

“Please. Please stop torturing me.” Armand begged and Marius smiled against his neck. 

“Am I, my love?” Even his voice sounded deeper, stained with passion. 

“You are so cruel, the cruelest.” 

Then Armand couldn’t keep going for his words morphed into a scream of pure pleasure as Marius slid inside him, his body accommodating around his girth. Marius didn’t stop until every inch of him was inside Armand, and yet Armand needed more. 

Until dawn they made love, in the privacy of their room. Not even the call of the sun was strong enough to keep them from each other, so deep their need was. 

Only the heaviness of their limbs told them that soon they would be dead to the world, trapped in the sleep that plagued their kind, and once again Armand surprised Marius. 

“Stay. Stay inside me.” 

Marius wrapped himself around Armand’s body, offering him shelter in his arms, and as one they slept. 

Only the unfinished portrait would watch over their sleep, a silent witness to their renewed bond. As the fire died in the fireplace and darkness engulfed them, they slept aware that the other would stay, now and forever. 

END                           

[thepoliticalvulcan]

Do not misinterpret the Paradox of Intolerance to give yourself license to make trolling the sum total of your politics.

The Paradox of (In)Tolerance describes PHYSICAL safety. It is not a prescription to use the tools of the enemy to create change. That is foolish and its never been clearer to me than after this election why its a snake eating its own tail.

If you need more evidence than 2015 - 2024 why using the Paradox of Intolerance as an excuse to never educate, to never attempt persuasion, to ONLY meet ignorance with withering scorn, then let me ask you a hypothetical:

There is a Muslim with whom you have a close, personal relationship: a friend, a coworker, an in-law etc. They are very warm and courteous to you but sometimes they say things that hint at a worldview you don't quite grok or feels like they are a bit too credulous when it comes to rumors. At some point after election day they confess to you that they 1. didn't vote, 2. voted third party, or 3. voted for Trump: would you engage them in dialogue to try to understand why and try to persuade them why this was an error without intentionally insulting them? Or would you disavow them and never speak to them again to the fullest extent possible within the limits of your common ties? Would you encourage people you know in common to disavow them or would you engage these people in conversation about how best to reach your Muslim friend?

Now what I am getting at is not the same as asking you to do emotional and intellectual labor when you're burnt out and the other party is overtly abusive and clearly acting in bad faith or to show up, in person, in spaces where you feel like you may be physically in danger.

What I am saying is that the Paradox of Intolerance or self care should not become an excuse to abdicate any responsibility for doing any amount of outreach and education. To advocate for ourselves and for our values.

Kamala Harris going on Joe Rogan would not have changed the outcome of this election, but the growing tendency of people with liberal and leftist values to ignore these increasingly important venues in favor of only ever doing interviews inside the hug box is poison. We are losing the culture war and its not because we don't have the best, most witty entertainers to sell our ideas its because our avatars are not pitching their ideas to audiences they assume are unreachable or irrelevant.

Late Night monologues and leftist podcasts are an echo chamber. I love QAA, Behind the Bastards, and other "dirt bag left" forums but the model of deradicalization where you passively wait for the most open minded red pills and "enlightened centrists" to stumble upon something that might tilt their worldview ever so slightly has DEMONSTRABLY failed.

Those with silver tongues need to follow the example of Mayor Pete and Bernie Sanders and take the fight for real equality and humanism to the lion's den, or at least the boorish stoner gym bro's den. Rogan is a prime example of someone who has become stupider and meaner the more he is surrounded by people who nurture these instincts. He is a cautionary tale.

We should contemplate how this applies to our own lives and our own dealings.

No one should tolerate physical threats or emotional abuse.

But also we should not mislabel stupidity and ignorance as emotional abuse because our labor is not free.

And I've got news for people who themselves are marginalized: you're going to have to advocate for yourself.

We who are not marginalized can do our best to prepare the soil, to combat misinformation and prejudices, but if there is one thing to be learned from Trump's multiracial coalition its that experience reduces prejudice more than rhetoric. A few Latino and Asian men were Trump curious, tested the waters, and over time they've become more accepted. It ain't all sunshine and roses: Ramaswamy still has to deal with the likes of Anne Coulter, but he's benefited enormously from his willingness to tolerate a few bigoted morons in order to sell himself and his interests directly.

Coalition politics are messy, but you have to be seen in order to be seen as fully human. It just doesn't work any other way and I'm sorry for that. The rest of us can do our best to set an expectation that persons X,Y,&Z are chill and should be protected from morons but that will only achieve so much without some people willing to represent themselves: if they can without compromising safety. I'm under no illusions that for some populations, like trans people and undocumented immigrants, things might be headed to somewhere even bleaker and unsafe than it already is.

And again, louder for the people in the back, if you cannot be PHYSICALLY safe or you cannot be your best self at the moment, then you are not obligated to attempt outreach; but we are screwed if everyone abdicates all of the time forever.

[pastafossa]

Hello dear pasta. I’ve come to scream about jane and matt, because why not??

Jane almost dying after swallowing a random memory from foggy? Iconic. I hope the memory was something good though. Maybe something silly like him trying to ride a bike as a four year old and failing miserably, or the first time he ate sushi, put too much wasabi on it and had to drink copious amounts of liquid to soothe the burning!!

But, i feel very bad for matt too. This man can’t catch a break with people he’s on the brink of losing, can he? So i get his overprotectiveness tbh, but oh man do i love jane and her backstory. If you sold this as a standalone book id definitely buy it, like ive never heard about such an eloborate backstory in a fanfic??? God bless that you walk along us mere mortals on this earth pasta!!

(Jane is not only spitting rocks, she’s spitting bars too with those arguments with matt. <- yes i laughed when i thought of this lmao. I feel like such a dad)

(Also i think tumblr has been eating my asks *raises fist* tumblr gods, rest assured my vengeance shall be coming upon you soon!)

- @buckysbiota

HELLO AGAIN MY FRIEND!

I do feel after this, at least for a little while, Jane can reign as queen of the, 'Weirdest Way I Almost Died' club, because yeah, choking on Foggy's memory and almost dying because of it? They'll have to work to beat the strange factor. I can also confirm it was a good memory, cause if you're gonna choke to death on one, may as well be a pleasant one, even if it doesn't feel that way when it's stuck in your esophagus. 😂

Matt really does have sorta shitty luck here, yeah. He's got a history of losing people and these people he loves just keep winding up in danger, or almost dying in ways he doesn't quite expect them to. It naturally ends up putting him a bit on edge, like you said, especially with something like this with Jane where it is such an unknown, and something he can't really fight against. There is no going into the thread to haul her ass out of the water, there's no shoving his hand down her throat there to pull that stupid rock out, so he's just kind of... stuck waiting to see if she makes it out of whatever she's fighting. Poor guy.

And thank you SO SO MUCH! 😭 I tried to make all the backstory and plotlines just as elaborate and detailed as I might a book series, so I could practice what I'd learned about connecting plotlines, laying out clues, and building it all up slowly. I really do want to get published one day, so ya'll are getting every trick and lesson I've ever picked up over the years, and I am endlessly grateful for the response TRT's gotten! ���

(sweet jesus, I spat water, the Dad jokes are here! 😂😂😂)

(IT DOES EAT ASKS, I LIVE IN ETERNAL FEAR I'VE MISSED SOME??? Did I miss it? Is it buried in the backlog of asks I haven't gotten to yet? Did it get eaten? HELLSITEEEEEE.)

[twistedintern]

~A summary/analysis of Mozus Trein’s voice lines [from Unified Exams No.7]~

Once again, the following analysis would not possible were it not for the efforts of the one and only Ras and their terrific Mystery Shop Translations. Theirs is not short of a bonafide labor of love; I am eternally grateful for their kindness in allowing me to corroborate my own interpretation of game content with top-quality translations.

The voice lines under examination in this post can be found here.

DISCLAIMER: As with my previous writings on staff voice lines, please keep in mind that this post is speculative in nature and should not, under any circumstances, be heralded as canon.

Let’s not delay any longer, dear visitors!

(As an added bonus, I furthermore have in my drafts a critical treatment for your reading pleasure: that is, a “mini-study” detailing Professor Trein’s relationship with another canon character, featuring evidence gleaned from personal episodes.)

FACTS

- He lives alone - His adult daughters correspond with him through written letters - They are concerned for his well-being; they often ask after his health and urge him to call upon them if ever a need - His view of academia is certifiably a no-nonsense one. He insists the duty of students is singular in nature: learning should--no, must--take precedence - He is firmly against utilizing the Internet as a research tool and/or study aid. According to him, it is rife with false information that anyone can claim factual. Books and printed matter (which require review in most cases) are far more reliable in his eyes - Not only does he loathe yawning during his class, he finds the gesture rude in public settings in general - He asserts that each and every one of Night Raven College’s instructors care deeply for students’ success and behave in accordance to seeing pupils realize their potential. No matter how strict he and his colleagues may be, what they do is for students’ own good - He strives to keep up a presentable, professional image befitting a scholar: little else factors into his choice in attire. In the interest of tidiness, he always has a lint roller handy for the removal of cat fur - He demonstrates admirable dedication to maintaining an orderly home and domestic environment, such that he cleans his kitchen and bathroom daily. He attributes this habit of his to his late wife--he thinks it unkind toward her memory to live in squalor - He does not play favorites; he treats all students equally - He has on a prior occasion consulted Vargas on the topic of keeping physically fit in a manner befitting his age. True to form, Vargas suggested he take up Magift... Trein is reluctant to pursue the latter’s advice on account of the risk of injury - He provides us with another example of Sam’s product savvy: despite Trein’s misgivings, Lucius has loved each and every cat toy the former has recommended. (A curious thing indeed, as the same cannot be said for the toys he personally selects!)

Logical Assumptions

- When he mentions “living alone,” he means, “living alone with Lucius”. Lucius is an indoor cat, after all: it would be strange if he did not share his domicile with his beloved companion - As he speaks of (laments) time passing since his daughters were small, it’s quite likely many years have passed since they “left the nest”

Speculation

- His daughters demonstrate incredible devotion to their father as well as an interest in his affairs: this very pronounced attachment could be an immediate consequence of having lost their mother early in their lives. Taken a step further, it’s possible that upon entering adulthood they came to recognize his labors and sacrifice as a single parent--a tremendous feat of selflessness and love

[postmodernbeing]

Shingeki no Kyojin headcanons: 104th training corps (College AU)

Hello, Postmodernbeing here. This time I wanted to write about things that I actually know, since I’m a college student and I’m studing History and Social Sciences I found myself wondering about what would the 104th training corps focus their studies on if all of them had chosen humanities as their career. I hope you find this funny and at least a bit accurate.

IMPORTANT:  I do not own Shingeki no Kyojin, only these HCs are my own. // Might contain a few spoilers from the manga. // English is not my first language and I study uni at Latin America, so scientifical terms/words/concepts may vary. Anyhow, I thank you for reading and for your patience.

Eren Jaeger

He’s passionate about Military History, not to be confused with history of army. Eren’s rather focused in strategies, weapons and semiotics involved in military speech.

First started with books about great wars in modern era. The use of certain weapons took him by surprise due the technological development.

Then he took classes about discourse analysis, semiotics and such, and felt inspired by the discourse reflected in emblems, uniforms, flags, etc.

Eren doesn’t really have a preference between occidental or oriental, North or South, Modern or Ancient settings. He would simply devour all the books that deal with military strategy and warlike conflicts. Although he has more experience and information about great wars in modern era.

He’s fascinated with the inexhaustible human desire of freedom and the extent that it can reach. This fascination might not be very healthy, he concludes.

Also, finds a cruel beauty in violence when showed in freedom and ideals are protected over one’s own life. But he won’t tell his classmates or professors. He knows is a controversial opinion for he’s still aware the implications of massive conflicts and the abuse of power.

One thing led to another, Eren is now taking classes and reading about philosophy in war and anthropological perspectives about violence through time.

He’s so into social movements besides his main interest in college: “No one’s really free until all humanity is”, that’s his life motto pretty much.

Due his readings and researches he decided it was important to develop a political stance about the world’s problems. Eren strongly believes all lives worth the same, but systems and nations had imposed over others and vulnerated other human's lives.

Yes, Eren is anti-capitalist and anti-imperialist.

Mikasa Ackerman

Asian Studies Major / History Minor.

She thinks by studying these degrees, she pays honor to her heritage. Specially to her mother. Her family is the proudest for Mikasa is also the best student in her whole generation.

Mikasa received a scholarship thanks to Azumabito family, who are co-founders of an academic institution dedicated to Asian historical and cultural research. She might as well start working when she graduates.

Although she’s passionate about Japan’s history, she has written a few articles and essays about Asian Studies themselves and the importance of preserving but also divulging by means of art and sciences.

In her essays and research work, she likes to employ tools from many disciplines since she strongly believes all humanities and social sciences serve the very same purpose at scrutinize the social reality all the same. Might as well use demographics, ethnology, sociology, philosophy, anthropology, archeology, and so on. For it proves to bring light into questions that history by itself could answer unsatisfactorily (in Mikasa’s opinion).

Even her professors wonder how she manages to organize that much information and pull it off successfully. She might as well be more brilliant than a few PhD’s students.

Armin Arlert

Prehistoric studies / Archeology

He’s so into the studies about the prehistoric humans and routes of migration.

Passionate about the ocean and natural wonders since kid, Armin believed his career would be environmentalist or geoscience related.

That was the agreement he had with his grandad since middleschool, until he read Paul Rivet’s “The Origins of the American Man” book and captured him thoroughly. The way the book explained logically the diverse theories about global migration and enlisted the challenges of modern archeology -for there are numerous mysteries- simply devoured his conscience.

He knew from the books he’d read that most evidence of the first settlements are deep under dirt or far away in the ocean whose level has risen over the centuries leaving primitive camps – and answers – unreachable. 

That’s the reason he is so eager to study and give his best to contribute both archeology and history disciplines. Also, he’ll forever love the ocean and nature, just leave him do all the fieldwork, please.

Jean Kirstein

History of industry / Industrial heritage / Historical materialism

Jean first started interested in capitalist industries and production development in first world countries. Kind of rejected other visions and explanations since he’d read about positivism studies.

His interest in such matters started when he was a just boy. He often found himself wondering how things were made and that question captured him ever since. As he grew up, he realized that machines and industrial processes were highly involved in the most mundane objects creation.

Nonetheless, he learnt that not always the best machinery was used, nor the best work conditions were available for mass production. From that moment he’d started to read about the First Industrial Revolution and his mind just took off with questions. Invariably, he learned about labour struggle and the transforming power due workforce.

Between his readings and university classes, he’d knew more about labour movements, unions. And in the theoretical aspect, he'd learned about historical materialism analysis.

One could say that Jean possesses a humanistic vision of the implications in mass production under capitalist system along history and nowadays.

Marco Bodt

Royalty's history / Medieval Studies 

I wanted to keep his canonical fascination to royalty and the best way to do that was including Medieval Studies.

Marco would study since the fall of Roman Empire until the latest gossip of royal families all across Europe.

Might get a bit of Eurocentric with his essays but in real life discussions he’s always open to debates about decolonization. He has even read Frantz Fanon books and possesses a critical thinking about colonial countries and their relations with the so named third world.

Nevertheless, Marco finds a strange beauty in the lives of monarchs and he’s interested in study from their education, hobbies, strategies, relationships, everything.

I’d say that his favorite historical period is probably the establishment of the descendants of the barbarian peoples in the new kingdoms such as the Visigoths, Ostrogoths, Franks, Vandals, Huns, Saxons, Angles and Jutes (holy shit, they're a lot).

Because this would transcend as the beginning of his favorite matter of analysis.

Sasha Braus

History of gastronomy, development of cooking, antropology and archeological studies.

Sasha’s interested in the history that shows human development of food and cooking. She finds wonders when she inquires into cultural aspects from the first farming till modern artistic expressions that would involve food.

Such as gastronomy. But her attention got caught in literature’s food representation too, with its symbols and allegories, also in paintings that belong in still life movement, but also Sasha finds interest when food is used as rhetorical devices (for example: the apple in Adam and Eve’s myth).

She’s curious about primitive systems of irrigation, cultivation, food distribution, adaptation of wild species; as well as the domestication of animals, the diversification of the diet and its link with sedentary life, as well as the subsequent division of labor once the need for food was assured in humanity’ first cities.

Sasha’s convinced that alimentation is the pilar of civilization as we know it. For it involves cultural, artistic, economic, emotion and social aspects. Food is a microcosm of analysis of humanity.

Sasha hasn’t a favorite historical period or setting. But she definitely has a special fascination for first civilizations and their link with alimentation. Also, she likes to study the development gastronomy in occident world around different regions, social classes, and time.

Although, let’s be honest, Sasha would devour (lol, couldn’t help it) ANY book about agriculture, cattle raising, cooking or gastronomy. 

Connie Springer

Micro-history / History of everyday life.

Connie loves his hometown, has a deep respect to his family and traditions. That’s why he finds himself wondering about the most ordinary events that developed in his dear Ragako. 

The book “The Cheese and the Worms” by Carlo Ginzburg changed the way he used to understand history and capture him into meaningful discussions about what he learned was called micro-history.

His favorite quote from that book is: “As with language, culture offers to the individual a horizon of latent possibilities—a flexible and invisible cage in which he can exercise his own conditional liberty.”

Once deep into studying the Italian historians and their works, he decided to give it a try, and ever since he’s mesmerized with the mundane vestiges craftsmen that worked in his village left behind.

Connie’s parents are so proud of him and his achivements, but mostly because he became a passionate academic over human and simple matters, (so down to earth our big baby).

His attitude towards his essays and research works truly shows his great heart and humility. Connie is aware that academic works have no use if they are not meant to teach us about ourselves too and current times.

Empathy and hard work, that’s how one could describe the elements that integrate his recently started academic career.

Historia Reiss

Political History / Statistician

Her father’s family pressured Historia since she was a little girl into studying History just like his dad. For he’s a very famous historian that had made important researches and books about the greatest statesmen of Paradis.

She thought in numerous ways that she could sabotage her career or study any other career without her family’s consent and end with her linage of historians. But she ended up enrolling in tuition and so far, she is trying her best in her studies. Historia swears this is the right path for her.

But don’t let the appearances fool you, even thought she studies her father’s career and the very same branch of history’s discipline, she has her own critical sense and she’s so talented on her own, very meticulous with her research papers.

Definitely wants a PhD about women, power and politics. We stand a Gender Studies Queen.

Her complementary disciplines are Political Sciences. Historia also has a talent for philosophy and owns a diary with all her thoughts about them. She hopes one day she would write a book or a manifesto about an innovative methodology for research and teaching History of Politic Thinking.

Ymir 

Religion’s History / Theology

Just like Historia, Ymir was pressured into studying History. And if she’s totally honest, she still has some doubts about it. Even if she couldn’t imagine herself studying anything else.

Anyways, Ymir thought that she could build her career around topics that she enjoys. So, she finally chose theology for unusual reasons.

Her classmates had grown up in religious families or had experience studying the doctrines they practiced. But she, being an agnostic, found satisfaction in unraveling belief systems in different cultures and time periods.

Albeit she studies in Paradis’ University, she currently has the opportunity of taking an academic exchange at Marley’s University. This only made Ymir more conflicted about her future, for she wants to stay (near Historia) but she’s aware that Marley would offer her more academic opportunities for her specialization.

Nowadays she’s working in some collaborative research paper with some people from Mythological Studies from the Literature department. She’s nailing it, writing some historical studies about titans in Greek mythology and its impact in shaping neoclassical poetry. Her brains ugh, love her.

Reiner Braun

Official History / Biographies of heroes and great wars.

His mother convinced him with numerous books about great national heroes, but mostly because she knew that would mean sure job to her son. All political administration in every level requires of an official chronicler. 

When he started his college courses, Reiner felt motivated and he was actually convinced that he had the vocation. But the more he read the less sure he felt that the academic world was for him. He wondered if he made the right choice. If he did it for him or for his mother.

Stories and myths about heroes have always cheered him up. That gave him purpose and consoled him when feeling down. Or at least it was like that when younger. Reiner truly didn’t feel like himself when regretting his choices, but he couldn’t help it for he was changing in more than a way.

That’s why he decided to experiment with other disciplines and with time he would find joy in historical novels. He would analyze them just as good as a litterateur and research about historical context in the written story AND study the artwork’s context itself.

His favorites theorical books are: “Historical Text as Literary Artifact” by Hayden White and Michel de Certeau’ “The Writing of History”.·        

Heroes stories would always accompany him, just differently now.

Bertolt Hoover

History of mentalities / Les Annales

Intimate relationships, basic habits and attitudes. / Culture

Bertie has always been a much reticent and shy guy. As he grew up, he consolidated his sullen personality, but maintained a friendly attitude towards anyone who needed him. That’s why he thought that the priority in his studies was to be at the service of his classmates.

So, although he was passionate about research and was a fan of the French Les Annales current, he considered his mission to be in the Archive. As a cataloger, organizer and curator of ancient documents.

But the ways of History are always mysterious, and Doctor Magath showed him that other way of being was possible. Before Bertolt picked his specialty, he met Theo Magath, a professor who recently had finished writing a book: “The Idea of Death in Liberio’s Ghetto in Marley During its War Against Eldia (Paradis)” (long-ass titles are historians specialty btw). After Magath ended his book’ presentation, Bertolt reached him. They talked for hours and finally, he felt inspired into pursuing his true passion. Magath gifted him “The Historian’s Craft” by Marc Bloch as a way to reminding him his way.

By the time Bertolt took History of Mentalities as optional class, he already had some basic notions about Les Annales, Lucien Febvre, Marc Bloch, Fernand Braudel, Jacques Le Goff and such. 

Being the gentle giant he is, Bertolt finds joy in reading about different lifestyles in diverse cultures. He constantly wonders about the origin of social constructs and the way they shape thinking as much as identity.

This boy is a wonder, he might not be the best in oral presentations or  extracurricular activities but sure as hell he’ll graduate with honors.

Annie Leonhart

Oral history, about institutions. Particularly, police and justice system in early XXs.

Albeit she got into the same University than Bertolt and Reiner, even shared classes and hopes, Annie regularly felt disconnected from her studies. With time she realized it wasn't due her career itself but rather because of the currents that her professors had suggested her taking. Until now.

Talking with Hitch and Marlow about their doubts concerning subjects and departments it came up the topics of history and present time but also oral history. She’d never heard something like that before. So, that very same week, Annie started searching for information about that.

She ended up with more questions: is it all of this just academic journalism? Or maybe sociology? When we can talk about regular history and when it starts being present time? If she introduces interviews due oral history, then that makes it an interdisciplinary work? Which are the best systems for analyzing data? Definitely, she’ll need help from anthropology and sociology departments if she wants to keep going. 

Contrary to her initial prognostic, philosophy and history of historic writing became her new allies, and the text “Le temps présent et l'historiographie contemporaine” (Present Time and Contemporary Historiography) by Bédarida among others, provided Annie another perspective. 

Regarding her favorite topics, she wouldn’t say that she selected them freely. They were just practical preferences. For institutions own extensive archives and numerous functionaries. One way or another, she ended up tangled in judicial system and police issues.

With new tools and object for studying, one could find Annie having a blast as detective too. Even if her academic essays focus on institutions’ history and configuration, she’s also working in corruption and more. She doesn’t do it because she believes it’s the right thing, but besides, the thrill of the tea is spicy. Although she won’t admit it. 

[informed-empowered-birth]

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[tipsycad147]

The eight Sabbats: Witch's holidays

by Michelle Gruben

Modern Pagans celebrate eight major holidays throughout the year, known as Sabbats. They are based on pre-Christian customs related to the movement of the sun. Most are related to the Celtic agricultural festivals that have given them their names.

Of course, now we know that the sun doesn’t actually move around the earth. And lots of Pagans live far away from the places where our food is grown. But the Sabbats are still a meaningful way to connect with the cycles of the seasons and of human life.

The Pagan Sabbats include the four astronomical holidays (the equinoxes and solstices) and four traditional holidays in between. Together, these eight festivals are known as the Wheel of the Year. They are observed in Wicca and Wicca-influenced forms of neo-Paganism.

Learn about the eight Witch’s holidays and some popular customs for each one:

Samhain

Probably the best-known of the Sabbats, Samhain is celebrated on October 31st. It coincides with Halloween or All Hallows Eve. Halloween is a time when even non-magickal people indulge in spooky activities and ancient superstitions. It's also the time when mainstream culture pays the most attention to the activities of Witches and Pagans.

The word Samhain comes from the Irish Gaelic word for “summer’s end.” The days have become shorter, and the darker half of the solar year is upon us. At this time, farmers would use up the remaining stores of perishable fruits and vegetables, preserving other foods to sustain them through the cold and dark season. They would also slaughter any livestock that they did not plan to feed through the winter. This is why we sometimes refer to Samhain as the Third Harvest, or Blood Harvest.

At Samhain, many people believe the boundary between the words is at its thinnest. Samhain is also known as Ancestor’s Night or the Feast of the Dead. For most Witches, Samhain is the best time to commune with the beloved dead (ancestors and honored spirits). Some also believe that lonely or angry spirits may wander the Earth on Samhain night, looking for humans to annoy.

How Pagans celebrate: For Pagans, Samhain is the beginning of the new year. It is a holiday of reflection and celebration. At Samhain, we cast off the old year’s attachments and turn our attention to the coming scarcity of winter. We feast on the last of summer’s bounty. We contemplate what is worth saving and nurturing during the dark of winter. We try to make friends with Death.

Pagans celebrate Samhain in many of the same ways muggles do: Scarfing down sweets, carving jack-o-lanterns, dressing up in costumes. We decorate with skulls and spiders and go to haunted houses. All of these Halloween traditions are too fun to miss out on—and besides, most of them have their roots in old Pagan beliefs, anyway.

If you’re invited to a Samhain ritual, you may see an ancestor altar. This is a shared altar where participants are invited to pile on their mementos and offerings for the dead. The presiding priest or priestess may invoke a deity who rules over transitions or the migration of souls—Morrighan, Hecate, or Hermes. You may participate in a meditation where you travel into the depths of the underworld, or look departed friends in the eye once more. People will speak the names of loved ones who died during the previous year, or long ago.

Feasting is a component of many Samhain rituals. When we eat sweets, we are savoring the sweetness of life and its impermanence. When we eat meat, we remember that all flesh must die and become nourishment for some creature or another.

We also use food as an offering to the dead—to communicate fond memories, to pay our respects—and perhaps, to appease hungry ghosts. Some Pagans set an extra plate at the Samhain table for spirit visitors. Another contemporary Pagan custom is the “dumb supper”—a silent meal where we invite our ancestors (both known and unknown) to come and dine with us.

Yule

Yule is the Pagan name for the Winter Solstice, the longest night of the year. In the Northern Hemisphere, it falls on or around December 21.

After the winter solstice, the darkest part of the year is over and the days begin increasing in length. This solar holiday is related historically to Christmas—Pagans delight in pointing out that Christians co-opted the date around the third century CE.

In the overarching neo-Pagan mythos, Yule is the birthday of the divine infant who is conceived in the spring. The dark of midwinter is the period of the Goddess’s confinement and labor as she prepares to welcome the solar child. On the longest night, the Sun God is born to the praise and gratitude of all Earth’s creatures.

How Pagans celebrate:

Yuletide is a time for passive, personal magick—for short days of work and long nights of dreaming. We set intentions and incubate our plans. It is a time of preparing mentally and spiritually for the light half of the year. Some Pagans keep a midwinter vigil, awaiting the rebirth of the sun at dawn.

It’s not often that you find large group rituals for Yule—probably because lots of Pagans are busy traveling and visiting with non-Pagan family! Instead, Yule rituals tend toward the home-y and conventional.

We decorate with evergreens and holly. We exchange gifts with friends and family. On Midwinter Eve, we light candles to herald the return of the sun. (The ambitious among us may set a Yule log blazing.) We eat traditional, calorie-rich holiday foods: Tamales, eggnog, rum cake, ham, and chocolate. We give thanks for the life-giving energy of our planet’s sun.  

Imbolc

Imbolc is a festival of purification and the early signs of spring. Imbolc is celebrated on Feb 1. (Not yet spring in most of the world, to be sure—but sometimes spring-like in Britain due to the warming influence of the Gulf Stream.) It is the first of the three Pagan fertility festivals, followed by Ostara and Beltane.

In Old Irish, Imbolc means “in the belly” and was associated with the onset of the lambing season. It was an obscure Irish folk festival until the 20th century, when neo-Pagans revived it as part of the Wheel of the Year. It coincides with the Christian festival of Candlemas and with that old farmer’s oracle, Groundhog’s Day, both observed on Feb. 2.

For our ancestors, the significance of Imbolc would have been the beginning of the ground thaw. It is the time to prepare for the planting season—to survey the land, take an inventory of tools, and make any repairs or modifications that will be needed. For the Witch, it also a time of preparation. We clean and bless our altars, and make sure that the tools of our practice are attuned to their intended use.

Mythically, Imbolc celebrates the awakening of the Goddess after giving birth to the young God at Yule. In the Earth, we observe the first stirrings of life after the frozen winter. (If you don’t know what a frozen winter looks like, ask your grandmother.)  Imbolc brings the energy of creativity and imagination. Projects that were put on hold during the holiday season start to creak into motion again. Our midwinter dreams resolve themselves into their first visible shapes.

How Pagans celebrate:

Imbolc is especially sacred to Brigid—Celtic Goddess of hearthfire, healing, the bardic arts, and smithwork. Many Imbolc rituals honor Brigid with candlelight, poems, and woven ornaments known as Brigid’s crosses. The first light of spring is evident by now, and it is an auspicious time of year for rites of cleansing, healing, and blessing.

Imbolc is a time for spiritual dedication and re-dedication. Some covens—especially women’s covens—initiate new members at Imbolc. For old Pagans, it is also a time to examine and refresh our practice. If we have become lax, Imbolc is an opportunity to purify our intentions and reconnect with spiritual guides. We light candles, open windows, and wash the floors to cast out the last gloom of winter. Some also use Imbolc for divination for the year’s harvest.

Imbolc is not really a feasting holiday, as the season of grains and fruits is months away. The first food of the year is dairy. Butter, milk, and cream are traditional foods for the Imbolc table.

Ostara

Ostara is the spring equinox, which falls on or about March 21 in the Northern Hemisphere. It is opposite the autumn equinox (which Pagans refer to as Mabon). But any desktop calendar can tell you that. Ostara is the Pagan cousin of the Easter holiday, a modern revival of one or more ancient spring celebrations.

Ostara is the second of three fertility festivals, a time when the blessings of spring become more visible in the natural world. Flowers bloom, the birds and the bees do their thing, and grocery aisles fill up with pastel-colored treats. Ancient fertility symbols like eggs and bunnies are everywhere. (Yep, Ostara is the Sabbat with the rabbit!)

Astronomically speaking, Ostara is a midpoint of the year, and day and night are equal at this time. The Sun God (who has been growing and gathering strength since Yule) is an adolescent. The Great Goddess, who has been getting progressively younger since December 21, is in her maiden form. These two lusty youths are now the same age, and will soon conceive the child who will be born at Yule.

How Pagans celebrate:

The original meaning of Ostara as a fertility festival is not lost on modern Pagans. Ostara provides a perfect opportunity to work magick for love, prosperity, and gains of any kind. We harness the energy of the lengthening days to fuel our desires and bring projects to fruition. We honor the gifts of the earth Goddess, who is presently blessing the land with beauty and nourishment.

Pagans also use Ostara as a time to reflect on the principle of balance. Everyone has goals and responsibilities—work, family, art, spirituality—that compete for our time and attention. At Ostara, we take a moment to notice things that may have shifted out of balance. We reset our priorities as the austerity of winter gives way to the exuberance of spring.

Beltane

Beltane is the ancient name for the May Day rite, held on May 1. Originally a fire festival, it was widely celebrated in pre-Christian Ireland and Scotland. The name comes from the god Bel (“the bright one”) and means “Bel’s fire.” It is the second of two principle festivals on the Celtic Pagan calendar, the other one being Samhain. Samhain and Beltane are the two poles of the magickal year, when the gates to Faery and the spirit world are most open to travelers. ­­­

In traditional Wicca, Beltane is a sexual festival, the last of the three fertility festivals. It is the time when the Maiden Goddess takes a lover in the form of the young God. Wiccans enact this drama through the ritual marriage (Great Rite) of a High Priestess and High Priest, whose union will bless the land.

How Pagans celebrate:

Theoretically, Beltane is an occasion of unbridled sensuality and revelry. However, sexual rites are rare in modern covens. If invited to a Beltane ritual, you’re far more likely to dance around a maypole or witness a symbolic Great Rite (with a chalice and athame) than encounter an orgy.

For the social Pagan, Beltane season abounds with bonfires, festivals, concerts, and campouts. Solitary Pagans might celebrate by making an altar to the young God and Goddess or connecting with a lover. Flowers, honey, sweets and wine on the altar echo the sweetness of the occasion. Beltane is also a time for illusion, seduction, and Faery tricks. By the light of the Beltane fire, the real can become unreal (and vice versa).

Since Beltane celebrates the union of the God and Goddess, it is a popular time for proposals, handfastings, and renewing of vows. Magickally, the combined masculine and feminine energies lend a powerful alchemical surge to almost any type of spellwork.

Litha

Litha is the summer solstice, which in the Northern Hemisphere falls on or about June 21. Linguists disagree about the origin of the Sabbat’s name, but summer festivals were common across pre-Christian Europe. People lit bonfires to keep the sun’s light alive for as long as possible. Solstice revels were supposed to bless the crops in the fields and drive away evil spirits.

Litha is the day when the Sun God is at the peak of his power. It is an auspicious day, ruled by the Sun and the element of Fire. After Litha, the nights will begin to grow longer and the Sun will move further away each day. With the fall harvest imminent, Litha is an opportunity for anticipating the (actual or symbolic) crop. Medieval people believed that Midsummer Night was blessed, and that whatever a person dreamed on this night would come true.

How Pagans celebrate:

Outdoor rituals are common at Litha, as Pagans take advantage of the long hours of daylight. It is a joyful Sabbat. Bonfires and summer games brighten the space between earth and sky. We decorate our altars with solar symbols, and honor the God in his aspect as Father.

Litha is an appropriate time for all magick ruled by the Sun. This includes spells of cleansing, protection, charisma, and truth.

Lammas

Lammas is the first harvest festival on the Pagan calendar, observed on or about August 1. It is related to an old agricultural holiday celebrating the reaping of grain. Lammas probably comes from the Old English words for “loaf mass.” Loaves of freshly baked bread would have been prepared from the first grain and blessed in churches around the countryside. Lammas is also called Lughnasadh, after the Celtic sun God, Lugh.

As the summer stretches on and the days grow shorter, the sun God symbolically loses some of his strength. He is not yet dead, but is aware that the dark season will soon approach. The god of summer “dies” in the fields to nourish the people, and prepares for rebirth at Yule.

How Pagans celebrate:

Lammas is a time to welcome the harvest. We give thanks that the year’s work is proceeding as planned, and that we will soon enjoy the fruits of our labor. Grain is the traditional food for the Lammas table, in the form of wheat, barley, beers and ales.

Celtic Pagans celebrate Lammas/Lughnasadh as the feast of Lugh, an agricultural god—but also a patron of poets, musicians, and craftspeople. At Lammas, we may show off the skills we have acquired and trade them for things we will need. It is a traditional time of year for craft fairs and local markets.

Mabon

Mabon is the autumn equinox (or as us Texans call, it “fawwwl”). In the Northern Hemisphere, it falls around Sept 21. Mabon is the pivot point of the solar year when the days begin to shorten and winter is on its way. (The name of the festival is modern and dates from the 1960s or early 1970s.)

Mabon may also be called the Second Harvest, because it is the time when autumn fruits and nuts reach their maturity. It is a time to contemplate what we have worked for in the previous year and what rewards we are ready to reap. We give thanks to the waning sunlight and prepare to store our wealth away for the scarce season. We shift from active to contemplative magick. Mabon season is a fine time for workings of prosperity, gratitude, security, and balance.

How Pagans celebrate:

Mabon is a time for celebration after the hard work of the harvest. Though it is sad to watch the beauty of the growing season fade away, we revel in the mild weather and rest that autumn brings.

Mabon foods are comfort foods, those that evoke fond memories and connect us through sharing. We bake and brew, pickle and can. Offerings of wine, cider, fruits, and boughs may adorn the Mabon table—along with that most Pagan of centerpieces, the Cornucopia.

On the Pagan religious calendar, Mabon represents the turning point to the dark half of the year. We shift our attention from the youthful merriment of the summer Sabbats. At Mabon, we honor the Crone and Sage deities, the cycles of aging and death, and the spirit world.

Mabon is a popular time for large outdoor rituals—in part because the weather is good and it doesn’t conflict with any major mainstream holidays. We gather together to feast and express gratitude for our lovely tilted planet. Many cities host a public Mabon ritual as part of their annual Pagan Pride Day gatherings. Solitary Pagans might celebrate Mabon with offerings at a home altar, or a contemplative walk in the woods.

https://www.groveandgrotto.com/blogs/articles/the-eight-sabbats-witchs-holidays

[trashassassin]

Two Halves of a Whole | 1: Torture (V x Reader)

Wow, at last, I’ve finished a thing! And they said it couldn’t be done, they being me of course. Truth be told, this has been sitting in my google docs, finished and unedited, for way too long. And then I got all ready to post it when I remembered that I hadn’t come up with a name for the series yet and I had to sit on that for a while. It’s a whole mess, as per the usual.

These stories were originally going to be used for Kinktober, but then I accidentally a whole series instead. I originally had this idea planned for a megafic, but this format works out way better for it, imo. It’s going to have a bit of a coherent storyline, but it will be told out of order, so you definitely don’t need to read all of them if you don’t want to. The last one will be the most important in regards to the plot if you actually care about that as opposed to just the “plot” hehe. Anyway, I’m rambling now, so let’s get on with it!

In celebration of the recent announcement of DMC 5 Special Edition, I have begun crafting a series all about Vergil and his twink-y human half finally getting all the love and affection they deserve in life! Here, we are kicking things off right by torturing poor V with sex toys.

Word Count: 1987

Warnings: Sexually Explicit Content, BDSM/Bondage, Strong Language

You weren't sure you would ever grow used to the amount of power you felt in situations such as this. Physically, V was quite a bit larger than you and was more than capable of overpowering you in spite of his slight frame.

And yet, in this instance, he would have allowed you to do anything to him and the thought of it was intoxicating.

You positioned yourself so that you were straddling him, your legs falling to either side of his abdomen, then reached over and gently tugged on the restraints that held his wrists. 

"It's not too tight, is it?" you asked. 

"No," he replied. "It's fine." 

He was already breathless and you hadn't even touched him yet, a fact that filled you with a sense of pride.

You were both still fairly new to this, so you were always careful to check in every once in a while and make sure you hadn't accidentally crossed any boundaries. With the power he had offered you came a great deal of trust and you weren't about to break that. 

You smiled at him, a gesture that he returned, then reached down toward the nearby nightstand to pick up today's tool of choice: a small, black vibrating wand.

It was one that you had used on yourself a number of times, so you were already familiar with its settings and which ones you preferred. 

Learning V's own unique preferences would be easy. This was evident enough from the few times you'd already been together. He was incredibly expressive, his desires laid plain, whether he wanted them to be or not. It was this, among other things, that made him so ideal for the role you'd put him in.

"Have you ever used anything like this before?" you asked, caressing the wand suggestively with your fingertips as you did. 

"You know I haven't," he replied, the smallest hint of a smirk playing on his lips.

"I was just curious. We'll start off on the slower setting then, cause it can be a little intense if you're not used to it."

"I think I can handle it." 

You leaned over him once again and whispered in his ear, "then prove it. Don't cum until I say you can."

You sat back upright and the brief flash of uncertainty that passed his face did not escape your notice.

"Hold out your hand," you said. 

He did as you asked and you switched on the wand, then lowered it to his palm, which he eyed curiously as it buzzed from the vibrations.

"We'll start off slow," you continued. 

You were going to give him a bit of a chance; this was supposed to be fun for you too, after all. 

You repositioned yourself so that you would have a better vantage point, coming to sit just at the edge of the bed, then slowly lowered the wand until it pressed against the tip of his cock. 

His entire body tense and he gasped.

You pulled the wand away and said, "I told you." 

He narrowed his eyes, but said nothing. 

"Try to focus on your breathing. It'll help you last longer." 

You pressed the wand back to his skin and he flinched a bit, but this time, managed to regain his composure for the most part. 

Using your free hand to keep his cock steady, you maneuvered the wand up and over the head, then down the shaft where you brought it to rest just above your clasped fingers. 

"You're so hard already," you purred. "This is gonna be easy." 

You dragged the wand back up at a slow and even pace, and his breath stuttered a bit.

"Does it feel good?" you asked. 

"Yes," he replied. 

His voice was low and husky, as it always was when he was very aroused, and you found yourself getting a bit distracted by it. This was shaping up to be more of a challenge for you than you��d anticipated.

You brought the wand down again, then followed its upward motion with your hand, using it to stroke up and down his shaft as you used to wand to circle the head. 

His back arched and the wand slipped, nearly causing you to drop it. 

"Keep still," you scolded. 

"No promises," he said. 

His voice came out strained, as though he were holding his breath. That wasn't exactly what you had meant when you told him to focus on his breathing, but it amused you how hard he was trying. 

"There are a few more settings I can try," you said. "Let me know which one you like best." 

You clicked the button on the wand's handle, causing it to switch from the basic vibration setting to one that spun in one direction, paused, then continued in the other direction. You began to run it up and down the underside of his cock and studied his reaction carefully.

He squirmed a bit, but that was all you managed to get. 

Perhaps the pauses between the turns were too long. You pressed one of the other buttons and the rotations sped up just a little bit.

His eyes squeezed shut and he clenched his hands, causing the ribbon that held them to visibly tighten. 

"How's this one?" you asked. 

His lips parted into a smile and he sighed. 

"Good," he said.

You held the wand in place for a moment, allowing him to grow used to the sensation, then switched to the next setting. 

This one elicited the response you had been hoping for. His hips rose from the bed, forcing you to readjust and a throaty moan escaped his lips in spite of his continued efforts to keep his breath held. 

Once he'd returned to his original position, you fell back into your previous rhythm of sliding the wand up and down the length of his cock, your hand following in its wake.

His arms tensed, pulling his restraints taut, and his breath came in uneven pants. 

You began to move a little faster, trying your best to keep your pace steady in spite of the unpredictable jerking of his hips. 

"Wait!" he gasped. "Slow down." 

You contemplated for a moment whether or not you were going to comply with his request, and eventually decided that you were, if only to draw out the experience a bit longer.

You turned the intensity down back to where it had started, then gave a few more lazy strokes before pulling the wand and your hand away. 

His cock pulsed a few times in the absence of your touch, forcing a drop of precum to the tip. You were so tempted to reach out and tease him again, but decided against it for the time being. 

"You're so close already," you said with an exaggerated frown.

You kept your face lowered so that he would be able to feel the warmth of your breath as you spoke. 

"It's not my fault," he said. "You're really good at this." 

The breathy tone of his voice coupled with sight of his cock only inches from your face, which pulsed again in desperation for your touch, sent your head spinning.

You suddenly became aware of your own labored breathing and, given the proximity you had so carefully calculated, he was aware of it too. 

"I wanna fuck you," he said, followed by a rough sigh. "So bad." 

You cocked your head to one side and feigned nonchalance, even though you wanted this just as badly. 

"Maybe if you pass my test," you said. 

You held up your free hand and, with deliberation, wrapped it just beneath the head of his cock, using your thumb to swirl the precum around the tip as you had imagined doing moments before. This provoked even more, and it began to run down over your fingers. 

"This is torture," he groaned, and you couldn't help but smile.

"I know," you said.

You were beginning to feel the same way, but you weren’t about to let him know that.

You ran your hand, which was now quite sticky, up and down the length of his shaft before withdrawing it and using it to hold the wand steady as you switched it back on.

"Ready?" you asked, and he nodded.

You picked up exactly where you left off and he reacted within seconds, his eyes fluttering closed as his head tipped back against the pillow beneath it.

You had to struggle quite a bit to keep your hand in place as he had taken to thrusting into it this time around.

“I told you to stay still,” you said. “You’re only making this harder for yourself.”

“Sorry,” he said.

He slowly lowered himself back onto the bed and did his best to stay there, but you could tell how much he was struggling. His hands were clenched again and his arms were drawn up tight, pulling at the restraints so hard that you were certain there would be a mark on his wrists when you removed them later.

Just as he’d begun to relax again, you turned the intensity up by one, the new setting leaving almost no gap at all between the pulsing vibrations.

He moaned and started to thrust into your hand again but managed to catch himself before you’d even opened your mouth to scold him. 

He flushed, both from arousal and from embarrassment, you guessed. You got the impression that he was ashamed of how vocal he got in the throes of passion, a quirk of his that you found quite endearing.

With his hands restrained, his only option was to bite down on his bottom lip, first one side, then the other, but it was no use. Every time you managed to hit a particularly sensitive spot, he cried out again, in spite of his best efforts.

You turned the intensity up one more time and mentally began counting down from thirty before you would allow him his release.

“Almost there,” you encouraged, but you weren’t sure he was still paying attention to what you were saying.

He began shifting from side to side as though he were trying to escape your grasp, but you weren’t about to allow him to do that.

“Slow down,” he gasped, but you’d already made up your mind.

You weren’t going to give him the relief he was looking for this time.

“Just a little bit longer.”

Only a moment after you’d said this, his face contorted in pleasure and the first spurt of cum hit your hand, the rest coating a good majority of his abdomen.

“Stop!” he cried out, and you switched off the wand as his cock continued to pulse wildly between your fingers.

When it finally came to a stop and his breathing began to return to normal, he opened his eyes and looked up at you with a sly smile.

“Well?” he asked.

“Not quite,” you replied. 

You’d only managed to make it to twenty-six.

“That was hardly fair,” he said. “Were you even keeping track?”

“I was.”

This was only a partial truth. It was hardly your fault that you’d gotten a bit distracted along the way.

“You did your best,” you said as you stood to undo his restraints. “Let me know when you’re ready to try again.”

His eyes widened.

“With that thing?” he asked, pointing to the wand, which now sat inert where you had once been sitting. “I’m not sure I can handle that again today.”

“I warned you.” You chuckled. “Maybe I’ll try something different.”

Perhaps next time, you would try with your mouth or your hand instead. So many possibilities ran through your mind as you stared down at him and he stared back at you, a contented look on his face.

For now, at least.

As soon as he was ready, you planned to start your unique brand of torture all over again.

[steadytigerobject]

Elgin Baylor wasn't going to be the beginning of anything. He certainly didn't set out to be the beginning of everything: the superstar who saved the Lakers and brought them to the NBA, L. A.; the transcendent athlete who "reinvented everything but the rim game" and changed the geometry of the sport; the avant-garde innovator who was, in the words of legendary Hoops writer Bob Ryan, “the most influential offensive lineman of the last 60 years.” He was fair ... Let's go. Trying to use the tools at his disposal to put the ball in the hole, in any way he can.

“The way I played the game was just natural, " Baylor told Bleacher Report's Dave Schilling in 2018 . "I never sat down and thought about what I was going to do. I was just reacting to the situation, to the way the guys were guarding me. I've done things that people have probably never done before. I just instinctively did it.”

These instincts, combined with a considerable amount of skill, strength, and athleticism, have produced one of the greatest and most important players in the history of basketball. They sketched out a plan that generations of super-sports wing scorers would follow-and, in fact, still do.

They propelled Baylor, who died Monday of natural causes at age 86, through a remarkable Hall of Fame career that helped lay the groundwork for the NBA’s transformation into a nightly highlight factory but that, for several reasons, has never quite seemed to get its proper respect.

These days, Baylor is most often discussed in the language of ancestry and lineage. In the NBA’s creation myth, he’s a Promethean figure—an early skywalker who, in the years before frequent nationally televised games and widely distributed video footage, helped pave a path toward the sort of eye-popping feats we now see every night.

“He just might be the best player I ever saw,” legendary Lakers play-by-play man Chick Hearn once said. “He was doing things that Dr. Julius Erving made famous 20 years later, the hang time and so forth. But Elgin didn’t have the TV exposure. Nobody did in those days.”

Those who did see him, though, never forgot it—and learned from the experience.

“In basketball, you watch and emulate the things other players do,” Michael Goldberg, former head of the National Basketball Coaches Association, said in Basketball: A Love Story. “Once one player can do a ‘wow’ move, then every kid in every school yard tries to do that themselves. Those that can refine it take it to the next level, and so on down the line. I would say that Elgin Baylor begat Connie Hawkins, and Hawkins begat Earl Monroe, and Monroe begat Dr. J, and Dr. J begat David Thompson, and Thompson begat Michael Jordan, and Jordan begat Kobe Bryant, and there’s more begats going on.”

Off the court, he was a fearless trailblazer who fought against the racist, segregationist policies of the Jim Crow era. On it, he was a groundbreaking slasher who, as Ryan wrote in the foreword to Bijan C. Bayne’s 2015 biography of Baylor, took “a game that was essentially horizontal and occasionally vertical and [made] it diagonal.” He was a tradition-flouting talent, an improvisational creator constantly unlocking new possibilities.

“His ballhandling ability at 6-foot-5, 220 pounds made him a one-man revolution,” Bayne wrote. “He had all the fakes and a sure handle, and some of his spectacular plays culminated in twisting, hanging, or gliding near or past the basket. Yet, it was the combination of those elements—the yo-yo dribbling, the subtle feints, the knifing reverse layups between taller defenders—that set Baylor apart from his predecessors and peers. Where such players as Hawkins, Erving, and, of course, Jordan became known for their trademark dunks, Baylor scored on one-hand push shots, banks, floaters, and fallaways.”

Baylor had the deepest off-the-dribble bag of his era, and he used every trick in it to score a ton. He totaled 23,149 points over 14 seasons—all after entering the NBA at age 24, all compiled without a 3-point line—which made him the third-leading scorer in NBA history behind Wilt and Oscar when he retired in 1972. (He now ranks 36th on the all-time NBA/ABA leaderboard.) He averaged 38.3 points per game during the 1961-62 season, the fourth-highest single-season average in NBA history, while spending a large chunk of it as an active-duty Army reservist who could play only on weekends and when given special clearance.

There was a bitter irony in that: Baylor performing at an all-time-superstar level while on leave from serving a country that continued to treat him and people who looked like him as second-class citizens.

Two years earlier, on January 16, 1959, the Lakers were scheduled to play the Cincinnati Royals in Charleston, West Virginia. When they arrived at the Kanawha Hotel, the desk clerk took one look at them—specifically Baylor, Boo Ellis, and Ed Fleming—and told team captain Vern Mikkelsen, “The three colored boys will have to go somewhere else. This is a nice, respectable hotel. We can’t take the colored boys.”

Rather than submit to the discriminatory policy, the entire Lakers team left, staying instead in a motel that welcomed Black guests. Later, Baylor went out with his teammates to get something to eat, only to be denied service at a restaurant, too. An incensed Baylor decided not to play in the game, boycotting to call attention to the inequality and mistreatment he and other Black people faced in the town.

“I'm human, " he told his friend and teammate Hot Rod Hundley, who was white. "All I want is to be treated like a human being. I am not an animal that is put in a cage and released on the show. They won't treat me like an animal.”

The NBA and the Lakers stood by Baylor. From then on, the Lakers will require that there be no segregation clauses in their contracts when organizing games. Soon after, then-NBA Commissioner Maurice Podoloff " promised to make sure that such treatment of black players in hotels is a thing of the past when they represent the League.”

” Of course, I don't regret doing it, " Baylor said in a March 1963 sports magazine op - ed. "I'm not a trailblazer or anything, but I'm interested in my people and progress. My name is Elgin Baylor, and I don't want anything more than I have a right to.”

That perseverance is evident again at the 1964 NBA All-Star Game in Boston, when Baylor, Robertson, Jerry West, and other star players “barricaded themselves in the locker room and announced that they would not play unless they were guaranteed benefits originally directed by the commissioner last summer”—namely , improved playing conditions, athletic coaches on all teams, and a retirement plan.

“[Lakers owner Bob Short] said to an Irish cop that guarded the door, ‘Tell Elgin Baylor if he doesn’t get out there, he’s through,’” Celtics All-Star Tommy Heinsohn told Mike Bresnahan of the Los Angeles Times in 2011. Baylor didn’t budge. The stoppage worked.

“For Elgin, in particular, the Black athletes, they had to be crusaders in this league and in many cases were vilified for it,” West told Sam Smith in his 2017 book Hard Labor: The Battle That Birthed the Billion-Dollar NBA. “That day has always resonated with me as one of the seminal points of this league. … That day in Boston probably was the beginning of something that few could comprehend.”

Baylor represented an inflection point on the court, too. In the early years of the NBA, the run of play was dominated by towering post players like George Mikan and Dolph Schayes, or sweet-shooting perimeter playmakers like “Jumpin’” Joe Fulks, Paul Arizin, and Bob Cousy. Baylor split the difference, combining the bulldozing strength and rebounding of the league’s best bigs with the speed, quickness, passing, and shotmaking of its top guards, all in a bruising 6-foot-5, 225-pound package. You know how James Harden is sometimes described as being built like a tank? Baylor was the same size and, in his day, just as tough to stop; Knicks forward Richie Guerin, a Hall of Famer in his own right, once said defending Baylor was “like guarding a flood.”

The way Baylor moved could move people. Stylistic successor Julius Erving described it as “just ballet in basketball.” To Hall of Fame guard Charlie Scott, watching Baylor was “like watching poetry.” They weren’t alone in their hosannas; Baylor’s play inspired some delightfully creative and high-minded descriptions from the ink-stained wretches tasked with capturing his brilliance. One favorite: “When Baylor gets the ball, the opposition scatters like quail at the sight of the hunter.”

You can only earn prose that purple with pure production. Baylor is one of only four players to average more than 25 points and 10 rebounds per game in his career, joined by Chamberlain, Karl Malone, and Bob Pettit. Of that group, only Wilt delivered as many assists per game as Baylor, a heady passer who still ranks 20th on the all-time triple-double list:

Baylor is one of only 10 players ever to have at least 10 appearances on an NBA first team; only LeBron James, Bryant and Malone have more. Nearly 50 years after his retirement, his career scoring average of 27.4 points per game still ranks third, behind only Wilt and Jordan. He still ranks 11th in rebounds per game, and in the top 30 in player efficiency, field goals, free throws, and total rebounds.

[jyndor]

so I was talking to my friend @timelordthirteen about some shit and I decided to just share with you all about the importance of actually explaining shit instead of just saying it. the Left, I am looking at you bitch (ily bitch but)

lol would put a read more but tumblr's being a petty little bitch today ❤

shitposting is fun. dunking on asshat right wingers is fun. you know what is not fun? seeing people not understand the basic terminology that we use in the ~discourse*

but. if we are going to use terminology, if we are going to inject regular old laypeople conversations with (imo) unneccessary amounts of academic terms, then we should try to use them correctly** because in many cases misusing them means we as leftists do not have a full understanding of what the fuck we're on about. this dilutes both the meanings of these terms and their purposes. I know I am wordy as fuck and can be hard to understand sometimes (thanks adhd) so what I am about to say is a little ironic, but clarity is fucking important when it comes to strategy and organizing.

so I am going to examine some commonly misused concepts and terms today. yay.

1. THEORY, PRAXIS AND FRAMEWORKS FOR ANALYSIS weeee yes I am fun at parties tyvm

what is a framework? a structure, in this case, for analyzing some bullshit we deal with irl. that's it lol but I use it a lot so I figured I'd define it here. examples of frameworks are: intersectionality, marxism, queer theory. seriously, if you can think it, it has already been analyzed through the queer lens.

what is theory? ideas, knowledge in the abstract based on looking at shit happen and analyzing that shit. it is useful because it can help us articulate what we are going through in our shitty lives. this is why I often recommend people learn about chomsky's manufacturing consent (theory of why we get the info we get from the media tl;dr), not because I think chomsky is the ultimate leftist grandpa but because this site needs some media literacy lmao. and btw, this clip narrated by amy goodman is a great, trippy little 4:30 min long video that explains the basics of manufacturing consent so you don't have to open a book or use drugs!

theory can help serve as a framework to understand what the fuck is happening to us irl, but imo is kind of an incomplete understanding of shit without lived experience (aka - theory v praxis). this is one reason why we should listen to marginalized groups on their own shit and not talk over them - because all of the research and theory in the world does not make me a Black woman living in Flint (aka - ground up organizing v technocracy). it is not about being nice, or politically correct, although we should be nice and we should care about people just because they're people. if you understand the why of listening to marginalized groups, you understand that it is mainly about communities knowing their own problems best and therefore having the best solutions for those problems.

2. MARXISM, CAPITALISM AND OTHER BUZZWORDS (and leftists need hobbies)

so marxism is a framework for socioeconomic analysis observed by mr kpop himself, karl marx (and his sugar daddy friedrich engels). because leftists love to argue, there are so many kinds of marxism, and if you ever feel like you are shouting into the void too much, just look up some arguments between stalinists and trotskyists. it's just... magical. no, I am not defining tankie here.

as many people smarter than I am have said (read: kwame ture seriously watch this video it's iconic), karl marx did not discover socialism or invent it or whatever, he observed capitalism and saw how shitty it is, like any other sane person would do. the point of marxism is not karl marx (which he would say) or tankies or fuckin guillotines***

things that marxism is:

- an analytical tool for looking at the world

- a theory which was used to develop the basis of different kinds of post-capitalist economic systems like communism and socialism

things that marxism is not:

- a system of economics or government lmao marx did not govern dick

- scary

marx looked at capitalism and said "this is definitely gonna fail someday because it's clearly unsustainable, I mean the proletariat is bigger than the bourgeoisie who owns everything uh yeah so I can do basic fucking math. if I have one capitalist and fifteen hundred workers, eventually that capitalist is gonna lose his damn head because he is gonna hoard all that wealth and his workers are gonna get pissed that they don't have their basic fucking needs met. lmao now put on some kpop, freddy" or something. idk that might not be a direct quote.

what is capitalism? (besides horseshit) a system of economics where industry is privately owned. and yes, this includes publically traded corporations because they are still owned by individuals (shareholders) even if they aren't privately owned by one person or a group of partners. truly a nightmare to live in, and we hate to see it.

what is the proletariat? well, the working class. and the bourgeoisie is the owner class, the capitalist class. the rich.

and this is something else that we need to discuss, tumblr. if you are going to say "eat the rich" please understand who you are talking about. we're not talking about random actors or musicians, or doctors or lawyers, even if they make better than a liveable wage. even if they often have zero class consciousness, meaning they don't ~see class, like colorblind racism for classism.

anyone who has to sell their labor for wages and is not part of the owner class is working class. this includes people who cannot work for any multitude of reasons (disability, can't find work, caretaker, etc) and also white collar workers who might be well off in relatively high paying jobs because they don't own the means of production, or capital that is used to produce shit. so yes, that rich actor who is a part of a union is actually part of the working class in marxist theory. when we say eat the rich, we mean jeff bezos, not john boyega. jeff bezos owns the means of production. john boyega is a working actor who is in a union.

this is important not because we shouldn't get pissed off when actors and celebrities do tone deaf shit like singing about imagining no possessions in their mansions while people starve during a pandemic. they need to put their money to good use, have some class consciousness, instead of asking fans to donate to causes that they could fund. but they are not the bourgeoisie until they start owning the means of production. and there is no doubt that many of them do, which is why we might eat gwyneth paltrow but we won't eat john boyega.

and by the way, eating the rich is metaphorical, a reference to french revolution-era philosopher jean-jacques rousseau's quote: "when the people shall have nothing more to eat, they will eat the rich." obviously I don't even need to explain it but I will anyway. basically, the people will forcibly redistribute the wealth of the rich if they have nothing else. this is why there are some very smart capitalists who are in favor of reforms and raising taxes, because they recognize the danger to their necks in not providing for basic needs of the working class. no, "eat the rich" does not mean be pro-cannibalism. but there are many capitalists who would prefer to die than lose their hoard so

oh, and one last thing. "no ethical consumption in capitalism" is tossed around a lot and it's a million percent true, but I need all of us to understand that it is not an excuse to support harmful practices but it is also not meant to shame consumers. it is rather an understanding that we as consumers are not responsible for the monstrous impact of capitalism. we live in it, we have no choice but to consume, and sometimes (most of the time) that means we have to buy shit that was produced in unethical ways. unfortunately supply chains being what they are, all consumption causes harm in some way.

it is a reminder that individual actions are not going to have the impact of collection actions. this is why plastic bag bans, though well-meaning, are not going to have the same impact on climate catastrophe as, say, banning fossil fuels would.

I am a vegetarian and I can recognize that I am doing a whole lot of nothing by not supporting factory farms, and when I was a vegan I wasn't doing much either. boycotts without mass support don't have much evidence of working. this is why bds exists - boycott divestment and sanctions. boycott, meaning don't support goods from various conpanies connected to something, divestment, meaning get companies/countries/institutions to remove their money from something, and sanctions, meaning getting countries to penalize a country for their bad behavior until they comply.

this is what the anti-apartheid south africa movement did and what palestinian rights organizers support for israeli apartheid.

do not allow legislators to put the burden of fixing the ills of society that capitalism created on consumers' shoulders.

3. INTERSECTIONALITY (because it deserves its own section)

I don't have as much to say on this as I did the last bit because holy shit capitalism, man.

intersectionality, a term that was coined by law professor kimberlé crenshaw in the late 80s to serve as a framework for people to critically assess how legal structures impact Black women differently due to class, race and gender. it is not incompatible with marxism (in fact marxism has been argued to be a form of intersectionality).

intersectionality can and should be used to examine why the Black queer experience is unique, for example. I also want to acknowledge that professor crenshaw isn't the only person to come up with intersectionality; sojourner truth spoke about it even if she didn't coin the term, for example. patricia hill collins, another influential af Black feminist academic****, created frameworks for viewing intersectionality. also you can read her book black feminist thought here for free.

intersectionality has been used - improperly - by liberal feminists***** to excuse bad behavior from leaders who pretend to care about women while creating and enforcing legislation that harms women. anyone who stans politicians at all needs help. it has also been misrepresented as essentialism, which it is also not (essentialism is the idea that everything has some assets that are necessary to its identity) because intersectionality isn't saying that every Black queer woman has the same experience, just that Black queer women might experience similar issues because of a system that negatively views them as Black and queer and women.

intersectionality does not excuse kamala harris for prosecuting poor moms of truant kids.

okay if you guys have things to add please do because I want us to educate each other instead of always talking shit. both is good.

* I am not calling out people for not being academic enough or not speaking english or not reading enough theory because LOL I am a 2x neurodivergent college dropout who radicalized by working retail and not by hearing karl marx talk dirty to me. also, not everyone speaks english like, I am truly not shitting on people.

** I recognize that language is fluid and ever changing, and that is a good thing. But diluting terms that serve specific purposes is not ever going to be good.

*** and I don't want to dismiss intra-leftist theory discourse (🤢) because I know how annoying it is to hear bernie sanders lumped in with liz warren, or bernie sanders lumping himself in with post-capitalists lmao of course I get it. but twitter discourse is not dismantling capitalism so ANYWAY

**** actually crenshaw built on collins' work (black feminist thought) and the collins built on crenshaw' work we love to see it.

***** I should go ahead and define liberal feminism as well as rad fem and terf and shit because people use them all very very loosely, especially terf (not every transphobe is a terf but every terf is a transphobe, it's like the rectangle/square thing). but I am exhausted with this so next time.

[theculturedmarxist]

What will reading Marx do for my bank account?

At the very least, because the people that determine what is in that bank account study Marx, and so you should as well.

A valid, but very revealing question. It’s a common sentiment, especially considering all the economic factors effecting the working class today, everywhere in the world. The accumulation and capital is an overriding concern, both for practical reasons, as well as the logic we absorb from living in a capitalist society. All human endeavor is reduced to cost analysis. Time spent not making money is time wasted, and wasting time—not making money, either for yourself or others—is a cardinal sin of capitalism. The drive to convert every aspect of the lives humans live into a monetary transaction is relentless, and has become so common that it simply goes without question. It has seeped into and colored everything people do, their romances, their careers, their passions, their lusts. The logic of accumulation and transaction eliminates the person and in its place leaves a bank account, a debit card, a dumb repository of value in relation to what they can do for someone else.

The less you eat, drink and buy books; the less you go to the theatre, the dance hall, the public house; the less you think, love, theorise, sing, paint, fence, etc., the more you save  – the greater becomes your treasure which neither moths nor rust will devour – your capital. The less you are, the less you express your own life, the more you have, i.e., the greater is your alienated life, the greater is the store of your estranged being. Everything ||XVI| which the political economist takes from you in life and in humanity, he replaces for you in money and in wealth; and all the things which you cannot do, your money can do. It can eat and, drink, go to the dance hall and the theatre; it can travel, it can appropriate art, learning, the treasures of the past, political power – all this it can appropriate for you – it can buy all this: it is true endowment. Yet being all this, it wants to do nothing but create itself, buy itself; for everything else is after all its servant, and when I have the master I have the servant and do not need his servant. All passions and all activity must therefore be submerged in avarice. The worker may only have enough for him to want to live, and may only want to live in order to have that.>

So entrenched has this mindset become that in the mainstream it goes utterly unquestioned. People are immersed in it from birth, and might go to their grave without even knowing that there was any possible alternative, or even that they should desire one. Marx (for instance, he’s certainly not the only one) offers both a perspective outside of this logic as well as the analysis that can not only allow people to see it, but dismantle it. Marx and Marxist analysis provide a vocabulary and framework otherwise missing from the average worker’s lexicon. They are missing not because they are so esoteric and abstract that they require an imparted understanding, like a teacher to a child, but because the people in charge of workers’ lives—government officials, police, landlords, institutional educators, and bosses most of all—have done everything they can to strike them from the record. Billions are invested in making the thoughts themselves impossible, in inverting human tendencies and behaviors and values to make even the idea that the system is unfair a shameful one. Everything drives at ensuring that the worker stays isolated, ashamed, and desperate.

The benefit of reading Marx and other communists is that they understand this arrangement, go to great lengths to explain its whys and wherefores, and offer workers the tools not only to reframe the narrative in a manner of speaking, but the ideological guidance necessary to undo and escape it. Where capitalism breeds alienation, communists advocate socialization. Where capitalism fosters isolation, communists urge community. Where capitalism cultivates war and hatred, communism professes peace and international solidarity.

Marx tells the worker why he has to consider his bank account in the first place. He explains the mechanisms by which it is filled and drained and to whose profit. The confusion of chauvinism, nationalism, racism, classism, genderism, and so on is dispelled when revealed to be the deceptive antics of the very people that keep the working individual in perpetual anxiety over their bank account.

And still, even though Marx was writing about events that seem like a distant memory, does any of this sound familiar?

Dazzled by the “Progress of the Nation” statistics dancing before his eyes, the Chancellor of the Exchequer exclaims in wild ecstasy:

“From 1842 to 1852, the taxable income of the country increased by 6 per cent; in the eight years from 1853 to 1861, it has increased from the basis taken in 1853, 20 per cent! The fact is so astonishing to be almost incredible! ... This intoxicating augmentation of wealth and power,” adds Mr. Gladstone, “is entirely confined to classes of property.”

Again, reverse the medal! The income and property tax returns laid before the House of Commons on July 20, 1864, teach us that the persons with yearly incomes valued by the tax gatherer of 50,000 pounds and upwards had, from April 5, 1862, to April 5, 1863, been joined by a dozen and one, their number having increased in that single year from 67 to 80. The same returns disclose the fact that about 3,000 persons divide among themselves a yearly income of about 25,000,000 pounds sterling, rather more than the total revenue doled out annually to the whole mass of the agricultural laborers of England and Wales. Open the census of 1861 and you will find that the number of male landed proprietors of England and Wales has decreased from 16,934 in 1851 to 15,066 in 1861, so that the concentration of land had grown in 10 years 11 per cent. If the concentration of the soil of the country in a few hands proceeds at the same rate, the land question will become singularly simplified, as it had become in the Roman Empire when Nero grinned at the discovery that half of the province of Africa was owned by six gentlemen.

In the domain of Political Economy, free scientific inquiry meets not merely the same enemies as in all other domains. The peculiar nature of the materials it deals with, summons as foes into the field of battle the most violent, mean and malignant passions of the human breast, the Furies of private interest. The English Established Church, e.g., will more readily pardon an attack on 38 of its 39 articles than on 1/39 of its income. Now-a-days atheism is culpa levis [a relatively slight sin, c.f. mortal sin], as compared with criticism of existing property relations. Nevertheless, there is an unmistakable advance. I refer, e.g., to the Blue book published within the last few weeks: “Correspondence with Her Majesty’s Missions Abroad, regarding Industrial Questions and Trades’ Unions.” The representatives of the English Crown in foreign countries there declare in so many words that in Germany, in France, to be brief, in all the civilised states of the European Continent, radical change in the existing relations between capital and labour is as evident and inevitable as in England. At the same time, on the other side of the Atlantic Ocean, Mr. Wade, vice-president of the United States, declared in public meetings that, after the abolition of slavery, a radical change of the relations of capital and of property in land is next upon the order of the day. These are signs of the times, not to be hidden by purple mantles or black cassocks. They do not signify that tomorrow a miracle will happen. They show that, within the ruling classes themselves, a foreboding is dawning, that the present society is no solid crystal, but an organism capable of change, and is constantly changing.

The colonial system ripened, like a hot-house, trade and navigation. The “societies Monopolia” of Luther were powerful levers for concentration of capital. The colonies secured a market for the budding manufactures, and, through the monopoly of the market, an increased accumulation. The treasures captured outside Europe by undisguised looting, enslavement, and murder, floated back to the mother-country and were there turned into capital. Holland, which first fully developed the colonial system, in 1648 stood already in the acme of its commercial greatness. It was

 “in almost exclusive possession of the East Indian trade and the commerce between the south-east and north-west of Europe. Its fisheries, marine, manufactures, surpassed those of any other country. The total capital of the Republic was probably more important than that of all the rest of Europe put together.” Gülich forgets to add that by 1648, the people of Holland were more over-worked, poorer and more brutally oppressed than those of all the rest of Europe put together.

Today industrial supremacy implies commercial supremacy. In the period of manufacture properly so called, it is, on the other hand, the commercial supremacy that gives industrial predominance. Hence the preponderant rôle that the colonial system plays at that time. It was “the strange God” who perched himself on the altar cheek by jowl with the old Gods of Europe, and one fine day with a shove and a kick chucked them all of a heap. It proclaimed surplus-value making as the sole end and aim of humanity.

Even these examples removed by time have their parallels and echoes today. Now just as then, capitalists refuse to raise wages, claiming it will bankrupt them. Now just as then, capitalists accumulate by rape and pillage the wealth of lesser nations. Now just as then, capitalists one and all make their fortunes through the pitiless exploitation of the working class. You worry about your bank account because it’s been emptied to fill the hoard of the person that owns all you make and for which they’ve never labored themselves.

That’s why you should read Marx and all the rest, because you have a bank account to worry about in the first place—a clock perpetually ticking down towards your ruin, and the only means of escape is joining with your fellow workers and building Communism.

[deathghost8]

Harm reduction script essay compiled

1- “TLDR” (I wrote the book that will save the world)

2- ancap math 101 : Purchasers and fulfillers

3- #MATH politics : Harm reduction education platform overview

1 Innovation: Viable Tech in a social organism)

(I wrote the book on saving this social organism, it is 3 pages long.)

Pages 1��⃣2️⃣3️⃣

1️⃣ • Social order is a circle. []

our agreement of what is valued is : that which flows back into the organism, if it does not, we cannot place value on it -

Look, What goes out is our waste: Poop. 💩What flows in and circulates is our life blood. ⭕️

any attempted systematized defiance of the circle constitutes a tumor or a heart attack. Some type of unholy disease which kills the organism. In today’s tech feudalism that’s called Net Worth, or influencers. 🤑

Technologically civilized would mean that the emergent wealth of the organism flows from the top end of total aggregate productivity (value generated) back to the beginning in an automatic credit type of way, such that no individual beneficiary is raised above others, and no individual sponsor or authority point is held responsible or given control of this flow. This would be the invention of decentralized money, the Viable Tech connecting all other viable tech to all beneficiaries, effectively employing the meaning of innovation to reduce or totally eliminate labor/overhead / cost to human wellbeing and the enjoyment of wealth produced by the organism as a whole.

2️⃣ • Ya cannot govern by Ruling, ya Dingus!! []

Automating the purchase of the basic minimum in food and wellbeing commerce on behalf of the entire population is the means by which tech feudalism converts into technologically civilized, because the only authority that doesn’t kill the organism is that of the combined emergence of the V O L U N T A R Y spending decisions of all the sovereign individuals.

(For yer health!!)

~Purchase on behalf of~

Is the bridge tech to the full decentralization system, because you need to retain the aspect of voluntary purchasing by individuals, who then select and continue to sustain the winners in the innovation contest whose offering is widely adopted because it’s the most optimal and wins at reducing cost and overhead.

Thus, we see that it is pure ancap : a means of total divorce from the harmful entanglement of authority and status attainment institutions like government and corporation - a simple payment to every citizen to purchase their wellbeing voluntarily, sponsoring the winners in that contest via the auto refilling minimum income credit app (like bill pulte sending everyone 1337$ every month on their cash app).

3️⃣ •We held these truths to be self evident - The income floor is like tokens to vote via purchase, but simultaneously a gesture of wellbeing toward all those who have been harmed by state tyranny, domestic violence , corporate rigging (monopsony, gouging, monopoly, theft, etc) or any kind of oppression - Of course, As any good democracy Which eliminates poverty and guarantees life liberty and the pursuit of happiness should do.

The actions of a truly free populace will then fund whatever else can or should exist in such a free society, because healthy humans who aren’t exhausted , depleted , and diseased are creative and industrious. Here you have a next generation society that invents itself. It starts with the decentralization of money so that democracy begins to flow in the commerce itself.

22 - technological civility

🔄 Inclusion pricing / inclusion model -

Let me mathematically discuss The next human innovation equation

First of all, social order definitions.

We are calculating social order where we have eliminated boss tyranny and installed voluntary transacting as the basic motion.

(The lack of doing so is how economy runs now, full of tyranny and abuse, and distraction politics with illusory division. )

Doing so will Philanthropize value between

Purchaser & Fulfiller.

- the worker and the beneficiary of work both need to capture most, ( ifnot 100% ) of the value within that TRANSACTION

Fulfillers provides any needed function or item to the social organism.

Purchasers are the VOTE PLACERS.

|| Anything that harms or suppresses the social organism can not qualify under the fulfiller. It has to be actual value.

This is democracy of nature - the organism’s emergent intelligence describes:

✨ what is positively valued:

* either vital or desired,

* Or just an optional luxury

💩 What is value minus:

* either simply inefficient (ie obsolete or archaic)

* OR worthless, harmful, or toxic

Inclusion model is the basic exertion of educational value - the human GAin of wellness and growth, taking place of itself, voluntary.

(Educational value is what is expressed by the basic principle about zen:

calm wellbeing in the present now, uninfringed by illusion or coercion.)

Instead of not allowing non paying users to come in, you use advertising and other mechanisms which sponsor them, to avoid excluding.

That is what the Viable Tech of decentralized money can and will do. Enable the democracy of nature by the principle of wu wei.

↘️⭕️↘️ Meta conclusion / sharp rectangle punchline

-

the wealthy innovators or influencers that currently hold Potential energy are responsible for continuously accumulating opportunity cost - if they were to view the emergent intelligence of the social organism somehow, with leader vision, they would circulate the **necessary amount** to fund work at the the bottom, by sponsoring purchasers to create the work for fulfillers.

Emergence is the technological democracy replacement for a representative system that was made obsolete when communication faster than the horse carried letter - instant electronic messaging - came forth.

333

[][][] So Then,

Now [][][]

(Interlude - there is another joker - sets up the monastery value)

() The monastery idea flows into and within the harm reduction platform and is a necessary piece of monk education as a structure of my mind, my deepest heart.

Monastery is Harm Reduction because if money were no object I would open them everywhere and hire other monks to run it with me

() the real purpose is to offer a place that is not tied down by commercial / profitability burden, nor public funding approval.

There was a time that Kanye tried to start a shoes gifting program, but what he should have done was open monasteries, the maximum adequacy 3rd place.

I want to create the space for Leaving this social contract as the main function of my business. 🚪🃏 My business is people’s wellbeing.

👁‍🗨The joker sees through all pairs of eyes - but there is another joker. The warrior

[image transition here:

there is another joker

🚪👁‍🗨🃏

the warrior is the joker

The joker is the tank

The tank is the monk

The monk is at the top

Battling

[image transition back]

He battles every boss, taking Aggro and defending the young and the vulnerable, leading the group, so that the newer ones may learn and get xp

And this monastery is the warrior’s house of gathering.

The base.

What school actually means. The warrior’s house.

STANLEY [the LOVE SAMURAI]

lives there.

In regular reality the Love samurai is a joke in the Raphael level

Of Stanley parable.

In my game, the love samurai is the joker. He is me.

Education monk.

Monastery is the warrior’s house, the place where no nazi infringement is allowed to take away our wellbeing or our free will.

Harm reduction is critical, vital, and sharply precise with intent.

It is abstract, but unambiguous comprised of a few separate but inseparable policy values.

first understand the Nucleus values :

* wellbeing / healing

&

* curiosity / sovereignty

1️⃣ Decriminalization - remove policing against medicinal and educational action / tools. This item resonates by the recent cultural movements to decriminalize federal cannabis and psychedelics, (plus all types of sex work and human interaction for the purpose of wellbeing) and most recently the public outcry to defund policing.

This item is an essential modification to the social contract. We need to be allowed to grow up, and make decisions; with no one standing over the shoulder saying we are wrong. That cannot be tolerated anymore. It’s just too much. It’s too violent. It’s too oppressive. We’re done with it.

2️⃣ decentralization. FUND wellbeing directly

To children and their guardians as valued individually-owned Work. This is an income floor policy. Its true meaning is that there can be no outside boss who could fire you or in any other way withhold the funding.

Because- they aren’t the stake holder. You are, on behalf - your kids are.

We will have decentralized this by letting it be funded at the very bottom of social order, at the purchase level, recognizing that the best purchase will always be made by the individual.

With democracy, That is the liberty we believe in. It’s time we started acting like it.

3️⃣ infrastructural - 3rd places that kids may be kids and Peace is the purpose. All are invited. It is not for sale. Very very simple, common sense for the type of spaces we want to have in a CIVILIZED social order.

I’m Not saying don’t have a public building that is the school. I’m saying don’t have it be an authoritarian Hell , a part time jail with bosses and grading, and de-individualization.

So To have it at all, you need to make it both voluntary and useful. So that children and families may use the resources in support of their kids’ curiosity.

Real TLDR distilled conclusion:

My task as monk educator:

UNPLUG us

from Use of Force Matrix

which demands we emulate coercion

And then PLUG us back In Again

But into the Celebration and Sharing Matrix this time.

Disconnection is the illness -

- Use of Force is the illness

Contact is the medicine []

[] Sharing is the medicine

⭕️

How to contact ?

Celebration

How to Share?

Crafting

���

👁‍🗨

Wellbeing (means of doing: healing)

Sovereignty (means of doing: curiosity / question pathing [quests] )

[cami-chats]

I Always Have You

Fandom: Marvel

Pairings: Bucky Barnes & Tony Stark

Warnings: Mentioned pedophilia (but nothing happens or even comes close)

Summary: From Tony's first day on the earth, he had a soulmate looking after him. Not everyone wanted Bucky to be that close with him, but they manage.

Also on AO3

Bucky was half excited and half scared. Mostly excited because it's not like this was his baby, it was his friend that was having a kid. Which meant he got to have all the fun and none of the headaches. Ply him with candy so Bucky was his favorite, but then he wouldn't have to deal with the kid bouncing off the walls at bedtime. He had it made, and he loved it. 

Maria's labor didn't take very long according to people that knew more about birth than him, and when Howard came out to retrieve them, they filed in with quiet steps but eager faces-- Peggy and the Howlies minus a noted few. 

Peggy was the first to hold him of course, positively beaming at the scrunched up little face. Bucky was next, and he was careful that his left arm was already perfectly in place when Peggy eased the baby into his arms. 

Maria was exhausted but smiling, strands of hair sticking to her face from sweat. "His name's Antonio Edward Stark," she said, pride clear as day in her tone. 

"Aw you little thing," Bucky cooed, "they'll probably call you Tony. Do you like that? Tony?" He wiggled a finger in front of his face, then stroked it over a chubby cheek. The he froze as the world... exploded. There was no other word for it. Color didn't seep into his vision like it always belonged there, it was like a knock to the head that landed so hard his vision whited out before blowing back in. 

"Bucky?" Howard was asking from in front of him, clearly no the first time he had said his name. 

"Yeah," Bucky said nonsensically, glancing down at Tony for a moment before shoving him into his father's arms. As if that wasn't enough to warn everyone in the room that he wasn't feeling right, he fumbled the door knob when he tried to stumble out into the hallway. He didn't bother trying to find a chair, he just leaned against the wall right next to the room and slid to the floor. 

He had a soulmate. Shit. Shit. He'd always thought that if it wasn't Steve it wasn't going to be anyone, and he was fine with that. But now he had a soulmate and he couldn't even begin to know how to handle that. He was going to have to go to a goddamn class to learn what all the colors were. He probably wouldn't have to take the meds that would prevent him from getting headaches the first week because of his healing factor, but that was a pale comfort. He didn't know how to be a soulmate to anyone let alone a baby. He was good with kids when the occasion called for it, but that was a hell of a difference to helping raise one. But maybe he was getting ahead of himself because there was no guarantee that Howard would even let him see Tony again. 

Howard was kneeling in front of him now, face concerned and saying his name over and over to try and catch his attention. When Bucky finally met his eyes, he gave a small smile. "It's okay. We're just uh-" he glanced at the closed hospital door- "not going to tell Maria for a while. She'd panic, but it's not like anything's going to happen. Take a couple of breaths and get back in there, okay?" 

"You're takin' this better than I am," Bucky noted, doing as instructed and taking several deep breaths. 

Howard shrugged, staying where he was on his knees so Bucky didn't feel rushed. "He's not going to have it easy being my son. I feel a lot better knowing that you'll be there to look after him." He clapped Bucky on the shoulder, and it actually made him feel better. He was still freaking out, but he knew that it was temporary. 

*

Bucky spent more time at Stark Mansion than his own home. Howard offered him a room full time, but Bucky turned it down, citing Maria as an excuse. Even so, he ended up spending the night about half the time. 

Tony was absolutely adorable, all wide-eyed curiosity and demanding that Bucky explain things to him. It only took a couple years before Tony was asking questions he didn't know the answer to. 

"Dad says you knew Captain America," Tony said one day, a Bucky-bear in one hand and an official Captain America action figure in the other. 

"Yeah." 

Tony tilted his head. "Like the one in the comics?" 

"Yep, only I knew him before he got super." 

Tony looked at him skeptically, so full of doubt in a way only kids could manage. "He's always been super." 

"Really? I thought the comics showed him getting bigger." 

"That's not real," Tony said like it was obvious. "Nobody grows that much in one minute, it takes years." 

Bucky was the one that had corrected him on that originally, explaining that everyone had to wait years to get big and Tony would too. Evidently Tony had taken that to heart. "That's how it is for you and me, but Steve was... special." 

"I thought I was special." 

"You're special too," Bucky assured him. "It's just in a different way." 

Tony hugged the Bucky-bear tighter, Captain America falling to the side, forgotten. "Different," Tony repeated. 

"That's right." 

Bucky-bear firmly clutched in one hand, Tony crawled onto the couch and put himself in Bucky's lap. "Was Captain America different too?" 

"Yeah kiddo," Bucky said, laying a kiss on top of Tony's messy hair, "he was different too." 

*

"Why do people wear white to get married?" Tony asked. He was lying on his stomach, arms propping up his head while he wrinkled his nose in disgust. 

"I dunno," Bucky said. "Purity, I think?" 

"Well it's boring. They should wear red. Red's the best color." 

Bucky shrugged, and Tony continued to frown. It should have been so innocent. Tony knew that Maria worked with fashion, so if Bucky didn't know why people wore white to weddings, maybe she would. He sought her out a little later, when Bucky had to leave to do some boring adult thing. "Mama?" 

"Yes?" 

"Why do people wear white to weddings?" he asked. Then, because he wanted someone to agree with him, "Wouldn't red look better?" 

Maria froze. "Red?" 

Tony nodded, sure that she was about to say 'Yes Antonio, you're right, red would be much better'. 

"Who taught you your colors?" 

"Bucky." It had been a little game, pointing at candies. When Tony got the color right, he got to eat the candy. Tony was too big for that game now, but he still did it sometimes. 

"Bucky," Maria repeated, jaw clenched and something steely in her gaze. Tony didn't know why she looked like that. Bucky was great! He gave hugs anytime Tony wanted them, and he was always warm and squishy. Plus, anytime Tony asked, Bucky would carry him around like he didn't weigh a thing. 

Without answering Tony's question, she left the room, yelling for Howard. Tony waited for her to come back at first, but nothing happened. With a put-upon sigh, Tony went to go look for him. He heard the yelling long before he saw them. 

"I want you out of my house!" Maria screamed. 

"It's my home, and I say that he'd not going anywhere!" Howard yelled right back. 

"Think of our son!" 

"That's who I am thinking about!" 

Him. They were talking about him. Tony ran to get closer, stopping just outside the doorway so they wouldn't see him. 

"You have no idea what he's going to face in the future, wouldn't you like it if he had some protection?" 

"He needs protection from him!" 

"Maria-" Bucky tried to say, but she cut him off. 

"Take your shit and get the hell out of here!" 

"No," Howard snapped. "He stays." 

There was a tense, long pause. "Fine," Maria spit, and Tony ran back to the parlor so he wouldn't get caught. He had no idea what was going on, but it sounded bad. 

Three days later, Maria told him he was going to boarding school, cheery smile on her face and his already packed bag by her feet. 

"What?" 

"Boarding school, darling. It'll be better for you than staying cooped up in this house with only the occasional visit from your tutors." 

"I'm not cooped up," Tony protested even though he knew that she'd already made up her mind and no amount of protests would change that. He couldn't help but try though, especially since what she said was wrong. Bucky brought him out all the time, and Howard taught him things the tutors didn't know. He didn't say any of that aloud, remembering the strange argument he'd heard before. 

Maria looked at him in that way adults did when they thought he didn't understand what they were saying. "This will be good for you Antonio. I want you to be happy, and this decision's already been made." 

"My name's Tony," he muttered, and Maria's face hardened though she didn't say anything to correct him. 

"It's time to go darling, we wouldn't want for you to be late." 

"We're leaving right now?" 

"That's correct." 

"Are Bucky and Dad coming?" 

"They're both awfully busy Antonio. It'll just be you, and, and Mister Jarvis. Doesn't that sound like fun?" 

No. In fact, it sounded weird and like nothing they'd done before. But when she took his hand and started pulling him towards the door, he didn't try to get away. 

*

When Tony had realized that boarding school had meant never going home and not getting visitors, he'd tried to leave. When he got shipped back, he figured that she couldn't do it again if the school wouldn't take him. So he got himself expelled, but instead of everything going back to normal, Maria found a different one to stick him in. He got kicked out of that one. He tried telling her that he was miserable, the classes too easy and the other students too mean, but nothing worked. For whatever reason, Maria was determined to keep him away. 

Before he knew it, he was in college, shoving all the engineering tools he was unwilling to part with in a tiny dorm room that was painted slate grey. 

Tony was busy trying to shove boxes under the bed when the door opened. The only part of him that was visible were his calves and feet. 

"You must be Stark." 

"Yeah that's me!" This thing was stupid heavy. If Bucky'd come to help, it wouldn't have been a problem, but Bucky had looked all awkward and said, "I don't think I should. Call me when you get there though, yeah? Let me know if I can help." It finally shoved into place, and he wiggled out from under the bed. He rolled over and saw his roommate. James Rhodes was plenty handsome, but god at what cost? Tony had no idea a shade of red that horrible existed. He looked nice though, and Tony wasn't going to make Rhodes annoyed with him quicker than usual if he could help it. "Rhodes?" 

"Yep." He offered Tony a hand up, and Tony forced himself to take it because he wasn't allowed to be squeamish with his classmates-- Maria had made that pretty clear. "Listen man, I know this is college and all, but you're way underage so don't expect me to get you beer or anything." 

Tony snorted. "Yeah don't worry. I'm sure if I want some, I can get it on my own." He almost went back to putting things away, but he wanted to check on this before it became a problem. "Try not to bring too many people to our room, yeah? Who you sleep with is your business, but people have a tendency to 'accidentally' pick up my things when they leave and I'd prefer not to deal with it." 

"Shit man. Yeah, you got it." 

"Thanks." 

"No problem, it's not like I was hooking up with a whole bunch of people anyways." He looked at his side of the room, nodded to himself then said, "Ignore the ten different people helping me move three boxes. My family all insisted they come even though I told them I didn't really need the help." 

His entire family was coming? Tony had Howard and Maria for family. Past that, the help he could expect would come from Jarvis of Bucky (of course). But Maria wasn't exactly that kind of mother, so wherever she was was where Jarvis would be. Howard had a trip planned for this entire month, and they'd known about that before they even knew Tony was going to college. Bucky's help had been a given to Tony, all the way until Bucky had given him that look and been entirely uncertain in his own skin. "I'm probably going to clear out if it's all the same to you," Tony said, and Rhodes grinned. 

"Don't want to deal with them? Smart move. See you around." 

Missing out on the family interactions was definitely a bonus, but mostly Tony needed to find a phone so he could call Bucky. It was easy to find a phone, and he didn't have to wait for anyone else to be done, because everyone else on campus was busy moving. He dialed the number for the Mansion, assuming that's where Bucky was. 

"Stark residence." 

"Hi Mrs. Jarvis, it's Tony. Can you put Bucky on?" 

"Mister Barnes is not here," she said, and Tony waited for her to elaborate but nothing was forthcoming. 

"Uh, okay. Thanks." 

"Of course sir," she said, then hung up. 

Well. Maybe he'd be at his apartment, though only Bucky and god knew why he bothered to keep it. He tapped the receiver down then dialed the much less familiar number for Bucky's apartment. It didn't make it to two full rings before he answered. "Barnes." 

"Hey Bucky." 

"Tony," Bucky said, noticeably happier. "How was moving in?" 

"Would've been better if you were here." 

"Yeah, I'm sorry. Maria sorta hates me though, so I would've just gotten in her and Jarvis's way." 

"Their way?" Tony asked. "They didn't come." 

"...what? Then who helped you move in?" 

"No one." 

"Fuck Tony, I'm so sorry, I would've come to help you if I'd known. Maria told me-" Bucky blew out an angry breath "-or I guess she implied that she'd be there to help you so I wouldn't have to show up. I'm sorry I wasn't there. I know it doesn't do you a whole lot of good now, but next time something like this happens, you can call me before you start and I'll come help you." 

"I will." 

"I'm so sorry," he said again. "You shouldn't have had to do that alone." 

"It's okay," he said, though he was still a little hurt; he just wanted Bucky to be happy again. "What are you doing at your old apartment? I'm surprised you spend the money to keep the lease running when you spend all your time at the Mansion." 

Bucky made a noncommittal noise. "Without you or Howard there, there's not much point in me staying, y'know?" 

"It's your home too." 

"I'm happy you think that kiddo, but technically I'm only visiting. And again, without you there, there's not much point." 

Normally, Tony would have been comforted by the reminder that Bucky liked him, but something in the phrasing was off. Was Bucky a babysitter? Is that... why he always spent so much time with Tony? He didn't want to believe it, but it was a familiar pattern in Tony's life. Teachers, tutors, and friends, they'd all been bought for him before. What was a babysitter in the face of that? All the fond smiles Tony remembered, all the times he'd thought that Bucky was rescuing him from boredom, bought and paid for. Tony swallowed around the lump in his throat. "I should probably get back to unpacking." 

"Yeah of course. Did you want me to come down and help you finish? Not as good as being there from the start, but better than nothing." 

Tony thought about saying no and pushing him away. But the truth was that even if Bucky's time was paid for, Tony liked him, and he wasn't willing to give that up. "I'd love that. If you have the time." 

"I always have the time for you. I'll get there as soon as I can, and don't bother trying to finish before I arrive. Sit around and work on that AI of yours or something, yeah?" 

"Yeah." He thought about saying something else, something about how much he appreciated him. He settled on, "Thanks Bucky." 

"Anything for you kiddo. See you soon." 

*

"Hey sugar patch, can you hand me the screwdriver?" 

"Which one?" 

"The red-handled one." 

"Uhh, right. And which one is that for us normal people?" 

Tony looked up from his project frowning. "It's that one," he said, pointing to the one on Rhodey's left. "Do you not... know your colors?" It seemed ludicrous to him, but he didn't have a better guess. 

Rhodey handed it over with a snort. "Man, I can't even see my colors, let alone tell them apart. When did you meet your soulmate?" 

"My who?" 

"Soulmate," Rhodey repeated. Now they both looked confused, and that was never a good place to be. 

"Am I supposed to know what that means?" 

"I mean, I thought you would, but I guess not. You're... you and- you have a soul, right?" 

"Okay," Tony said slowly. It was the same tone he used when Rhodey was explaining why he thought Han could use the Force.

"So, the idea is that there's at least one person out there with a soul that complements yours." 

"That's nice. What does this have to do with me?" 

"When you touch them, you can see colors. It's how you recognize them from everybody else." 

Tony blinked. "Seriously? You're not messing with me or anything, this is real." 

"Yeah it's real." 

"It sounds like romanticized bullshit." 

"Some people think that, but it's still true. Until you meet a very specific person, you won't see colors. It's not perfect obviously, since some people are blind and some have the medical condition of color blindness, but it's legit." 

"But I've been able to see colors my entire life. There was never a chance to meet anyone." 

"You probably met them really young. I don't think there's actually ever been anyone born with them." 

Tony started to say that well, he must be the exception because Bucky definitely would have told him. Then he froze. Bucky. "Are soulmates- um, romantic?" 

"Most people think so." 

"But you don't?" 

Rhodey shrugged. "My older sister has a soulmate, and she swears up and down that she'll never love him that way even though she loves him more than anybody else in the world. Maybe that'll change, or maybe they'll keep being best friends the way they are now. Nobody really knows but them, y'know? Everybody's different." 

"I see." Bucky... if by some chance he wasn't Tony's soulmate, he'd definitely know who was. "I'm gonna make a call." 

"I'll clear out," Rhodey said getting to his feet and stretching. "I've been craving a meatball sub for hours." 

"Okay," Tony said, even thought they both knew Rhodey was only leaving to give him privacy. "Thanks man." 

Rhodey pat him on the shoulder as he left, and for a brief moment, Tony stared at the phone without moving. What was he hoping to hear? That Bucky was his soulmate and maybe the obligation he felt had nothing do with Howard or money, but was solely because he cared about Tony? That was exactly what he wanted to hear actually, but what then? If that was true, Bucky would've been keeping it a secret this whole time. Even if it wasn't Bucky, he had to know, and he still hadn't told Tony a damn thing. He picked up the receiver and dialed the number for Bucky's apartment since that where he spent all his time these days. 

"Barnes," he answered, like after all this time he was still expecting a military call. 

"Hi Bucky." 

"Hey Tony," Bucky said, smile evident in his voice. "How's it going?" 

"Who's my soulmate?" he blurted. He expected a pause, some sort of stalling, but there was nothing. Bucky answered immediately. 

"Me. Unless you've got some big news for me," he joked. 

Tony couldn't often say that he'd been struck dumb since most of the time when he was quiet it was by choice. But right now he wanted to ask how the hell Bucky could say that so casually, but he couldn't force the words out. 

"Tony?" he asked, sounding worried. "You okay?" 

His throat worked, and he choked out, "No one told me." 

"No one told you what? Tony? Are you okay?" 

"Soulmates. I didn't- no one told me." 

"...oh." It was amazing that one little word, more of a sound than anything else, could hold so much emotion. "I thought you knew." 

"I didn't even know that soulmates existed. Rhodey mentioned it and I sounded fucking stupid. Are people really born not seeing colors?" 

"Yeah. Shit, it never even occurred to one me that you wouldn't know. Of course you wouldn't, we all just assumed that you'd know, somehow." 

"Maria," Tony said suddenly. "This is why she hates you, right?" She thinks you're going to take advantage or some shit." 

"Basically. And Tony, I would never-" 

"I know. Fuck's sake, you're better to me than I am." 

"I wouldn't go that far," Bucky said, but it was a blatant lie. 

*

Tony felt numb. He'd felt numb (and more than a little disbelieving) when the police told him that his parents had died in a car crash. He'd felt numb when Obadiah clapped him on the shoulder and said that he'd take care of things until Tony was ready. He'd felt numb as they made the funeral arrangements and Bucky had to leave the room to cry because he didn't want anyone to see him like that. He'd felt numb through the wake, with old friends and business partners huddled together in the grass as reporters took pictures and filmed from the sidelines. 

He didn't know how long feeling numb would last, but he guessed another week. He wasn't expecting it to hit when they got back to the mansion after the funeral. It's not like he saw something that reminded him, but he realized that Howard was never coming back; he wasn't on a trip, he was just gone. 

Bucky already had an arm around his shoulders, so it was easy to turn and smush his face against Bucky's chest as he cried. Tony didn't say anything, and Bucky didn't say anything. He simply held him, like a warm shield between Tony and the rest of the world. 

It was probably the first time Tony truly understood that Bucky was his soulmate, not just a friend who had always been there for him. In the midst of a tragedy, snot clogging his nose and cheeks sticky with tears, he felt true comfort. It didn't fix anything, and in the moment it didn't even make him feel better. But he clung to Bucky that much harder, and in return, Bucky squeezed him tighter. 

"I've got you," Bucky said when the tears tapered off. He pressed a kiss to the top of Tony's head. "I've got you."

[mayogalivingblogs]

What to Look for in a Childbirth Class

When you picture your birth going perfectly, what do you see? Can you picture yourself easefully breathing through contractions, feeling safe and supported by your team, and even enjoying the power moving through you as you move through the stages until baby is in your arms? Creating a vision for your ideal labor experience is like an athlete seeing themselves cross the finish line. It can help you let go of worry and fear, so you’ll be more likely to relax into your power. Still, envisioning your ideal birth is not necessarily going to make it happen. As my birth teacher used to say, “We get the birth we get. If pregnancy doesn’t teach you you’re not in charge, labor will. And if labor doesn’t, your children will.” So what can you do to get the birth you want? Rather than going for a particular outcome, setting your sights on creating an "Empowering Birth" experience can pay off every time you think of your birth, for the rest of your life. An Empowering Birth means: 1. Everyone was healthy 2. You felt supported and nurtured by your birth team 3. You prepared enough to fully participate in all decisions Your birth can look very different from the one you were imagining, and still be incredibly empowering. The feeling of empowerment can start when you’re pregnant, because you can actually take action steps that will help make it happen. And for the rest of your life, every time you'll think of it you'll feel a rush good feelings: gratitude, pride, love, connection, and a sense of your own infinite possibility. How to help make an Empowering Birth happen for yourself? To lay the foundations for number one in our list above, do what you can to stay healthy throughout your pregnancy: · Try to eat as clean and close to the source as possible. Lots of vegetables and fruits. · Walk or do prenatal yoga every day to support the optimal flow of energy and to keep your muscles and core strong. · Instead of relying on one doctor, gather a healthcare team with different perspectives on how to stay healthy. A Chinese medical practitioner, an Ayurvedic doctor, and a naturopath all provide wonderful lifestyle practices to help you remain vibrant throughout your pregnancy. The second two elements in our Empowering Birth list are all about receiving guidance, support, and inspiration from birth experts. Taking a comprehensive, evidence-based childbirth class will give you the information you’ll need to make choices you'll feel good about. It will help you know what support you want, and put it in place. And it will inspire you to do what you can to create an Empowering Birth for yourself. What to look for when considering a childbirth class? You’ll remember your birth forever, so it’s worth investing in. Make sure it has these components: · Objectivity - Some in-person and online birth class teach ways to avoid intervention. Underneath their lessons is the idea that birth is better without drugs. But what if you have your own reasons for wanting to get an epidural in the parking lot? Or, for reasons beyond your control, an intervention is optimal to keep things moving forward? These classes might leave you feeling unprepared to make these choices and worse, like you failed somehow. Other childbirth classes have a slant toward intervention. Their assumption is "of course you should use an epidural, why be in pain?" But what if by the time you get there it’s too close to pushing time? What if – as sometimes happens, but rarely – the epidural doesn’t fully take? And what if, like me, you are pleasantly surprised that you are able to breathe through the contractions, and you’d rather be able to move around? You might not have learned the skills you’ll want to be able to get through it all with as little pain as possible. · Coping techniques – How do you deal with pain when it comes up? What are the actions you can take to relax into each contraction? How to use breath, posture, focal items, music, smell, touch, visualizations and other tools to keep things moving and flowing? · Birth Plan – It’s YOUR birth and a good birth class will help you make choices that are right for you and your family. But how do you know? The process of creating a birth plan involves both "education and meditation": you’ll learn about a subject, and then turn inward to sense what's right for you. Often we don’t even realize the choices we have along the way until they’re made for us. By considering each choice you’ll have, the pro’s and con’s, and taking it through with your partner and birth team, you can make choices you’ll feel good about forever. · Birth Intention – If Birth Plans are about how you’d like things to go on the outside, your Birth Intention is how you’d like things to feel on the inside. Setting your intention is a powerful way to stay connected to your inner resources. With a good teacher, you’ll not only come out with a Birth Plan, but you’ll be clear on how you want to be through it all, no matter what – calm, steady, full of love. Meditations will help you connect to the inner experience you want. · Postpartum Preparation – So often we see birth as the mountain and forget that beyond that is another even bigger one we can’t see. Being ready for breastfeeding, knowing the issues to look for and where to find support if we need it is essential. Principles and practices for full recovery are so important to have going in to your healing process. And knowing who will be there helping you out – both with household tasks as well as getting your body aligned and strong again – will be life-changing. Whether your birth ends up looking like your ideal vision, or if it goes in unexpected ways, a good online childbirth class will help you lay the foundation for an Empowering Birth. You can take a self-paced, online Birth Class or a live online birth class with us and get all of the elements you’ll need for an Empowering Birth - in the comfort of your living room.

Learn more about the 3 Pillars of Birth Preparation here.

Original Source: https://bit.ly/2EqO2xy

[lovehaswonangelnumbers]

New Post has been published on https://lovehaswonangelnumbers.org/karmic-tools-weekly-forecast-march-29-april-3-2020/

Karmic Tools Weekly Forecast: March 29 – April 3, 2020

Karmic Tools Weekly Forecast: March 29 – April 3, 2020

By Kelly M Beard

The video version of this forecast, as read by Kelly, is available here.

The Karmic Tools Weekly Forecast covers the current planetary transits which affect people in different ways and to various degrees of intensity. Take notice when it is a Personal planet (Sun / Moon / Mercury / Venus / Mars) interacting with a Social (Jupiter/Saturn) or Collective planet (Uranus / Neptune/Pluto). And pay extremely close attention when it is a Social planet interacting with a Collective planet because that means something *big* is brewing that will move large groups of people along their evolutionary paths. Tuning in to the energy and rhythm of the planets can serve as a useful *guide* as you move along your Individual Path. It also helps to understand your place within the context of the larger Social & Collective Story. Below, you will find out how these energies tend to manifest, as well as guidance and direction. 

*NOTE*  There are some days when there are NO CONTACTS (besides the Moon), please note that there are no missing entries, we just list the actual Activations of each week + the day they happen.

Weekly Forecast: March 29 – April 3, 2020  

3/31 ~ Mars (energy, desire & action) ~conjunct~ Saturn (structure, responsibility & timing):

Any conjunction is an initiation and Mars rules ‘who you are’ and ‘what you want’, while Saturn rules your definition of reality and your physical limits. If you are feeling frustrated, you may need to clarify your desires more, then take tangible, practical steps toward them. Anytime Saturn is involved, it will depend on your personal nature, as some thrive on structure & good boundaries, while others buck the system and want to do it their own way (which causes its own types of conflicts in the world). Sometimes this energy manifests as action being restricted and the anger that follows. You can either be angry and feel restricted, limited and unable to move … or you can see this energy as an opportunity to define the right actions to take and strategically plan to take them when the Universe is more supportive. This energy requires us to slow down and double check The Plan (Saturn). If you proceed consciously, your plan has a better chance of success than if you were reckless & impatient (Mars). You may experience a blockage of some sort, whether internal or external. You feel this tremendous urge to move forward in your life but seem to find blockages and limitations with every effort. That is more likely your perception rather than the reality, so ask your Self if you feel inadequate to the task at hand or if you are dealing with some personal fears around this issue. Remember that fear is: False Evidence Appearing Real – so try to release the fear and reclaim your inner authority to create/lead your own life. If you don’t, your outer circumstance only becomes a reflection of your inner belief. You will attract criticism & delays and repel support & protection. Take your grand vision and figure out three small steps that you can take, even on this restricted level, that will still take you in the direction of your goal. Mars links up with Saturn every 2-years or so, so even though it is an initiation, you may be better supported for cultivating, planning, working behind the scenes, doing the detail work and foundational (grunt) work that is NECESSARY to support the grand vision when the time comes to fully express it.

4/3 ~ Mercury (communication/expression) ~conjunct~ Neptune (imagination/spirituality):

This is a mixed blessing, but definitely an initiation either way. It can be miraculous for creativity, art or exploration. I like this one for a personal ‘conversation with God’, your Higher Self, your SoulSelf. As with any initiation, a completion must come first, and in this case with Mercury, it’s time to expand your thinking in some way – go deeper. Invite your Ancestors, Angels & Animal Guides to answer your questions and guide you at this time. Communing with them is much more supported than communing with the humans around you. So if you need to think about the mundane or confront someone about something which requires complete honesty from both parties, things could get a little hazy & confused thanks to Neptune here. There is always a veil to contend with when dealing with Neptune, but you have to know which side of it you are on so you are in alignment with the Nature around you (3D vs 5D). This energy tends to color reality, misleading you to think you are being perfectly clear in your communication or what you’re trying to express, while others are completely lost. It’s better to say nothing, rather than be completely misunderstood.

4/3 ~ Venus Enters GEMINI (until Aug 7th):

She is entering a zone where she will linger April 3 – Aug 7 and stir up the energy of that Area of Life for you. The last time she was in Gemini was July 2019, so I believe we received some clues back then as to what may need extra attention by now. Your other frame of reference is 2012, which is the last time she extended her stay with a retrograde. As she moves back and forth through this area, she is awakening us to new values & priorities where our ideas, thoughts, words, concepts & perceptions are concerned. We are going to be presented with wildly new & different choices and decisions to make so we want to take the next four months to research and review our ideas, thoughts & concepts. Some of the review will stir up how you magnetize what you think about and some will be assessing the actual value of your creative ideas and how they can serve & support others along the way too. I will be doing a 2-part Open House in April to introduce the new Venus Cycle, so stay tuned!

4/4 ~ Venus (values & priorities) ~trine~ Saturn (stability & endurance):

This is a smooth, easy energy that you can work with consciously and yield incredible, even tangible, results. It’s a good time to define your terms where relationships are concerned because you are really clear about your values & priorities, at this time. Based on your past choices & efforts, positive benefits & earned rewards are forthcoming. If you’ve avoided responsibility in your own relationships (public or private), then this energy can help get you back on track, with less pain & suffering than usual (when Saturn’s involved). If you can be practical about your own limits and realistic about what others bring to the table, then this energy also supports discussing forward movement, development or spiraling to a new, higher level in some way, as a team. Strategizing about the future, clarifying the vision of what will support & protect all involved and honoring the essence of life that runs throughout is deeply supported by these two getting together in an easy angle. Venus is also the energy of love & money, so it’s a good time to be objective and somewhat conservative where both your relationships & finances are concerned. With this interaction with Saturn, I would suggest outlining a reasonable relationship or financial goal for the next 3 – 6 – 9 – or 12 months.

4/4 ~ Jupiter (consciousness, learning & belief systems) ~conjunct~ Pluto (purification & transformation): (1 of 3: 4/4 ~ 6/30 ~ 11/12)

The highest possible expression of this energy is channeling your very passionate, intense energy into your Highest vision – Highest ideal – deepest personal Truth and receiving the fruits of such hard labor. There is power behind the current expansion and you are in a unique position to create your greatest vision or your deepest fear – it’s your choice. Both these planets force you to improve your Self, your life & your environment, usually stripping you of misconceptions and excess baggage along the way. This is a 13yr cycle, so you can reflect on how your life completely shifted 13 years ago? This is your time to choose to co-create, to cultivate & commit to expressing your infinite potential. Dig deeper, there is more to you than you give your Self credit for being. This is your chance to completely redefine your Truth & Purpose. The worst possible expression of this energy is to become obsessed by a belief, try to force others to your way of thinking, blow things way out of proportion, magnify the darkness and prolong your trip through the Underworld. Jupiter insists we learn from such excavations of the Soul. Your deepest Truth is surfacing at this time, is it based in fear or faith? Under pressure, whatever is inside, comes out. It’s time to decide if you are going to believe in positive outcomes and the ability to turn your deepest wounds into your most trusted, earned wisdom.

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