#it's important to note that this is all preemptive grousing

[panharmonium]

next round of in-progress naruto thoughts under the cut

[i actually haven’t progressed that far from where i was last time, honestly, but i could feel myself getting to a stage where i had some things i needed to write up.]

fyi, this one is a little more gripe-y than usual - still enjoying myself, but there are some things in the current arc that are bugging me.

[spoiler policy disclaimer first, as always: I am watching naruto for the first time and have only gotten to the point where naruto and bee break out of the island barrier and leave to join the war.  i am trying to avoid spoilers, so please don’t interact with this (tags included, because the notifications now show them to me automatically) with any spoilery commentary, including even general things like “oh i love this show but it gets less good after X point” or “X season is better than Y season” or any general assessments of quality/likability/etc re: future seasons.  Thank you! <3 ]

anyway, to go ahead with my grousing -

there are a couple things about this current arc that have me feeling "ehhh.”

1) too many dead people

i’ve personally always been lukewarm on the “revive/reanimate dead characters for the Confrontation Value” trope, which is probably due to me having been a comics fan for so long (i was pretty deep into DC-land during Blackest Night, and that’s not even the first/last time this sort of thing has been done there, so).  i’m not saying it CAN’T be done in an interesting way, but most of the time my experience with it has been that it’s kind of cheap/redundant storytelling.  it usually doesn’t add much to an emotional arc, for me, and when it retreads an emotional arc that did have a strong conclusion, i feel like all it does is weaken the original story.  

so like - places where i feel like shippuden does this well are with minato and kushina.  i found both of those scenes with naruto to be powerful moments that added something new to the story/to naruto’s development.  (but they’re not even part of the whole reanimation jutsu plotline, which is what i’m mostly feeling “eh” on, so it’s not even the greatest example.)

a place where i’m kind of in the middle is with asuma.  on the one hand, i really don’t think that this needed to happen, because the original story arc with him was SO strong.  however, they did kind of redeem themselves in a way by focusing the redux on choji instead of shikamaru, so at least they were still saying/exploring something something new.

places where i’m still pretty dubious are pretty much...everyone else.  i’m just not sure...well, i don’t know.  i can’t really say definitively how i feel about it until i get to the end of the arc and see how it ends, but at the current moment, i’m just not sure what we get out of seeing people like zabuza+haku, lady chio, itachi, nagato, etc....ALL of those stories had such powerful endings; it just makes me leery of these “resurrections” invalidating everything we saw previously/weakening the impact of what came before.

2) mixed messaging

this is my bigger gripe, and it’s something i’ve kind of had floating on the edges of my mind for a long time, but this season especially is highlighting it.

the one thing that is guaranteed to make me frustrated about this show (besides its obvious disinterest in female characters) is when it starts to lean super hard into the “Naruto Is The Only One Who Can Do It!” for every single task that needs to be completed.  and i know this is a stupid thing to complain about when the show is literally titled “Naruto,” but the reason it gets frustrating is because the initial message of this show was never “one super special person must do everything on their own and save everyone else.”  the original message of this show was teamwork.  

the very first lesson kakashi teaches the kids (and the foundation upon which the rest of the story has been built) is “you are stronger together.”  if you had all come at me together, you might have been able to take [the bells]!  he specifically criticizes naruto for working alone: “naruto - you do EVERYTHING on your own.  EVERYTHING.”  and that’s understood to be the Wrong Thing; it’s the reason naruto ends up tied to the stump.  but in the last few seasons especially (though there have definitely been previous moments where this has shown up before) the ONLY thing we keep hearing is how naruto has to accomplish everything by himself.  

it didn’t bother me in the Pain arc; i actually thought that confrontation was appropriate and necessary for naruto’s development.  but ever since then, it’s escalated to a point where now it’s like - “naruto is the only one who can fight sasuke!  naruto is the only one who can defeat madara!  naruto is the only one who can stop the war!  naruto is the only one who can erase everybody’s hatred!”  

and that’s the point at which i start to get frustrated, because my mind is like “okay, and the other characters are going to be doing...what, exactly?”

again, maybe it’s stupid to complain about that when the show is literally titled “Naruto.”  but i don’t think so.  title notwithstanding, this story at its heart was, in the beginning, an ensemble show with four main characters, whereas nowadays, the messaging is that only one of those characters can actually accomplish anything.  so i get kind of resentful, when i’m told that the other members of the team can’t do anything but step back and hold naruto up, because the essential message of this story has ALWAYS been “teamwork is more important than anything.  you are NEVER stronger by yourself.  we ALL have something to contribute.”

right now, the other characters feel like they’ve just been shunted off to do busywork.  none of them have grown or changed at all since the end of season 10 (and even the end of season 10 was starting to slide into the “only naruto can do anything about sasuke in the end blah blah” - yes it’s a huge pet peeve of mine but it is what it is; whatever; moving on).  we haven’t even SEEN sasuke since the end of season 10.  there’s been no consideration given to how kakashi is handling being drafted into a second war and being put in charge of 20,000 lives (and his clash with zabuza was just a vehicle for all the characters to reflect once again on how great naruto is).  there’s been virtually ZERO attention given to how sakura is handling things, minus that one scene where she’s looking at gory pictures from the previous great ninja war.  everybody is just marking time, punching a bunch of identical white zetsus until naruto can come solve the problem and wow everyone with his new abilities.

part of my annoyance might just be due to the fact that the timeline is so wonky due to filler arcs - it feels like ages have passed for me, but in-universe it really hasn’t been all that long.  but i also think there are legitimate reasons for me to be frustrated, when the show introduces things and then just unceremoniously drops them without any indicator of when they might be picked up again.  like - the uchiha genocide reveal was (i thought) a Huge Fucking Deal that should have Major Repercussions - but it’s just kind of.....disappeared as an issue???  and yamato - he’s been CAPTURED!!!!!!  but the show has not shown a single character reacting to this, or even being informed that it happened, and i think that’s shitty, actually.  yamato isn’t a minor character.  he’s been naruto’s personal guardian since season 2.  he has done SO MUCH for the kids, and he is kakashi’s friend, and i think it is shitty to have him get captured by the same people who experimented on him as a child and then not spend a second or two making it clear that other characters CARE about this.  

anyway.  this is just something that’s been creeping up on me as time goes on, and the last few episodes of “Naruto is the Savior of the Entire World” talk just made it feel more immediate, i guess.  plus the new intro (which i know may not be reliable; sometimes they show things that never happen) had a shot of naruto fighting itachi, and i think that tipped me over the edge, lmao, because you know what?  enough!!!!!  naruto can’t be the one who gets to do EVERYTHING!  some stories are not about him!  there are other characters who have relationships that are not about naruto.  there are places where other characters should be able to accomplish things naruto can’t do.  the other main characters should be allowed to complete their personal arcs, separate from (not just secondary to) naruto’s journey.

like - just - this is how i feel: this show started out as a story about a group of four people, and the root theme was “teamwork is everything.”  i don’t like how the show has slowly started to mutate into a story about naruto’s “solitary” quest to save sasuke, when we have seen MANY TIMES that: 

a) sakura was the first of the kids who even knew that something was wrong with sasuke, while naruto remained utterly oblivious all the way through shonen jump (and partway into shippuden, tbh)

b) kakashi in the past has connected with sasuke in ways that NEITHER of the two kids have been able to achieve

i just don’t like it.  i don’t like how S10 had sakura say the line “naruto...you were the first one to ever see the darkness in sasuke...” when she’s reflecting on their fight on top of the hospital, because that is a LIE.  it’s a blatant retcon.  of the kids, sakura was the one who knew from the very beginning that something was wrong with sasuke.  she was the one who was with him when he had that semi-dissociative episode during the bells test.  she was the one who was with him during all the curse mark stuff in the forest of death.  she was the one who knew something was off when he challenged naruto to a fight - naruto was just psyched that sasuke wanted to “spar” with him!  and SHE was the one who suspected that sasuke might do something as drastic as leave the village - naruto explicitly told her not to worry; that sasuke was totally fine; he would never ever do something like that!

like - the show already barely gives sakura anything for herself; now they try to take this away from her, too?  and give it to naruto?  to hammer in a kind of connection between naruto and sasuke that demonstrably did not exist??  (i’m not saying that naruto and sasuke don’t have their own important relationship!  but it is just provably untrue that naruto was the person who understood sasuke best.  shonen jump goes out of its way to demonstrate how clueless naruto is about what sasuke is really like and what he’s going through.  naruto is SHOCKED that sasuke would go to orochimaru.  he doesn’t realize that their fight on top of the hospital is anything more than their usual rivalry business.  when sasuke pops out of the coffin behind kimimaro, naruto waves and starts laughing, because he thinks sasuke is still on their side and is going to run right home!  and even in shippuden, when naruto hears that orochimaru is dead, he gets all excited and goes “so sasuke must be on his way back to the leaf village!!! :D”  like.  he just doesn’t get it.)

and i won’t really get into kakashi’s side of things here, because i would end up writing too much, but suffice to say that i am just...wary of the way it feels like recent parts of the show are trying to minimize or...push aside the real, textually-documented connections that kakashi and sakura had with sasuke in favor of “Only Naruto Can Help!”  it frustrates me.  kakashi made inroads with sasuke that neither of the kids ever achieved.  sasuke talks to kakashi in a more honest way than he ever does with either of his peers, even when he’s out of his head with rage.  and i would prefer to see this show taking the angle that all three of sasuke’s team members are going to be indispensable for saving him.  

you know.  like teamwork.

[damienthepious]

lizard kiss time thank you

The Rite of Movement (Chapter 2)

[Ch 1] [ao3] [Ch 3] [Ch 4] [Ch 5]

[Fandom: The Penumbra Podcast

Relationship: Lord Arum/Sir Damien/Rilla

Characters:  Lord Arum, Sir Damien, Rilla, The Keep, Original Monster Character(s), Sir Marc, Sir Talfryn, Sir Angelo, Quanyii, Sir Caroline

Additional Tags: Established Relationship, Engagement, Post-Canon, Domestic Fluff, Romantic Fluff, Poetry, Presents, Monster Customs, Dancing

Fic Summary: Arum has a surprising revelation about his own feelings, and then decides to take matters into his own claws since his humans don’t seem to realize what they are denying themselves.

Chapter Summary: A conversation over breakfast. Hashing out the details, as it were.

Notes: Sorry for the long delay between chapters, I don't have as much of a well-defined plot for this one as I did for Reckoning, so Reckoning took precedence until it was done. Hopefully, this story will just keep going until we hit the actual wedding. Will I be able to actually WRITE said wedding, as an unmarried enby who hasn't been to a wedding since I was maybe eight years old? WE SHALL SEE.]

It isn’t until the next morning that Rilla remembers to question the technicalities, and Damien starts to worry again in the general sense.

“It’s one thing to be engaged,” Rilla says gently as Damien scoops out scrambled eggs and a vegetable hash onto their plates for breakfast. “There’s no law against engagement, regardless of how many people are involved or whether any of them happen to be monsters. But actually getting married… I don’t know if there’s a priest in the world who would-”

“I told you not to worry about what is possible, Amaryllis,” Arum says, voice warm and content and a little bit smug. “You are thinking too small. A human priest? Admittedly, you would be hard pressed to find one amenable to our situation. But your world is larger than just the realm of humanity now, is it not?”

“You are suggesting a- a monster priest?” Damien says, his voice lilting up in disbelief as he sets the skillet back on the counter and comes to join them at the table.

“Probably not a priest as you would recognize. But- there are monsters who oversee such ceremonies.” When they stare at him, doubtful, he scoffs, but he’s still smiling. “What, did you think that committing to each other was a strictly human desire? Not every monster wishes to, and some who desire commitment simply decide that they are married without the pomp and circumstance. But still others have a fondness for attention, ritual, the involvement of friends and rivals and underlings- you understand my meaning.”

“It wouldn’t matter that there are three of us?” Damien asks curiously. “I know that two in unity is a very human concept, but-”

“Monster unions are often complex, and often even more complex than three. Sometimes unions are more practical than romantic, sometimes they are mergers of families, sometimes a commitment of monsters will fall out of love and hold an extravagant ceremony of parting. Three instead of two in the human way is an unchallenging thought, honeysuckle. There is only one rule, for monsters.”

“And marrying you off to a couple of humans…” Rilla trails off.

Arum shrugs. “I know one or two powerful monsters who live far from the Citadel, who hold no specific grudge towards humanity, and if I asked them to oversee the ceremony for me… I think I could convince them.” He pauses, clears his throat. “I… may have already opened a correspondence or two… to test the waters.”

“Wow,” Rilla says. “You’ve really been thinking about this a lot, haven’t you?”

“… yes,” Arum admits, his tail curling around her ankle gently. “Yes I have.”

“A monster wedding,” Damien murmurs. “Saints, how my life has changed…”

“Does the idea bother you?” Arum asks, tone carefully blank.

“Once upon a time it would have,” he says with a wry smile. “Now I’m merely considering how to go about telling Sir Angelo about this without him accidentally revealing to the entire Citadel the event we are planning.”

“Oh, damn,” Rilla says with a sigh. “Working out the invitations for this is going to be interesting, huh?”

Arum gives a long-suffering sigh. “Marrying a knight, I suppose I shall have to endure a limited number of other knights in attendance,” he grouses. “I shall not be inviting many guests myself. The Keep shall be my most important witness.”

The Keep gives a joyous trill at that, and Arum hides a smile as he takes a bite of his food.

“Hm.” Rilla taps her fork against her plate absently. “Angelo obviously, and Tal and Marc and Dampierre…” she sighs. “We can’t invite Sir Caroline, even if we did kind of reach an understanding. She’ll still walk in and behead the monster that’s supposed to marry us in a heartbeat, no doubt. And I would invite Quanyii, but I have no idea how to get in touch with her, and, well-”

“You think she’ll start asking for my thumbs again, Amaryllis?”

“Oh hush, I was desperate and I never promised anything.” She pauses. “But I really don’t want her to bring it up again, yeah.”

“I am amused that you should wish such a chaotic creature attend our ceremony at all,” Arum says with a laugh.

“She was instrumental in the saving of our Citadel,” Damien muses. “I’m sure if we are determined, we can find a way to contact her.”

“Maybe,” Rilla says. “Either way, I think we’re getting ahead of ourselves a bit. Saints… I can’t believe we’re going to have to plan a wedding. I had resigned myself to perpetual engagement, to be honest.”

“It can be done however you want it to be, Amaryllis,” Arum reminds her, trying not to sound too eager. “You need not adhere to any human traditions that you do not find appealing. And the Keep will help make any arrangements with the space that we need, of course.”

“Will we hold the actual ceremony outside?” Rilla asks, tilting her head. “I don’t imagine that you would want any knights and critters running around the inside of the Keep at will, wedding or no.”

“I had-” Arum pauses. “I hadn’t thought of that. I had been imagining-” a new song filling the greenhouse, hopeful and content instead of yearning, this time. Arum clears his throat, continues, “imagining it in the greenhouse. But outside, yes, I suppose that makes more sense-”

“The greenhouse,” Rilla sighs. “It is the most incredible room in the Keep, I think.”

The Keep sings a soft pleased note at that, and Arum scowls but does not mean it in the least.

“And we could have the Keep seal it off,” Damien suggests, “and only have the guests come in through portals, limit access to the rest of the structure, if only to keep things simple and contained…”

“Yes,” Arum says, fiercely glad that they appear as enthusiastic about the idea as he is. “Yes, I think that will work quite well.”

“How soon were you thinking that we would hold the actual- ceremony?” Rilla asks, watching with amusement as Arum clenches and unclenches his fists, not meeting her eyes.

“I… a month, perhaps?” he suggests, his heart thudding, not sure if that time frame is at all reasonable by human standards. “Small ceremony, shouldn’t require too much planning, just- need to see if our ‘priest’ is willing, make sure those we want will be able to attend- and-” he sighs. “I am due to molt soon, and I had wanted to wait until after that unpleasantness for this.”

“M-molt?” Damien asks, voice tilting up.

“Lizard,” Rilla chimes, and Arum scowls.

“I am a magical construct-”

“Who just so happens to closely resemble a bunch of lizards and shares many biological similarities with them,” Rilla says with a shrug and a grin. “You haven’t noticed, Damien? The Keep’s been trying to keep him all moisturized and cared for, but poor Arum’s scales have been all dry and pale lately.”

“It isn’t exactly a pleasant process,” Arum grouses.

“But I bet you’ll look pretty incredible when it’s over.” She pauses, eying him. “Shiny new husband,” she muses, mostly to watch the way his posture freezes, the way his eyes go wide, and then narrow.

“Shameless tormentor,” he mutters, fondly, leaning so he can nudge an arm against hers. “So. After I molt at least.”

“Let’s wait until we hear from your monster officiant, and when we know they’ll be available we can start inviting the rest of the little group.”

“You are being remarkably quiet, honeysuckle,” Arum says after a moment, and Rilla feigns a wince.

“Oh, don’t get him started,” she teases.

“It’s only-” Damien laughs, possibly at himself. “I’m so happy,” he says wonderingly. “It’s quite overwhelming, actually. Distracting, even- I keep thinking about-” he glances towards Arum, then gives another pleased little laugh. “I keep half expecting to wake from a dream. This seemed impossible only a day ago, and yet-”

“The impossible is my business, honeysuckle,” Arum says mildly.

“I am overwhelmed by my love for the both of you,” he says, and Rilla smiles and sighs and reaches out to grip his wrist.

“You know we love you too,” she says gently. “No need to get worked up this early in the morning. Besides, you might wanna start saving up your speeches for the wedding itself, don’t you think?”

“I am going to preemptively set a time limit on any speechifying or poetry-reading during the ceremony,” Arum barks quickly.

“At the reception, then,” Rilla concedes with a smile.

“The what?”

Rilla blinks, then bursts out laughing. “Okay- I am asking this completely seriously, I’m not laughing at you, I promise. Have you ever actually been to a wedding, Arum?”

“Of-” he snaps his mouth shut, his snout wrinkling in irritation. “I-” he bares his teeth, and then his shoulders sink in defeat. “Of course not. When would I have ever? Who do you think would have invited me?”

Damien is making a face like he’s about to declare that he would, of course, he would invite Arum anywhere, for the rest of his life, anywhere and everywhere, all the most beautiful places- but Rilla steers the conversation before the poet can make Arum any more uncomfortable.

“It’s not a big deal, Arum. I just- didn’t want there to be any big surprises for you if you didn’t know what to expect. Usually after the whole actual ceremony, there’s a reception. A party, really. With food, and dancing, presents, and stuff like that. We don’t have to do that if you don’t want to, though.”

“… dancing?” Arum echoes.

“Dancing,” Damien agrees in a dreamy tone, his head tilted and eyes looking somewhere distant.

“I… enjoy…” Arum pauses, frill flaring enough to reveal his embarrassment. “I enjoy dancing,” he says quietly, and then he coughs and sticks his nose in the air just a bit. “Of course, I’m sure your human dancing customs are just like all of your other customs: rigid and ridiculous and if you put one claw out of line someone will mock you for it.”

Damien, affronted, opens his mouth to retort, but Rilla gets there first with a laugh.

“Some dancing is like that,” she admits. “But obviously if you wouldn’t like that sort of lock-step, organized dancing, we just wouldn’t do it. I mean, I don’t really like that kind of dancing either, so that’s fine with me.”

Damien ducks his head slightly, almost pouting, but then he sighs and admits, “Most of that choreography is designed for… groupings of two, anyway.”

Arum wrinkles his nose. “Ugh. So invariably dull. You creatures cannot even cavort without putting restraints on every little step and turn.”

Damien frowns in earnest, now. “You don’t seem to mind terribly the restraint on my every little step and turn when I go through my exercises each morning, when you so often conveniently happen to be nearby and observing.”

“I-” Arum’s eyes dart to the side in a way that fails entirely to be stealthy. “Don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“I mean, I do,” Rilla says with a shrug. “Watching Damien stretch is my favorite part of my morning routine, just barely beating out coffee.”

Arum laughs. “Fine, fine. I suppose restraint can have its place.”

“What I’m getting from this is that you do want to dance, though,” Rilla says slyly.

“Dancing, food,” he deflects with a shrug, “none of that sounds… disagreeable.”

“How coy your phrasing,” Damien says, voice lilting. “Who would have suspected that a monster could be so very meek about the simple matter of a dance?”

“Meek,” Arum growls. He clearly knows that Damien is goading him, but he narrows his eyes and stands regardless. “I will show you meek, little knight. Keep?”

The Keep sings, then, but not in the usual way, not in its harmonious vagueness, but with rhythm and purpose. A full song, not a phrase of notes. Arum lifts Damien out of his chair with a hand on each side of his waist, and the movement glides easily into a waltzing turn. Arum is substantially taller than Damien, and Damien is less used to following than he is to leading, but he adjusts quickly with a laugh on his breath as Arum guides him through a series of steps that manage to be both unpredictable and elegant at the same time. Monstrous, but controlled. He turns Damien in a tight circle, and his movements to the music are measured and slow compared to his typical blurring speed. Finally he dips the knight back, leaning in close to nip at his jaw as if he just can’t help himself, and when that startles a more enthusiastic laugh out of Damien, Arum pulls him back to stand again, looking equal parts smug and smitten.

“Wedding ceremony planning, version two, entry one,” Rilla chimes into her recorder with a grin, and both of her breathless fiances pause to look at her. “Dancing at the reception is non-negotiable.”

[pitiless-achilles-wept]

Shake It Off: Love and thanks to the cast of SAA 2019

Hello friends, I've just returned from a week in Washington DC where I spent a few days at the Folger Shakespeare Library followed by a few days at my all-time favorite conference, the annual meeting of the Shakespeare Association of America. I would say that it's like Comic Con for Shakespeareans but there's a lot less cosplay (no, we're not a Ren Faire) and a lot more intellectually crunchy panels featuring the newest scholarship by brilliant scholars in the field. Some people in my position would, I'm sure, not be so invested in attending an academic conference that they spent the night before their first chemo treatment completing the paper in time for the participation deadline (perhaps the most on-brand thing I have ever done). They're occasions that we often grouse about, after all: the timing is bad; the flights and hotels are expensive; the schedule is too packed; the program doesn't have what we want on it; we have to grade/prepare lessons/do admin work when we get home. Admittedly, this is a more fun conference than many and I see a lot less general grumpiness about it than some I could name (*cough* MLA *cough*). It does share a little bit of the carnival atmosphere of Comic Con, culminating in a dance on the last night that could feel hokey (and does to some people...the conference is divided pretty sharply between dance-attenders and dance non-attenders) but which gives me the kind of warm feelings of kinship that you get from dancing at a wedding. Like: ah, nerdy as they are, this is my family.

[Below the cut: thoughts and thanks to the members of my profession.]

Perhaps this trip was kind of a weird thing for someone with Stage 4 cancer to be doing. I have, potentially, precious little time in this world (even in the best case scenario it's far less time than I'd anticipated) so why spend so much of it on work? The simple answer is that, with less time, it has become all the more important to spend it doing the things that make me feel the most like myself. And that means a trip to a rare books library where I can spend 8 hours a day combing through 400-year-old plays in search of annotations. It means doing a survey cross-indexing my list of plays against the library catalog while listening to all the Girl Talk albums in succession. It means the giddy satisfaction of closing out the library and going to happy hour with my fellow researchers. It means 10-hour conference days where I work hard and play hard and take copious notes in appreciation of my friends' and colleagues' fantastic minds (and maybe sneak a nap in my hotel room during the late-afternoon slump). And it means closing out the weekend with a community that has stepped up in incredible support of me in the time since I've made my diagnosis public in a way I did not expect and am profoundly grateful for - a fact which is the point of this post. I found myself in the hotel bar somewhere in the neighborhood of 2am on Sunday morning, quite literally weak in the knees from so much dancing, guzzling water and keeping company with colleagues who I've come to call friends as we all, exhaustedly, said repeatedly "we should go to bed" and subsequently did not. There was a real last-day-of-camp vibe that infused the whole thing with preemptive nostalgia for the time--so soon!--when we would not be together in the same place. This is the thing about assembling in person only for a few days every year. There is never enough time to catch up one-on-one (or even many-on-many) among the events of the days. It's both the best and worst part of attending a conference where your colleagues are also friends. You're left wanting more time, more conversation, more connection. Many conversations and much of the friendship continues over various forms of social media, which I have a very deep attachment to and which has helped me make it through these years of instability and separation from people I care about. Some people regard social media or blogs (like this one) as a stand-in or poor substitute for the intimacy of real-world friendships. But for someone like me who became a teenager at the same time instant messaging apps came into existence (shoutout to AIM!) and who has had the repeated experience of developing a friendship or a friend group only to have to bid farewell to its members they are a godsend. They are a conduit for intimacy, fostering it but not replacing it. At this conference I had the unusual and somewhat surreal experience of having people--some of whom I knew well, some of whom only in passing or from Twitter, some not at all--reach out and thank me for writing and sharing so much of myself. Some of them had been through something similar, either on their own or with a loved one. Others hadn't but wanted me to know that my experience had affected them and that they were on my side, hoping along with me for things to get better. I was moved almost to tears several times because, in that way that happens when you write and then post into the void, I wasn't sure anyone was listening. But they were and responded with manifold kindness. It seemed somehow symbolic of my experience with the academic profession overall. It can seem cold and empty, as we are all separated by space and time (especially the lack of it). And when we speak into it not as a professional academic but as a person the likelihood of getting any response, let alone a positive one, seems so slim. That is, I think, why revealing so much of myself on here seemed somewhat risky to me and would to many people. We cultivate very carefully our professional selves, even in casual interactions, because the line between the personal and the professional is so blurry in academia. Often we use this fact to impute great skepticism to our readers (our colleagues); better not to show any vulnerability in case someone, some day, may want to hire you and who would want to hire a vulnerable human being? But in this case I've seen the other side of that grey area. I found a wealth of empathy where I did not expect it. And that as much as anything has made me want to keep working, to keep writing, to stay in this academic community. Your continued and continual support has really sustained me. I do recognize, however, that one reason I'm able to share all this is that I have a secure job. I think I would still be posting about my experience in any case simply because it isn't in my nature not to share thoughts on the most important thing in my life. But I also know that it's my privilege to be able to do so, to even have the choice. And it is a choice that I have made in smaller ways in the past too. I still recall several years ago during one of my turns on the academic job market when I received an unsolicited email from someone I did not know (although we had a friend in common) informing me that my Twitter account was unprofessional and that I was likely writing myself out of a job. Of course, I cracked my knuckles and wrote a pointed reply about how I had quite literally written a dissertation on the concept of the public sphere and thought very carefully about what I wanted to put in public or not and, what's more, that it was only for me to decide and not for him to arbitrate. (For the record, I do not consider my account "unprofessional" since it is a purely personal account from which I sometimes tweet about work-related things. Also for the record, this person wrote back with an apology.) But that fear, stoked by incidents like that, would keep many junior people (or even senior people) from publicly showing their wounds--literal and figurative--in a situation like this. I am glad to be able to speak. I am more than glad that someone is listening. As I return home from the conference, prepared to resume chemo again on Thursday, I feel sadness and trepidation, sure, but I do also feel energized and supported, raised up by a larger community of far-flung friends, colleagues, acquaintances; people I've never met face-to-face and people who are an integral part of my daily life. Friends, academics, Shakespeareans, you are a wonderful bunch. Thank you for making this trip and this conference an occasion to recharge and return to fight another day.