#kindness and love will persist

[ironspine]

Dear everyone who posts videos of this latest generation having tantrums and being entitled, and everyone who comments and reblogs and goes, "See! We were never like that. The world is going to end and they'll be doing their skibidi cocomelon dances as it burns!"

Yesterday I was at work, and saw that some bottles of soda had fallen out of their bin and rolled halfway under the freezers. Being very tired, I decided to pick them up later. But as I watched, two kids, like, elementary school age, running around and exploring while their mother shopped, came over and casually picked up the bottles and put them back. They weren't prompted by anyone, and they didn't look at either me or their mother for any kind of acknowledgment or reward. They just saw that something needed to be put away, and decided that they might as well be the ones to do it.

[frumious-bandersnatch-ao3]

@ultramarinaa’s cat Martin design has been living rent free in my head since I first saw it, so I have bestowed on him the highest honor of the season:

Pumpkin.

Tried to do shading; we’ll see how his splotches look when he’s illuminated.

Process under the cut; I’ll update with him lit up when he finally goes outside

[poorly-drawn-mdzs]

I think I have to tell you that you're borderline genius.

I would consider it to be closer to borderline madness to be honest. A healthy person would not do what I have done.

[socksandbuttons]

I HAD TO DRAW SOEMTHING DOWN FOR MY DUDE!!! I have Thoughts about all all this but good god this mans been rally thru it, they both have. AND YET HUGS ARE SO FAR AWAY. Don't worry Solar, you get hugs later. I'm just gonna assume his moon wrote down that note for him.

[rebeccasbiscuits]

I’m thinking so many thoughts after that episode, which was wonderful and hilarious, but something I’m very much thinking about is where someone on twitter pointed out the contrast between Rupert going to the club every single day for six weeks to wear Rebecca down vs Ted coming to her office every day for biscuits and genuinely wanting to get to know her. I’m especially thinking about how this adds some more context to Rebecca’s point of view on that as well. We see her disparagingly calling him ‘relentless, and nice’, and her desire for her love of the biscuits to not make her dependent on him providing her with something.

The moment I’m thinking about most is the one at the end of episode 5, where Ted storms in after finding out she sent Jamie away. The biscuit reveal at the end has always felt crucial in this way, but even more so in this context. Her experience has been with the relentless interest and charm until the other person pulled back the layer of charm and showed that this charming nature wasn’t genuine, and in a way I think here, as Ted yells at her, it lets her feel a bit vindicated, or at least secure, in her belief, or lack of belief, in the nature of other people. But then Ted continues the biscuits, and the extension of kindness they represent, no matter how angry he is, and not only that but reveals he has been (without having told her) baking the biscuits himself. His only deceit was hiding an extra kindness he didn't even seek self serving credit for, despite knowing how much she liked the biscuits. Obviously this works so interestingly as another anti-Rupert parallel in a Ted/Rebecca sense, but I love it even just generally in the context of how it’s visible that this is what shakes Rebecca in that scene, because it shakes the view she has of how people treat people after her abusive marriage and isolation, which is allowing her to go on with the plan that will hurt so many of them. It disarms her because even when she has done something bad, and Ted is expressing legitimate annoyance about it, he will not stop extending this relentless kindness and generosity to her, even when he has not got what he wanted, the way she experienced Rupert doing once he had got what he wanted. Ted’s not only relentless, not only nice, he’s also sincere.

[cupophrogs]

I know it's random as hell, but I gotta ask, does drew listen to lady gaga on his phone? I was listening and he have the chaotic vibe of her songs

Yes actually! However

The Doobie Brothers are far better to boogie to!

[agirlunfilteredsblog]

LETTING GO AND MOVING ON

Hi girls!! Learning to pick and choose where I place my energy is something I’ve always deeply struggled with so today, I figured we’d discuss ways of learning when to let go and simply let things be the way they are supposed to be.

1. MAKING PEACE WITH YOUR SITUATION

Although things nay not be going on the way you want them to, sometimes, you need to face the music and accept your reality. Now, I never said to settle for your reality, simply accept it. Denial will get you nowhere but delusion and no matter how much social media attempts to glorify it, you do nothing except make yourself look stupid. Delusion is nothing more but the logic and mind killer.

2. COMMUNICATING

If you ever feel the need to say your piece to an individual; just say it. So long as it’s in the bounds of respect and rationality, expressing yourself will make it much easier to let go of a situation. You won’t live with regrets and you’ll be able to move on knowing you’ve expressed your true feelings and intentions.

3. REMINDING YOURSELF THAT LETTING GO IS NOT THE END FOR YOU

Often times, we think that letting go of someone or something is the end of the world. We say that we won’t be able to do life happily, but that is not the case. Your course in life is not linear, you will undoubtedly face obstacles. But those obstacles are not your end and letting go isn’t either. Embrace the fact that your life is ever-changing. As they would say in Latin: Promoveo.

sending so much love,

A girl unfiltered 💋

[fighting-naturalist]

Daniel in "Resurrection"

[trentcrimminallybeautiful]

never not emo about trent becoming part of the nelson road community, joining the diamond dogs, loosening up both like, emotionally/internally and physically/externally

[skrunksthatwunk]

you go to a lesbian blog and find it says women only!! no men allowed!!! and go oh! excuse me, um, what about other lesbians? plenty of lesbians are genderqueer... and they go well, okay, go fuck yourself tim chop off your sweaty dick and stop calling yourself a lesbian. you do not have a dick, actually. you think about that fact often, even though it does you no good. you do not tell this person that.

you go to another lesbian blog and it says women only and you try again, and this time they change it to wlw + nblw only (non-men who love non-men :D). and you'll say hey i appreciate that but gender's not really that cut and dry for a lot of people. someone could be both a man and nonbinary, for instance. i just worry that you're looking at nonbinary as a generic third gender, or an extension of womanhood. i mean yeah you include nblw in your tags but all your posts are about pussy-havers exclusively. what's with that? and they say go fuck yourself you pervy man pretending to be a lesbian. you tried to sneak in but i won't let you.

so you go to a lesbian blog with a dozen or so posts about queer people needing to be more weird about it and you sigh in relief. but you still see the men dni. that's odd. hoping for the best, you say hey! i know you mean well but please maybe don't put men dni at the end of the lovely posts on your lesbian blog bc some lesbians are men. and they'll be like ok!! well you're allowed ;) and you say no that's not. no. some men are lesbians not just me. you think about your own dicklessness and wonder if that's why you were given entry. and you add that even if male lesbians are allowed, there's no indication of that. how would anyone know without asking? and they're like ohh gotcha gotcha well men dni + this is for sapphics only!! and you'll be like ok well that treats the concepts of men and sapphics as mutually exclusive identities and i just told you that's not true and you agreed with me so.. i don't think that solves our problem. and they're like. ok. fine. men dni but genderfluid and multigender people are allowed! and you're like no see that's. that's still the same thing.. you're saying the same thing just with different words. if you don't want men to interact but you're fine with multigender/genderfluid/etc ppl interacting then you either don't see them as Real Men (because they don't reach a standard of Full Manhood) or Complete Men (because they're only Part-Time Men), both of which suggest that they are, in some way, not men or less-than men, which is invalidating and defeats the point of the exception in the first place (accommodation) OR that you don't really mean the dni which is confusing and inconsistent and makes guydykes feel weird and uncomfortable and excluded from the lesbian space you're trying to cultivate. and they're like um. ok. so. cishet men dni? and you're like well i think that makes more sense, but what if someone identifies as both a cishet man and a sapphic? again, if we're trying to accommodate the genderfucky populace then that has to be a possibility that is considered. and they say god you people are never happy. what do you want me to do? what am i supposed to say to keep the right men out? and you pause. you empathize with the need for a space free from dudes trying to fuck you straight and feminine. dudes who watch lesbian porn and joke about what they'd do if they were allowed into girls locker rooms. who look at you like a piece of meat, and like someone who looks at women like pieces of meat in the same way he does. you get it. you know. you want a space where you can be sapphic, too. that's why you came to these blogs in the first place. you brace yourself and you say well i don't know that there are "right men" to keep out. i don't know that there's any single label that would accomplish whatever it is you're trying to accomplish. you could go for "sapphics only" or "queers only" and i think that might be the closest thing to what you want, but it's never going to be perfect. creating any exclusive space is going to shut out people you didn't account for, and the broader the label, the more people will be shut out that you didn't want to shut out. and what about people who don't know if they're allowed? what of questioning transbians, where are they supposed to go? and, frankly, i think i might rather my dykey posts get read and appreciated by a gay guy who sees me as a man than a woman who only sees me as a sacred womb, pure from male perversions or violence or whatever. i think community might just be more complex than a dni can handle. and they look at you and say i don't want to not have a dni. i think you're too permissive. you can't just "what about" or microlabel your way into everything. go fuck yourself, i bet you're not even a lesbian anyway. go find a real problem to get mad about.

you go to a lesbian blog. you ignore the men dni because you know you probably don't even count to them. or maybe you do count and, out of respect for your manhood, they'd shun you accordingly. you try to feel okay about that. you scroll past dozens of posts about mediocre men and gagging at straight friends' boyfriends and how gross and undeserving men are of the beautiful women they couple up with and how all women should be gay so they can get treated right and and and and and. you finally find a post about curling into someone you love and feeling at peace and try to lose yourself in it. you know that feeling is what unites you, what makes you belong. you try to focus on it. you think about carding your hands through a butch's hair or lacing fingers with a femme and feeling warm and loved and more yourself than you ever have before. like this is who you're meant to be. you read about lesboys and butch boytoys and genderfucky dykes and big hairy deep-voiced wonderful women (like you want to be someday, like you wish you could make yourself) and you try to ignore the men dni underneath each and every post. and you daydream about meeting someone kind and earnest at a lesbian bar even though you don't think any such bars exist within three states of you and you can't drink and don't want to drink because you need to be in control of yourself at all times so you don't fuck up like you're always about to and here in the nonexistent lesbian bar you feel wanted and safe and in good company. you picture your ideal, happiest self. it is a mistake. ideal-you has a goatee. not the mascara one you smear on and call drag even though you know it's not drag, not really, the beard you call drag because you think everyone would look at you sadly if you told them it was just to pretend you had something out of your reach. a beard that's soft and that you grew and that cannot be smudged away if you get too comfortable with it. the dream shatters. your people pull away from you, their scoffs mixing with the mind-numbing gay girl bedroom pop you learned to settle for just to have something that almost resembled you, they all pull away and turn their backs and do not look at you. you're too close to being a man now, even though you're the same amount of man as before. and they know you're not supposed to interact with men, not as you would with dykes, at least. and it sours. it's all your imagination, all in your head, but it sours.

you sigh. you think about how small you are. how short, how narrow, how feeble. how your voice pitches up when you talk to strangers because it's easier to speak quietly when it carries more, and because you're nervous. because it's a chore to talk, like everything is. you think about testosterone. you think about how your family would look at you, the questions they would ask, your answers they would only pretend to accept. the uncomfortable glances and whispered questions they'd try to hide from you. you think about how small you are, and how small you will always be. how you don't know of a way to fix it, but even if there was one, no one would want you anymore. you'd be the only one thinking it made you a cooler dyke. you think about how you don't even want a T-voice all the time, how you'll never be able to switch it at will, because you don't know how and can't bring yourself to figure it out. you think about how your throat closes around every hint of your own attraction. how wanting is perverse, how wanting is invasive, how wanting is embarrassing and too vulnerable so it must stay anonymous, as an online witness, and how you can barely manage to form or maintain friendships because your brain makes you pull away, always spinning out and struggling to recover from the simplest of interactions. how they'll all leave you and you won't chase after them at all and how that will hurt them. how stuck you get. how it looks like nothing's holding you back, how that frustrates everyone who thought you were going to be more than you were. the people you love who understand except when it comes to being ghosted, being shut out. how you don't want to hurt them. how you can't tell them that because you're stuck. how you turn to stone when touched, how you never reach out, how you lose your speech and can't look at people, how your autism is fun and sexy until it becomes real and you never see them anymore, how much you longed for someone who knew everything without you having to explain, and who loved you anyway. how unreasonable you know that is to expect of anyone. you think about that not-even-real lesbian bar. you think about how you still can't drive. how you can't leave your home on your own, without dragging somebody into helping you. how you can't leave your body. how you can't leave your manhood behind.

you think about finding another lesbian blog and ignoring everything. about skimming it for the parts you can juice some meaning from. the parts men ignore and don't understand, and how typical of you it is to do so. or the parts where you're not welcome and you should accept that, because it's for lesbians only. how you are a lesbian anyway. how you're meant to choose lesbian or man, how each is a betrayal of some kind to yourself or your people, your family, your lovely strangers, your rare friendly acquaintances. about the parts that tell you you're not wanted, that you're ugly and lazy and gross and insert yourself everywhere without even asking. about the parts that tell you you are hated, and how lesbians are above it all by rejecting men. how lesbians are each blessed miracles. about the parts that say you should be ashamed of being whatever twisted confused freak you are, of everything, of looking and wanting or not looking or not wanting, of picking and choosing instead of taking it all in with a smile. after all, shouldn't you take it? or is your ego too fragile, as men's so often are? aren't you tired? good. we're not here for your consumption. and we sure as hell don't want your company or "community" or whatever. didn't you read the sign? no boys allowed. and if you want to come in you have to make up your mind. as if you haven't told them the only answer you have. you're both. you're both.

you know you broke the rule by interacting.

but it gets lonely sometimes. you wonder if they know.

[worstloki]

huge fan of a character traits like ‘compassion’ ‘selflessness’ and ‘goodness’ in a narrative inflicting direct damage on the character in question for having those traits

[agirlunfilteredsblog]

[sysig]

Butterfly kisses (Patreon)

[keets-writing-corner]

look you can talk all you want about Yato’s self image issues, self-sabotaging behavior and atrocious spending habits

my man really said “If no one loves me enough to build me a shrine, then I’M going to love me enough to build me a shrine!” and I love that for him

[justafriend-ql]

Are you longing for someone? NEVER LET ME GO Episode 12

[euesworld]