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religion-is-a-mental-illness · 3 years ago

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Why the hell are liberals so defensive of Islam? By all accounts its an extremely conservative religion, that does everything and WAAAAAY more than the libs claim that conservatives do in the United States! I mean, honestly it seems like so—called ‘progressives’ turn into some of the most goddamn fundamentalist proselytizers OF the Islam religion, when anybody tries to be even REMOTELY fucking critical of it! Even when its straight from ex—Muslims THEMSELVES!!

So, this reply sort of turned out as two posts in one. The first part mostly comes about as a result of interactions with some other people, so isn't targeted at you, I'm just using some of your phrasing as a jumping off point. In the second part, I'll get to the meat of your question, as best as I can figure it out and understand it.

First, I want to be clear about terminology. This is the definition of "Liberal" that I work with:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liberalism

Liberalism is a political and moral philosophy based on liberty, consent of the governed and equality before the law. Liberals espouse a wide array of views depending on their understanding of these principles, but they generally support individual rights (including civil rights and human rights), democracy, secularism, freedom of speech, freedom of the press, freedom of religion and a market economy.

These are kind of values you'll find represented in the constitutions and laws of many "western" countries. Although, they sometimes manifest in different ways, which we'll get to in a second.

When I've talked to Americans who are conservatively inclined, they often go "no, those are conservative values." No, those are the values of Liberalism. They're in your constitution. Your constitution is a Liberal constitution.

While most other countries understand it as the above, in the USA, Liberalism is conflated with people on the "left". In Australia it's conflated with people on the "right"; their conservative party is literally called the Liberal Party, which appears to have occurred on the back of conservative Liberalism, and sort of went from there. So talking to an Australian, the conversation might go the other way: "no, those are progressive values" or if you said you were Liberal, they might assume that you were a conservative. (Although I think they probably get enough exposure to US culture to know both meanings.)

But liberalism spans the aisle. It's the common language, common science of the free, secular, WEIRD (Western, Educated, Industrial, Rich, Democratic) societies.

So, there's sort of a dual X-Y axis of conservative/progressive and liberal/illiberal. In the same way as the dual axes of atheism/theism and gnostic/agnostic.

It means that under normal circumstances, progressive (left) Liberals and conservative (right) Liberals should be able to communicate in a common language, because there are shared values that can be agreed upon as underlying principles. The debate then is on the merits of whatever topic is being discussed and the solutions or proposals at hand. If only circumstances were normal.

In a non-dysfunctional society, you need both. Progressives are the accelerator pedal, conservatives are the brake pedal. If you sit with your foot on the brake, you never go anywhere and you’re just wasting your time. If you floor it and never touch the brake, you're going to go flying off a cliff. To actually drive is a balancing act and a skill - sometimes you need more of one than another. This is why the way these values are implemented can vary from vary from country to country, even if they're similar in principle across Liberal societies. They address different problems at different times, in a manner relevant to the culture.

Lest anyone take away the impression I think these societies are perfect: of course not. Like science, it's imperfect. It doesn't get the answer right all the time. Bad shit has gone down under the Modern Era and the Liberal order. No surprise. It did in the preceding eras too.

But what it does do better than any other social structure I'm aware of, is to offer better tools for identifying flaws and trying to correct them. To give opposing ideas grounds to battle out their merits. To appeal to those values and say “this isn’t fair.” And that mere “faith” is not sufficient. These countries sought to end, learn from, and prevent the mistakes of the past with more Liberalism, not less. For example, the US Civil Rights Movement was a project of liberal values. Just as we solve flaws in science with more science, not less.

A recent interest of mine has been Liberalism and liberal ethics. And of course, the attack on them, coming from both sides. But like Islam, one side seems to hold protected status the other does not which, like the taboo of criticizing Islam, needs chipping away.

And, of course, applying them consistently.

Xianity and Islam are profoundly illiberal. A glance at the Wikipedia description above reveals how far from Liberal values these religious doctrines are: inherited guilt; group judgements - sinner/saved, mumin/kafir - instead of on an individual basis; authoritarianism; blasphemy; stands in defiance of reason and evidence; and so on. Most non-believers seem to understand this, and it doesn't take a lot of effort to reject them as unfair and unreasonable. Even most believers hold these values too. Things like "iT's a mEtApHoR" occur when the believer's values - which we know are not "god given" or they wouldn't make up the excuses at all - are more Liberal than the primitive doctrine. We know religion is malleable, so cherry-picking, interpretation, denial and other tactics resolve this conflict.

Woke is also profoundly illiberal, and the list looks pretty much the same, just with some of the terminology changed. Actually, it's anti-liberal, explicitly; a core tenet of Critical Theory, which is the fuel that drives the vehicle of the Woke theology, is that Liberalism has failed to deliver a utopian paradise, and it's time to tear it down; that's what they mean by "liberation". Which is like saying that science is a failure because it hasn't answered every question perfectly, so it's time to abandon it. The US Civil Rights Movement appealed to Liberal ethics of equality theory, neutral laws, and so on. Modern-day Woke-based "antiracism" does not, replaced by “equity” (not the same thing) and desire to implement “corrective” discrimination; CRT even criticizes the CRM for demphasizing race and appealing to a common humanity, rather then centering it.

If Liberalism is the science of healthy societies, then Woke is the homeopathy.

And yet, some who reject religious illiberalism - even if only Xianity - have embraced Woke illiberalism most fervently. There’s a whole treatise on religious psychology and filling the moral-religious vacuum that could be inserted here. But that’s probably one for another day.

Suffice to say, though, that progressive Liberals and conservative Liberals, who are overall the majority, really need to step up and rein in their illiberal wingnuts, who are currently sucking all the air out of the room.

So, with that in mind, I take your meaning to be progressives espousing, at best, inconsistent Liberal ethics to, at worst, outright illiberalism. For reasons that I’ll try to explain as best as I understand them.

So secondly, returning to your actual question, you have recent trends in Intersectionality and Postcolonial Theory to thank for much of this.

To be fair, Intersectionality did identify a hole in legal reasoning: discrimination that could occur by being a black woman that a white woman and a black man wouldn’t experience. But then ideologues took a legal argument and insisted that the entire world works this way. Like a toddler who takes off their diaper and runs down the hallway smearing it on everything.

Muslims, as people, are a comparative minority in countries like the USA, UK, etc, where this elite academic ideology tends to take hold, and "Muslim" is seen as a minority, marginalized identity.

Xians, on the other hand, are usually a significant proportion of the population of these countries. Although, as we know, this is dropping.

For postmodern reasons related to epistemology and skepticism/rejection of objective/universal knowledge claims that I won't deep dive into, everything in this ideology is validated by identity: "my truth", "my lived experience." To criticize Islam is to therefore to criticize the identity of a Muslim. Valid criticism of an idea is reinterpreted as an unreasonable personal attack. You’ve probably heard the cries of “invalidating Muslims,” “erasing Muslims,” etc.

The core of this ideology is power analysis; specifically Marxist conflict theory, but centered on identity attributes rather than social class. Who has power, how is it expressed, identifying and labeling "dominant"/"oppressor" and "oppressed" identities. As a "dominant" identity, criticizing Xianity is "punching up." You're allowed to punch someone bigger, stronger than you. But you're not allowed to "punch down."

This is why when you reject the accusation of "Islamophobia" - criticism of Islam, the belief, as being a form of "hate" against people - you will often get some retort like "isn't that splitting hairs?" This sentiment often seems to reflect guilt and/or shame, arguably deserved, over how the USA reacted to the 2001 attacks, And reflects an ignorant fear that criticizing a belief is a return to harassment of people.

Motivated Islamic zealots have quickly picked up on this language, and you can see them mimic it, having witnessed how successfully shrill Intersectional scolding has silenced legitimate discourse. Even though there’s literally no reason, other than the word salad of pseudo-intellectual jargonese, why it should, since it is, likewise, merely an idea. And even though these zealots are only using the language as a weapon and don’t get or adhere to the ideology. It’s useful and that’s all.

What’s troubling, and honestly the most sickening part of all, is that Intersectionality’s pursuit of power dynamics, and simplistic and myopic equations leave no room for the individual - this is by design. It’s a feature, not a bug.

Which leaves the victims of Islam out in the cold, or even worse: in the crosshairs. So you get this really gross irony of free, western feminists prancing around, celebrating the hijab, patting themselves on the back for how tolerant and inclusive they are (while lamenting their own oppression of men sitting comfortably), while women in Islamic countries, both ex-Muslims and devout reformist Muslims, who want to be able to take it off if they choose to, are arrested. Or performative displays among the gay community of “LGBT against Islamophobia” in free, secular countries, while homosexuality is illegal, subject to imprisonment, forced gender transition or execution in countries they’ve never lived in and will never visit. Sudan has only just removed the death penalty for homosexuality - it’s still illegal, just not subject to execution. Ex-Muslims find themselves in the crosshairs of this too, as the ideologically possessed target and vilify those who lived life as a Muslim, left it, and want people to know what’s going on. Sarah Haider talks at length about this, and laments that the people who should be on her side are not.

Incidentally, the above, along with its overt pseudo-religious overtones, ultimately drew me into the exploration of Woke ideology: witnessing citizens of free, Liberal countries, who pretend to be advocates of women’s rights, LGBT rights, etc, use their constitutionally guaranteed rights to bemoan their own imagined oppression, while tut-tutting criticism of the barbarism of the treatment of women, LGBT people and non-believers in actually oppressive societies. It seemed like it was more than just mere self-absorption, and it is. Much more.

These ideologues are noticeably unbothered by whether criticism of Xianity causes Xians to feel attacked. And therein lies the rub, the grain of truth that often sells this ideology to new converts. We shouldn't be too bothered by whether Xians feel attacked by criticizing Xianity. But for different reasons.

This ideology sees it as deserved retaliation for Xianity's dominance. It's time to punch up. But the Liberal ethic of secularism is more consistent: Xianity deserves criticism because all ideas can be criticized, because we only want society as a whole - separate from private "freedom of religion" belief - to adopt, or allow to be influenced by, the ideas that withstand analysis, criticism, etc. We want the ones that are "true." The same way we only want to accept conclusions in science that have withstood criticism, analysis, attempts to falsify, etc.

And as an idea, Islam deserves it too. Whether believers feel attacked by it is a problem of adopting beliefs as identity, and isn't a reason they shouldn't be criticized. A distinction is drawn between the belief and the believer. How many times have I posted that “people have rights, ideas don’t have rights” image? I’ve lost count.

The difference is, put simply, between a priority of truth or power. The former criticizes consistently, regardless of power. The latter defends protected classes, regardless of truth.

“A society that chooses comfort over honesty will eventually lose both.”

Which you even see in atheist circles, with the rationalists on one side, and the Wokes on the other. Aka, the Schism.

This view is kind of ironically colonialist, by the way, as it paints a worldwide population of 1.2b Muslims as a "marginalized identity" based on the view of Muslims from a western country, ignoring the fact that there are countries where Muslims are the majority, and Xians, other religions and non-believers are a marginalized minority there. It's using parochial US (usually) centric assumptions to project onto the rest of the world. Which brings us to....

Onto this, you need to layer the notion that Postcolonial Theory says - in simplified terms - that western, liberal, secular society is just one way of living, one societal structure, no better or worse than any other, just as science is merely one way of knowledge production, no better or worse than tradition or storytelling. Because look at it. It had slavery, sexism, etc, etc. It's just one way of living, and it's imperialist to impose it onto other societies, or judge them through that lens.

Never mind that Muslims and ex-Muslims themselves in countries like Iran want to either escape to free countries that share the same Liberal values they hold, or change their own country to adopt those values and shed Islamic theocratic reign.

You see this manifest in cultural relativism. Yasmine Mohammed is the example I always cite. She endured abuse from her fundamentalist Muslim father, condoned and even facilitated by her mother, hung upside down and beaten on the soles of her feet for failing to memorize and recite the quran to their satisfaction. She had the courage to report this abuse, but it was handwaved and she was sent back to continue to endure it. This happened in Canada. They said it was their "culture" and that punishments can be different from culture to culture. The case, from all accounts, a slam-dunk, was dismissed due to "cultural sensitivity." As she always says, had she been a blonde white girl in a fundamentalist Xian family, she has no doubt that the outcome would be different.

No, we don't go around conquering countries and imposing liberal, secular democracies onto them. But we shouldn't remain silent and turn a blind eye to those who are crying out for help and recognition, out of “cultural sensitivity.” Which is little more than a desire to signal their own virtues.

In short, we are not permitted to judge other societies by our western, liberal, secular standards. Even though we can objectively demonstrate higher quality of life: life expectancy, healthcare, equality, rights, opportunities, etc, etc. Of course, those criteria are still seen as a western (white and male) way of viewing quality of life, and intolerant of the quality of life criteria other societies might have. Such as dying a young halal death rather than be injected with a vaccine containing microscopic quantities of haram pig product. There really is no way to engage with this sort of self-supporting “faith.”

Islam is not a culture anyway. Culture is what you experienced, what surrounds you. Indonesia has the largest population of Muslims in the world, with over 12% of the worldwide population. The overwhelming majority of Indonesians don’t speak Arabic. American Xians will share more in common culturally with American atheists than they will with Zambian Xians. “Cultural sensitivity” to Islam is just stupid. When Xianity drops to 1.2b people, will there be calls for “cultural sensitivity” to Xianity? No, it would be just as astonishingly stupid. Xianity isn’t a cultural hive-mind any more than Islam is.

In the same vein, we also shouldn’t ignore those who call criticizing Islam “racist.” Put simply, those people are themselves racists. They see Islam as a homogenous collective of brown people, rather than a diverse range of adherents from many different countries and backgrounds. As an idea, you can think yourself into or - and hopefully - out of it.

There’s a quote from QuaiaSoup’s “Burden of Proof” video which I’ve long appreciated and tried to hold to:

“If certain groups over the centuries have grown accustomed to not substantiating their claims, so that they regard the mere suggestion as impudent, the way we resolve that is not by letting them remain accustomed to dismissing their burden of proof, but by pointing out that they were at fault for growing so accustomed in the first place.”

When certain people insist that it’s wrong, or even “hate”, to criticize religions like Islam, we can resolve that by pointing out that we don’t afford that privilege to other religions, beliefs or ideas, that they were wrong to expect that deference in the first place.

And then proceed to (validly) crticize it. We make them become accustomed to that criticism, and to take away the power of being hushed into compliance.

In short, we don’t play the game.

#ask #islam #intersectionality #criticism of religion #criticism of ideas #criticism of islam #islamophobia #religion #religion is a mental illness #wokeness as religion #cult of woke #woke activism #wokeism #woke #Liberalism #illiberalism #anti liberal #liberal ethics #long post

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oftenderweapons · 4 years ago

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Small Town Swoons

Hello buttercups! Here is the big fat project I was talking about. I am giving you snippets and teasers of the whole thing, just to let you know what you’re all getting yourself into.

There are some spicy tidbits here and there, so I would suggest only mature (18+) people read and/or engage with this post.

I’ll be starting with Yoongi since his piece is really in the holiday spirit and I’m super hella inspired to write it, but don’t worry, Steamy waters is still coming (just know that I’m not done publishing stuff for the night 👀)

Let me know what you think about this project, what story you like the most and which one you really really look forward to reading 💕✨

Just in case you need it, here is my masterlist

Enjoy 💜

Apple of My Pie — Jin

In the bakery and café near the university many students barge in, desperate for coffee and the delicious apple pies served there once October comes. Some of them barge in for the sweet sight of the owner, still mysteriously single. Little do you know that he’s been pining after you for years, since you ran into his café in a slow, rainy Sunday morning, drenched like a stray kitten, asking only for friendly help. Friendship sparks easily and his comfort tastes as sweet as autumn apples. That’s how you find yourself flatmates, watching movies with his secret recipe hot cocoa on Saturday evenings and waking up to the delicious scent of his pies on Sunday morning. But the sudden apparition of a rival makes you wonder, what would it be like to fall asleep in his bed every night?

Mold Me New — Taehyung

Divorce is a mess, especially when you’re so young and you had bet your life on your high school crush. All those things you never had to learn are scary now: dating, friends with benefits, all those secret rules on social interactions and flirting. But then your friends gift you a clay modelling lesson at the local pottery. Your teacher looks like a quiet, grumpy man who slowly warms up to you, offering you his kind smiles and gentle laughs. Right when fear that your lack in courtship manners might cost you your greatest chance at a new happiness, his lessons indirectly turn into small advice, and suddenly it feels like his hands are shaping your heart into the perfect, beautiful whole you needed. And to show him your gratitude, you’re more than willing to gift the artist his creation.

“Don’t let it dry too much. Too much water will mess it up. It will become too pliant and it won’t hold up.” That was it. The rule to love. You had bathed him in reassurance and affection, and just like that he had melted underneath your touch, and he had turned into nothing. And the love had run out. “Every shape has its specific requirements.” He explained, dipping his hands in the basin and letting the droplets fall from his fingertips. “Wet hands, but not drenched.” Once he was happy with the result he sat up, his foot starting a small pressure on the pedal. “See, here we go. The clay will show how much water it needs. Easy on the pedal. Very slow. You’re warming it up. Be gentle. You’re not sure it’s good. Just like with people. Easy at first, and once it works you speed up.” He smiled at the material underneath his hands. “Gentle. Easy.” He said, his sinewy fingers gently pressing into the art piece to be. His fingers seemed to stretch and bend imperceptibly, as if he was feeling the very texture of the material, and of the final result he wanted to obtain. “That’s the secret to good things.”

The Shrew, Untamed — Jimin

Everyone gets married in small towns. The hairdresser’s daughter, the butcher’s niece, the doctor’s granddaughter. Even your best friend. And someone has to organise all the weddings. You have taken part in so many it is unnerving. You’re not asking for a husband, a simple fuckbuddy would suffice. You don’t even need someone with skill, you just need to have sex with a human. Though your goal seems unattainable and life apparently truly sucks, the petty florist where you order the flower arrangements offers you a beacon of hope, comforting you and spoiling you whenever you visit his shop, condescending to your every whim. Will he satisfy your every wish or will you have to supervision your best friend’s wedding on the verge of sanity?

“Sit down, sweet pea.” He said, offering you his chair. He immediately stood behind you, digging his fingers into your shoulders, massaging them. He always smelled like greenery. It was relaxing. “Who pissed on your roses, tiger?” He asked, his thumbs drawing circles at the base of your neck. You moaned and closed your eyes. “Poor baby. So stressed.” He purred, laughing. “Portia is getting married.” You groaned. He ohed. “Your friend, Portia?” You frowned and pouted. “That bitch. Portia.” You growled. He laughed a silvery sound. “It’s your best friend.” “It’s a stressed out insult. She wants me to plan it. Jimin, I am so tired of watching people getting married.” He kneaded the nerves near to your spine. “It’s a professional hazard, baby’s breath.” His finger stilled as he reached the middle of your back without finding the clasp of your bra. He moved upwards, ignoring the small detail. “It’s the third in two weeks. I can’t. Is everybody getting married this spring?” You asked, your head rolling forward. “I’m tired. Stressed. Grumpy.” You whine. “Baby, you have your sugarcane at home, use it.” He said, referring to your swirl shaped dildo. You shook your head. “It’s the warmth. Human touch. Sympathy.” Ask me, please — Jimin mentally begged — I’ll be so sweet to you. “And now I even need a plus one for Portia’s wedding. Lest she pairs me up with her cousin. Did I mention that he’s thirty and bald?” You sighed. “I can help.” He said. “With the Plus one.” He clarified. “Don’t expect me to get my fingers in your pie, blossom.” He stated. You shook your head. “Your loss.” You tutted. His loss, for sure. Not like you wanted him massaging your breasts as you sucked him off, laying on your white silk sheets, his dulcet moans filling your lonely room and your empty

Natural Connection — Namjoon

The city sucks. And before you definitely choose to resign from your job, you spend the money earned with your all-work-and-no-play attitude in a reinvigorating holiday in a natural resort in the woods. What you find is true heaven on earth, an eden of wonders and explorations. When you meet your guide, who will follow you and you alone, you almost cannot believe your luck. The closed-off man leads you through all the breathtaking sights of your location, offering you emotions and landscapes unrivalled — both in terms of wildlife and... well, humans? The steamy atmosphere seems to keep growing hotter together with the summer days, and before you can think twice your big friendly giant helps you get rid of the hots. What happens when your Adam and Eve idyllium gets interrupted by a ruckus of stag-partying jocks?

Namjoon knew your average blood pressure at rest and under effort, your shoe size, your weight and height. Still when he found you right before him he could barely believe the sight of you. He knew you were small but this small? He was surprised. Amazed. Completely dazzled by your size. “Uhm. Kim Namjoon?” You asked, hesitant. God, even your voice was small — he noticed. As you got even closer, he realised you barely reached his sternum. He was endeared. He imagined how hugging you would feel. Why was he imagining to hug a stranger? “Hello! Welcome to the Valley!” He said, offering you his hand. You took it and shook it energetically. “Thank you. I assume you will be my guide during my stay.” You commented. “Exactly. I'll be your coach and your guide through the whole experience.” “Perfect.” You smiled. He was dumbstruck by it. So sweet and bright. You noticed he had a nice voice. And a kind smile. He looked like a very gentle giant. “Have you brought any specific equipment with you or would you prefer to use the one we offer?” “I have trekking boots and walking sticks. You know, basic stuff that's difficult to find when you're the size of a teapot.” He laughed a loud belly laugh, which surprised you and pleased you. “Okay, we can head to the hall and chat about your activity plan.” He said, leading you. Walking behind him was definitely a hard challenge, both because his legs were kilometric — and damn fine — and because how could you not stare at that ass right in front of your gaze, clad in oh-so tight shorts? Once he realized you were basically running behind him, he turned, a bit confused. And then embarrassed. “Sorry,” he smiled sheepishly, taking shorter steps. "Don't worry, it's okay. I'm a fast walker." You stated. He grinned. He barely stopped himself from murmuring a 'cute'. You were adorable.

Ink ‘n’ Run — Jungkook

People find awful ways to inculcate mean insecurities in our lives. It is to get rid of insecurity that you head to the talented tattooist in a small town near your campus, ready to ink your fears away. Ready to start from zero, you let yourself enjoy a night out clubbing and a steamy one night stand with a tattoed god. Hit by the morning-after regrets, you run away before he wakes up. Little do you know that he’ll be the man you’ll be spending several hours underneath, half-naked as he inks you. Such a shame that you keep running away each time he is ready to ask you for a date. And that he keeps running away after you convince yourself to concede him one. Will you manage to let each other see that you click perfectly or will you let that night be just an accident?

“Oh. You’re back. Lovely to see you, how can I help you?” He looks sweet. God, he was sweet, of course he looks sweet; you thought. He was the most gentle man you had ever been with. Wicked hips, but such a sweet mouth. “Uhm, I have an appointment?” You said, showing him the business card with the date and time of your appointment. “Oh.” His expression was the perfect depiction of confusion. “Uhm. I guess you can come into my studio, then. Do you have someone with you? Would you like Daisy to come in?” He said, looking at the girl sitting at the reception table. “No, I’m cool.” You forced yourself to form a tiny, polite smile on your face. As he walked ahead of you you noticed the way his tight black t-shirt hugged his narrow waist. And his wonderful, jeans-clad, toned ass. God, he had rammed into you like a mad man that night. You shook your head, trying to bring yourself back to reality. Meanwhile, his mind was fuelled by millions of questions. Why had you run? Were you freaked out by what was happening? Were you as affected as he was at the idea of him working on you? Did you think he was a fuckboy? Would you let him take you out on a date? Would you let him fuck you again? Wait, scratch the last one.

Head over Heals — Hoseok

You are the most talented ice skater of your state. Or rather, you were. Your career was harshly interrupted by an unfortunate accident. Healing from the hurtful events takes strong nerves and positive energy. Luckily, your physiotherapist — the neighbour of your childhood home — is the most positive, enthusiastic person. New feelings bloom like daisies on a warm spring morning, while old feelings rekindle and light your way back home like a field of fireflights, back to places that you’ve always loved. It takes little time to get used again to his sweet energy and his gentle hands, healing your body and your soul. It takes even less time to fall head over heels for him.

“What changed?” He asked, drying your tear with his thumb. “I don’t know. It feels like it changed.” He smiled. “You’re still the same to me. Same bright eyed little girl running around in a summer dress, smelling like honey shampoo and sun cream. You feel like home. I think nothing has been okay since you were gone.” Your heart took a second to melt and resolidify around that new truth. “Hobi.” His eyes were glittering. “I think I always had a soft spot for you. You and your knees always scraped, the small curls framing your face, the way your braids came undone that night as we were driving away after prom in the convertible your parents ran away in when they eloped.” He looked so sad. And so beautiful. “Hoseok, I never forgot you, you know. You were my first.” You confessed. “And you were mine.” He replied. He paused. “We were perfect.” “We were.” You replied. We still could be. We are.

Sugar and Spice — Yoongi

A new girl moves into town, her goal starting her life from scrap. And then on a foggy autumn night she ventures in the local pub, where she meets a cute, tattooed bartender who happens to be the local sweetheart. Fate — and the sweet granny next door — seem to push them together; it’s only a matter of time before feelings bloom and attraction becomes too intense to resist. The magic of a small town, and that loneliness that they share and understand so deeply, bring them close at the most wonderful time of the year. Love can blossom even in the dead of winter and who knows, maybe they’ll find a new life by the time of the new year?

“How does it feel to live in a small town?” You asked, stretching your legs out the flannel blanket. Sunlight came in through the yellow leaves of the apple trees. “Like time doesn’t really exist. Until you don’t have any left and suddenly your friends are getting married and having children and all you have is a useless piece of paper stating that you’re a doctor.” He said. “But it’s okay. It’s lovely, at times like this.” He said, looking at the sky. “Marriage and kids are overrated.” You said, laying down. He looked at you, your eyes closed, your hair coming out of his beanie, currently covering your head. “Don’t leave me alone here.” You had a beauty he had never known. Or that maybe he had seen in his mother. That rough, tough beauty that looks dangerous from afar. Delicate from up close. You weren’t gracious. You weren’t cobwebs and golden hair and clouds. You were the ground, the trees, the stone. You were the mountains capped in ice, beautiful and so endangered. Still, so steady. You were the forest, eternal. Nothing could marr you. No man, no humanly disgrace. You would weather and transform, like nature does. Maybe he was idealising you, maybe he was giving you all those traits he had always wished in a woman. “Stop staring at me. Lay down. Enjoy your seconds before you turn into a fifty-something lonesome worm.” You teased. He laid. Your hand found his. “I’ll tell you how a small town feels like, based on the opinion of a girl from a big city.” He exhaled a laugh. “It’s comfort. Like when it rains outside but you’re in your bed and you’re warm and you don’t have to get up. You can simply lay.” He rolled onto his side, staring at your eyelashes. If I blink, will she disappear?

#bangtan sonyeondan #Bts blog #bts fanfiction #bts au masterlist #bts au teaser #bts fic

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miseriathome · 4 years ago

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I wrote this elsewhere, but I don’t think I ever posted it on tumblr, so:

Don't ever get so caught up in your snark at libs that you start implying that facilitating voter registration or voting is "performative," or that voting is easy/should be taken for granted/is a "low priority" issue.

You shouldn't need somebody to make a laundry list of the compounding marginalizations they face which have barred them from several elections in order to remember that this institution, much like that of marriage, is one that people are still battling to have access to. You shouldn't need to be chastised by an immigrant, a trans person, a native person, a resident abroad, a disabled person, a fiscal dependent, a felon, or a transient/homeless person in order to remember that access to voting is NOT a guarantee for all people, that bureaucracy is NOT simple for everybody to navigate, that ballots and polling facilities are NOT accessible to all.

Whether or not "use your rights or lose them" is central to your ethical code, whatever your stance is on the utility of local vs national elections, don't EVER make the mistake of suggesting that this civil rights issue has been long dealt with and is thus dispensable. Until EVERYBODY gets the access and rights you take for granted, it's not your place to scoff about how easy it is and how unnecessary it is to fight for.

Somebody who sets out to help people register to vote is still doing more for your cause and for their community than some "all lives matter" asshat. People who you write off as cringe libs are still risking everything to have access to the vote that you pedal as useless. You aren't going to earn their solidarity for shit if you can't be arsed to ally with them on something you consider so easy it's beneath your activism.

Just let the Lumpenproletariat LIVE for once and turn your frustrations on the Proud Boys and the ruling class. Get back to challenging your base assumptions about social structures lest you forget AGAIN how oppression works.

Final disclaimer: Yes I KNOOOW "both sides" of the American political spectrum are the same tiny shade of conservative neoliberalism and that the system will not be changed from within and that injustice is embedded into the very foundations of our institutions and thus we need to dismantle the yadda yadda yadda. This isn't me saying that yelling "vote!" is meaningful activism; this is me saying that when somebody says "I want to facilitate voting," it is NOT your time to bust out the eyerolling bellyaching about the ~bigger~ issues. Voter suppression, voter disenfranchisement, and voting inaccessibility are issues quite a lot of marginalized people have very good reason to be concerned about and if your revolution isn't interested in facilitating the "ability" part of "from each according to their ability," then you have no right to be demanding the "from." You have the critical foundations to think through this one; USE THEM.

Sincerely, an Oppressed Person who has been personally barred from quite a lot of elections for systemic- and non-systemic-based reasons who now works very hard to facilitate access to voting IN ADDITION to other work and other forms of direct action, who is VERY TIRED at seeing this rhetoric being pedaled by the allies who pride themselves the most on their working knowledge of intersectionality and institutional injustice.

#1 #2 #3 #4 #5 #activism #voting #us politics #performative activism

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wolffyluna · 5 years ago

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Maedhros Has No Brakes

(As a note, this is is just headcanon that is vaguely supported by the text, and also it’s been awhile since I read the text so I may have forgotten an important detail or two.)

During a large part of the Silmarillion, Maedhros was basically a shark*: he could not Stop, Lest Bad Things Happen.

This was not true in Valinor. In Valinor, Maedhros was someone who liked to keep busy, certainly. And he was someone who tended to deal with stress by trying to do something about the stressful situation, or at the very least trying to feel productive and like he was doing something about the stressful situation. This wasn’t a concerning tendency until around the time of the exile to Formenos. It got a bit unhealthy then, but even so, he could still stop. Someone he trusted could say “Maedhros, you having been Doing All The Things, please take a break,” and there was a reasonable chance he would.

And this stayed relatively true up until he was rescued from Angband. Immediately post-rescue, he had no choice but to stop. (Surviving in Angband counted as Doing Something, as Not Being Stopped enough for Maedhros to...’cope’ is not word, but I don’t know a better one.)

And stopping was so bad. It was a lot of terrible-horrible psychological pain on top of a whole lot of physical pain, and it was agonising, and it was a real concern that his fea might leave his hroa (possibly by his own force). A lot of that was because he was in a safe enough environment that all the trauma that had got locked away and filed under ‘to deal with when not in a life or death situation’ came to the surface, but it still Sucked So Bad. Even if most of it was just the affect of being safe enough to process trauma, he associated it with Being Stopped/Still.

So as soon as he was physically and mentally capable of doing things continuously for a reasonable stretch of time-- he did that. Stopping was horrible, and he was going to not do that as much as possible.

Now, has was not as bad at stopping as he ended up later. To use a (possibly nonsensical) car metaphor: he wasn’t using the hand brake, and he certainly wasn’t going to go into park, but he was still using the brake pedal. He didn’t stop, but he could slow down. He could look back, reassess actions.

(And I would say besieging Angband is a pretty active thing to do. It involves a surprising amount of Doing Things, and very little sitting still and doing nothing, and it was directly confronting the source of his stress-- and it was surprisingly good for Maedhros. Not ideal _or _healthy, but he was aiming for_ functional_ and oh boy did he achieve that.)

And things went on like that until the Nirnaeth.

The post-Nirnaeth was one of the very few times post-Angband that he Stopped. It wasn’t by choice, and he had basically no say in the matter, but he had to. All he worked for was in ruins, and he realised that his goal of defeating Melkor was impossible, and so there was no point working ceaselessly towards that goal, and that combined with grief meant there was no way of him stopping himself from completely crashing--

It was bad.

And after the Nirnaeth, his no brake tendencies got worse. He stopped using the brake pedal. Before, he could safely look back on his actions, ask “was that the best way of achieving my goals? was there a better way?” But afterwards, that was too much like stopping. He couldn’t trust himself with hindsight. And he needed a new goal to work towards that wasn’t defeating Melkor, because haha, like that was achievable. He needed something to swim towards, to drive full tilt at with his foot jammed on the accelerator-- so he fixated on getting the silmarils.

...we all know how that worked out. It doesn’t even matter whether the Oath was supernaturally compelling, or just something he wanted to fulfill. Either way, he was equally unable to stop trying to fulfill it. Even as he committed more and more atrocities, he couldn’t stop, because who knows if he would live through doing that? And he couldn’t reassess, couldn’t ask if there was a better way, if this was worth it, because that was slowing down too much--

When he jumped into the chasm, a lot of that was because of the guilt. Because of the sinking realisation that what he had done had made his claim forfeit, that it was all for nothing. I don’t want to downplay the importance of that.

But I think a surprising amount of that decision came from reaching his goal. Because once you have reached a goal, you can’t keep non-stop striving for it.

You kind of have to stop.

*#NotAllSharks, but this is not necessarily relevant to my point. And anyway, #SomeSharks.

#premium original content #silmarillion #maedhros #suicide cw #disscussion of trauma cw #meta

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goofygomez · 5 years ago

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After the War - A Harry Potter Fanfiction

Description: After the war, Harry turns his back on the wizarding world for some time to figure things out for himself. His trip leads him to uncover new truths about his new reality.

Wordcount: 4429

This fanfic was inspired by this tumblr post.

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After the war, Harry Potter was shocked to come to the realization that he’d survived. It had not crossed his mind that he would, and he told his friends as much. The sight of the destruction the war had left on the world as he knew it, the world that had harboured so many fond memories for him, had been so horrible to see, Harry had broken down barely moments after arriving at the Burrow. It was too much to handle.

He’d spoken to Ron, Hermione, and Ginny about it, and decided that he needed some time to sort things out for himself. To his surprise, they didn’t object. Having extracted a promise that they wouldn’t reveal his whereabouts to anyone else, Harry bid them farewell and set off to America, where he’d distance himself from the magical world as he knew it.

And so, three months later, Harry put his foot to the pedal as he sped through the countryside just outside some major city, the sun beating down on him from above. Ahead of him, the road stretched on for miles, disappearing in the horizon into the unknown. The heat building up on the concrete distorted its surface, as though a shimmering pool of diamonds awaited him ahead. He smiled.

He looked down at the radio, which was now blaring a rock song loudly, enveloping him like a warm blanket. He liked it, he decided. Ever since he’d arrived here, he’d amassed quite the collection of old cassette records from odd places he visited, stashing them in the glove compartment. He pressed the cassette, removed it, and replaced it with one by the name of “Radiohead”.

As he listened to it, he thought of his first days in America. Luckily, he’d been able to acquire a driver’s license fairly quickly. Driving wasn’t as hard as he thought it would be, he would tell himself as he tried to teach himself the craft. With some of the money he’d exchanged, he bought a beat-up car and set off on the road, no clear destination in mind. He’d considered backpacking through Europe, but the thought of more camping after the year he’d had was enough to drive him insane.

Then, unbidden, his mind wandered to Ginny Weasley, halfway across the world. Her flaming red hair flapping in the wind, her freckles that ran all over her body, that flowery scent that had driven Harry mad for a year. He remembered that time he’d broken up with her over ‘some stupid, noble reason’, as she’d put it, and the time she’d kissed him after it was all over. She’d promised to wait for him until he got back, even though he knew... he didn’t deserve it.

Five minutes later, he saw a figure on the side of the road, standing alone. As he approached it, he saw it was a man, his arm outstretched and his finger held high. His eyes darted toward the visor above him, where his wand was stowed, but he shook his head. He hadn’t used magic if he could help it, preferring to do everything the normal way. Magic had lost its appeal somewhat. It felt… tainted, somehow.

“Magic belonged in the war”, he muttered to himself every night before going to bed and reliving the horrors it had caused. The small, lifeless body of Dobby in his arms. Fred’s last smile before the blast that ended his life. Colin Creevey’s face, unseeing, on the Great Hall floor. They all taunted him, mocking his failure to save them as he thrashed and screamed in his sleep.

Magic belonged in the war. Magic had stripped him of his parents, his godfather, his own life… It marked him for life as someone with power; someone with the weight of the world thrust upon his shoulders, drifting through life as the punches kept on coming. And they never stopped. Even after he’d defeated Voldemort, he felt powerless. A stupid boy in over his head for whom people gave their lives. He definitely didn’t deserve it.

He shook his head again, slowing down the car and nodding to the hitchhiker, a small smile on his face. He’d met many others like him, travelling to places Harry had never heard of. He listened to their stories as he drove through the country, sometimes choosing to reveal some of his himself. Of course, they were all muggles, so some details had to be glossed over but, to his great surprise, none of the people he met pushed farther than he was willing to say. They were all too glad to talk about themselves, he figured.

As he came to a halt beside the man, he rolled down the passenger window and stared at the hitchhiker. He was a tall man with broad shoulders, a hat on his head and sunglasses on his eyes to shield against the summer sun. He looked a few years older than Harry. He wore cargo shorts, a plain white shirt and he’d flung a large backpack on his right shoulder. Sweat clung to his armpits, and his breath was ragged as he spoke in a friendly tone.

“Thank you,” the man said, nodding and smiling at Harry. He did the same. “Are you going to Columbus by any chance?” As a matter of fact, he’d been there not two weeks ago, so he nodded once more and unlocked the car.

Grateful, the man flung his backpack in the backseat and sat down on the passenger seat, closing the door with a thud. He turned to Harry and removed his sunglasses. His eyes were a deep blue, and they surveyed Harry up and down.

“Haven’t had much luck out here,” he explained as Harry set off once more, heading due north. “Not a lot of people stop for hitchhikers these days.”

“I was heading there anyway,” Harry lied, shrugging. “What’s your name?” he asked amicably, casting a side glance at him and then one at his wand. Magic belonged in the war, he told himself.

“Mark Thorne,” said the man, removing his hat and running a hand through his blond hair, slick with sweat. “And yours?”

It was a nice change of pace to have people ask for his name, rather than goggle at him and his scar. Here, away from the wizarding world, he was just another face. Just another man driving through the country with no purpose in life. No purpose in life, he thought fondly, relishing the freedom that simple sentence carried.

“Harry Potter,” he said, nodding. He passed a sign that told him it was another 150 miles to Columbus, with only one stop in between. “What are you doing in Columbus?” he asked.

Mark heaved a sigh and said, “I’m meeting my friends there. See, we live very far away from each other, and none of us has a car, so we decided to go to a middle point between us. That’s Columbus. I’ve been walking for like 3 hours and my legs were already cramping up.”

“Sounds fun,” Harry said, chuckling.

“Not so much,” said Mark, grinning. “You have no idea how many cars just passed by me without a second glance. One old woman even glared at me, I think.”

“Reckon it’s that one?” he said, pointing at the back of a car that loomed ever closer.

Harry passed it with a surge of speed, and Mark whistled from beside him. “And here I thought this old thing could go no further than sixty,” he commented, nodding in approval. After a few seconds of silence, he asked, “And what about you? Long way from home.”

It was true, he knew, but something inside told him he didn’t really have a home. There’s the Burrow, another voice piped in helpfully. But yet, some shred of doubt still lingered in him. Would he even be welcome there when he went back? Would he ever have the courage to go back? In the end, he settled for chuckling again.

“Yeah, I needed to get away.”

“Amen to that, brother,” Mark said, raising an invisible glass in the air. “What are you, like nineteen?”

“Eighteen.”

“Must have been bad back there, huh?” Mark said with a solemn tone.

“You could say that,” Harry said bitterly. Indeed, it had been bad, though not for the reasons Mark thought. Sometimes Harry wished he could talk about it with one of these people, but they wouldn’t understand. They’d think I was mad, he thought. They’d laugh and think I was pulling their hair.

The next hour passed by in silence, punctuated by the music coming from the stereo. Every now and then, Mark made a remark about his music taste, and Harry would just nod and smile. About twenty minutes before they arrived at their destination, Mark cocked his head and asked the last question Harry wanted to hear.

“What’s that scar from?” He pointed at Harry’s forehead, where the lightning bolt scar stood as a constant reminder that Harry was special. The scar that told the world that he’d survived the Killing Curse from Voldemort. The scar that had made him famous; that had marked his future thereafter. He must have winced because Mark backtracked. “Sorry, didn’t mean to be rude.”

“It’s okay,” Harry said, sighing. “It’s from when my parents died,” he explained, as if that settled the matter.

“They – oh...” Mark trailed off, looking far off into the horizon, where the outline of a city loomed ever closer, bathed in a golden hue in the afternoon sun. “Sorry for asking.”

Then, he fell silent. When they passed a dingy hotel, its sign hanging from a single thread of rope on a pole sticking out from above the mahogany door, Mark cleared his throat awkwardly.

“This is my stop,” he said, jabbing a finger outside. Harry nodded and pulled over, unlocking the car. “Thanks for the ride, Harry.”

“It was no problem,” he said, managing a small smile.

“I hope you figure things out soon, man,” Mark said sadly, nodding. “Good luck.” And with that, he heaved the backpack onto his back and walked off, disappearing inside the hotel.

“I hope so too,” Harry said to himself, sighing.

That was how most of his days had been

That night, as he lay on a bed in a considerably better hotel not far from there, he stared up at the ceiling, his eyelids drooping. It had become a habit to stay up as late as he could, lest he give in to the nightmares for longer than he absolutely had to. He had them constantly, no matter what he did. And they were always the same...

When his brain finally betrayed him and he drifted off, he found himself in the Great Hall again, deserted but for himself. He looked around warily, expecting the worst. Suddenly, he heard voices around him. They were soft at first and then got louder, echoing against the high walls of the Hall. They screamed his name, over and over again.

He pressed his hands to his ears, unable to bear another night of torture, but the voices were relentless, slithering into his skull like one of Uncle Vernon’s drills. They hammered into him as he shrunk in on himself, screaming, begging them to stop, to leave him alone.

They cursed him, hatred seeping through their bodiless voices. He was on his knees now, his hands pressed tightly to his ears. Cries of despair and horror ripped through the otherwise still air. They seem to shatter the windows around him, showering him with glass.

“GO AWAY!” he bellowed, but his voice was hoarse, much too strained. He felt his throat close up, his airways contracting. His hands flew to his neck, gasping for breath. Surely, he could save himself with his wand, he thought, reaching for it in his pocket.

No, magic belongs to the war! a new voice, much higher than the rest, screamed at him, making him pull up short. It was right, he knew. He shouldn’t; couldn’t... With a final gasp, the world around him became dark, and he woke again, sweat clinging to his face as he struggled to control his rattled breathing. It was just a nightmare.

But was it?

Most of his nights were that way these days, to the point where Harry had begun to wonder if it was even worth fighting it anymore. The few nights his thoughts managed to drift away from the war, he dreamt of Ginny, Ron, and Hermione, their laughing faces alight with joy as he watched them from a distance. Sometimes, he tried talking to them, but their faces became hard and their laughter died out as if they were upset that he’d push his luck by even daring to speak in their direction. Suffice to say, he was getting tired of it.

After the encounter with Mark Thorne, he came across many other stragglers and offered them a place in the passenger seat. It felt nice to listen to stories that didn’t remind him of the wizarding world. He found, to his great surprise, that he could even relate to some of the problems the muggles had in their everyday lives, though they all felt distant somehow.

Once, after dropping a rather chatty young woman off at a town just outside San Francisco, he pulled over in a deserted alley and broke down on the steering wheel, too overwhelmed to even attempt to stop the flow of tears. Throughout the conversation, he’d smile genially, laughing at the jokes Maria, the chatty woman, had told him. But Harry knew better than to fool himself into believing he could even begin to relate to her.

She hadn’t lived through what he’d lived through; hadn’t had to carry the weight of a prophecy on her shoulders from the age of fifteen. It had all seemed hard at the time, Harry thought ruefully, but he realised now that he’d been mistaken. The hardest part was what came after. The weight of all he’d gone through in the past seven years suddenly seemed to dawn on him.

Why couldn’t he have been like all other people, unperturbed by the tides of fate? Was it so much to ask for Harry to want a regular life, with regular teenager problems? Was he selfish for wanting a normal schooling experience without having to sacrifice himself for the greater good?

He supposed that was the point of this whole trip; to find out what it was like not to be a world-saving hero, but just... Harry. Numbly, he’d wiped his tears drove off, his breathing still rather uneven.

A month later, he was driving along yet another deserted highway. He was now listening to AC/DC on the radio, bobbing his head along to the rhythm. It was peaceful. The day was warm. The bag of groceries he’d bought rattled in the backseat, reminding him that he was hungry. He picked up a sandwich from one of the bags and bit into it greedily.

Minutes later, he spotted a silhouette a few miles ahead on the side of the road. Putting his sandwich down, he squinted against the glare of the sun. It was an older man, no younger than eighty, carrying nothing but a small paper bag and walking along the road.

Harry pulled over next to him. “Sir, do you need a ride?” he asked.

The old man pondered his question for a moment, looking far into the horizon longingly and then back at Harry. His face was full of wrinkles and his eyes were a soft grey. They reminded him of Dumbledore’s blue ones, for some reason. He wore, to Harry’s surprise, an army uniform. Many badges were pinned to his chest, and the tag at his breast read ‘Colonel’.

He seemed to deem Harry’s offer acceptable as he smiled and nodded, getting into the already unlocked car. He placed his hands on his lap, intertwining his long, white fingers. “Thank you, young man,” he said softly, not looking at Harry.

Offering the man a smile, he drove off. “Where are you going, sir?”

Again, the old man took his time, licking his lips slowly as he looked out the window, the smile long gone from his wizened face. “Scottsdale,” he said finally, pointing a pale finger through the windshield. “Should be a few hundred miles, however. I hope that’s not a bother.”

“Not at all,” Harry said, shaking his head. “I was going there anyway.” That was his standard response, as he didn’t really have a single destination in mind.

The man nodded shortly. Silence ensued. Neither of them spoke for a while, choosing instead to take in the changing scenery as the desert gave way to a green pasture, small trees littering the horizon. They saw no other cars, though that was to be expected on a Sunday afternoon, Harry thought.

After a while, the man cleared his throat and Harry turned to him. He wore a small smile that accented his wrinkled features. His hair, or what was left of it, was silvery white. It reminded him of Dumbledore once more, though his former Headmaster had had much longer hair, and had rarely looked as frail.

“I’m going to my best friend’s funeral,” the man said suddenly, startling Harry. He searched for words to say in such a situation but was saved the trouble when the old man elaborated. “I haven’t seen him in years. Since just after the war, actually,” he mused, half to himself.

Harry frowned. “Was he... in the army as well?” he asked carefully, casting a side glance at the veteran, who nodded slowly.

“He was,” he said fondly. “One of the best, one of the best.”

Harry looked forward, his thoughts drifting to Ron and Hermione, and to all the crazy adventures the three of them had gotten themselves into. He imagined himself driving to one of their funerals, a fond smile on his face as he thought of them. It was too much to handle, however, so he shook his head and willed it away.

He didn’t know why he spoke up, but when he did, a sudden weight seemed to have lifted from his lungs, letting him breathe normally again.

“I was a soldier too,” he said, pursing his lips.

The veteran looked at him from the passenger seat with a raised eyebrow, his eyes softening somewhat. “Were you?” he said, in a tone that definitely reminded him of his former headmaster.

“Yeah,” he muttered, looking down for a moment. Again, impulse took over and he asked, “How do you do it?”

“How do I do what?” the man asked, intrigued.

“How do you live after the war?” Harry said, shaking his head. “Because it’s so hard... It’s so hard to adjust to a life I didn’t think I’d have. Hard to think about settling down and marrying the girl I thought I’d never see again.” He thought of Ginny, his eyes watering as he talked, unable to contain himself now that he’d started.

The man regarded him with a soft expression, silent as he let Harry let it all out.

“It’s hard to think not everyone around me is an enemy.” He remembered what it had been like after Dumbledore’s death. No one to trust but himself and his friends, looking over their shoulders at every turn, having to work in the shadows as Voldemort grew more powerful.

The veteran seemed to weigh his words before answering, blinking slowly.

“Were you a prisoner of war,” he asked softly, “or undercover?”

Harry chuckled. “Both, in a way.” It was true, he knew, though he couldn’t quite explain it to him. “I was lost for a long time, searching for a way to end my mission, to end the war. In the end, I got out of it alive, but there’s something inside me... Something’s definitely dead, you know?”

“How old are you?” the man asked, eyebrows raised at Harry’s words.

“Eighteen,” Harry said, making the man turn his head so rapidly Harry thought he might crack it. But he said nothing. Harry knew why. Some armies – some wars – don’t care about your age.

They drove on in silence after that, barely listening to the radio as he sped through the pasture and back into a desert that seemed to go on forever. His thoughts dreadfully drifted back to the Final Battle, to the moment when Voldemort’s forces had retreated, leaving them to collect their dead. Again, the face of Colin Creevey taunted him, pale and lifeless. The boy had been sixteen, not even of age. Yet he’d sneaked into the battlefield. The Death Eaters, however, didn’t care how many OWLs you’d gotten or how well you’d performed in your Defence Against the Dark Arts exam.

Magic belongs in the war.

“I think,” he said after a while, cocking his head, “I think the dead thing is me.”

“What makes you say that, son?” the man asked, not unkindly.

“When I killed the enemy.” He thought of Voldemort, his limp body falling dead on the floor of the Great Hall. “I killed myself as well.” Again, that was true, in a twisted sort of way.

Another long silence. Harry’s eyes filled with tears once more, thinking of home. Thinking of Hogwarts, where Ginny and Hermione had just started their final year. He thought of Ron, joining his brother George in managing the joke shop in Diagon Alley. He thought of Sirius, of his broad smile as he’d clapped at his parents’ wedding, wearing his best tuxedo.

He thought about his parents and their untimely deaths. Their sacrifice had made it possible for him to be here, and he was grateful for that. Yet a part of him wished he’d died with them that night. He remembered that night in the Forbidden Forest when he used the Resurrection Stone.

“Will you stay with me?” he’d asked his father, his heart in his throat.

“Until the very end.” James Potter had said, a smile etched on his young face.

“No,” said a voice to his right, and he turned. The man was looking at him with a frown on his wrinkled face.

“What?” he said, dabbing at his eyes to wipe the tears away.

“No, you lived,” the man said, more firmly this time. “And you’ll keep living, son. You see, living after a war is not about forgetting the horrors you saw.”

Harry thought that wouldn’t be such a bad idea, in truth. The man placed a hand on Harry’s shoulder and felt himself shudder beneath his touch.

“I was sent to the frontlines during the Second War,” the old man said conversationally, looking through the windshield into the horizon again. “I got drafted with some friends of mine, and we got into the same battalion. We were eager to prove ourselves, young and stupid that we were.”

“I wasn’t long before we realised how wrong we’d been. Men we’d joked with in Boot Camp dropped dead before us, shot by some German soldier or other, and we just kept shooting back. At the time, we knew in our hearts it was the right thing. We were fighting for our freedom, we told ourselves.”

“But you’re right about one thing. We may not have been prisoners, but we were trapped. Trapped in a war we didn’t belong in, the power to take lives at the tips of our fingers. And we embraced it willingly. The truth is, no matter what you try and tell yourself, those things stay with you until you’re old.”

Harry never spoke as the man kept talking, entranced by his voice as it became stronger and harder. He could hear the pain in it, the hurt of retelling such horrors, and he finally found himself relating to him; truly relating to him, much more than he’d done with any other muggle.

“Living after the war is not about forgetting those horrors,” the man repeated slowly. “It’s about learning to live with them, embracing them,” he said softly, nodding as Harry drove on, unable to tear his eyes from the road ahead.

“One day, you’ll be ready to marry that girl of yours. One day, you’ll forgive yourself for the things you did,” he said, almost knowingly.

“Now that you’ve got out of the war,” he finished firmly, smiling at the young man at the steering wheel, “it’s time to get the war out of you.”

Harry said nothing and instead chose to keep driving, but the man seemed to take this as an appropriate response because he said nothing and sat back on his seat, a hard expression on his face. It was a mixture of sadness and, surprisingly, fondness. Harry thought he could understand.

Much as he hated to admit it, those times when everything seemed lost, when nothing seemed to make sense, had been the times he thrived. He was good in such situations, he knew. It was the unknown he feared now; the uncertainty of his future.

Faster and faster Harry drove, his eyes watering every few seconds, his hand dabbing furiously at them. At one point, he couldn’t take it any longer. He pulled over on the side of the road, casting a fleeting glance at the man, who cocked his head.

Sparing him an apologetic smile, Harry got out of the car and walked a few paces through the grass around him. He couldn’t remember the desert around him turning into this beautiful sight, yet green fields covered the ground as far as the eye could see. Weak, his knees gave way and he slumped on the ground. He let the tears stream freely from his eyes now, but his mouth was curled into a smile.

Before he knew what he was doing, he was laughing. It all seemed so silly, looking back on it, he thought. But he couldn’t seem to stop. His hands grazed the soft, tall grass that grew around him. Suddenly, flowers the colour of the rainbow sprang up around him, blossoming in seconds as their petals opened up to him.

He took in a deep breath, closing his eyes. He felt a rush of power within him, much like he’d felt that night against Voldemort. But this time, it felt different. It was peaceful and pure and fun. Unspoiled, somehow.

He knew it wouldn’t always feel this way, but for now, it was enough. Because for now, he was the boy who lived again.

The boy who lived after the war...

#harry potter #ginny weasley #original character #fanfic #angst #fluff #posthogwarts #ptsd #hurt #canon compliant #jk rowling

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seventhfracture · 7 years ago

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FMA Prompt Drabbles?

So I found this glorious list of prompts which I’ll reblog but they inspired this weird, rambling, sort of crack fest (more under the cut!);

If you asked Roy Mustang he would’ve told you that terrorists were getting stupider every fucking year. Sure attacking Mei’s wedding seemed, on one level, a logical strike against the Amestrian-Xingese alliance. Until you remembered it was also Alphonse’s wedding and hence an Elric Wedding. So Roy and Edward and Alex and Riza and everyone else were in rapt attendance when the armed gunmen broke down the chapel doors. And when the best man and the groomsmen flew into action.

“Mustang up high!” Edward called.

And so everyone ducked.

And so Roy snapped his fingers.

Because who doesn’t bring their transmutation gear to an Elric Wedding?

It was a mistake to let Edward give a speech at the wedding. He does a wonderful job, don’t get it wrong, but Roy is hissing with laughter and Alphonse is so red he has to physically wrestle the microphone from his brother lest the eldest blonde finish his train of thought.

“Listen up!” Alphonse roars. “I hate all of you! You especially!” He assures Edward and then, heaving, lets go of some tension to finish; “That’s it. That’s my announcement.”

Edward is plainly determined to dance with everyone; Riza, Mei, Winry, both the Armstrongs, Alphonse, Sig, Ling, Havoc…

“And here I was thinking you’d forgotten me!” Roy snorts as Edward rounds the table in a bounce and grabs him by the upper arm.

“Sometimes you just gotta dance, General.” Edward answers. “So come on! Up!”

“Coming, coming…” Roy chuckles. “Easy on the merchandise Fullmetal.”

Edward hauls him onto the dance floor when he doesn’t move fast enough and Roy is having too much of a good time to tell him off for it. He might be a little drunk at this point. Still dancing is easy and dancing with Edward? Well they might as well be sparring! They don’t fight together often, not full pedal, but when they do they move in tangible unison like this.

They dance too hard. Roy swings Edward out far and something—“OW! Fuck!” The blonde hisses, wrenching his automail arm away. Because no arm, automail or otherwise, is meant to bend like that.

Roy winces.

“Are you alright?” He asks.

“Yeah- Ow…” He rolls his shoulders, trying to adjust the arm. “Shit, Winry’s going to kill me!”

“She won’t kill you,” Roy promises, but then he spies Miss Rockbells’ eyes narrowing across the dance floor in interest. In an instant Roy has Edward’s other hand and whispers. “Though if there was ever a time to start running, now would be it.”

Edward bolts.

Roy finds Izumi and Edward outside an hour later when he leaves the reception hall for a cigarette. Hands stuffed in his suit pockets he saunters to them and they welcome him into their closed knit conversation readily.

“How’s the arm?” Roy asks, offering the cigarette to Edward who refuses with a cough and a wave of his flesh hand.

“It’s good,” Edward splutters, “Sig popped everything back into place.”

“It is holding together with spit, gum and a dream.” Sig clarifies softly.

“Ah shuddup,” Edward dismisses, “it’ll be fine!” Still Edward turns to Roy with a kind of fear in his eyes. “Walk me back inside?”

“Not a chance,” Roy laughs, “incase you haven’t heard, there is a bounty on your head.”

“Shiiiit…” Edward moans into his hands.

Eventually Edward goes back inside. He and Winry claim a table and pulling screwdrivers from somewhere Miss Rockbell dismantles and reassembles his arm right there on the table. Roy can hear them bickering as he dances with Riza for the sixth time.

“I said ‘break a leg’, not you arm!” Winry hisses. “It’s a euphemism Edward.”

“Maybe it’s a pun? Ever thought about that?” The alchemist grunts.

“That’s not how puns work!”

The arm is amazing. Winry must have a sharp mind, Roy decides; another prodigy. He tucks the knowledge away content to take the moment to rest his chin on Riza’s head. Meanwhile Edward and Winry look suddenly sheepish.

“You gearhead!” Edward whispers sharply.

“I-it’s not my fault you bloody arm got oil on the table cloth!”

“You’re the one who pulled it apart!”

“You broke it!”

Edward is very drunk very early in the night but patting him on the back Roy shoves a canister of something under his nose as he sags in his seat at the bridal table.

“Ugh no!” Edward dismisses.

“Drink Elric,” Roy orders.

“You’re going to kill me!” Edward whines but drinks anyway—“Hey!” He sounds thoroughly betrayed. “This is water!”

“You’re fading.” Roy chuckles. “You need to hydrate.”

“Going to fucking kill me…” Edward grumbles and sips. “Why’s it in a fucking canister?”

“Because I must maintain my image.”

“For the record; if I did die? I only have one regret, and its not flipping you off more when I had the chance.”

Roy wheezes.

Ling and Roy have been batting away dignitaries all night and they have made a game of it. Every time a certain minister or official comes their way they turn and say:

“Have you met my friend Edward?”

And Edward proceeds to ruin everything for everyone.

After a particularly incessant official is shown to this cruel and unnatural form of torture they retreat outside again. Roy and Edward are in the pergola then, talking shit, resting their weight into their joined shoulders as the fireworks boom and hiss and sparkle overhead.

“You’re a good friend,” Roy murmurs, “I hope you know that.”

“I am the best friend,” Edward nods solemnly, resting his head on Roy’s shoulder.

Of course a fight breaks out.

Of course Olivier is involved.

“No offense, but didn’t you just say we weren’t gonna be violent?” Ling leans over the body of her downed combatant.

“This is not violence, your Highness.” Olivier grunts. “If I were being violent he would be dead.”

The shuffle the man, Olivier and the whole scene away quickly before Alphonse even knows anything has gone on. Roy and Edward haul the man- Alex, actually- into the kitchen where they administer first aid. Sloppily, at best, because they’re both still drunk.

Eventually Knox sees them struggling and Ling raiding the fridge and decides to help.

“I hear you can get pretty ace medications with the right diagnosis,” Edward is talking shit, he’s good at that. “Think you could give me the right diagnosis Knox?”

“Well, let me see here…” Knox hums as he applies the bandage to Alex’s head. “No, sorry, the only thing I could diagnose you with is idiocy.”

Havoc’s the next one to break. Roy has him on his arm howling; “I just want to fall in love! Is that so hard?”

“Very hard Havoc,” Roy tuts solemnly.

“Oh without a doubt.” Edward agrees. “Love is fucking hard man. It anally rapes you.”

“What?” Havoc blinks.

“Love is a prison warden and you are it’s bitch,” Ling nods knowingly to Edward from the fridge where he is still rifling.

Edward salutes him with his drink.

Roy tips his own back.

Ling eventually emerges with the left over wedding cake. Alex and Havoc frown, Roy drinks, and Edward, always wise, supposes sagely;

“Cake? In this dire time? Yeah, sure, why not? We all die anyway.”

“Edward--!” Alex begins.

“Well said Elric,” Roy nods, eyes glossy with determined admiration. “Well said.”

It’s three am when Alphonse and Mei and the bridal car depart the reception for the honeymoon suite at Central Ritz.

“Floor it Al!” Edward hollers after the car.

Alphonse does not, in fact, floor it but there is a little toot in acknowledgement.

Edward is thoroughly disappointed.

The party does not end with the reception. A whole gaggle of them head into the streets when the venue kicks them out. They’re a motley crew. Ling and Edward are arm in arm, singing, and Roy still has his canister but he’s seemingly transformed water into wine and some point. He’s trying to find his land legs when Ling suggests;

“Let’s go swimming!”

“Let’s not!” Edward returns passionately.

“Why not?”

“I’m a third metal. I sink.”

“Well aren’t you special?” Ling pats his head dutifully.

It might as well be a short joke. Roy and Havoc start placing bets as Alex attempts to break up the burgeoning brawl.

They jump the fence at the amusement park. Ling and Edward anyway because Roy is too old and too rich to jump fences. Edward returns, moments later, throwing the gates open and, leaning wantonly into the post, declares;

“From here on out, you shall call me; Edward Elric Gate Master.”

“I’m aiming for Ling Yao; Pussy Smasher, personally. But yours is nice too.”

Ling and Havoc reach an agreement in the amusement park;

“Jean you will operate this equipment, I shall try not to die, and then we’ll swap places. Deal?”

“Deal!”

While they wrestle with the commands of this or that harmless fair ride Roy wonders if they’ll get arrested but then there’s very little in this place that can break that they can’t fix.

Edward is talking to Armstrong, who is looking rapt, and nodding sagely (because a drunken Edward is a sagely one evidently) the blonde adds;

“I never wanted to die, but to be immortal, that sounds awful too. Paying taxes? Forever? Nah man.”

Truly, Edward is the philosopher of their age.

They get on the subject of childhoods. It becomes a pissing contest quickly. Ling is convinced his childhood of near servitude and constant fear of assassination is plainly the worst option. Especially compared to the luxury and splendour of Alex’s loving homestead.

Havoc has very little to contribute, is not even going to participate but supposes; “It was just me, mum and the dogs and living with seven dogs really opens your eyes to a lot of things.”

Roy tsks.

“I was raised in a brothel,” he recounts and then, just to stir the pot, brazenly lies; “and there were no such thing as birthdays.”

“I had to sleep in a cardboard box when I arrived in this country.” Ling challenges.

“I lost my virginity under the bleachers at my high school. She gave me a cigarette burn on my--” Roy returns.

“Nah, nah, you’re both losers.” Edward commits to the contest recounting with some fondness the near idyllic conditions of his earlier years— “you know, before I tried to raise the dead n’ stuff.”

That shuts them up.

“I spent years keeping you out of trouble,” Roy moans. “Years! I could’ve devoted that time to a hobby, a pursuit, a spouse—”

“I don’t see what the big deal is!” Edward rolls his eyes, sick of this train of thought already as they walk home. Roy’s telling him off but Edward’s also holding him upright so he doesn’t fall flat on his ass so really the blonde’s not all bad. “For the most part, I am, in fact, an idiot. But I fully admit to it, which should count for something.”

You can’t really argue with that.

They discover a suspicious alley on the way home, when all other company has vanished, and swearing Edward rolls up his sleeves.

“Oh no!” Roy yanks him back by the scruff. “None of that.”

“Oh come on!” Edward moans. “Clearly there is something untoward happening thatta way!”

“And we are going thatta way!” Roy gestures emphatically to the well lit street corner. He just has to walk Edward Elric home, that’s it. The sun is rising. It should be easy.

“I am investigating.”

“Fu—” He’s not sure what he’s about to say but quickly he’s following because lord forbid Edward endure any milestone without at least one fatality. He curses his life; “how come it’s never, ‘let’s explore the ice cream section’? Or 'let’s try and find the cutest dog’? It’s always something horrible. Why?”

#FMA #Edward Elric #drabbles #they all follow one main event but very sloppily

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storiesbybrian · 4 years ago

Text

No Goats Were Harmed in the Celebration of this Bar Mitzvah

Most of Carew’s friends had self-righteous parents, well-meaning adults generally respected and admired by their adolescent kids. But Carew’s parents meant extra well, like repair the world well. When he was younger, their moral exertions felt negligible. While trick or treaters came away from the Shapiros’ front door with copies of Notes from a Birmingham Jail, Carew still hauled in a bucketful of candy from their less, or maybe more civic-minded neighbors. But as the hormonal tide of adolescence rolled in, Ralph and Bettina started requiring Carew’s participation in their ethical olympiad. Carew presumed they mistook his physical maturation for a readiness to join the family’s devotion to restorative justice, because he was still too immature to allow himself to realize that their disruptions of his constant attempts to, in honor of his namesake, steal third, were not entirely unintentional.

At a bat mitzvah party in April, just after his mother had finished helping lift his classmate Aviva’s family members up in chairs, while Carew tried finding the best angle to see some flesh through all that royal blue taffeta, but not wanting to see too much lest the arousal become unbearable, he felt a hand rest on his shoulder, and even recognizing the feel and weight of his father’s caress, his first thought was that a policeman had responded to a call from Aviva’s horrified parents and got there as quickly as he could to haul Carew to jail on charges of private lewdness.

“Hey,” Ralph said. “Got a sec?”

Carew tried to recover from the jolt of contact, and then from the strange absence of relief that he’d been approached by someone who loved him instead of an apprehending officer, accomplishing neither and just following his dad out of the hotel ballroom and into a lobby where children were giggling at each other’s high-pitched profanities between sips of helium from unknotted, steel-colored balloons. Ralph gestured toward a circular banquette that reminded Carew of an impaled ring of pineapple. Bettina exited the ballroom, checking her watch for confirmation that this appointment was happening right on schedule, and sat down next to her son, close enough to darken his blazer with the sweat she’d worked up during the hora.

“Hey buddy,” she said.

“Do we have to leave?” Carew asked.

“No no,” Ralph said. “We just wanted to ask you, well tell you, well-”

“Carew,” Bettina said. “Do you remember Aviva’s Torah portion?”

“Well, I didn’t really study-”

“No. I mean, do you remember what it was about?”

“Oh,” Carew said. “Yeah, it was about all the specific instructions Moses got on Mount Sinai for the Ark of the Covenant and how to decorate the tent where they’d keep it.”

“Never mind that last week was Mishpatim where they lay out the rules for free labor,” Bettina said. “Post-Exodus codification of ethical slavery. Hmph!”

“Well your mom’s the family scholar, that’s for sure!” Ralph said. “But, do you see anything related to uh-”

“Terumah,” Bettina said.

“Right, Terumah here? Like, anything?”

“Um, shiny decorations?”

“Carew,” Ralph said.

“Well I think it’s a really fun party, and Aviva looks beautiful!” Carew said. “I mean, look how much fun Mom’s having!”

But even with his balls distorting every signal his brain received, Carew knew there was no point in arguing with people who believed they were doing God’s work, and that the smartest thing would be to warn his friends that his bar mitzvah was going to be… unusual.

The Shapiros biked home through the faint crispness of early Spring. Ralph ignored his son’s subdued disappointment (he was beginning to feel deceptive about all of Carew’s feelings and activities he pretended not to notice), while simultaneously making it seem like keeping up with Carew was a struggle, knowing Carew was no dummy and that too much obtuse encouragement would be identified as the pathetic compensation it really was. Inhaling deeply, imagining his family crashing through the remnants of winter, the contrast between how Ralph felt and how he wanted Carew to think he felt amounted to a level of manipulation that made him very uncomfortable. Bettina cruised ahead in the biking gear she’d changed into after cake was served. The moon came in sight and Ralph decided that blow-softening wasn’t manipulation. It was kindness. And parents always guided their children, whether they noticed it or not, and if anything, Carew should have as great a sense of autonomy as possible. So Ralph kept his tongue dangling in faux exhaustion as they approached the biggest hill they’d tackle between the Marriott and their house.

With her toes clipped to her pedals, Bettina was halfway up the hill before Carew started climbing, Ralph not far behind. Her breathing was easier and skin drier than it had gotten in the thick of the Romanian folk dance she’d been sure to explain to Ralph and Carew had been appropriated as “Jewish tradition” by kibbutzniks in British-mandated Palestine in the 1920s. As ever, she’d assured her husband and son that the hora’s ersatz authenticity shouldn’t diminish the joy it brought to families who assumed their ancestors had been stomping, circling and hoisting for centuries. But that was one more thing to cross off the list on Carew’s big day.

“Come on, you two,” she called back down the hill.

The asphalt sparkled under the sodium lights, wiped briefly dark by their passing shadows. Ralph raised from his seat to put more body weight on his pedals. Though he’d long outgrown the bitterness he carried from his own bar mitzvah 34 years earlier, he could still hear the clang of metal chairs unfolding on his family’s cracked driveway while his father set plastic bottles of off-brand soda on a card table in preparation for the spare, poorly attended celebration of his attainment of Jewish manhood. He remembered coming home from school that Friday, hoping for some rest before services that night. But his father needed him to clear out the garage so they could set up a ping pong table borrowed from the synagogue before Sabbath began. Ralph tried to muster gratitude for his parents’ efforts, mainly because he loved and genuinely appreciated them, but also because he sensed his father was testing him, daring him to complain, or even betray a glimmer of disappointment that no hall would be rented, no meal would be served and Saturday night’s dj would be Grandma Corrine playing her favorite cassettes on his boombox. Ralph hoped that he’d been gentle enough with his father’s pride that an unspoken accord was reached, one that recognized how gracefully Ralph handled the weight of expectations his father was placing on him. But, as he stood on the ping pong table wrapping a lone blue streamer around the dangling lightbulb, it felt eerily like the perfect time for his dad to offer some sign, some expression of appreciation, not only for the flawless job he’d done in front of the entire congregation that morning, but for the perfect dutifulness and lack of entitlement he’d shown in its aftermath. But, like so many of his Hebrew school classmates who had better things to do that night, this was one more rejected invitation. Now that Ralph could stand and be counted as a member of his community, the faith he’d maintained and even bolstered that his father was watching him intently for signs of true manhood was shaken by a suspicion that the real message his father was sending him, intentionally or not, was get used to disappointment. And Ralph’s response had been a private vow that when he had children, they would know that he was proud of them. And when they reached adolescence, he would celebrate them lavishly.

Carew pedaled harder, catching Bettina near the top of the hill, and as Ralph crested a few seconds behind, he loosened his tie to let the wind of the downhill cool his hot, sweaty neck, amazed by how wildly he could vascillate between feeling like he’d arrived at a given moment along a coherent, linear path, and the more realistic sense that a man’s life entailed cracking, spilling, gutting and rotting before hurriedly gathering up the filthy encampment one laughably called the self, and how fraudulent but necessary it seemed to keep zooming out until the whole mess was far enough away to seem whole again.

The trio turned onto their street and Carew and Bettina broke into an all out race. Ralph hung back, hearing his wife and son laugh as they shot, Tron-like toward the three-story house they’d owned since Carew was 9. He still got a jolt of dopamine from attributing his success to discipline and hard work. But as soon as they’d met, Bettina told him about the “green lights for whites,” ticking off a list of unacknowledged advantages he’d been granted by seeming, even as a Jew, acceptable while so many people of color worked harder than Ralph ever did, only to wind up in Ralph’s parents’ neighborhood, so much more grateful for so much less that they still sent their kids off to fight wars to protect such sacred privileges. The way Bettina’s discourse swooped in for intricate detail, then back up to the general idea had an electric effect on Ralph. He listened eagerly as she described how black people stuffed themselves into “honky-ass personas” just to be considered for a job, a raise, a clerkship, a business loan, a taxi ride, an office lease, only to be perceived as threatening anyway, and the resilience it took to go through that much self-betrayal. Sitting with her over coffee, Ralph felt cleansed of whatever residual self-pity he still carried from his modest upbringing, and he loved her instantly. He loved how fiercely she inspired him to be a better man than he thought he could be. He loved how Bettina helped him love himself more.

Carew beat Bettina by a few bike lengths and Ralph opened the garage with his phone. They hung their bikes from hooks on the giant peg board Carew and he had put up the previous summer, and hung their helmets from their handlebars.

“Can I play FIFA for a little while?” Carew asked as they entered the house through the garage.

“What chapter are you on in your book?” Bettina asked.

“Um, the one where Menelaus retrieves Patroclus’s body from the battlefield.”

“Book 17. Alright. Don’t stay up too late.”

“Thanks mom!”

Carew dashed further into the house while Ralph and Bettina shared their special “that boy’s alright” smile with each other.

Bettina knew more history, but Ralph had more history with bar mitzvahs. They were able to acknowledge this difference and felt assured that they could avoid a conflation that might damage the harmony with which they were enlisting their son to enjoy a much more serious type of bar mitzvah. But as much as they wanted to believe there was no daylight between their values and those of their adolescent son, Ralph had caught signs of Carew wobbling, lololol’ing at offensive jokes in chat rooms, exaggerating how much he bench-pressed, shunning some of the kids he’d played with since kindergarten, shrugging and looking at the ground when speaking with other adults; all normal, but still disappointing. Maybe now wasn’t the best time for statements some might call radical, statements that might knock Carew over just when he needed more shoring up. Ralph understood that harboring notions of secret, nay conspiratorial alliances with his son was an invocation of exactly the kind of privilege Bettina loved him for purposefully eschewing. But he began to wonder, Am I limiting myself for the sake of wokeness? It was an insidious thought, a damn spot he couldn’t scrub out, which is why he avoided sharing it with Bettina. Because she was right. A teenager’s well-being had nothing to do with caterers and fog machines.

Since becoming a widower when Carew was 10, Ralph’s father came over every Friday for dinner. Tension got high enough often enough that the ritual never felt permanent, like any Friday might be the last one. But seven nights later, he’d be out on the front porch in his houndstooth fedora, holding a half-gallon of non-dairy mint chip. On the Friday six weeks before his bar mitzvah, Carew went out on a limb.

“Grandpa Eddie, have you ever heard of Utnaphishtim?” Carew asked after his grandfather had blessed the wine and bread.

“Who?”

Carew looked at his mother like he needed help. He did, but not the way Bettina thought.

“Utnapishtim,” Bettina said. “A character in the Epic of Gilgamesh who mirrors Noah in the Torah.”

“Oh boy,” Eddie said. “Here we go. Alright, let’s get it over with. Come on, come on. Do I need to take notes?”

“It’s-” Carew began, knowing his mom would take the bait and activate a high and mighty tone that Carew loved, whenever it wasn’t directed at him.

“It’s contextual, Eddie, and no I will not apologize for using that big, fancy term,” Bettina said. “Because we want Carew to understand the cultural values of-”

“Cultural values?” Eddie said. “The Jewish People-”

“They weren’t Jews, Eddie,” Bettina said.

“They were Hebrews!” Carew and Ralph said in unison.

“My favorite part of the evening,” Eddie said. “When my daughter-in-law gives me Judaism lessons. Actually Bettina, the Hebrews split into the Judaeans, aka ‘Jews,’ and Israelites around 2600 years ago. So as I was saying, while other cults in the desert were trying to make camels fly, the Jewish People invented the very concept of ‘cultural values’. What happened to the people that wrote this other flood story?”

“Dad would you please pass the broccoli?”

“OK, Eddie,” Bettina said. “Sorry for getting pedantic. No offense.”

“None taken,” Eddie said. “And the chicken’s delicious tonight, too.”

“It’s just that we’re very excited.”

This is what Carew was waiting for.

“Oh yeah?” Eddie asked.

Bettina looked hopefully at Ralph, who took his cue.

“Dad,” he said. “We’re taking on the Bar Mitzvah Industrial Complex!”

“Really,” Eddie said, showing no signs of awareness that Ralph’s bar mitzvah was the moment when things began to change between them. “And how do you plan on doing that? No wait, lemme guess. You’re renting a cruise ship and filling it with endangered animals.”

“Cruise ship?!” Carew said. “Like one with a big water slide?”

“Carew,” Ralph said. “No one’s renting a cruise ship.”

“Uh Ralph,” Eddie said. “Are you ever gonna give that broccoli back?”

Carew continued his studies, still hopeful Grandpa Eddie might make enough trouble to steer his parents’ lances toward a different windmill. In one of his weekly meetings with Rabbi Foreman, he asked the rabbi what made Noah so superior to the rest of the antediluvian global population? If the life expectancy was upwards of 500 back then, didn’t that mean people were treating each other better than they did nowadays? And what about all the animals on the Ark? Were they the moral exceptions to their species too, or were those left behind just innocent casualties of mankind’s iniquity? Most students just wanted to memorize the Hebrew so they didn’t embarrass their parents when the big day came, so Rabbi Foreman was thrilled by Carew’s inquisitiveness. On the other hand, he was in too much demand as it was, and afraid that kindling too much warmth with the Shapiros would make it harder to fend off Bettina’s involvement in more synagogue affairs. The recycling program she’d implemented was one thing, writing letters to supermax inmates another, and it was too hard to explain the thorniness to Carew’s mother without exposing himself to accusations of complicity in society’s dooming actions. Still, when a young congregant was genuinely curious about Torah, his rabbi should the last person to mute that interest.

So he explained about Nephilim, the semi-angelic beings in the previous chapter, who had intermingled with mankind to produce giants not only capable of fathering children in their 500s, but of building watercraft that could rescue all of life on Earth. Rabbi Foreman spun the same yarn Carew’s parents did, about how research used to be relatives’ encyclopedias and trips to the library and requests by mail to the Smithsonian Institute, and how he wondered if the knowledge stuck as well when it was easier to come by.

“So you see,” the rabbi said. “These ancestors, they were heroic in the ways that mattered most to our people, mentally, morally, and yes, physically.”

“Or maybe,” Carew said. “They exaggerated their virility because men who subjugated women back then were just as insecure about their masculinity as they are now.”

“Maybe,” Rabbi Foreman said, stroking his beard and looking at the clock.

The rabbi thought about the passage immediately following the Earth’s restoration of habitability. It was only three verses, about post-flood humanity’s attempt to build a tower to the heavens. Maybe they were just striving for safety beyond the floodline. But even if their reasons were not as noble, Rabbi Foreman never really understood why mankind’s unity incurred the wrath of God. What was so wicked about working together to build something great? Or was the destruction of a great tower and the scattering of its tiny inhabitants supposed to be a much more symbolic rebuke of toxic masculinity?

“Rabbi Foreman?” Carew said.

“Yes.”

“I asked if we could meet a little later next week? I’m supposed to visit that dairy my parents talked to you about.”

The following week, in the car on the way to Telmont’s Dairy Farm, Carew dispensed with all subtleties and socraticisms and spoke openly about his feelings.

“I feel trapped,” he said.

“The windows are shut to keep out the manure smell, buddy,” Ralph said.

“Dad.”

Bettina shot Ralph a look and he dropped his innocence act at once.

“Trapped, you say?”

“No. Mom. I just- look. I know how that sounds. But yeah. Like I feel like I either have to be in lockstep with you guys or I’m a bad person. Feels… stifling.”

All three Shapiros stared out of their respective windows at the farmland they were passing, the corn and tobacco fields just beginning to brown, the pasture sod stiffening at the tips. Carew drummed on the little shelf by his door.

“Carew,” Bettina said. “What would make you feel better?”

“I mean,” he said, struggling to keep his voice even. “Just, a normal party? Where our friends and family can have fun instead of being reminded of how short they’re all falling?”

Bettina parked the car by the dairy office and turned around to face her son.

“But they are falling short, son,” she said. “Even we, who work so hard, don’t always embody our ideals. Do we, honey?”

Carew shook his head, unable to keep tears from springing forth.

“I’m sorry,” he said.

“Well you should be!” Ralph said.

“Ralph!”

“No! Look at this!” Ralph said. “Oh I want a big party, OMG stop making me feel so guilty! How in the world have all the years we’ve put into raising him amounted to this?”

Carew wept more openly. His mother handed him a recycled tissue.

“Fine,” Carew said. “Let’s go commune with beasts.”

“No,” Bettina said. “Wait a second!”

Carew and Ralph were already out of the car, refusing to look at each other. Both were confused, but Ralph’s impulse to project certainty was stronger. Carew seemed to have already abandoned whatever that little rebellion in the car was, but something felt unsettled.

A screen door squeaked open and whacked shut. A large woman in a Doc Martens and a tattered gingham dress crunched across the gravel to greet them. Both of her arms were fully sleeved in tattoos.

“Hi!” she said. “Zippy Telmont. Y’all must be the Shapiros!”

Bettina was still in the car. Carew’s face was still streaked and puffy. Ralph was still too furious and confused to be authentically friendly.

“Yeah,” he said. “Zippy. Could you, would you mind if I just talked to my son for a minute here? Alone?”

“OK. I did think y’all were the ones on a tight schedule, but…” Zippy lowered her face to her phone and walked back into the office, murmuring to herself.

Carew glared at his father, sensing his doubts, silently accusing him of bullying. Ralph stood guilty as charged, trying to slow his breathing. And maybe it was the inhalation of cow patty fumes, but suddenly Ralph was disgusted by the dairy, and ashamed of their plan to bring friends and family there to work the land alongside the addicts and runaways Telmont employed. His hands were balled up and he wanted to get back in the car and drive away and never come back. Looking around, his gaze fixed on a brightly painted silo jutting from behind the office. It took him a moment to decipher the nursery rhyme splashed along its walls, the red and blue Holstein’s lunar leap, the laughing mutt, cheshire musician and romantically involved tablewear all waving from the back of a psychedelic haywagon. Bettina finally got out of the car, but stayed where she was, giving Ralph a chance to resolve his own outburst. Ralph just stared at the silo, hoping Carew might look at it too, and find a better message in its cartoon than anything Ralph could think of to say. Carew blew his nose and shrugged at his dad.

“Ready?” Ralph asked. Carew nodded and Bettina came to join them. Zippy loomed behind the screendoor. Ralph beckoned her and she came out and shook everyone’s hand.

“Alright!” she said, squeezing Carew’s shoulder with an absent-mindedness that felt studied. “Lemme show y’all around.”

Two weeks later, Carew Daniel Shapiro flanked Rabbi Foreman on the pulpit. Facing a sanctuary packed with family, friends and fellow congregants, Carew recited the blessings that bracketed the last four verses of Genesis 11, and his Jewish adulthood was official. He also read chapters 7-10 in Hebrew, and chanted chapters 54 and 55 from the Book of Isaiah. The pervading theme of both readings was the assurance of post-flood humanity’s survival.

In his speech, Carew got tepid laughter from a line about the flood in Genesis being “the ultimate Chapter 11.” He wondered aloud what bar mitzvah boys 1000 years ago thought about Noah. Did 600 year-old superancestors seem as improbable to pre-Enlightenment teenagers as they did to millenial ones? Or were medeival communities superstitious enough to believe such holiness and longevity were still within reach? Carew paused for effect, paying extra attention to his mother in the front row. Her eyes were glistening and he knew he was on the right track. He pivoted to a bit about how common language wasn’t much of a safeguard from miscommunication and saw that Bettina was so rapt by what her son was saying that she didn’t even look around the sanctuary to check everybody else’s reaction. Carew closed his speech by quoting God’s promise to Noah:

“So long as the earth endures,

Seedtime and harvest,

Cold and heat,

Summer and winter,

Day and night

Shall not cease.

Shabbat Shalom.”

Carew stepped back from the podium. Knowing he was a few hours away from getting bossed around by people with much bigger problems, while covered in dung, he tried to bask as presently as he could in this moment. The most prominent face in the front row now was his grandfather’s. Eddie was brimming with such pride that he unconsciously clapped a hand on his son’s thigh. And at that moment, for the first time in a long time, everything was alright with Ralph.

#shortfiction #fiction #bar mitzvah #writing #stories #Judaism #short stories #short fiction #Noah #Noah's Ark #"Tower of Babel

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perksofwifi · 5 years ago

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Four Is the Furious: Mercedes-AMG Reveals New CLA 45

Watch out, BMW M2 and Audi RS3: There’s a new contender for the hyper-compact crown.

The Mercedes-AMG CLA 45 lives again, now with far more power and performance than before. Packing the new M139 turbocharged 2.0-liter I-4 engine—the most powerful production four-cylinder in the world—the CLA 45 throws down 382 hp and 354 lb-ft. A more potent version of this engine makes 416 ponies.

That’s largely thanks to its turbocharger, which features improved ducting and low-friction roller bearings to aid response and deliver a maximum of 30 psi. AMG engineers worked to give the punchy powerplant a naturally aspirated feel, indicated by its 4,750 rpm torque peak and 7,200 rpm redline.

It’s all bolted to an eight-speed dual-clutch transmission with paddle shifters, which sends power through AMG’s 4MATIC+ all-wheel-drive system. While front-wheel-drive based, the system constantly distributes power between the axles, and can deliver it variably between the left or right side.

With launch control, this drivetrain allows a 0-60 sprint of 4.0 seconds, on to a 168-mph top speed unlocked by an optional driver’s package. Optional too is drift mode, which, like in its E63 stablemate, sends power solely to the rear axle for—as AMG puts it—”even more driving pleasure.” Keep in mind the cost of the CLA 45’s 235/55 R 19 tires before hitting that button.

Changes over the standard CLA improve dynamic response. Bracing in the engine bay increases front-end stiffness, while diagonal struts on the underbody tighten the rear section. Model-specific suspension elements, including springs and shock absorbers, work with adaptive dampers to provide driver-selectable modes ranging from Mercedes-soft to AMG-stiff. Additional drive-select modes adapt the car to conditions, whether around town cruising, wet road treading, or racetrack ripping.

Compared to the previous CLA 45, designers worked to further differentiate it from the base car. It now wears the AMG-signature trapezoidal multi-slat grille, which works with the squinting headlights to give the car a ferocious visage. The lower fascia features twin inlets to feed heat exchangers, surrounded by aerodynamic splitter elements. Around back, double double-barrel exhaust tips sunken into the diffuser blat out what’s sure to be a delightfully crackly exhaust note. A trunklid spoiler and front bumper dive planes come with an optional aero package.

The interior gains visual distinctions including front bucket seats and a flat-bottomed steering wheel. Lest you forget you’re inside the sport model, AMG reminds you with available red or yellow seat belts, dashboard stitching and trim, and air vent surrounds (yellow trim is part of a special edition). Brushed steel pedals and door sills further the theme. Like the standard CLA, the 45 includes Mercedes’ MBUX infotainment system. Here, however, it features AMG-specific readouts which show a g-force meter, manual-mode gear display, and engine data such as temperatures or real-time power output.

With the A-Class now opening the door to entry-level Mercedes-Benz ownership, the CLA is elevated as a more stylish, sporty offering. That’s especially true of this new 45 AMG, which sits at the top of the range with the CLA 35 AMG below. It competes against other hardcore compacts like the BMW M2 and Audi RS3, and certain super-hatchbacks like the Honda Civic Type R or Volkswagen Golf R. Regardless, based on how the original CLA 45 performed, we’re guessing its successor will be more than good—we can’t wait to get behind the wheel.

The 2020 Mercedes-AMG CLA 45 will go on sale by the end of the year in the U.S. Pricing has not yet been announced.

Photos of the Euro-spec CLA 45 are shown. Note that the 416-hp AMG CLA 45 S seen in these photos has not been announced for the U.S. market.

The post Four Is the Furious: Mercedes-AMG Reveals New CLA 45 appeared first on MotorTrend.

https://www.motortrend.com/news/2020-mercedes-amg-cla-45/ visto antes em https://www.motortrend.com

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the-light-of-stars · 6 years ago

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It’s Alright @bluerosesburnblue 😅 I’m gonna try to post with a read more, though, please tell me if it works

[READ MORE]

So, I didn’t know that about Mundungus @wilhelminafujita , but you’re right it means he would’ve recognized the mark and wouldntve just described it as a dragon/snake tattoo. Also, I think as far as we know it doesn’t seem like the cabal are purists, but striving for power etc. for other reasons. Which would also contradict them being a subgroup of death eaters.

And the vaults themselves don’t hold anything, according to that sidequest with Nearly headless Nick. Like I mentioned in a previous reblog, their purpose is building some sort of magical protection ring for something that’s hidden in the center of said ring - which means to find that you’d need to know the location of all vaults. The question is wether they’re acting as a protection keeping others from using whatever it is for evil, or wether they’re a safeguard holding it back lest it would cause great suffering once set free. And opening all vaults and breaking their curses is the way to destroy that ring of protection.

About the floo network: see, I DID think about it, that’s why I said it’s likely MC doesn’t know about it because their parents didn’t want them to. That children know what the pedals and switches on cars are for is something different from the floo network, though, because cars are hard to handle, and it’s very obvious when someone took them, while the floo network is easily accessible and no one will know you used it until they search for you. I think a better comparison might be the internet. You see, MC said their parents are very strict, and that their mother didn’t allow them to have a broom because she didn’t want them to run away like Jacob, so it’s likely their parents were restricting their children’s freedom earlier, too. MC and Jacob likely grew up at home, without much contact to other children until they went to school, probably not allowed to go outside alone either until then. speaking from personal experience: if you parents don’t want you to know about something, you will not know about it unless you have contact to people from the outside world. Even if your parents often use the thing they don’t want you to know about, because they’ll do so in secret. And since MC and Jacob likely didn’t have such contact until they went to Hogwarts it’s likely they didn’t have a way to know about floo before that. Not to mention MC was a small child then so they likely didn’t even notice their parents hid something from them.

And yes, it’s also not just the Santa Claus thing, which could be explained by the mother not believing in such a myth, but in the Christmas quest that’s currently running MC also doesn’t recognize a toaster as ..well, a toaster. Instead they can say that it’s some kind of box for safekeeping, a weapon used to bludgeon people, or they can say they think it’s used for food, but they also mention the last option is just a guess on their part. They also didn’t know what a cable is used for. And I don’t think their mother wouldn’t have a toaster or electricity in her house unless she didn’t know about things like that either.

And I’m not sure about the surname part. Maybe Merula just didn’t use MCs surname against them because their father/parents weren’t outright purists but only supporters? Personally I think it wouldn’t make sense for there to be so many rumors of Jacob being a death eater if he wasn’t a pureblood. Even Merula says things like that, and she should know the criteria for joining that group.

MC will only have the map if they manage to get it back from Rakepick, though, but otherwise I agree.

And about your last point: yes they’re indeed showing parallels. And MC already has been acting different than Jacob - even though they’re showing many parallels - for example like you mentioned they’ve got a lot of friends that they can rely on, while Jacob was alone with his thoughts and his guilt concerning Duncan and the others he endangered. I wonder if the players decisions throughout the game will influence the stories outcome, though. For example wether or not you told Penny to drink that carelessness potion, that could’ve put her in a coma if brewed incorrectly. Because if you allowed her to, MC might’ve acted more like Jacob did when he let Duncan brew that dangerous potion alone.

@the-light-of-stars Ah, that’s a shame. Hope you don’t mind me hiding your reply, then, for people avoiding spoilers!

Keep reading

#hphm #hphm spoilers #long post

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ezonrasslin · 8 years ago

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7 Chris Jericho Catchphrases Ranked Better to Best

Here's one for all you Jerichoholics!

2016 was one wild year, and nowhere showed it more than the world of pro wrestling. Despite all the turbulent change in the WWE the return of Chris Jericho at Night of Champions in 2015 pointed towards a back-pedal. Ignoring all the negativity swelling around him Jericho insisted once more that he would ��save the company” going into 2016 - and that he did.

Reinventing and restoring his character to new heights, despite his power ranking having drifted he always managed to outshine his “juniors” at the discretion of the crowd. Y2J’s mic skills and general presence are so masterful he managed to turn a clipboard list into one of the most over devices on WWE television at the conclusion of 2016. Ridiculous.

In a year engulfed by meme culture, Chris Jericho paraded caricature and cliché in a way that only the GOAT ever could. He’s solidified his legacy as a staple of every era of WWE he’s performed in, his addictive words forever ingrained in wrestling lingo. Now, the new United States Champion has the WWE Universe at his feet.

To these 7 Catchphrases...

7. The Man Of 1,004 Holds

The "Man of 1,004 holds" had more than 1,004 words readily available at his disposal, so why not congregate them into a list?

This only scratches the surface of Jericho's WCW run, but it was an indicator of unique charisma and innovation unlike anything else around him. Feuding with profound technical wrestler Dean Malenko, the Cruiserweight Champion took to 1998 episode of WCW Monday Night Nitro post-match to proclaim his superiority. To out-do Malenko, hailed as the "Man of 1000 holds", he'd have to up the ante.

From the mundane and repetitive "Armbar" to the outlandish and yet-to-be-seen "Saskatchewan spinning nerve hold", the original List of Jericho promo is one of the most memorable and critically acclaimed of all time. The Lionheart exuded charm, even in early days.

6. The Gift Of Jericho

The modern manifestation of the 5 Second Pose, Jericho firmly grasps the WWE Universe in his hands when he unveils the Gift of Jericho.

Succeeding to shake off the now-stale shell of his former self, Jericho took on a whole new life post-WrestleMania 32. Originally a gift to Dean Ambrose, with this new life came a whole new catalogue of fresh catch phrases. The same premise remained - Jericho sees himself as the salvation of the WWE, a literal gift to all those he graces with his presence.

Sporting the $15,000 light up jacket or not, he's a sight to behold. Whether it's a warning to his opponent or a pander to the crowd, someone's going to get "IT". Chris Jericho, is simply a gift. Drink it in, maaaaaaaaan!

5. I Am The Best In The World At What I Do

Do you understand what I'm saying to you right now? He told us he was the best, and we trusted him. Maybe he really is the Ayatollah (of Rock 'n' Rolla).

Jericho has never been shy to declare how great he is, first proclaiming himself as the "best in the world" at what he does after winning the World Heavyweight Championship in 2008. This was an unprecedented high point in his career, as his award-winning feud with Shawn Michaels continues to be hailed as a modern classic.

Proving that he was the best encouraged his return in 2012, as he derided the WWE Champion CM Punk of being unworthy of calling himself “Best in the World.” For all his physical talent and accomplishments, his presence alone could always raise the bar.

4. Stupid Idiot

It started as a fleeting insult and would soon spread like wildfire. Yes, we are idiots.

No one was safe from the wrath of Chris Jericho throughout 2016 shortly prior to WrestleMania and forever afterwards. Whether he was slapping his opponent around in the ring and echoing "you're a stupid man", insulting Tom Phillips backstage, or calling everything in plain sight (fans included) "Stupid Idiots", it would eventually become the most over crowd chant of the year, and a welcome addition to Jericho's dialogue.

However, this one's more than two elementary insults. It's everything from the shirtless scarf-adorned arrogance, the flick of the wrist whenever someone makes the list, the best-friend banter - Chris Jericho is positively infectious.

3. Would You PLEASE, Shut, The Hell, Up!

Absolute text book Jericho, and applicable in all face/heel situations.

The Invasion angle was in full swing when Jericho went head-to-head with the Rock, and the calibre of their promos make them absolute must-sees for any wrestling fan. While the Rock is often remembered as the best smack-talker the WWE has ever seen, lest we forget the time Jericho completely obliterated the Brahma Bull with one line. It would crop up again at the most unexpected and sometimes inappropriate of times, because the crowd took it on as their own.

Jericho never stood for being put in his place. Realistically he never should have been the first WWF Undisputed Champion with the Rock and Stone Cold in contention, but he continues to prove to this day that anyone who says he didn't deserve to be, is out of their mind.

2. Raw is Jericho

It's still true today. Whenever Jericho makes a comeback, he owns the show. From the instant he first stepped foot in the WWF when the 'Countdown to Millennium' came to a close, a new era began. Jericho immediately stole the spotlight on his debut in 1999, interrupting the company's biggest star at the time, the Rock. Despite his size, he was always destined to be a larger-than-life star.

Regardless of how busy he is - touring with Fozzy, running a successful podcast, or main eventing Monday Night Raw - Jericho has without a doubt been a workhorse of the company throughout his entire career. His passion for the WWE is evident every time he steps in the ring.

His iconic arms-outstretched pose, the high ponytail or the smug goatee, whatever he may look like, his image will always come hand-in-hand with WWE's 'flagship show’.

1. - Will Never EVER Be The Same Again

In his second ever WWE appearance, Jericho interrupted The Undertaker and the Big Show to proclaim Raw would "never, EEEVER be the same again" upon his arrival.

If anyone knows how to make a lasting impact, it's Y2J. He goes beyond the dramatic returns - the cryptic vignettes featuring codes that would be revealed as "Save us Y2J" in 2007, or his momentous return at the Rumble in 2013. He brought something new every time, be in a new finisher, a fresh hair cut, a newfound nostalgia act, or even a new catchphrase.

Fast forward to today, and the theme still applies - Jericho was put on this earth to save us wrestling diehards, and there doesn't seem to be any slowing down for him, having just captured the US title for the first time. An innovator, a creator, a God amongst men, Y2J continues to change the face of pro wrestling. Again and again, and contrary to what might have been said as little as a year go, the image of Jericho has personified the turn of a new leaf, and moreover, a lasting legacy.

youtube

#Chris Jericho #WWE #wrestling #catchphrases #attitude era #new era #Ruthless Aggression #y2j #list of jericho #raw #stupid idiot #drink it in man #the gift of jericho

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rossjoedwards · 8 years ago

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Why We Long For Culture Shock

Sometimes the most obvious facts are ones that escape us again and again in our daily lives. For example, looking at my past I see that I am a very different person than I was only a year ago, and yet, in my everyday experience my personality seems to change at a glacial pace, if at all. Perhaps other people are the best authority for viewing changes within ourselves: when you reunite with an old friend, you suddenly feel torn between two identities, and the changes within yourself become obvious.

The transformation of our personalities is obscured partly because our daily routine is structured around the idea of stability in our personalities. For practical effect, we stick to our routines: working everyday, seeing the same people everyday, returning to the same restaurants and bars and so on. Our environment encourages repetitive behavior. In fact, our whole society is structured around it. What would life be like if no one was expected to do at least some of the same things every day? I suspect we’d have a culture of well-rounded charlatans, with greater breadth of experience, but far less skill.

The stasis of routine might explain the appeal of traveling. The term ‘culture shock’ accurately portrays the jolt we feel from exposing ourselves to unimaginably novel daily routines. Lest we fall victim to the idea that we are ‘fixed,’ that our personalities don’t change, that there is nothing new under the sun, we visit somewhere new, basking in the unfamiliar. Take Japan, for example.

I studied jazz performance in college, and in four years I played, studied, and heard every variation of the genre from dixieland to bebop to free jazz to experiments beyond definition. My musical cohorts and I lived and breathed jazz history, while familiarizing ourselves with the always exciting New York jazz scene. None of this prepared me for my experience at a club in Tokyo. My girlfriend found the place, nestled beneath a row of indistinguishable skyscrapers, packed with studious, stern-faced musical seekers, and surprisingly expensive. A nine-piece band whose name I sadly will never recall took the stage and counted off into a pitch-perfect (almost too perfect) impersonation of early ‘60s post-bop. They were incredible. Every note was exactly in place - a stunning impersonation, performed with obvious reverence for jazz history. With one exception: the cello player.

Hidden in back, stage left, sat a middle aged man with wild hair, obscured partly by a worn cello, feet flying eagerly at a row of effects pedals. From the first to the last note of each song, as the eight others deftly executed musical calculations, the cellist thrashed at his instrument, producing squeals of atonal noise filtered through digital delays and distortions. He was like a tuneless whirlwind, spreading chaos over immaculate cityscapes, never hesitant or self-conscious.

The schizophrenic combination of tradition and spontaneity was, to me, a culture shock like I’d never heard. It was brilliant. What a genuinely strange blend of noise and clarity! Who would ever think to do such a thing? Certainly no one in my musical background was capable of that effortless, earnest cacophony. I’ll never forget it.

Of course, we don’t only experience life-changing moments across the world, but often enough in our homes, as readers and lovers know. Culture shock remains the same, however, in that we never expect it. It hits us out of the blue, even when the source is someone we’ve known for years. Our reaction to the shock is a surprise even to ourselves.

The lesson to be learned is profound: our lives are, at some level, circumstantial. The consistency of our daily lives provides a bedrock from which we extrapolate our stable, independent selves, but when this consistency is altered we feel ourselves as dependent, as components of an environment, reacting naturally to whatever comes our way.

This idea is scary. It undermines the sense of security about our very identities. But, on the other hand, accepting this insecurity gives us a more accurate sense of self as interconnected with environment, rather than independent from it. We start to see life as a flow of shifting relationships, rather than a battle between fixed entities. Exciting, isn’t it? We never know what’s going to mess up our routines, and reveal something we didn’t know about ourselves.

The painting above is Jackson Pollack’s Number 8, 1949.

#culture #shock #jazz #tokyo #japan #self #growth #acceptance #personality

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nancydhooper · 5 years ago

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Murum Aries Attigit, Y'all

Tell them boys they can have the statue and $2.5m… US dollars, that is.

This here case is a pretty good story.

It all starts in Orange County, North Carolina. Folks there, well, everywhere, say the wheels of justice turn slowly. But, a few weeks ago, Lady Justice traded in her robe and blindfold for a pair of short cutoff jeans, tossed her scales into the kudzu on the side of a dusty road, and grabbed the keys to a bright orange 1969 Dodge Charger. She jumped in one window and Mendacius rode shotgun. The two of them let out a cry that bystanders called “a foxhunt yip mixed up with sort of a banshee squall.”

She pushed the pedal to the metal and made those 426 cubic inches growl through Orange County (North Carolina, that is) at such a speed that I do say that ol’ road’s hills flattened and its curves straightened for her. She screeched on up back to the courthouse hoping to return before anyone noticed her joyride had taken her from her post. She skidded to a stop, but those wheels were spinning just a bit too fast for her to brake in enough time to avoid running right over poor Veritas, who ironically was waiting outside for her daddy – who always did seem to dawdle when he was in that building. Lady Justice crawled out of the car window and put her blindfold back on, lest she see with her own eyes the consequences of leaving her post to go on such a joyride. And while she blindly wept, Mendacius grabbed her robes and scales and ran right in that courthouse to set things just the way he liked em – dirty.

Now Mr. Doucette ain’t no Greek god, but he might be mistaken for one mythological figure – Mr. Clean. Acts like him too – at least in this story. He’s a lawyer in North Carolina now, but once upon a time, he was on the Board of Governors of the University of North Carolina (“UNC”).

Way back, more than a hundred years ago, a group of ladies went around calling themselves the United Daughters of the Confederacy and putting up monuments to that lost cause. Now this was pretty darn ironic, since General Lee, himself, believed memorials like this would just keep the wounds of the Civil War open. He famously said “I think it well, moreover, not to keep open the sores of war, but to follow the examples of those nations who endeavored to obliterate the marks of civil strife and to commit to oblivion the feelings it engendered.”. Well who am I to argue with Robert E. Lee?

I might not be nobody to argue with the General, but a bunch of folks down South didn’t have so much respect for what he wanted. And those former slaves around that time were getting a bit what folks called “uppity.” It was right about 1908 when the started the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People, or as you know it, the NAACP. They started asking for things like “rights” and “equality.” So those nice ladies went around with smiles as wide as their hats and didn’t have to work to hard to convince the powers that be all across the South to start putting up monuments to General Lee’s lost cause, and nobody paid any mind to what he said about ‘em.

Along came “Silent Sam” – a pretty tall feller made all out of bronze who these nice ladies with a not-so-nice mission got put right there at the front door to the University of North Carolina, in a position of honor. Now that was a pretty ironic kind of position for him to be in, since his mission was about as dishonorable as the soldier he represented. Where the real thing was there to preserve slavery, Sam was there to remind Black people that, if Joss Whedon will indulge me and forgive me, the Confederates might have been on the losing side, but they weren’t quite convinced it was the wrong one.

When they oh so ironically pulled the sheet off of Silent Sam in 1913, this KKK supporter named Julian Carr spoke from his heart, and told the crowd that the Confederate soldiers it honored had saved “the very life of the Anglo Saxon race in the South,” and told the following story:

“One hundred yards from where we stand, less than ninety days perhaps after my return from Appomattox, I horse-whipped a negro wench until her skirts hung in shreds, because upon the streets of this quiet village she had publicly insulted and maligned a Southern lady, and then rushed for protection to these University buildings where was stationed a garrison of 100 Federal soldiers. I performed the pleasing duty in the immediate presence of the entire garrison, and for thirty nights afterwards slept with a double-barrel shot gun under my head.”

Nobody really remembered that until about 2018, but about then someone dug it up. With a metaphorical flamethrower taken to the tale that Sam stood there as a solemn testament to “southern pride,” some people just couldn’t take looking at him anymore – so they got together and damn if they didn’t tear that statue right down. Now that might not have been the polite, legal, or gentlemanly thing to do. And, I’m not one for giving a pass to destroying art or public property. But, I can still say, with no insincerity at all, that I damn well understand.

It don't end there. You see there’s this group of good ol boys, call themselves the North Carolina Sons of Confederate Veterans. We’re sure that some of ‘em are pretty nice guys and they mean well. But, them all that run it, they’re still a bit put out that you can buy an old Dodge Charger in the Auto Trader, but there’s no similar publication to buy and sell yourself a Negro, if y’all is so inclined.

So let's fast forward to November 27, 2019 – when the Sons of Confederate Veterans filed a lawsuit, despite lacking standing to bring it, against UNC for its failure to put Silent Sam back in his place of honor. (check it out) Despite the fact that the plaintiffs lacked standing, seven minutes after the suit was filed, a state court judge approved a settlement between the parties. Whoooo-eeee! Thats there where I was talking about earlier with Lady Justice using all 426 cubic inches of that engine!

Well, in those seven minutes, the Sons of Confederate Veterans got themselves the Silent Sam statue and slap my ass and call me Sally if they didn’t also get $2.5 million United States dollars from the University too. Now if that don’t beat all! Seven minutes of a lawsuit, and a nice sweetheart deal with a bag o’ cash come just raining down on the Confederates!

The day the settlement was approved, the Sons’ “commander” Ronald Kevin Stone, announced this “victory” to thousands of his members – not all of whom agreed with it. Some of those boys who didn’t much like it, they sent Mr. Doucette the victory proclamation. Well you might be surprised to learn that the victory proclamation itself confirmed that this deal stank like the shithouse on a shrimper boat. The Commander himself admitted that the Confederates had no business suing the University, and his victory speech sure made it seem like that someone might have used a bit of impropriety, as they say, to convince Justice to take that joyride of hers.

Now Mr. Doucette thought everyone had a right to know, so he went on and put that victory proclamation right up on the glowin’ tubes of all of the Internets, just so you and me and everyone else could see what they’d done. But, the Confederates didn’t like that. They wanted their skulduggery done in the shadows. So what they did is say that the proclamation was a copyrighted work, would you believe it? They then got it all censor-iffic despite knowing full well they were no more in their rights than if they were firing on Fort Sumter.

Well, Mr. Doucette wasn’t takin that lying down. He gave those boys a chance to come to their senses. They didn’t.

Murum Aries Attigit, Y'all..

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thejustinmarshall · 5 years ago

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Choose Wonder

The South Rim of the Grand Canyon can be a magical place: You stand with a 180-degree view of a thing so big and complicated, you can’t understand it if you only look for a few seconds. You see millions of years of erosion, dozens of layers of geology, dozens of side canyons with their own side canyons. You could sit there for hours or days, taking it in, watching the light change, illuminating things you didn’t see the minute before and won’t see a minute after. It’s a huge, complex artwork in an open-air museum that never closes, and you can stay as long as it takes you to figure out what it means to you and your existence, or decide it’s impossible to figure out and walk away satisfied with whatever you got from it. That’s one way to look at it.

Alternately, you could describe it as crowded with tour-bus passengers and selfie sticks, packing the restaurants a few steps away from the rim, accidentally dropping water bottles and food wrappers into the canyon, ignoring the signs that say please don’t feed the squirrels, talking loudly on cell phones, and making the whole thing feel like a bit of a tourist trap, more like Times Square than one of America’s most famous national parks.

You have a choice when you’re there: You can focus on the canyon in front of you and have your mind blown by nature, or you can focus on the people behind you and have your spirits dampened by the negative aspects of making one viewpoint accessible to millions of people.

You can choose wonder—or you can choose the opposite of wonder, something that seems to be plentiful in our current day, available via the tap of a finger and a second or two of scrolling: a million hot takes, snarky comments, and contrarian reactions on anything and everything. One of the heartening things about the internet nowadays is that you can find, in seconds, other people who love some obscure thing just as much as you do (like the Subreddit for grilled cheese), and you can connect with them. One of the less heartening things is that, with the same amount of ease (or completely by accident), you can find someone who hates the thing you love, whether it’s a musician, a restaurant, or a national park. If you spend enough time paying attention to all the opinions on the internet, they can gradually become a sort of blanket of despair, snuffing out your joy, or infecting your perspective. If you concentrate on how all the other tourists at the South Rim are interfering with your Grand Canyon experience, you’re choosing to ruin your own experience. Instead: Grab an ice cream cone (there might be a line) and enjoy the view.

I’m not advocating for 24/7 blind optimism. The world is not a perfect place. It’s never great for everyone at the same time, and many things about it should change so it can become a better place for more people. But you can fight for change and still experience joy, as smarter people than me have pointed out.

I’m not naturally an optimistic or positive person, but I often find myself stopping in awe to watch a truck driver back a tractor-trailer into a tight alley. I still get a little kick—even 35 years after my first rides without training wheels—out of how my bicycle just keeps rolling after a few hard pedal strokes. I can’t believe how tasty even below-average pizza is, and that some form of pizza is in almost every populated place I’ve ever traveled in the world. I never get tired of Kind of Blue, even well after the thousandth time I’ve listened to it.

I think that snarky voice, the negative remark, the ability to have a slight dissatisfaction with everything, is inside all of us. We are blessed and cursed with seemingly infinite choice, the possibility that there might be something a little bit better, or even “perfect,” around the corner, in the next swipe left, or after a few more seconds of scrolling.

You can decide every day, multiple times every day, if you want to have a sense of joy, slight awe, and/or amazement in your life. You can do the opposite and spend your time figuring out how to creatively take a shit on everything, building a shield out of snark to hide behind, lest you get too excited about something. I have both these voices in my head at all times, just like you. But I recommend you choose wonder. It won’t solve all the world’s problems, but it certainly must do more to make the world a better place than being perpetually unimpressed does, don’t you think?

A friend once told me he thought someone should make a film capturing people’s reactions at the moment they see the Grand Canyon for the first time, from the viewpoint on the South Rim. I think it’s a fascinating idea, turning the camera away from one of the Seven Natural Wonders of the World and showing not the scenery, but its effect on the humans who experience it.

The world is changing faster than ever before, and it gets easier every year you’re alive to be just a bit more of a pessimist, turning the brightness dial of your perspective down another notch. It takes effort, but I believe it’s worth it, when we can, to squint into a visual field of rain clouds loaded with infinite ways we could be disappointed, unimpressed, and dissatisfied with every little thing in our lives, and instead focus on a sense of awe and amazement.

—Brendan

More writing like this in my new book, Bears Don’t Care About Your Problems, out now.

The post Choose Wonder appeared first on semi-rad.com.

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olivereliott · 5 years ago

Text

Choose Wonder

—Brendan

More writing like this in my new book, Bears Don’t Care About Your Problems, out now.

The post Choose Wonder appeared first on semi-rad.com.

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jesusvasser · 6 years ago

Text

One Week With: 2019 Jeep Grand Cherokee Trackhawk

These are wild times we’re living in, pardner. The burnout smoke from the ongoing horsepower war still hangs heavy on the 1/4-mile tarmac, and American cars are only getting beefier and meaner. Heaven forbid you try to impress any God-fearing American with a V-8 putting out less than 600 hp. Haven’t you heard? 450 hp is the new 300, and 300 is for the Europeans.

Leave those candy-colored coupes to the youngsters. Nowadays, you’ve got boats to haul and (grand)kids to shuttle. Forget the four-door Charger SRT Hellcat, you’ve got a gravel path leading up to that south Florida McMansion–you need four-wheel-drive. Fuel economy? Who cares?! Let those Tesla-driving hipsters in California worry about it.

No, you, a true patriot, drive a 2019 Jeep Grand Cherokee Trackhawk. Screw the status quo—push the envelope of normalcy to the point of splitting. In 2018 a 707-hp Jeep is not only unsurprising, it’s also almost conventional. The precedent for this power-mad dystopia was set back in 2011 at the debut of the second-generation of Grand Cherokee SRT, and again in 2014 when the Hellcat twins dropped. Now we’re caught in an accelerated game of “Yes, and…what’s next?” where we Americans firmly believe we deserve more than 400 hp in an SUV. Don’t worry, undoubtedly future versions of the Trackhawk will receive the new Redeye package, likely boosting power to the 797-hp mark. When the time comes, you’d better upgrade, lest someone think you’re weak for a nanosecond.

Or, maybe, just be glad we’re able to enjoy cars and trucks like the Trackhawk before things go south for internal combustion

In terms of outright power, the Trackhawk is king of the performance SUVs—for now. That 6.2-liter supercharged Hellcat V-8 is as vicious as ever, now hooked up to four-wheel-drive for gnarly mid-three-second 0-60-mph sprints that edge out even the Challenger/Charger Hellcat twins. No more feathering the throttle here; this is point-and-squirt at its best, excellent for dusting Mustang GTs and Volkswagen GTIs at stoplights regulating rough city streets.

It’s very shouty, but it’s equally stealthy, even with big-ass yellow calipers, blacked-out exterior trim, and the ever-present lub-lub-lub engine lope. I pulled up next to a car-minded couple who live in my area, and had a conversation through the open window without them ever once asking why in the world my family-friendly Jeep made such a racket.

It’s not too shabby on curvy mountain roads either, as far as mid-size SUVs go. The Trackhawk certainly handles better than it has to, considering this bruiser prioritizes a low quarter-mile time rather than tire-ripping cornering speeds. It’s refreshingly honest, even in an age where you can roll up to an Alfa Romeo dealer and drive away in a Stelvio Quadrifoglio crossover that cracked a 7-minute, 51-second lap on the Nurburgring.

The Trackhawk is every bit as fun as a muscle car—better, even. With a focus set for stoplight digs, you wouldn’t expect it to remain composed on the ever-curvaceous Angeles Crest Highway, but you’d be surprised. This is the fourth SRT product I’ve driven up that mountain in recent times, and short of the Challenger Hellcat Widebody, good luck leaving a Trackhawk behind in a family race. It’s not as hunkered-down and flat-cornering as most German performance SUVs, but that meaty four-wheel-drive system works in tandem with the stability control to keep things under control, and it’s mostly effective. Don’t push too hard, though, as this is still 5,300 pounds on stilts. As a result, because the traction and stability control work hard to keep things pointed in the right direction, there’s a chance the brake pedal goes soft within a few turns if you’re not careful.

Back on city streets, it’s got that same dual-purpose cruiser capability possessed by most muscle cars that makes them so well suited for American roads. Only in this case, your trip won’t be sidelined by inclement weather, extra luggage, or washed-out cabin trails. Your ears and butts won’t be blown-out, either; even with that 6.2-liter screamer, it settles down to a dull rumble when you pootle around town, and the ride is supple enough once forced into comfort mode. It’s genuinely one of the best all-arounders available, despite its unrelenting thirst. Around town, the EPA expects 11 mpg, and that’s if you treat it with kid gloves.

Of course, all this absurdity comes with a similarly absurd price tag of $88,145. Fully loaded, the Trackhawk will set you back a smidge more than $100,000. That’s a lump of cash, but it’ll cost you the same six-figures for a base-spec BMW X5 M, and roughly $20,000 more to set foot in a stripper Porsche Cayenne Turbo. Even then, both the Porsche and the BMW will have their chrome trim blown right off by a Trackhawk in a head-to-head sprint.

In the end, that’s all you should really hope from a 707-hp SUV. It’s not meant for corners, and that’s part of its identity—something sorely missing from other hyperspeed haulers. The Trackhawk makes no bones about its red-blooded muscle-car identity, and that’s what sets it apart.

2019 Jeep Grand Cherokee Trackhawk

ON SALE: Now

PRICE: $87,695 (base)

ENGINE: 6.2L OHV 16-valve supercharged V-8/707 hp @ 6,000 rpm, 645 lb-ft @ 4,800 rpm

TRANSMISSION: 8-speed automatic

LAYOUT: 4-door, 5-passenger, front-engine, 4WD SUV

EPA MILEAGE: 11/17 mpg (city/hwy)

L x W x H: 189.8 x 76.5 x 67.9 in

WHEELBASE: 114.7 in

WEIGHT: 5,363 lb

0-60 MPH: 3.5 sec

TOP SPEED: 180 mph

The post One Week With: 2019 Jeep Grand Cherokee Trackhawk appeared first on Automobile Magazine.

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