#life is really complicated sometimes?
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I have... many feelings. And I'm not sure what to do with that other that sit and listen to them
#anya shush#personal#prob gonna delete later#life is really complicated sometimes?#it's an act of grace and self compassion to sit and listen to them but it's ironic because i was raised to do just that for everyone else:#sit and listen#not that i resent doing it. it would be a part of who i am whether i was raised to be that way or not i think#the introvertedness and the autism makes just listening really nice#but there's listening to the people you love and care about#and listening to people who aren't very kind to you#and/or hold some sort of power over you#and those are two completely different things#i don't know how to put anything into words today
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Remember that time they confirmed Sonic has emotions and experiences burnout ?
I do. I remember
#best advice comes from experience by the way#nobody can be endlessly positive and go through the complicated shit Sonic does and not burn out sometimes by the way#I say this because I AM Sonic.#slash j. I just really try to be positive and life really tries to crush me for it I’m not sonic. Sonic is me#sonic the hedgehog#sth#sonic
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one of the things about having an unstable parent is that it can so easily ruin your future. you want to get out, but getting out takes having agency. it takes the resume and the grades and the stellar community service history.
but you have to choose your battles. you know if you sign up for an after-school activity, it'll be okay for a while, so long as the activity is parent-approved and god-fearing. over time, like all things, it will become an argument (i can't keep carting your ass to these things) or a weapon (talk to me like that again, see if you get to go to practice). sometimes, if you love the thing, it's worth it. but you also know better than to love something: that's how they get you. if you ever actually want something, it will always be the center of their attention. they will never stop threatening you with it. telling you of course i'm a good parent, i came to all of those stupid events.
you learn to balance yourself perfectly. you can either have a social life or you can have hobbies. both of these things will be under constant scrutiny. you spend too much time with her, you should be at home with family is equally paired with you're acting like this because you're addicted to what's on that goddamn screen. you cannot ever actually win, so everything falls within a barter system that you calculate before entering: do you want to learn how to drive? if so, you'll need to give up asking for a new laptop, even though yours died. maybe you can work on a computer at the library. of course, that would mean you'd be allowed to go to the library, which would mean something else has to bleed. nothing ever actually comes free.
and that bitter, horrible irony: you could be literally following their orders and it still isn't pretty. they tell you to get a job; they hate that your job keeps you late and gives you access to actual money. they tell you to do better in school; they say no child of mine needs a tutor. they want you to stop being so morose, don't you know there are people who are really suffering - but they revile the idea you might actually need therapy.
you didn't survive that fall the way other people would. you've seen other people scramble and get their way out, however they could. maybe you were made too-soft: the answer didn't come to you easily. it wasn't quick. it was brutal and nasty. some people even asked you why didn't you just work hard and escape during school? and you felt your head spinning. why didn't you? (they control your financial aid. they control your loan status. they love having that kind of thing). maybe in another life you got diagnosed sooner and got the meds you needed to actually focus and got attention from the right teachers who helped you clear hurdles to get up out of here - but for now? here?
the effort of trying. the effort of not-dying. that kind of effort was absolutely agonizing.
#writeblr#btw i got out#even though i felt this way#i was undiagnosed and was in a particularly fucked up situation#(it's complicated lol)#i had no money and no way out#no car no license . i still had a curfew at 22 years old#and still. i got out.#you can get out too.#i wasn't allowed to literally do anything after school we were pretty much only allowed 1 hobby#and STILL i got out.#it wasn't bc i was particularly smart or capable or clever. it's that 1. i got lucky & 2.#i knew there had to be The Rest of The World#and I wanted to at least VAGUELY get to the Rest of the World before i gave up trying#sometimes it's the spite that gets u thru it. that sense - fuck u#FUCK YOU ACTUALLY.#im gonna make my own life u stupid bitch. since u seem so convinced i could never REALLY do it.#whenever ppl are like <3 just cut out ur parents <3 im like <3 have u never been poor lol <3#<3 i needed them to sign my loans <3#<3 bestie not every person who is struggling is going to be able to make the grades and hero status to get a free ride.#and guess what baby!! we still deserve to get out and have a good life.
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so sick and tired of people writing fics about jeremy treating kevin like shit over kevin leaving jean at the nest like that is either 1) in character 2) something jean would appreciate or 3) fair. do you even bother to read the books you’re writing fanfic about or is the urge to create cheap angst so overwhelming you can’t see past the tropes you write for every other fictional pairing you like? the idea that jean would appreciate jeremy going out of his way to poke old wounds in his and kevin’s relationship when jean himself does not even like for jeremy to joke about kevin near him is absurd, and that’s without mentioning the fact that jeremy is not so clueless as to think he has any idea of what the nest was like, or why kevin felt he had to leave the way he did. if you need something to make your ship more interesting thinking beyond your flat interpretation of it is a lovely start, but don’t use kevin’s name and storyline if you’re just going to butcher it for the sake of a milquetoast sob fest the characters involved in would not even appreciate
#seriously annoying this is the third time i see this trope and its ridiculous#im sorry you feel the need to include jeremy in every aspect of jeans life to make up for his lack of one in tsc but dont think#for one second that this person who has not experienced even a fraction of the nest#would have the right or the inclination to tell kevin and jean how to deal with it#jean literally says on page in tsc that he does not want jeremy to ask questions or meddle any further and you’re creating scenarios#where jeremy literally ignores jean’s wishes and does just that?#what part of ‘and now i don’t feel safe with you captain’ do you not get?#however complicated kevins and jeans relationship is do you really think jean would want jeremy to get involved with it?#think whatever you want about kevin but if you need his name to come up with a good storyline for your ship maybe you’re just#bad at what you do#txt#sorry about the rant but sometimes this fandom really makes me want to believe there is a hell out there
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played dragon age 2...just simple scribbles
#dragon age tag#i doubt that will see much use again..but who knows. vvv rambling below#weird game..the characters dialogue stuff and ending were good tho :')#i've played some of the first game but it kept crashing. i knew already despite knowing nothing that this guy was going to be my type#it doesnt feel right making video game art any more bc games like this end up feeling really personal - an experience that happened to me#if i design the main character a bit and fall in love then..that happened to me..i can't make Fan Art of that..only ive been through that..#like i cant make fanart of my dear companions in bg3 despite it having been a huge part of my heart in the last year#almost 1000 hours of playtime in something i can barely talk about bc it means too much.... lol#tons of ideas and conversations and extra thoughts and scenes and emotions about all the incredible times i've been through in bg3#and the maelstrom just rotates around intensely in my own heart forever...but that's ok too...that is so precious to me#but fortunately i already knew people that have played this game and talked/drew abt it recently so it was saved from that for me#sharing scribbly fanart on my Blog is a way to capture the feeling just after experiencing something so it has good points#witch hat atelier escapes that by not being a GAME. games are so immersive. but my wha art & feelings are incredibly immersive too#which makes it difficult sometimes now. i live a complicated and emotional life <3 i am not suited to fandom <3#my character ended up looking so much like oru without me realising that's what i was doing. Kind bearded fireball throwing gay mage. Hmm.#falling for a sad white hair memory trauma fellow that keeps you at a tragic distance. Hmmmmmm.#i see also how very much bg3 is inspired by stuff like dragon age now lol so i'm glad i experienced it. I WANT MY KIRKWALL LIFE BACK...#so dated though as well and unpleasant at times (the city and the dismal atmosphere was depressing.) i hate violence/horror..#bg3 is SOOOO very dismal but it feels like I am killing people and going through horrors because i have to survive i have to be free#Well anyway. ahh it's so refreshing to fall in love. my gay journey continues...
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Hecate !!
Finally got around to doodling her like I promised I would🖤
#drew her happy because she deserves to be#me and the writers of this show are enemies#because how dare you look at this woman and go ‘let’s make her life really complicated for funzies’#give this woman some comfort dammit she needs so much of it#I will never forgive them for confining her to that school for half her life how dare you#stop picking on my girl❌❌#art#fanart#digital art#digital drawing#artists on tumblr#ms hardbroom#miss hardbroom#hecate hardbroom#the worst witch#tww2017#my art#mya draws sometimes#oh hecate hardbroom how I love you
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Women, so pretty, so shaped, i am so lesbian,,,
#im also incredibly dysphoric tonight#but i was told by my coworker im incredibly feminine by her earlier#and i mean yeah#.....#i am a tall weird internet woman who likes to draw#so funny how i thought i was bi#I'm just really into women...#my ex is a trans guy and he told me he thinks im lesbian and i had a “holy fuck this explains so much moment”#we broke up but we still have a weird queer relationship outside of social heteronormative norms that is hard to explain and only we#can really understand#im not into men because you know#im a lesbian#had a weird period in my life when i was dating a guy and said im a lesbian and i felt sooooo scared#turns out when youre on meds and your brain is working right you just stop caring about such things#i went on a parade wearing big lesbian flag and girls loved it :)#i dont really know if i ever want to date anyone again#but i think if you look at my art you can really tell my sexuality quite easily lolol#funny how love can be so complicated sometimes#i mean it was kind of inevitable we break up cause we're kind of incompatible but tbh#it was better for us#hehe
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is it fair to call people like this "hack writers" if the only way they find a relationship interesting is when it involves pedophilia, incest, cannibalism or necrophilia?
#context: this was in response to a quote about cannibalism in a romantic context#note: this is purely in a writing perspective.#i find the value in romantic cannibalism because it is a interesting metaphor in general#but maybe look at irl examples of cannibalism and you'll realize that it is WAY more complicated#(ex. families in different cultures eating parts of a dead family member to connect them together; even after death)#(or the written historical accounts of slave-owners cannibalizing their slaves & the subsequent trauma for black people related to it)#cannibalism as a metaphor should never be restrained to only romance or love#do you recognize how interesting it can be to use cannibalism as a metaphor for hate? or for literally anything else?#it can be used as a metaphor for control; power; possession; abuse or destroying someone at their very core#im sure it can be used for both simultaneously but i think its limiting to perceive it as 100% romantic#also it limits the discussions of real life cannibalism; both modern and historical#+ is it really impossible to think of a “forbidden relationship” without these 4 subjects?#but the persons' bio starts w/ them being into winc3st (the one who wrote that) so i dont think they give a shit#(sorry for the fuck-ton of tags. it always bothered me as someone who does writing analysis sometimes & get fixated on culture and history)#[just me yapping]#ok to rb#proships dni#tw pedophila mention#tw incest mention#tw necrophillia#racism tw#tw cannibalism#<- these definitely apply here
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Okay I've talked about the tragedy of Laudna now let's talk about the tragedy of Imogen.
It’s been a while, but her moment in the Feywild truth exercise where she says "I think I’m tainted. I don’t know if I want to save gods that don’t love me" has really stuck in my mind. The thing is, I don’t think she’s specifically talking about the gods here, but rather summing up and projecting her entire experience as a ruidusborn. She isn’t thinking "Why aren’t I the gods' special little princess? Why haven’t they come to save me specifically?? You better love me or I'll let you die" (which we have seen does seem to be a common attitude in the Vanguard) This is her fear of being against her own will tainted by something evil. Her fear that, despite knowing how wrong it is, part of her longs for the power and belonging that comes with giving in to Predathos. It’s knowing that this thing is the antithesis of the gods, and that no matter what she does and how much she opposes it, it is still part of her. And because of that, the world doesn’t love her. Her mother left, her father can barely look at her, her own body will betray her with feelings and powers she doesn't understand, her community ostracized her, her allies view her with suspicion, the gods will not lend a hand in their own rescue when she asks despite Imogen putting herself and her loved ones in danger for their sake.
And Imogen is tired. Tired of being the bigger person, tired of resisting. Logically she knows the gods don’t hate her specifically but it ads up, and as the lure of Predathos does promise love and belonging part of her wants to give in because why should she risk so much to save a world that has never once tried to save her.
And that’s where she, as well as Laudna, get so interesting. They have deeply sympathetic reasons for their doubts and flaws, as well as for why they value each other so much higher than the entirety of Exandria (tl;dr because they have only ever gotten genuine understanding and unconditional love from each other). But that doesn’t mean it isn't flaws. It doesn’t mean Imogen, if she hadn’t met Laudna and the Hells first and realized the harm the Vanguard is causing and that their promises are ultimately lies, couldn’t have been drawn in by the Vanguard's ideas. It doesn’t mean they aren't wrong in blaming gods for bad things in their own lives, or in demanding special treatment. But it’s deeply understandable, which is the very reason they and people like them're such excellent targets for the Vanguard to convert. And once in the Vanguard, it doesn’t matter how tragic and sympathetic you are, you are still doing evil.
#critical role#cr3#imogen temult#meanwhile Laudna's negative attitude towards the gods is a bit more complicated#in that she really does blame them for not saving her#she's repressing all of her negative emotions about her fate and situation but those feelings are still THERE#and lately they’ve been heightened due to the stressful situation of trying to save the gods#and laudna doesn’t want to save anyone she just want to chill and enjoy what little life she has#and so when the negative emotions do come out she projects them at the gods bc she needs SOMEONE to blame#and since she’s never interacted with a god they’re easy to blame bc in a way they aren’t entirely real to her#something that isn’t entirely real but very powerful can’t be a victim but it can be an easy scapegoat#bells hells travel past the divine gate and physically interact with the gods challange#it would be so juicy to see imogen and laudna be forced to face and process this projection of guilt against the gods they both share#i think it would help them realize that sometime randomly bad things will just Happen and it’s no ones fault#and in seeing that stop looking for someone to blame (both themselves and the gods) and start to heal#nella talks cr
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jandy nelson, i'll give you the sun | jean anouilh tr, by lewis galantière | @soulinkpoetry | trista mateer, the dogs i have kissed | the bible
#NO SLEEP OF THE INNOCENT. NOT FOR YOU: character study.#the concept of having a complicated relationship with one's sibling.#because ryuuji was the second born and thus the responsibility of taking care of him was given to misao most of the time she found herself-#being jealous of him sometimes. and misao felt very guilty because of this but she just wanted to be a kid for a moment. so sometimes she-#would imagine that she was ryu instead of herself and their roles were reversed because misao would just get so overwhelmed with things-#that this was the only way she could cope with it at times. which is sad in every sense of the word but misao knew that it wasn't ryu's-#fault at all that thing's were this way. it wasn't anyone's fault really but it was so much easier to place the blame on him subconsciously#sometimes because the alternative was blaming herself for not being strong enough to be both a caretaker and a child at the same time.#and that was perhaps even harder for her to think about because misao has always strived to be perfect. and i mean this in everything-#she does. she wants to be the 'perfect psychotherapist' the 'perfect lover' the 'perfect friend' and it is a LOT of pressure to be honest-#to be putting on yourself especially when you are not fully equipped to open yourself up to people about how you are struggling because-#you've dealt with things on your own all your life. but yeah. misao might've felt resentment towards ryuuji even though it was misplaced-#though she also felt a great deal of platonic love towards him and even if the whole world were against him then she'd still be on his side#but misao has been out of contact with him for the longest time and doesn't even know if he is alive anymore. and she is kind of scared-#to inquire someone to find out for her like a private investigator or something. because i think misao would not be able to take both her-#mom and her half-brother dying because at the end of the day ryuuji is her last remaining family member. and he understood her-#in ways that even she couldn't understand herself.
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Men who view women as their intellectual equals 😍
#pro tip for the boys: a lot of girls will respond a lot better to a stimulating conversation than to a guy trying to show off#ignore the movies they're lying to you when they tell you you need to be a show off#and if a girl wants that it's maybe not the best sign y'know?#but most girls just want to be treated like we're capable intelligent humans#that's all!! the movies and shit make it way more complicated than it has to be#and yes some girls do make things awkward and complicate everything#but maybe you wanna be careful about that because those girls generally have a lot to unpack#being friends with those girls is fine!! just make sure you have strong boundaries in place#and make sure she's doing some work on herself before considering a romantic relationship#but anyway i've had a lot of men in my life that i feel like wanted to be so much smarter than me#and not to be rude but they weren't?? i was just as smart and sometimes smarter#i didn't care that they were confident in their intelligence but i felt like i needed to dumb myself down#and it. freaking. sucked. i have no idea how i did it for so long#and i would even make jokes about like the guys i dated being smarter than me and nobody ever said anything??#and again these guys weren't smarter than me. that's not an insult to them just acknowledging i'm smarter than i was gave myself credit for#i'm outgrowing the notion that i have to dumb myself down for men and it's so freeing#and you know what really helps me actually? being in college#and especially being in college with so many intelligent men who know they're smart#these guys KNOW they're smart. and not in an arrogant way in a secure and confident way#them knowing they're smart makes them the OPPOSITE of arrogant actually#it's weird but i stand by my observation and it makes sense when you think about it#if you're secure in yourself and your intelligence you don't need to proce yourself by making other people look dumb#these guys are secure in their self-image and masculinity. they don't need women to be dumb and weak to feel strong and intelligent.#and it's so freaking endearing. i love that for these guys so much.#i am just so thankful for people in my life who are taking me seriously and who are helping me to understand i'm worth taking seriously.#wow these tags are long but anyway#guys you don't have to prove anything girls you should never have to dumb yourselves down live long and prosper
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“that’s a normal human behavior/thought that basically everyone has” not in a “you’re mentally normal and dont have any problems and are lying about whatever’s going on with you” way but instead in a “the degree to which you’re pathologizing human behavior and ascribing it to xyz disorder/syndrome is making you feel disconnected from other people and ignores the messy reality of mental well-being and how human beings function. viewing the world with such a clinical lens is ultimately detrimental to your health and also gives far too much credence and authority to psychology and mental health professionals and fails to understand how our entire idea of mental health is steeped in very human biases and is ultimately something that is subject to change and constant interpretation and reinterpretation”
#like yeah they’re real and causing problems. the labels we give to things and our understanding of mental health is also#extremely flawed and subject to human interpretation even if the actual science for causes is sound#idk i’ve just been in a lot of conversations with people about mental health where they’re expressing worry#about some thought or behavior of theirs and feeling the need to attribute it to xyz thing “wrong” with them#when in reality it’s a fairly normal thing and not something they’re alone in experiencing and doesn’t make them uniquely awful#a lot of this is just varying Degrees anyways and it becomes an issue when it’s like. an Issue for you and “excessive” in a way#that interferes with your well-being and life. and sometimes that’s genuinely a problem you’d always have and sometimes that’s the product#of how society functions at large and is something we’ve constructed. yknow. nuance#it’s almost like this stuff is really messy and complicated and varies from person to person. wild.
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Has Tim ever put Dick on a pedestal?
100% yes! This is basically Tim's backstory IMO. Prior to meeting Dick in Lonely Place of Dying, Tim's a kid who's got a distant, idealized, made-for-TV vision of Dick and Bruce - mostly Dick - and he sets out on a quest based entirely around that misperception.
Aaaand then he immediately crashes headfirst into reality, because the Dick Grayson and Bruce Wayne he remembers from his childhood memories and daydreams are like this:
But it turns out that the actual real-life human people are a bit more, uh, cranky than Tim's glossy vision - things are tense and neither of them are super-happy to meet Tim:
And Tim has to rethink a bunch of his mistaken deductions as it slowly dawns on him that - far from being a plucky team - Dick and Bruce are actually not getting along at all:
And so Tim has to realize his whole plan of "Dick has to be Robin again!!! That will fix everything!!! :)))))" was actually wrong, and based on a misunderstanding of Bruce and Dick's relationship. And having realized he was wrong, he immediately sets about trying to figure out what he’s failed to understand in the most intrusive way possible—by asking lots of nosy questions!
Actually-meeting-Dick is basically the end of Tim’s super-idealized vision of Dick. It's not a vision that can survive contact with an actual human being who's snapping at you. And kid!Tim is (I love him but) extremely pushy and annoying, and Dick's a prickly young adult who is not above getting annoyed, which means Dick snaps at him pretty regularly.
But Tim does continue to admire him.
So for their various interactions after Lonely Place of Dying, IMO "does Tim have Dick on a pedestal" is kind of a judgment call based on your assessment of Dick's relative strengths/virtues. What's unambiguous: Tim has a consistently higher opinion of Dick than Dick does of Dick, and they argue about it a lot.
I had way too many thoughts about this, so below the cut:
Comics where Dick and Tim have conversations along the lines of Dick: "I suck and I'm failing at everything." Tim: "That's not true!! Actually you're great and you're succeeding at the thing you think you're failing at!!"
So who's right - Dick or Tim?
Dick and Tim's high opinions/expectations of each other: the plusses and minuses
Comic examples
Here are a couple different variations on Tim thinking that Dick is great (often when Dick's less sure):
in Showcase, Tim thinks that Dick’s a way better teammate than Azrael, even as Dick’s thinking himself as a failure who let the Titans down;
in Prodigal, Dick tells Tim a story about confronting Two-Face which to Dick symbolizes a moment of great failure and which Tim insists was a no-win situation where Dick did the best he could;
also in Prodigal, Dick’s despairing over how badly he thinks their encounter with Killer Croc went and meanwhile Tim thinks it went fine (after all, Dick listened to him and called an ambulance instead of beating up Croc!), and Tim tells Dick to lighten up and Dick talks about how he’s a failure;
in Nightwing 6, Dick thinks he’s doing badly in Blüdhaven and he’s self-conscious about it and paranoid about what Tim might tell Bruce, and Tim insists that the fact that Dick’s being targeted means he’s succeeding and getting close instead of failing, and Dick retorts that this won’t be comforting if he winds up dead because getting close just isn’t good enough;
also in Nightwing 6, Tim thinks Dick was a better Robin than Tim is, and Dick thinks he wasn’t that great and that Tim’s better;
post-Last Laugh, Tim’s insistent that Dick's being too hard on himself about attacking the Joker whereas Dick's really haunted by the experience and confides that it feels like he's discovered a terrible dark side of himself;
way later in Nightwing 110, Tim’s seeking Dick out and Dick’s trying to avoid him because he thinks he’s a bad person who’d be bad for Tim;
in BW: Murderer, Tim doesn’t trust Bruce absolutely, but in Red Robin, he does trust Dick absolutely (or at least, more than Tim trusts himself);
etc. etc. etc.
Who's right: Dick or Tim?
So, is Tim being too easy on Dick and looking at him with rose-colored glasses, and Dick’s harsher view of himself is the correct one; or is Dick a perfectionist who’s being too hard on himself, and Tim’s the one who’s actually seeing Dick’s strengths more clearly?
I don’t think the comics really commit one way or another! These are moments of multiple-perspectives, where we notice that Tim has one attitude and Dick has another attitude and that tells us things about the characters, not moments that are meant to resolve to a simplistic “one person is Right and one person is Wrong.” I think often you could argue that they're both right? So, like, if you wanted to take the approach of, "Tim's idolizing him but he's not actually as great as Tim thinks," I don't think the comics precisely contradict that interpretation.
... THAT SAID, look, I am a Dick Grayson fan at heart, and I tend to lean toward “Dick’s being too hard on himself.”
Tim’s not oblivious to Dick’s flaws—he immediately figures out, for example, that Dick’s gonna attack the Joker, and rushes off to stop him; he just isn’t as judgmental about this moment as Dick is, and he doesn’t think it makes Dick an awful person forever. The point is (Tim says later, practical-minded) that it was made right, and Dick shouldn’t beat himself up about it. In Prodigal, Tim’s not unaware that their fight with Croc went badly; he’s just focused on how Dick’s morals and teamwork-centric attitude feel right to him in a way that Azrael’s didn’t, and look, Tim didn’t get shot even though he got shot at, and isn’t that the important thing? Tim gets caught in the same ambush that Dick does in Nightwing 6; he just takes the glass-half-full attitude toward it while Dick takes the glass-half-empty attitude. And so on.
Tim admires Dick, looks up to him, trusts him, interprets his flaws generously, and doesn’t think he’s a failure. And... this isn't quite in the comics, but it doesn't contradict them: I like to imagine Dick feeling like he's on a pedestal, and feeling kinda uncomfortable with Tim's admiration when he's forced to realize it exists, and feeling like he doesn't deserve it, and sometimes subconsciously braced for the other shoe to drop, convinced that Tim can't possibly really think this forever, that he's deluded somehow, and that eventually Tim will realize who Dick really is and get disillusioned and leave.
And I tend to think of Dick having this problem a bit with everyone in his life who thinks highly of him, but especially with Tim, because he doesn't feel like Tim's ever needed him or that he's done anything worth Tim's admiration. I feel like Dick - despite some insecurities - does know his own worth as a team leader, and he knows he was a good partner to Bruce, and he understands when he's helping people who are clearly floundering, like Damian and Rose. But all he's ever done for Tim is...hang out, and be nice. And he doesn't think Tim ever needed fixing or saving, and he vastly underestimates both the value of his own friendship in general and how much it's meant to Tim in particular. Not all the time, because later in their relationship when they've known each other for years I do think Dick does feel a bit more secure in that friendship and entitled to make demands based on it (and vice versa, for Tim). But I do imagine Dick periodically feeling like Tim lets him off the hook too easily, and thinks more highly of him than he should, and alternating between being grateful for it and uncomfortable with it.
But I would argue that Dick does deserve Tim’s admiration!
Look, Dick's not a perfect person - no one is. He does screw up sometimes, and sometimes he's petty or jealous, and sometimes his temper gets the better of him. But he is pretty great! He's brave and thoughtful and kind and generous and caring. He takes his own grief and his own suffering and devotes himself to helping other people. And Tim sees that. Tim watches an orphaned kid crying on stage, and has nightmares about it - and later recognizes the hero in him. Tim stops Dick from beating the Joker to death, and he holds Dick back from strangling Hugo Strange, and he talks Dick down from two separate panic attacks, and he listens to Dick monologue about his various perceived failures, and he gets yelled at a lot when Dick's annoyed with him, and his takeaway from all of that is that he believes in Dick, and trusts Dick, and thinks he's a hero.
You could see that as Tim having him on a pedestal and refusing to acknowledge the ugly reality. But I tend to see it as Tim understanding that Dick's flaws and occasional missteps don't define who he is - the fact that Dick's human doesn't make him any less of a hero. Tim can see the hero that Dick can't always see in himself.
Dick and Tim have really high opinions of each other... for better or worse
Tim's not alone in having a high opinion of Dick - Dick thinks Tim's pretty great, too! Dick repeatedly compares himself to Tim and finds himself wanting, whether he's thinking that Tim's a better partner for Bruce, or having a fear toxin nightmare where Tim's a rival who's beating him out of a job, or deciding that Tim would never have let Blockbuster die (and that he'll be better off if Dick avoids him), or musing that Tim would be a better Batman. Dick calls Tim his equal and closest ally in Red Robin; Tim thinks Dick is "the best" in his origin story and basically never changes his mind.
I think nowadays we're sometimes pretty highly-attuned to the way that high expectations can be bad or oppressive, and... I have mixed feelings about this? On the one hand, it isn't untrue! Dick and Tim's mutual high opinions of each other, and correspondingly high expectations, are not an unmixed blessing! They 100% cause problems! Dick and Tim think highly of each other, and expect a lot from each other, and sometimes they're pushy or abrupt or demanding when they could stand to be more sensitive. And the iffy side of high expectations is something I find interesting, and I do think it's solidly canon-based - you see aspects of this in several of their comic conflicts - LPoD, Graduation Day, BftC, RR, etc.
But at the same time, it's complicated! I don't think you can fully untangle the higher expectations from "they rely on each other and have a lot of faith in each other." Love and trust are different things, and Dick and Tim care a whole lot about being trusted, not just about being loved.
I also think it's important that their belief in each other is often a gift rather than an inevitability: Dick and Tim choose to see each other in positive ways. Something they both do is after they have a conflict, they'll apply on a retrospective very positive gloss to whatever just happened. So e.g. Dick starts Resurrection mad at Tim, and ends it by declaring, "I let you make the choice... because I knew you'd make the right one." Tim spends most of Red Robin 1-12 mad at Dick, and ends it by declaring that he knew Dick would catch him because Dick's always there for him. And in both cases, we-the-readers are aware that they knew no such thing! But to me, that doesn't make these declarations meaningless - it makes them more meaningful. Their faith in each other is sometimes genuinely felt, and sometimes it's something they stubbornly brute-force into existence because they want to give that gift to each other.
And I mean... Tim did make the right choice. Dick was there when it really counted. Just because it isn't the whole truth doesn't mean it's not a truth.
Now, does this positivity also put some pressure on them? Absolutely! They're both people who are very upset by failure, so they tend to reassure each other by insisting that there was no failure, could never be failure, failure is impossible, even when they know perfectly well that's not true. They praise each other's skills as a love language, when what they mean is I love you no matter what. They talk about other people's needs but don't always acknowledge each other's. And it'd probably be healthier if they said instead, "Even if you'd made the wrong choice, it'd be okay, because it's okay to make the wrong choice sometimes," or "Even if you're not always there for me, that's okay, because no one can be there for someone else all the time."
And they do not say that, because Dick and Tim are relatively well-adjusted by Batfamily standards but that is a very low bar, and at the end of the day they're still deeply messed-up perfectionists who deal with their emotional problems by punching crime in the face.
But look, they're trying. And isn't that the important thing? <3
#dick 'imposter syndrome' grayson and tim 'dick grayson stan' drake#dick grayson#tim drake#dick & tim#ask tag#i rambled for a really long time anon <3#it's complicated because i feel like mmmm the ''pedestal'' thing is obv true in some ways#but i think it also sometimes gets used in this kinda flanderized way#where it gets extrapolated into claims like ''older!tim is shocked to learn dick experiences normal human emotions' or w/e#and obv fandom is transformative and a rich tapestry etc but for me personally#part of what i LOVE about tim's introduction is that dick is in the middle of one of his very angsty eras#so tim's burst into his life being all ''hiiiiii!!! you're the best :)))))'' when dick is at peak ''i am gloomy and depressed''#that said tim's high opinion of dick is very canon and very compelling to me <3#tim does think dick is the greatest thing ever!#but it's more like being a stan of his rather than being a distant stranger who doesn't know him at all#it's not that tim's unaware that dick gets angry/sad/etc or that dick and tim never have fights (they do!)#it's more that unless they're actively in the middle of a fight tim admires/loves dick a lot and is determined to think well of him#so he considers all of dick's strengths What's Important About Him and all of his flaws Basically A Rounding Error If You Think About It#and he doubles-down on this when someone's questioning it (including Dick)#there is definite motivated reasoning at play in Tim's view of Dick but imo it's not quite the same as a pedestal sdfdsfds#i'm not sure there's anything that Dick could do that Tim couldn't find a way to justify in his head how it was okay /#not really Dick / not really his fault / etc. - like if Dick went on a murder spree#Tim would be there making the big This Isn't You! I Know You Won't Kill Me Because I Believe In You! speech#and like. if he was wrong then he'd be dead sdfdsf but the thing is he'd have secret doubts and be wary AND STILL#find himself ultimately making that speech / taking the risk - and ditto for Dick toward Tim#it's not that they never get mad / distrust each other and it's not impossible they'd stay bitter and suspicious for a while#but in the END they both really really WANT to trust each other
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I mean this in the nicest way possible: I wish I was a better friend.
#delete later#I know I’m not a good friend#but i think it’s trauma related#and I know that’s not an excuse#but a reason#and I’m just… also tired of people leaving me#I don’t strike up conversations anymore cause I was the friend who always did so#I was always the one making the effort to be in other peoples lives#and it sucks. ya know.#and sometimes I say dumb things that then like….. makes people not want to be around me I fear#and like…. yeah…. that’s part of life#but I’m just so tired of being alone#I want friends. I want people to send post cards and letters too#and I wanna hang out with people#and I want them to tell me things I want them to tell me how they are feeling#like. online friends are great!!#don’t get me wrong!!#but I know I’m not a great online friend either.#and when I try to be I fear I come off as flirting. like sometimes I am. don’t get me wrong#but I wish I could just… go to a friends house and sit with them and hold their hand when they are having a bad day and have the same done#for me!!!#I am always giving…. I am always giving parts of myself to people who don’t give themselves back#I still know my ex-best friends favorite color but I doubt she knows what mine was when we where friends#if you read this far just…. ignore it oof.#it’s just a rant#sometimes I rant in a tumblr post cause reading rants back in old journals is. bad. for my mental health#my adhd just picks the emotions right back up and then I go through it again. so it’s best to tumblr rant#I’ve also been having complicated gender emotions again#I don’t hate the idea of being a woman/girl as much as I used to. and it’s throwing me off a bit#I mean it’s right on time really… I have a gender crisis almost every four years…
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it's been a strange arc so far
when I was 19-21 and having an extremely imbalanced relationship with someone in their mid 30s I was like 'we are both adults so the fact that this is fucking me up is my fault'
when I hit my late 20s and saw how young people in their late teens and early 20s seem now I was like 'oh wait I was so fucking young I didn't know shit about my own limits or about managing relationships and I don't know why someone in their mid to late 30s would be into that except for nefarious purposes'
the weird bit is now I'm into my 30s - not even that far into my 30s - and while I still wholeheartedly believe that last thing about how young (and self destructive) 20 year olds are, I'm also kind of like 'huh, actually nobody I know that age has their shit remotely together and frankly the reason this fucked me up is because NEITHER of us knew what the fuck we were doing it how to cope, for different reasons and at different life stages, and there probably wasn't any malice or intent to control as much as there was Blind Flailing.'
#red said#this is about one specific relationship btw.#wanted to clarify that because there have been several men over 30 who fucked me up between the ages of 16 and 21#and i adamently do NOT want to keep pretending that was incompetence. that was predation. sometimes incompetent predation.#but with the person I'm thinking of? she really hurt me and the age gap and difference in life stage was a not insubstantial factor#but mostly she was just spiralling out really badly and i offered her something to hold and she did try to keep things balanced and safe#but she was very off balance at the time. so the fucking up was more that than it was about power or control#we were just both very stupid and very sensible at the same time which is a great way to dig yourselves deeper#and idk I'm like 2 or 3? years younger than she was when we met iirc#and the closer i get to her age the more I'm like yeah you know that's a human reaction. i can see how that happens.#and i kind of feel bad for the amount of bitterness I've held and malice I've ascribed because ultimately#i think it was just two people having different crises trying and failing to figure out boundaries around them#but this has come on really suddenly and it's kind of fucking me up as well#cause I'm frightened of falling back into patterns of oh it's never anyone else's fault that i got hurt#but i don't. thiiiiink so? bc it's really only this one thing. i am not making these excuses for other people.#idk. sometimes people just fuck each other up.#I'm not even sure i think it was a bad thing that it happened. a lot of bad happened but we also catalyzed a lot of change in each other.#i feel like the reason i keep picking at this is that it's complicated. it was not good. it was good.#she really fucked me up and she was a terrible friend to me at times. but she was also the first person to really look after me.#and she kind of helped me start to learn how to need other people. which was good.#when my grandma died she wrapped me in a blanket and cancelled her plans to watch TV on the couch with me#even though she barely knew me at that point#and she was one of the first people to consistently ask for consent and check in. and she did genuinely care about me.#but she also truly fucked me over a couple of times.#but mostly that was just because she was buried in a pit of despair and self loathing.#she seems a lot happier now. i hope she is. i don't know if i want to know her particularly but i think if she's happy she'd be nice to know
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entry for @moccasins's dtiys
thank you for giving me an excuse to draw a really funky night sky
timelapse under the cut
#my art#liem art#moccasins100dtiys#dtiys challenge#dtiys#dtiys entry#reaper sans#reapertale#stars#starry sky#but the stars are actually souls#because the light represents life and the darkness represents death#and the point of the og scene was to be like#the darkness of death makes life shine even brighter#so i thought it was a cool design choice :)#i didn't spend a lot of time on this so there are some stuff i don't like#this was kinda meant as a break from a really complicated drawing#sometimes i start a gigantic project with like 15 characters and then get surprised when i don't finish it in a week#so “small” drawings like this one that i can finish in a few days are a really good boost to my confidence#and sometimes i just like to draw shiny things
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