#love‚ etc

[nathanielbuildsatesseract]

This is the sort of post that'll probably get me in trouble and I shouldn't trust y'all to behave with it, but I'm in a dismal state and willing to take high-risk moves in an attempt to improve things. Nobody uses Tumblr on Friday nights anymore so it's not like many of you will even see this.

Recently I realized that my experience of being long-term single feels a lot like my experience of being unemployed. I met all the basic qualifications for all sorts of positions but couldn't get an interview. As far as I could tell, I was qualified, just a little light on experience. I was applying to jobs literally every day for months and maybe every couple of weeks would get some sort of indication that my resume had been advanced before ultimately getting the rejection email. After graduation, I was unemployed for a full year and got four (4) interviews in that time, one of which was a follow-up interview for a job I didn't get. Finally I threw in the towel and went to grad school. Two years later, I got plenty of interviews and multiple offers. When the job I took didn't work out, I got an offer for an even better position in just a few weeks. It's hard to express the difference between those three job search experiences. I never even finished the degree!

My attempts at romance feel very similar to when I couldn't get an interview after undergrad. I might not be an amazing catch, but I think I'm more than qualified for a serious boyfriend role. And yet, even when I'm active on Bumble every day for weeks at a time, I'm doing well if I match with someone every couple of weeks. Usually they send their mandatory first message, I respond as appropriate and ask a question in return, and I don't get any sort of response. I assume they're getting plenty of matches with men more attractive and neurotypical than me, just as I assume engineering firms were flooded with resumes from students at better schools with higher GPAs. Believe it or not, that doesn't make me feel any better about getting zero traction for months on end.

Just as when I was trying to get a job, it ultimately feels like getting into a relationship is a matter fundamentally outside of my control, that I have no ability to influence. All I can do is wait and hope that something turns up despite mounting evidence that it never will. Getting to a first date feels like a Herculean task when even the women who explicitly said they were interested choose instead to ignore my attempts at conversation. Actually being in a relationship is starting to feel like pure fantasy.

Perhaps I'm looking for love in the wrong places; neither of the firms where I've worked full-time were places where I applied when I was unemployed after undergrad. Of course, trying to figure out where women who want to date a nerd like me might be is not exactly easy, just like trying to find new firms that have relevant openings isn't easy when you have a niche resume and interests. (Tumblr worked once and never again since for reasons that are basically inscrutable to me.) Ultimately, the way I found those positions was just being systematic in checking the careers webpage for every aerospace firm I heard about and putting openings in a giant spreadsheet. I'd apply to at least one position a day, and started getting interviews that eventually led to an offer.

But I think what actually made the difference was going to grad school. For the life of me, I can't figure out what the dating equivalent of an MS would be. The only thing approaching a real suggestion that I've heard is Vibe Camp. Beyond the logistical nightmares I hear about every year, I'm very skeptical that something like that would meaningfully increase my odds of getting a girlfriend. I've been to special interest conventions (with better ratios) before and there doesn't seem to be any romantic value—immediate or long-term—to the experience. So as far as I can tell, I'm just stuck until I luck into meeting my wife randomly.

[batcavescolony]

Katniss is such an unreliable narrator. She says "Then something unexpected happens. At least, I don't expect it because I don't think of District 12 as a place that cares about me" girl you deliver strawberries to the Mayor, you hunt and trade for the district, when you fell at Prim being chosen someone caught you, when you went to Prim people parted for you, when you volunteered EVERYONE stopped. Idk how to tell you but I think you're a pillar of the community.

[wildbasil]

things haven't been great but i think they will be. eventually 🌻🌼🩷

[birdmenmanga]

they are putting yaoi in the city art museum and censoring nsfw content with heat-responsive material so you have to put your hands on it to see dick

[inkskinned]

this is just my opinion but i think any good media needs obsession behind it. it needs passion, the kind of passion that's no longer "gentle scented candle" and is now "oh shit the house caught on fire". it needs a creator that's biting the floorboards and gnawing the story off their skin. creators are supposed to be wild animals. they are supposed to want to tell a story with the ferocity of eating a good stone fruit while standing over the sink. the same protective, strange instinct as being 7 and making mud potions in pink teacups: you gotta get weird with it.

good media needs unhinged, googling-at-midnight kind of energy. it needs "what kind of seams are invented on this planet" energy and "im just gonna trust the audience to roll with me about this" energy. it needs one person (at least) screaming into the void with so much drive and energy that it forces the story to be real.

sometimes people are baffled when fanfic has some stunning jaw-dropping tattoo-it-on-you lines. and i'm like - well, i don't go here, but that makes sense to me. of fucking course people who have this amount of passion are going to create something good. they moved from a place of genuine love and enjoyment.

so yeah, duh! saturday cartoons have banger lines. random street art is sometimes the most precious heart-wrenching shit you've ever seen. someone singing on tiktok ends up creating your next favorite song. youtubers are giving us 5 hours of carefully researched content. all of this is the impossible equation to latestage capitalism. like, you can't force something to be good. AI cannot make it good. no amount of focus-group testing or market research. what makes a story worth listening to is that someone cares so much about telling it - through dance, art, music, whatever it takes - that they are just a little unhinged about it.

one time my friend told me he stayed up all night researching how many ways there are to peel an orange. he wrote me a poem that made me cry on public transportation. the love came through it like pith, you know? the words all came apart in my hands. it tasted like breakfast.

[platoapproved]

louis + cruelty

[geezmarty]

(bellara/taash) nerd/jocks lovers rise up

[goryfluff]

Nautilus expedition live streams (+ their commentary) 2020 / 2021 / 2022

[fraternum-momentum]

give me your complete and unwavering devotion.

[stiffyck]

Good luck during pride month to all the aroaces who are gonna be blasted with "love is love" everywhere

Edit:

This post includes aplatonic people, loveless aros and any other people who fall anywhere on the aro and ace spectrum.

Stop saying "but theres platonic love and familial love-"

[chloesimaginationthings]

How William Afton got his wife in FNAF

[nathanielbuildsatesseract]

My youngest cousin got engaged which means I'm the only one neither married, betrothed, nor divorced. Maybe its time to lean into the confirmed bachelor thing.

[bean-spring]

Hot take and not to be a killjoy or the shipping police but people treating Viktor or Jinx's aroace headcanons as if they were canon is not the revolutionary take people think it is.

Headcanons are always all right but we have to acknowledge that they are somehow damaging when they apply to stereotypes. It might not be the case for everyone but most of the time people unconsciously assume that disability/mental illness=asexuality. These headcanons erase the freedom of attraction from people who are already seen as unable to have sexual/romantic experiences/desires, when it's completely untrue and harmful.

You can headcanon Viktor and Jinx as aroace, but I have seen people changing their minds once Viktor is no longer disabled (s2 with all of his other forms) and Jinx is no longer as mentally ill (alternate universe Powder). And it speaks wonders of how people see these characters.

"I never thought about Jinx being able to feel romantic/sexual attraction until s2!" To believe she's actually only capable of that when she's not "damaged" is incredibly disturbing. Especially since Jinx has always had a bit of a flirty personality too.

"I've always seen Viktor as asexual, I don't know why!" That's fine. You can headcanon him as ace. But I believe there is a reason behind it, most of the time, if for some inexplicable reason the "vibes" of the disabled character are making you think he's ace.

I say all of this being aroaspec myself, by the way. Headcanon all you want but going to people's posts commenting how "it's weird for you that they have romantic/sexual plots when they're clearly aroace" is not a win at all. It's a headcanon, after all, and it should be treated as such, and that's fine. But it also is damaging to spread stereotypes like these.

Of course the disabled character is asexual. Of course the mentally ill character is aromantic. It's not as revolutionary as you might think, tbh.

Fandom is not activism and it's all right to have any headcanons you want BUT some of them are filled with damaging stuff and perhaps we should look into ourselves more before treating these assumptions as something canon.

[mienar]

the wandering painter, part one

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[1-7776]

This is makign me sick why are the devs taking off his hat every frame and putting it back just to do it again for the rest of his life. do you think its funny? you sickos you freaks leave him alone you dont deserve him