#makes me feel so inadequate

[veronicathegoddess]

realizing that you didn't do anything for an entire year is really such a humbling feeling. everyone's posting what they're proud of that they did in 2022 and i'm like i somehow made my life worse, had two of the worst heartbreaks of my life within a month and then kinda wrecked my finals. like i did not do a thing except fight for my life and that's nothing something to be proud of and it's a terrible crushing feeling that sits and lingers on my chest when i think about everything that i lost this year while getting not getting a thing except more reasons to hate myself because i threw away an entire year again because i keep making bad decisions and being stupid

[vegaseatsass]

My Stand-In Episode 10

Just a few scattered notes of things I have on my mind.

I have been very very very obsessed with the moment where Joe breaks up with Ming after Ming's mom went in on them. See, originally I took Joe at his word: He's tired. He's tired of the constant melodrama, the neverending battle just to exist. Ming and his family already killed Joe once, he just wants some quiet contentment and to not feel like he's fighting for his life every time he holds his boyfriend's hand. Honestly, I really loved that, that their breakup this episode wasn't a contrived fight full of blame and accusation, but was simply Joe realizing he's too exhausted and walking away.

But then it hit me like a load of bricks, that no, actually. Joe didn't end things in that moment because he wants peace and quiet. He left before Ming could hurt him again. He left because he didn't believe Ming would stand up to his mother or his family - or more like, he didn't want to let himself start hoping he could, and get disappointed. Since the funeral, Ming has been giving Joe everything he ever wanted Ming to give him and more (I mean if you don't count "respecting his boundaries" as something Joe wants but 1. Ming is kiiiinda starting to get there by the end of this ep lmao? 2. I'm talking about everything Joe wants to feel from Ming on a visceral level, more than what would make his relationship safe and sane). Ming has been telling Joe over and over again that he loves him, showing Joe over and over that he chooses him, showing Joe at every turn that Tong is nothing to him. No matter how much Joe or Ing push Ming or test Ming, Ming just keeps coming back and reaffirming his commitment to Joe, adapting to who Joe is now and offering him anything and everything he can give, sincerely, determinedly vowing to put him first. Joe has been trying so hard not to let himself want it or believe in it, but by the time they're in that meeting room with Ming's mom, he is back in honeymoon mode with Ming, truly starting to believe he gets to have the kind of relationship (two-sided. equal. where Joe is taken care of and spoiled and chased, not just the caretaker and spoiler and chaser) it used to feel too greedy to dare hope for.

And then Ming's mom reminds him of how easy (Joe thinks) it will be for Ming to pull the rug out from under him again, and send it all crashing down. Just like in his first life in honeymoon mode, when he realized Ming was here for Tong and not him, that this relationship that was making him feel so whole and safe was all a lie.

Like with something as big as breaking with a family that will never accept his sexuality, Joe has no instinct to "test" Ming or give him an ultimatum. I don't actually think it's with real disappointment in Ming himself that Joe gives up on Ming choosing him before Ming even gets the chance to try. I think Joe is probably completely sympathetic to the choice he expects Ming to make, and intellectually, doesn't begrudge it of him, the way he would (or should) begrudge so many of the actual terrible things Ming has done to him. But it still hurts so much to have reality force its way into their bubble, and remind Joe that even Ming trying his absolute hardest can't protect Joe from feeling that crushing loss again. So he takes himself away from the situation before it has the opportunity to hurt him again.

Idk if I'm getting at why I'm so obsessed with this, but there's just something to me about how happy Joe must have been feeling at Ming's side, to need to proactively remove himself from the situation to avoid getting his heart shattered like those mugs. Like "I'm tired" means "I can't do these high-lows anymore. I can't feel this good and have it taken away again." This is exactly why he's been trying so so so hard to freeze his heart around Ming: So he's not vulnerable to the particular kind of hurt he never recovered from in his first life.

And I just find it very moving that the source of that hurt this time isn't Ming making disastrous choices. It's something neither Ming nor Joe has control over. And Joe knows that! But it still hurts too much to hope and want things.

Meanwhile, Ming is like: Hope and want whatever you want, beloved. I am now Mr. Makes Shit Happen. I can do anything as long as you're alive in this world.

Which is another thing I've been thinking a lot about. Sol and Ming both trying to make themselves into these superperson supershields so things will be Different This Time, and smacking up against some natural end limits to their abilities. For Sol, no matter how hard he turns himself upside down trying to make himself into someone Joe can pick instead of Ming, the attraction will never be there, and Ming always WILL be there, reminding Joe of his feelings for him. For Ming, the limit on his absolutely determined devotion to Joe is his family. And Sol and Ming, both trying so hard to be bigger and more than they are, when they come face to face with their limit still refuse to back down. No matter how laughably futile it is.

To me, Ming standing there looking all tiny at the bottom of the stairs with his dad looming at the top is the equivalent of how manically out of his element trying to do the impossible Sol was in episode 9. But just like Sol, Ming can't stop now. No matter what happens in episode 11, Ming has to try to fight this impossible fight. Neither of them is willing to leave anything on the table after losing Joe once before.

Idk I wonder if they will have to work together before the end hahaha... we'll see.

I had more thoughts but this is once again a monster post so I will end by simply reiterating how amazing and hilarious I think it is that Tong tried to get Ming to pay him HUNDREDS OF MILLIONS OF BAHT for the privilege of removing the only source of happiness from his life. Like come to the meeting room, Ming! Let's make a deal where you go back to being depressed and alone, and give me all the money I want! Surely this will work out in a way where we can both walk out satisfied! The lion the witch and the audacity of this bitch <3 <3 <3 <3

[lizard-dumbass]

so The World Of Mr Plant is actually rly cool

Image ID: a digital illustration of Mr Plant from the web series The World Of Mr Plant. He is sitting on a white bed and is looking at the "camera". Behind him is an open doorway cloaked in pitch black darkness. The room is dimly lit and the lighting has a distinctly purpley blue color to it.

[zstraps]

.

[karliahs]

The average public library is not only a provider of the latest Anne Enright or Julia Donaldson: it is now an informal citizens advice bureau, a business development centre, a community centre and a mental health provider. It is an unofficial Sure Start centre, a homelessness shelter, a literacy and foreign language-learning centre, a calm space where tutors can help struggling kids, an asylum support provider, a citizenship and driving theory test centre, and a place to sit still all day and stare at the wall, if that is what you need to do, without anyone expecting you to buy anything. [...] The trouble comes when libraries – and the underpaid, overstretched people who work in them – start to become sole providers for all these things: when years of cost-cutting mean that the state has effectively reneged on all but the most unavoidable of its responsibilities to the troubled, the poor, the educationally challenged, the lonely, the physically unwell, the lost or the homeless. “We risk becoming a social care safety net,” said Nick Poole, the outgoing CEO of the library association Cilip, and “our staff are not clinical staff”.

[xerospaced]

If anyone, esp anyone diagnosed Autistic, wants to validate a very autistic but very not diagnosed chick who has done tonnes of research over years that like... my autism is valid even tho the system of diagnosing autism in adults (esp women, especially black women) has failed her...

I wouldn't say no 🙃

[songbird-orpheus]

sorry about the quality but. sigh

[image ID: an edited screenshot from twitter of two tweets. the first has been edited to say “bro last night was an old tale from way back when.” the second one says “bro last night was a sad song, but we’re gonna sing it again.” end ID.]

[driftveilcity]

yes of courseeeee I would find someone I knew from school online (without looking for them or ANYONE ELSE) and see that they went to college immediately after high school like MOST people do and is generally doing decently in life

[summerhighlandfalls]

I hate hate HATE tiktok pop psychology for many reasons but one of them is that they’ve taken the terms ‘anxious attachment’ and ‘avoidant attachment’ and bastardized them into ‘clingy partner’ and ‘distant partner’ so it’s become commonplace for random people on the internet—grown adults who should know better— to talk about how they hope everyone with an avoidant attachment style stays away from them or how there should be a dating app for people with an anxious attachment style and it’s becoming too much for me to take because those terms were created to describe the effects of how someone was treated in childhood and infancy. This incredible vitriol towards people with avoidant attachment styles is so so stupid and hurtful when you consider that that term originally applied to people whose psychology had been impacted by childhood neglect

[mxbitters]

on behalf of my gramma i think i should be allowed to tear people who make ai generated cross stitch and crochet patterns limb from limb thank you very much

[angels444yuri]

the voices (i should make a secret sideblog so i can finally have an outlet for all this anger and resentment)

[classical-vanity]

There’s days when I really feel like a failure/ disappointment because I think everyone had pretty high expectations of me growing up and I feel like I’ve done nothing with my life

[swinging-stars-from-satellites]

I think the funny thing about my being a youth leader is that I basically just Hang Out with a bunch of middle schoolers. like I just pal around with them and play games and then sit down and ramble at the youth pastor when it's time to discuss the Biblical topic of the night and somehow this has charmed like half a dozen of them into considering me A Cool Person despite the fact that I'm actually Introverted And Awkward at all times

[girlscarpia]

Sorryyyy need to mop for a bit

[ninja-knox-ur-sox-off]

Sometimes I feel very sad that I didn’t just focus on one creative skill. I look at my art some days and go I wish I’d spent all my time making only that, because that way it would look better and I’d do more and it wouldn’t matter if I couldn’t write very well because my art would be amazing and I’d be able to make the stuff I really want to and maybe even get a job related to it and I wouldn’t feel like so much time was wasted. And often times it really does feel like you’re wasting time and everything is telling you to just pick something to focus on so it can mean something and you can never seem to pick one of anything.

And then other days I feel like an absolute GOD. Anyone else able to write your own fic and then draw art for it just because you can? Can you make an edit/amv after writing a silly little analysis post on the show/character that is so perfectly on beat and fits the lyrics and with transitions so slapping you get chills while watching? Can you write a short silly ditty on the guitar about how you’re feeling using the eight chords know and belt it out only a little bit off key then do a choppy little animation of your sona singing it?

I may not be the most skilled at all of the above, and it can be a little lonely to be a one man band who doesn’t play half as well as a lot of people out there, but when your power goes out or your wifi dies or you have a day off, everyone else is busy and you’re alone...

you play the best gosh dang music in existence

[girlsdads]

lowkey so jealous of everyone that can pump out beautiful fics in response to prompts in a timely manner.. it takes me so long to write anything i need to rotate a concept around in my brain for at least a week before i even start writing anything down lol idk what’s wrong with me